Talk:Bleach (manga)/Archive 4

Infobox show/hide function, data and opinion collection

There is an optional field of the anime infobox (Template:Infobox animanga/Manga) that allows you to list the foreign publishers in a hidden field with a show/hide tag to reduce its length. However, in it's default form (viewable here) the text is too small for most people to see. I have attempted to fix this, and am currently transcluding one of my user subpages so that I don't have to mess with the main infobox.

For me, the infobox views perfectly. However, User:Dekimasu says that he still can't read the text in the box, and raised a couple other concerns as well. So I am asking for wider input here. I have two questions:

1. Does the infobox text show up at a legible size for you? (also, what browser and Wikipedia skin do you use?)
2. Is the show/hide field in the infobox a good idea?

Thanks in advance. For the record, I'm using Monobook (default skin) with Opera and Internet Explorer, and the infobox works. --tjstrf 10:47, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Everything is working fine for me. Its legible and im using the default skin and FireFox i believe 1.8 (what ever the most up to date one is) Malevious 23:00, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Even when you expand the publishers? I am running FireFox and the default skin but when I expand the publishers it is reducing the text size as though the contents are under a subheading. Dekimasu 01:16, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Works fine for me too, FF 1.0.5.7, WinXPpro sp2, Monobook.--Anaraug 01:26, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Personally I don't mind if I can't read them, but since the page is really for people who don't know anything about Bleach and not for us, let me know what other settings info I can give you to try to figure out what's happening. Dekimasu 01:31, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Not a clue why it isnt working right for you, and it is kinda important for you to read it, cuz if you can't that means other people might have the same problem. not that knowing who publishes it will be too helpfull to anyone lol Malevious 02:57, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Re: "correcting anon's edit to remove the line-wrap by removing unrequired word"... wasn't necessary for me, text is still so small that it didn't wrap! Dekimasu 06:17, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

"Bleach" = "Burichi"

Has anyone ever explained about the Japanese obsession with pseudo-english Words, which are all but impossible to write in Kana? I think that might deserve an article to itself, if there isn't one already. Certainly the Bleach-article should link there. (The article "Engrish" touches this subject a bit, but it doesn't really hit what I'm getting at.) --BjKa 09:21, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm just a bit curious on what you're trying to accomplish with your proposal... I mean this is merely a result of a language system in Japan where they attempt to assimilate foreign vocabularies into their own. It also serves as a way for them to directly take a word (phonetically) and write them in katakana for publication purposes.

I mean even Americans does this all the time with words from European and Asian countries... it's merely a way for us to cope with this multi-langual world we have today. -- Finestela 18:36, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

English is seen as a very trendy language in Japan, and most are able to at least somewhat read English words phonetically. It's not uncommon to see English words on clothing (such as the word "BOY" on Ranma's bathing suit). In other cases, the words are borrowed from English because an author likes the sound of the word. Akira Toriyama is particurly well known for deriving terms from English. Many other langauges are also borrowed from in this manner. I've seen German and Spanish quite a bit, especially in Bleach.

As for the the poor transliterations, this has more to do with the language itself. Specifically, Japanese speak in mora instead of syllables. That said, Burīchi might not be as bad as you'd think. The u is silent and the i at the end can be destressed or omitted. The ī is sounds almost identically to the "ea" of "Bleach". The only real problem is the r/l sound. They have a similar sound that falls somewhere in the middle. –Gunslinger47 19:55, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, you might expect that it would be, but in practice the u isn't silent here. They don't usually go silent unless they're at the end of the word. As for burīchi, it's not just on loan for the name of the comic. It's a real loan word. We could just as well start complaining about pseudo being used in English. Dekimasu 07:45, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Well we're off on this topic, how can you tell when the Us are not supposed to be pronounced? It sounds like suki, for example, is pronouced as the English word Ski. Such as in Tatski, and also perhaps in zanpaktō and the like. If the Us are being pronouced, they are certainly very quiet. –Gunslinger47 05:28, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

It's true that the U is almost wholly elided in "suki," but it's really not in "Tatsuki." It's also not elided in "zanpakutō." That might seem very confusing, but I think it's partially a result of how casual you are willing to be with your language. There's a saying, "tade kuu mushi mo sukizuki," (~equal to "there's no accounting for taste") in which the U is fully elocuted twice (possibly to sound more literate); it's also pronounced in "sukiyaki" (and you have to be polite to food, as in "osake"). Anyone who is being formal in their speech will also pronounce the U in "suki." Likewise, people who are being formal in their speech will sometimes pronounce the word-final U sound in "gozaimasu," "desu," "arimasu," etc.

I think one of the biggest issues is the length of the mora, which must be complete in correct speech (an N mora without a vowel gets the same "mouth time" as a KA or HO). In verb-final SU elision, like the normal pronunciation of any -masu form, removing the U allows the sentences to be more clearly separated, as the S is given more "mouth time" and effectively marks the end of the thought. This seems to carry over into elision of the SU in other positions in words, even to the point of shortening the mora that it was so important to draw out before (making, effectively, "suki" into a single mora), but the same type of elision isn't usually used when dealing with the TSU mora, the KU mora, etc.

I can't tell you that my impression is correct based on any references, but upon reflection I believe that this is what I do when I speak. Dekimasu 06:12, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. It's also worth noting that the U in the final SU is not normally elided in plain-form verbs ("kasu," "tasu," "dasu," "sasu," etc.). Couldn't tell you why. I don't think I could if I kept thinking about it, either. (>_<) Dekimasu 06:16, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd agree, but you're giving out the wrong examples. More often than not, I'd say that a 'u' following an 's' is usually glanced over (the only exception I can think of being "sumimasen" although in that case the first 'm' is often omitted instead; "sukiyaki" is often pronounced as "skiyaki"), noticeable in verbs like "dasu" or ... "korosu", whereas in verbs like "kaku" or "horu" or "kamu", the 'u' is much more apparent to the listener.

As for the "BOY" on Ranma's shirt and the issue that pertains to, the only thing I would say is that I'd equate that to any non-East Asian person getting a kanji tattoo based on how it looks or what (they think) it means. -Patchi- 8 January 2007

Pronouncing 'u' in Japanese works the same way as 't' in English. Most people omit t's at the end of words, "can't" for example, and end the sound before the t abruptly instead. If you were trying to be more formal, you'ld anunciate the t.Ziiv (talk • contribs) 06:02, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Defining a Spoiler

I think we need to define exactly what counts as a spoiler. I propose that something only qualifies as a spoiler if it was meant to be a secret at the time that it was eventually revealed. Facts that take time to be revealed simply because Kubo hadn't gotten around to it before then should not be considered spoilers. For the moment, I'm going to avoid discussing plot spoilers and stick just to fact spoilers. –Gunslinger47 00:04, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

{{spoilers}} Here is a list of spoiler facts. Feel free to comment or add spoilers.

Sōsuke Aizen is a traitor, Gin and Tōsen too

This is an obvious spoiler. Any text on Wikipedia that mentions it, or mentions Aizen's activities past the Recovery arc should be inside of spoiler tags. That said, mentioning Aizen should be avoided unless it is absolutely necessary. –Gunslinger47

Kisuke Urahara sold Rukia a power-siphoning gigai

There was never a sudden revealation for this, but it is a secret kept for practically the entire anime series, pre-filler. –Gunslinger47

Isshin Kurosaki is/was a shinigami

At the moment, anyone who goes to his page has a chance of seeing the zanpakutō subsection, spoiler tag or not. This is rather dangerous for new readers. –Gunslinger47

Ikkaku Madarame can use bankai

Knowing this in advance could spoil Ikkaku's battle against Edward. –Gunslinger47

Sajin Komamura is a giant, anthropomorphic fox

A minor spoiler, but technically it was a secret, not revealed until well after his initial appearance. Currently, if you go to his page, this fact is not hidden and his furry mug is prominently displayed as the corner picture. –Gunslinger47

Yoruichi, the black cat, is actually a woman

Another minor spoiler, and for a somewhat short span, but care should be taken so new readers don't stumble upon the truth. Simply not linking to Yoruichi's page when talking in a pre-revelation context should be sufficient. Currently the episode summary of episode 18 has such a link. –Gunslinger47 00:04, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Something to do with the Bount, I wasn't paying attention ^_^

Whatever it is, it seems pretty critical to the plot and should probably be guarded closely. –Gunslinger47

Hmm. That their creator is still alive? Dekimasu 15:35, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Byakuya Kuchiki wanted to save Rukia from execution.

Dekimasu

Or more specifically, Rukia is actually the sister of Byakuya's dead wife. They should probably be referred to as brother and sister outside of spoiler tags, and Byakuya's feelings towards Rukia should be avoided if possible. –Gunslinger47 20:20, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Grimmjow Jaggerjack led his assault on Karakura against orders.

Dekimasu

This is a plot-based spoiler, in that it hasn't happened yet from certain perspectives. Detailed plot should only be placed inside of spoilers tags, regardless of if it's the first episode or the last chapter. –Gunslinger47 20:20, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

{{endspoilers}}

I agree with your approach philosophically. In practice, I stay away from certain pages on the recent chapters of the manga (I generally haven't read past the end of the last published Japanese tankobon, although I've read some individual chapters after that in my Shonen Jumps). People should have the common sense to do that if they don't want to know what happens. On the other hand, if there is something that's a significant unexpected plot element (not necessarily a spoiler by your definition) unrelated to the article topic, I think it should be noted. For example, if I want to go read about Zaraki Kenpachi and I find out ahead of time that he has killed Ichinose, I might be a little upset. In that sense, I think we should be more careful of actual plot spoilers while being as careless as possible about background "spoilers" (for instance, everything on this page [outside of a prospective plot summary] with the exception of Aizen's name). Dekimasu 15:35, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, now. Plot spoilers are quite different than spoilers about facts. An example of something that sits outside of the plot is Rukia's sword. A new reader might be interested to read that when released, her zanpakutō turns pure white and whatnot. This was not revealed until later in the manga, but was not really part of the plot. Nor was it a secret. On the other hand, as mentioned above, describing the final release of Ikkaku's zanpakutō could potentially spoil his battle with Edward. It was certainly plot critical and was kept secret from almost all of the other shinigami.

I think all plot information should be kept inside its own section, with a sub-section, or otherwise obvious break for plot that occurs after the end of the anime. Facts that imply future plot events, such as a character being currently dead, should probably be kept inside spoiler tags as well. –Gunslinger47 20:20, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't think there's anything on the page now that really requires a spoiler tag. Revealing the existence of the vizard or the arrancar or Urahara's mod souls doesn't really say what they have to do with the story, and I would suggest they are not spoilers. I would go so far as to say that there are only two plot spoilers in the whole article, and they are the number of Quincy and the fact that the Bount were created by the shinigami. I think the spoiler tag could be removed entirely until a plot summary goes into the article. Dekimasu 08:41, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone have a problem with removing the spoiler tags from the article as it now stands? Dekimasu 01:46, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

I have no problem with it. –Gunslinger47 01:20, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Title

I'm moving it to Bleach (series) because it's not just a manga and it shouldn't be all that controversial Voretus the Benevolent 07:35, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I apologize, but I've reverted this move. Going to "What links here" for Bleach (manga) shows several hundred pages that would have to be editted. Ryūlóng 08:02, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Aside from the hundreds of double redirects this created, it was already discussed and decided as shown in the standardization reminder above. The discussion is in archive 3. Not that previous discussions are set in stone, but you can see that some thought has gone into the page title. Dekimasu 08:09, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Here is the discussion: Talk:Bleach (manga)/Archive 3#Bleach (manga) vs. Bleach (series) –Gunslinger47 20:22, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

To be honest i dont see any conclusion or decision being made in that archive. The debate just stops. I think mabey we should have a final vote and what ever wins, wins and thats the end of it. Even if it means editing 500 articals. --Malevious Userpage •Talk Page• Contributions 01:41, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia's not a democracy. We discussed it and there was no consensus either way, thus we defaulted to not moving it. –Gunslinger47 02:04, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Also note that "Article introductions should be primarily about the first format of a work (usually manga) and not about the most popular format of that work (usually anime). For example: Bleach is a manga series, that was later adapted into an anime series", NOT Bleach is an anime series, based on a manga of the same name. In cases where title disambiguation is necessary, a similar guideline should be followed." from the anime and manga project page. Dekimasu 02:23, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, when we're the example used for a rule, we probably shouldn't decide to violate that rule. --tjstrf talk 02:34, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Orihime's brother

Is his name Sora in the English-language manga? Or is he Kakei in both English-language versions? WhisperToMe 21:53, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

EDIT: Anime News Network lists Liam O'Brien as "Sora Inoue" - Is this a mistake? WhisperToMe 21:55, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

He was called Sora in both episodes so I guess the dub did not use the manga name (Kakei). Gdo01 22:00, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Odd, so the manga calls him Kakei but the anime doesn't? That is so odd. I guess VIZ made up a name since the actual name had not been revealed yet. I guess that kinda backfired. WhisperToMe 23:02, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I noted a while back that "Sora Inoue" was one of the redirects to Characters in Bleach and I was a little surprised... especially since it appears to be the name of a character in a different manga and all of the links were to that instead of Bleach. Silly VIZ. Dekimasu 00:36, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I wonder if they will edit the latest printings to rename him to Sora? WhisperToMe

VIZ isn't known for being good about things like that. Under what circumstances did the English manga and anime have to reveal his first name anyway, when the originals didn't? This after people were complimenting the dub on its respect for Japanese naming issues. Dekimasu 02:41, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

In Japanese, younger siblings call older ones "brother" or "Sister" - this meant that originally Orihime's brother had no name. WhisperToMe 02:53, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

They probably got confused over the last name first name naming system as some people do (70.187.188.219 19:23, 20 January 2007 (UTC))

(porting from User talk:Dekimasu) When a younger sibling addresses an older sibling in Japanese, he or she calls him or her "honorable older brother" or "honorable older sister" - I.E. Orihime called her brother "Brother" in the Japanese originals. VIZ did not want to have Orihime call her brother "brother" all the time, so VIZ had to make up a name for him. WhisperToMe 02:45, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

That's what I'm objecting to. If they wished to maintain the original flavor they wouldn't have subverted the "older brother" denotation (and I don't feel like san has as such an "honorable" connotation here, since it's more something said by convention). "Big brother" is in standard English usage and having Orihime say it would have reinforced her somewhat childlike image. I don't think they had to do it. Dekimasu 02:58, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Meh, it doesn't matter. VIZ may fix it now that the dub's out though, considering their odd willingness to screw up Zoro->Zolo in order to match the anime. --tjstrf 03:09, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Kakei is just a mistake by Viz in reading the kanji for the name Sora.

No - 1. All names have furigana in most shonen books. That means that they know that it says "Sora" - Also, the note for Sora mentioned a guidebook; I.E. the name was not revealed when the character first appeared. WhisperToMe 04:44, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

The name Kakei was taken from the first character poll, where it had 'Kakei (Orihime's Brother)'. I believe Viz believed that to be the correct name until it was later revealed to be Sora.

Renji -- Add to main characters?

I believe that Renji should probably be considered a main character alongside Ichigo, Rukia, Orihime, Chad, and Ishida at this point. He's gotten nearly the same amount of screentime as Ichigo (certainly more than poor neglected Chad has) ever since his introduction, had character development, and now is a part of the new rescue party. I realize this may kick up a bit of opposition from slippery slope arguers, but it's really a fact now in the series, why not acknowledge it? (And no, I don't believe we need to expand the list to include Hitsugaya, at least not yet) --tjstrf 06:28, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I could support Renji, but not by himself. It is indeed slippery and subjective. Personally I think Kon should be added as a central member of the group of protagonists. He was around when we barely knew anything about Soul Society, just like the other "main characters." Urahara has also been highly involved over time. That's my limit.

The Spanish page has Renji and Kon in addition to the characters we list now; Italian is the same as ours; French lists ours plus Kon; Finnish has ours plus Urahara; Portuguese adds Renji, Kon, Aizen, Hitsugaya, Yoruichi, and Urahara. So there's a survey. Dekimasu 07:04, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Kon hasn't done much since his introduction though. He's comic relief, but doesn't really even participate in the main storyline anymore. He would have been a major character at the beginning, but after they left for SS, he's pretty much been deprecated. Aizen shouldn't be on the list for spoilery reasons, Urahara I have no opinion about. --tjstrf 16:29, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The purpose of the "main characters" section, as I understand it, is to serve newer readers. As such, I believe it's best to just list the human Ryoka, plus Rukia. A more ideal solution, in my opinion, would be to merge the "Main characters" and "Races" section into one "Characters" section. The divide by "races" always seemed strange to me, as everyone (except possibly modsouls) are ultimately human, more or less. –Gunslinger47 18:29, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, Renji is a Ryoka in the Heuco Mundo arc, since iirc Ryoka refers to intruders. The purpose of the races section is to define all of the different soul classes. They may all be human, but they are all quite different. --tjstrf 18:54, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

About the "main characters" and "races," I had thought about merging them into one "characters" section, with an intro and subheaded into "main characters" and "character types." I think it would be difficult to merge them entirely, however. As for who the article is for, I agree that the people reading it would lean towards newer readers, and it should serve them as much as possible (this would seem to argue for including Kon), but one of the goals is still to be encyclopedic. If Renji is a main character, I think he has to go into the section. Dekimasu 20:30, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The VIZ site lists Kon as a main character. If you go to the larger list you can see that Urahara, Yoruichi, and Renji are farther down the main character list as shadows. I can't figure out who the last two boxes are supposed to be. Dekimasu 09:10, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The other shadows appear to be Aizen and Gin, not really sure on Aizen though. --tjstrf 22:10, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

New Humans Section

I temporarily took out the new "humans" section. I feel like this is covered in the introduction to the section and the rest of the material is too detailed for the series overview. Also, I don't think it's really true that most people accept the existence of ghosts in Bleach. The Kurosakis never talk to anyone outside of their family about seeing ghosts. I think Don Kanonji's television show is supposed to be popular in the same way Alien Autopsy is popular... as entertainment, not as truth. Here's what I removed... let's talk about it. "The humans of Bleach are much like those in a modern, non-fictional setting. They primarily differ in their wider acceptance of spiritual beings such as ghosts. One in 150,000 humans have at least some perception of nearby ghosts, though only a relative few, known as mediums, are able to perceive well enough to hold conversations. The best known medium is Don Kanonji, who hosts a television show where he interacts with ghosts. At the height of its popularity, it was regularly watched by 25% of the Japanese population. Despite all of this, human understanding of the spiritual world is somewhat limited. Only small groups such as the Quincy ever knew of the eternal conflict between shinigami and the hollows, but they have all but disappeared in the modern age." Dekimasu 04:32, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, is there a distinction between a plus and a spirit? Your ghosts section calls pluses souls that haven't been buried, where the old one called them the spirits of humans who have died. Aren't residents of Soul Society also pluses? And did you choose the word "ghosts" so that it wouldn't be a choice between "plus" and "whole," or was there another reason? Generally I think the new section reads better, but I'm confused why the title is changed. Dekimasu 05:55, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Reflecting this, I've tried "Ghosts in Bleach are known as pluses (Wholes in the official English editions). A plus is the disembodied spirit of a person who has died. A plus has a spiritual body composed of reishi that resembles its material body at the time of death. A chain, known as the Chain of Fate (因果の鎖, inga no kusari), protrudes from the chest and binds the soul to a location, object or person that they felt close to in life. The soul can move about freely if the chain is broken, but this also causes the chain to corrode. Normally, pluses are sent to Soul Society by shinigami in a ritual called soul burial (魂葬, konsō). However, if the Chain of Fate is corroded entirely before a soul burial can be performed, a hole will form in the chest of the spirit where the chain was once anchored. Such souls are driven mad and become spiritual monsters known as hollows. If the Chain of Fate is torn out deliberatly, this also leads to spiritual degradation." I also incorporated some of the edits into the introduction (about reishi), because in retrospect, I think some of the explanation was repetitive and could be explained fully in the introduction. Let me know what you think. Dekimasu 06:10, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

As an aside, I think the lead and the introduction are a little strange at the moment. It would be good to incorporate more of the intro into the lead and replace the intro with at least a cursive plot summary that doesn't reveal the endings to each (unofficial) arc. The plot summary is preferred to an introduction by WP:MANGA, although here I think it should probably go after the characters and setting sections so that it would make more sense. I've been translating the plot summaries from the Japanese page at User:Dekimasu/Sandbox without changing the content of them at all. Let me know if you have any suggestions for me on that. Dekimasu 06:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Hrm, this is a lot to go over. I'll explain my overarching motives. I'd like to see the "Character types" section turned into a "Characters" section, with the subdivisions logically denoting different types of characters. Characters worth a short overview, the "main characters" would be at the top. This leads into why I added the Human subsection. The humans subsection was meant to replace the content in the current introduction.

Next... Hmm, I think I'll make a new subject regarding the plus/whole/spirit/soul/ghost situation, and explain how I see it.

Onto the humans and their acceptance of ghosts. It seems you're right. I can find no incontestable evidence. This was just the general impression I had from viewing the series, but moreso, it worked well with the paragraph and lead into all the things I wanted to mention about humans. It probably needs to be reworded. I think something needs to be said about human and their relationship to the spiritual world. It's too bad not much is said on the subject. –Gunslinger47 06:44, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I totally agree with you that the section should be ==Characters==, followed by ===Main characters=== and ===Character types===. I think the lead to the ==Characters== section should deal with the series in as much an out-of-universe perspective as possible... for example, discussing how characters are used (redemption of "evil" characters as a theme, high level of character development in the series because the same characters are used throughout, etc.). Dekimasu 06:49, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Plus/Whole/Spirit/Soul/Ghost

I think we need to clear up a few things. This is how I understand it:

• All beings are souls.
• Human bodies contain a soul. They are chained together during life.
• A soul outside its original body in the real world is called a spirit.
• Hollows are evil souls of dead humans. In the real world, this makes them "evil spirits"
• As for pluses, Rukia explains it best, I believe:

  "One is called a plus and is the most common spirit. You can say that the 'ghosts' you usually see are these."

• Specifically, the term seems to refer to dead souls who still have their chains anchored to their chests.
• Shinigami perform a soul burial on pluses/wholes/ghosts, sending them to Soul Society.
• In soul society, they are no longer referred to as ghosts/pluses/spirits, they are simply "souls".

Regarding the Plus/Whole term. We have never heard this used outside of Rukia's explanations. This is what led me to believe that it is either a technical term, or a shinigami term. Humans obviously call them "ghosts". I believe this is the term we should use as well. –Gunslinger47 06:59, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

The character book says １死した人間の魂魄；２’ユウレイ’の総称 for pluses (1, the souls of dead humans; 2, a general term for ghosts), which seems to leave it up in the air. But no one ever says that soul burial turns a "plus" into a "spirit" either. The Japanese page for Bleach says that all souls that aren't hollows (ホロウに堕ちていない、通常の霊魂) are pluses, and that 死者の魂 (the souls of dead humans) live in Soul Society. The problem here is konpaku (霊魂, spirit) vs tamashii (魂, soul). The Japanese page makes clear that these terms can be used interchangeably (魂魄、いわゆる魂, spirits, in other words souls). I think you're right that all beings are souls. I think all good souls (including living humans, shinigami, etc.) are pluses, and all evil souls (hollows) are "minuses." I still think that residents of Soul Society are pluses.

If that's the case, then it does make more sense to use the term "ghosts" to distinguish the kind of souls we're talking about in that section from all the other kinds of pluses, and the pluses/hollows distinction should be made in the lead to the character types section. How does that sound? Dekimasu 07:22, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

It also makes the case that the distinction between character types that we should talk about in the introduction isn't human vs. spirit, but good soul vs. bad soul. Dekimasu 07:25, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

All right, now I'm distinctly unsatisfied with what we used to have. I'm not really satisfied with what we have now, either. (>_<) Dekimasu 12:50, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

"But no one ever says that soul burial turns a "plus" into a "spirit" either."

That's not exactly what I meant. Let's see if I can lay it out in a more logical form:

• soul - everyone is/has a soul
• human - soul in living body
• ghost - soul with no body in the real world
• spirit - same as ghost (Rukia's perfered term when speaking casually, see ep.02)
• plus - good ghost/spirit
• hollow - evil ghost/spirit
• soul society occupants - souls–

Gunslinger47 20:56, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I think it's

• soul - everyone is a soul (that's why the character book is named like it is, too). This is represented by both tamashii and konpaku.
• human - soul in living body
• spirit - same as soul, only appears as a translation artifact as a synonym for spirit and when Don Kanonji is talking

::* plus - good soul, maybe with no body (not sure)

• hollow - evil soul with no body
• soul society occupants - souls with no body

"Ghost" is only used by Ichigo's family in reference to what they see, because they don't have any idea what it is that they're seeing. I am guessing that when Rukia says "spirit" in English in episode 2, it's at the place outside the park when she says rei in the second manga chapter. This is when she's talking to Ichigo in the terms he uses and I don't think she ever says it again. Dekimasu 00:34, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I have been thinking about this more and reading the Japanese page and looking through my Secrets of Bleach book and I think I have a better handle on this now. Soul and spirit are exactly equal, so the dichotomy in the introduction is false (humans have souls too). On the other hand, the term plus is used for "a soul that hasn't become a hollow" and I can't find it used in any instances outside of what we're now calling "ghost." It seems to me like we should use that term for the section header to distinguish "pluses" ("good ghosts") from the "hollows" ("bad ghosts"). The part in the shinigami section where it says shinigami are recruited from the ranks of pluses should be changed to souls. Any place we have "spirit" could just as well be changed to "soul." Dekimasu 07:46, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I tried a little cleanup, but you're right that a humans section needs to go in now. The problem is that it's really a "normal humans" section - a "humans that aren't Quincy, Bounts, or Ichigo" section, and we don't really need to put a lot of information there. Dekimasu 08:16, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of what I said about spirit and soul being equal (I still think they are), it looks a lot better writing "spirit" than how many times I stuck "disembodied soul" in the article. Sigh. Dekimasu 08:37, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Have you considered that spirit merits use simply for grammatical reasons such as avoiding redundancy? --tjstrf 21:28, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I think it's fair that spirit should refer to every incorporeal being (plus, shinigami, hollow, etc.) as we have no other general word to describe this. As the previous version (a week+ ago) said, there are two main beings in Bleach - humans and spirits. They are further divided into humans/Quincy/Bounts/modsouls vs. pluses/shinigami/hollows. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 01:39, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

It read better, but I think it was a dichotomy constructed only for the purposes of the article. I suppose we could have a subheader of "humans" (followed by an intro and the bullet descriptions of the Quincy and the Bount), and a subheader of "spirits" (followed by an intro and the bullet descriptions of pluses, shinigami, hollows, and modsouls), but I don't think it should be articulated in the text. And I think the comment that all characters are souls should stay. Modsouls should go on the same side as shinigami because they both use gigai to go over to the human side - shouldn't they? Dekimasu 03:02, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I think the current edit is better than before in terms of getting information across, it just doesn't sound great. Dekimasu 03:05, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Looks like we're on the right track. A quick question, though. Do we have any specific reference to souls being called "spirits" other than while they are in the real world? The traditional meaning of spirit refers specifically to incorporeal beings. Within the perspective of soul society, reishi is very much corporeal, i.e. material; tangible. It's only in the real world that souls could honestly be referred to as incorporeal beings (spirits). This leads me to believe that it is synonymous with the human's word "ghost", and thus not synonymous with "soul". If so, it's an inappropriate label for resident souls in soul society. This is why I'd like to see a reference to be sure. –Gunslinger47 04:37, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, pluses/shinigami/hollows are not really "incorporeal" in the real world in Bleach, either. They can use their reishi to run into walls and knock things over... or both at the same time, in the case of the hollow from the first episode. The only difference is that they can't be seen and heard. I think tjstrf's changes were very good, although he didn't separate the humans from the spirits. As long as we stay away from cementing a spirit-soul distinction where it may not exist (obviously I don't think it does), I have no objection to using the word "spirit" in a descriptive way. Dekimasu 08:41, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Huh?

"In Volume 4, Issue 3 of the American Shonen Jump, there was an interview with the creator of Bleach. In the interview, it was said that Tite Kubo entered into a manga contest, but lost. An editor noticed him, and they worked with each other."

This sentence was in the Media Information section, and I just seem to be unable to make sense of it. Does anyone understand what this is referring to? 199.126.137.209 21:39, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

That text literally means this: A magazine held a "manga contest" which Kubo entered. He did not win, but one of the magazine's editors noticed his talent. They have since gotten together to work on joint projects. This was revealed in an interview with Tite Kubo in the "American Shonen Jump" magazine. (Volume 4, Issue 3) –Gunslinger47 23:41, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

This should really be on the Tite Kubo page. It's probably talking about before he wrote Zombie Powder anyway. I'm moving it over. Dekimasu 00:38, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Modified souls

I cleaned up the mod souls section a little bit because it referred to the arcs and we would have had to argue over the names of Urahara's mod souls all the time. But I'm confused. Isn't Rukia's Chappy another modified soul in the manga? Dekimasu 06:31, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I believe mod soul is only used as a name for the souls that have been enhanced of which Chappy isn't one. I really don't know what Chappy would be classified as. Gdo01 06:41, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Chappy is an artificial soul. Kon is a modsoul. The difference is that artificial souls are manufactured personalities designed to temporarily take over a body, while modsouls are modified, specifically designed for combat. --tjstrf 06:52, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

So, which character type is Chappy then, heh. Do we need a new section? I think the thing is that we have to be clear on the scope of the page. I have the feeling that making it more accurate is making it worse, and that pains me. Dekimasu 07:04, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Uhm... she'd be an artificial soul. I'll clarify that. --tjstrf 07:58, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I believe that artificial souls lack self-awareness. They are not intelligent beings, and probably do not rank as "characters". They are a dime a dozen. I believe Rukia has an entire canister of Chappy soul candy. –Gunslinger47 03:44, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Nemu Kurotsuchi would like to speak with you. --tjstrf Now on editor review! 09:40, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Obviously Nemu is somewhat more sophisticated than a piece of soul candy. –Gunslinger47 02:18, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Arguments on both sides completely based on OR pyon! Dekimasu 03:15, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Umm... Chappy wasn't the name of the artificial soul, I thought. Chappy is the name of the rabbit that she wanted to have the soul candy container look like. (Like the heads on a pez thingy.) Anyway, she doesn't have a Chappy soul candy, she got the one with the duck instead. She was really mad about that, remember? -- Anaraug 03:19, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Accidental spoiler pyon! Dekimasu 04:41, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

New category for images

I have created a category to classify images you upload for Bleach articles into, Category:Bleach images. Mainly because I wish to see how many we have, but also because I've felt for quite a while that our Bleach categorization system was incomplete without one. Please categorize any Bleach images you upload just as you would any other article, by adding [[Category:Bleach images]] to the bottom of the description page. Thanks. --tjstrf Now on editor review! 09:40, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

List of Bleach Terms

I really think that a new page named such needs to be made. Throughout the various pages on Bleach I see such a lack of detail on the various terms that are used. Also so few techniques are named, with the exception of known kidō. I'd say that all the terms are an important aspect to know, and a list of all terms and techniques would nicely cover that. TerraGamerX 00:50, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd really prefer not to. WP:NOT a glossary seems to be a popular sentiment right now, and Bleach isn't a very terminology intensive series anyway. The necessary terms can be dealt with easily within the articles where they are used. --tjstrf Now on editor review! 01:29, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Hrm. What purpose would such a list serve? As a side note, the pre-existing search function [1] seems to work adequately for technique names. –Gunslinger47 02:08, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Bleach may not be very terminology-intensive, but our articles are still pretty opaque. I was trying to look at the lead from the perspective of someone who knows nothing about Bleach, and it makes no sense at all at the moment. For example, "Together they search for hollows and perform soul burials on wayward souls, cleansing the spirits and sending them to Soul Society." I know it's the lead and that much of that is explained in the rest of the article, but really, the lead should be the easiest part of the article to understand, and we haven't written it that way. I don't generally work on the pages for the individual characters, but I imagine it's much the case there as well. I think there is an issue that needs to be dealt with, but that it should happen inside the existing articles rather than in a new article. Dekimasu 02:29, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

From what I've observed, Bleach is indeed much more focused on its various terms than most anime. I've actually never seen one that has such a frequent use of created terms as is seen in Bleach. Most of these created terms (in my opinion) aren't just some basic concept. Several have a variety of defining factors as to what it is and what it is not, but little is clarified about them. One particular term that remains in my mind is reiatsu. It is used on multiple pages, but only two pages give any slight mentioning as to what it is. Nen is a page that defines reiatsu in all of its aspects. Also I'm not too sure what the comment about searching is. If I look for something as common as getsuga tenshō, I will of course get links to Ichigo and the zanpakuto pages, explaining what that frequent ability is. But what will searching for the neglected frequent terms be for? I think that there enough significant terms for them to earn their own page, but there at least needs to be some improvement for knowledge on Bleach's terminology. Plus the many of the terms (most notably techniques) seem to have some very high symbolic details behind it, which someone (if they got to know what it meant and how it acted) could spend much time analyzing, understanding Tite Kubo's potentially subtle messages. I'm just thinking someone new to the series (or not into it at all) who would come here to better understand things, could instead wind up with gaps of understanding, giving up here and going to a knowledgable friend... --TerraGamerX 06:34, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Does the official English translation really use the word Spritrons? Because that would be crazy. However, a lot of the issue here is a simple lack of translation of the Japanese. Most of the made-up words are a combination of two or three Japanese kanji that make the general meaning of the term obvious to the reader. Thus rei+atsu=spiritual pressure in the same way that ki+atsu=barometric pressure. The Quincy kanji, likewise, indicate that they are "destroyers." This general method also allows Kubo to keep actual applications and meanings of many of the terms fairly vague (see our terminology dispute above). It probably helps him avoid violating the canon and creating paradoxes. I think that this main page should be able to explain the manga without reference to any in-depth concepts that are even confusing to people who really know about Bleach. Many of the Bleach subpages are still very crufty, making them more opaque and less useful (for example, many articles on individual characters include major plot summaries). Either way, creation of a list page has three main problems: problems of bias as to what should be included, the lack of a real way to clarify many of the vague terms, and the fact that it will draw AfD nominations left and right. Dekimasu 07:03, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

We could make it standard to use a the nihongo template on every prefered Japanese term the first time its used in an article. For example, instead of just throwing out a word like shinigami, we could say "shinigami (死神, lit. death god)". Also, all such terms should be italicized as a visual queue to the reader. An example of this being used in practice, from the Ichigo Kurosaki entry:

The series begins with Ichigo receiving shinigami (死神, lit. death god) powers as a result of a run-in with Rukia Kuchiki, one of the many shinigami who inhabit the spirit world, Soul Society.

We don't need to explain every term the first time we use it, but giving the literal translation when its first used would allow an English reader to understand at least as well as a Japanese one would. –Gunslinger47 17:31, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

You are undeniably right that many of the Bleach articles require a lot of work.... As for understanding symbolic details, I'm happy to wax poetic on the discussion pages, but since no one is really writing reviews or anything at all that would qualify as acceptable third-party references on Bleach, anything I said on the article pages would be original research. Dekimasu 07:07, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Yep, that's the biggest problem right there... since manga series have fanbases which are pretty much sufficient unto themselves and spread by word of mouth, it's hard to find real opinion references that pass WP:RS.

As for the invented term in Bleach, I don't think they would be opaque to a native speaker of Japanese. Think of it as constructing words from Latin or Greek roots. While a word you invent may not be in any dictionary, it will have a meaning based on its parts. --tjstrf Now on editor review! 17:41, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

The series begins with Ichigo receiving shinigami (死神, lit. death god) powers as a result of a run-in with Rukia Kuchiki, one of the many shinigami who inhabit the spirit world, Soul Society.

I think that if you leave in the fact that Ichigo could already see ghosts, this is really a better lead introduction to the series than what we have in the main article now, which actually would be fairly confusing to someone who didn't know the series. Dekimasu 03:26, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Tite Kubo on the Bleach movie

According to my sources [2], Tite Kubo is writing the story for Bleach: Memories of Nobody. This makes me wonder, who's writing the Bount arc? I tried pulling it out of the credits, but there's just too much text for me to understand. –Gunslinger47 00:58, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Without looking at anything, I know that he gets credited on everything, even stuff he doesn't write. The difference is that he will be listed as one of the authors instead of the author (a way of saying that he's signing off on whatever people are ghostwriting for him). This is true of the factbooks and various other Bleach materials. Unfortunately he is forced to sign off on things with plot holes. But speaking of the Bount arc and who's doing it, did anyone notice that the animators have changed as well? Ishida and Ichigo have a completely different facial geometry now. It's annoying and it doesn't look like the manga.

The movie is being marketed as though it's supposed to be canonical, so maybe he really did write it. I'll check the credits the next time I watch an episode and tell you what I see for writers. Dekimasu 13:55, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I noticed in Episode 96 when they kept drawing Ichigo's eyes funny (the "Kon eyes"). –Gunslinger47 01:09, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

"Main" characters

Do we really need a main characters section? If so, what's the criteria of becoming a "main" character? Should we just delete it? Bleach has a large cast of characters, each important. If the criteria for becoming a "main" character is being important to the storyline, I could put up a dang good argument for just about any character. Mwsilvabreen 02:43, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

See this for our prior convesation on the subject:

Talk:Bleach (manga)/Archive 3#Ordering of main characters

Renji was added later, along with Urahara.

#Renji -- Add to main characters?

Personally, I don't like seeing Urahara in there. I think only the core nakama should be there. –Gunslinger47 02:30, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

But why do we need a section with a list of just six or seven people? Wouldn't it be obvious who's important in the manga if someone were to just look through the character pages? Mwsilvabreen 02:43, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

I had an idea. What if we had a primary protagonists/antagonists section? Defined by whoever is currently featured prominently in the storyline. Mwsilvabreen 02:54, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Currently featured prominently in which storyline, anime or manga? And there are far too many characters featured in many of the arcs of both media to list them all as main characters. Personally, I think Main Characters are characters that have featured prominently in all the arcs since their respective introductions. I'm not sure about the manga, as I've only read up to about chapter 24, but in the anime the roles are fairly clearly designated as major or minor characters, at least up until the filler arc. Just my two cents. Nique1287 03:00, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Both storylines. From what I've seen, it's pretty easy to just tack on (anime only) to the end of a word. As for the far too many characters, its pretty easy right now. For protagonists, you could list the spirt powered imbued humans and the soul society characters currently residing in the human world. Antagonists is also fairly easy. You could list the three defecting captain, the arrancar, and the hollows. Mwsilvabreen 03:04, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Which would be common knowledge to some, and ruin the series for others. I really don't feel we should intentionally give away the biggest spoiler in the (still unfinished) series. Dekimasu 13:19, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

But even having Renji and Kisuke in there is also a spoiler. Even Chad, Uryu, and Orihime in there is a spoiler. If someone wants to learn about the series, the current featured characters is a big feature to learn about, which gets me back to my original question, why do we even need a main character section? Mwsilvabreen 19:14, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that any of those inclusions are spoilers. While it implies that they will become important characters in the series, it doesn't say anything about their role. Ishida could be important because he destroys Soul Society. Chad could be important because he's actually a hollow in disguise. Once you split the characters into a protagonists and antagonists section, you are giving away the fact that Renji isn't such a bad guy, or that you-know-who is a bad guy who isn't dead. As for why the section is there, I believe it is because the article is structured according to the guidelines at Wikipedia:WikiProject Anime and manga#Sections. In fact, the formatting that we have for the section now is flawed, and there should be blurbs on each of the main characters. However, as it stands, I believe that the page remains informative while containing no "spoilers" that could be said to detract from anyone's reading/viewing experience. Dekimasu 01:09, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

True, I'm still a newbie, so I haven't really looked at everything, thanks for pointing that page out for me. Mwsilvabreen 02:01, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Spanish information in the lead

While interesting, the information on Spanish naming/Hispanic origins is not one of the most important things that we can say about Bleach as a whole. I really believe that it is not appropriate to have that information at the top of the main article for the manga/anime, so I have taken it out. The page has to be lean and clean for people who don't know anything about Bleach. Dekimasu 13:19, 30 November 2006 (UTC)\

Why don't we put something about it in the hollow section where the spanish names are most prominent? Mwsilvabreen 19:16, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Naming issue

We have been using merchandising to standardize some of the names of characters in the series (the Bount, the mod souls, etc.). However, the merchandising is not always consistent. For example, some merchandise romanizes 市丸ギン to Itimaru Gin rather than Ichimaru, and Bleach DS romanizes Kyōraku's first name to Syunsui rather than Shunsui. This is not an inaccurate romanization system, as it reflects Kunrei-shiki. However, it's not the one that we usually use on Wikipedia (modified Hepburn romanization). It doesn't seem to make sense that we believe "Noba" but toss out "Itimaru". What are your thoughts on this? Dekimasu 03:09, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

As I said in Talk:Shunsui Kyōraku, there are 2 cases of romanization: for Japanese words and for non-Japanese words. The romanization for Japanese words and names should follow Hepburn and there really isn't much room for deviation. The official character book also spells Hitsugaya's name Toushiro in English, that doesn't mean we should. However, for non-Japanese terms (Bounts, Ulquiorra, cero), we should be more careful and probably make an educated guess until there is an official spelling. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 11:45, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

In the case of Noba/Nova, I think it was decided by the other character, Kuroud/Claude. Any existing romanization system would've placed an o at the end (i.e. Kuroudo or whatever), so it's likely that it's supposed to be an English spelling. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 11:47, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Sorry to draw it out after you gave a good answer. I don't mean to suggest that we should toss out the current names, which are certainly better (although we do override the Hepburn and macronization standards for company and personal names that are trademarked or designated as preferred by the companies/individuals themselves). However, following "Immanent God Blues" and the like, I have lost confidence in the idea that anything I see romanized in Jump or Bleach merchandising is reliable. I was happy to have a "solution" when I found "Noba" and "Kuroud" in English, but I'm beginning to believe I was just looking at the flair of an underling at an advertising agency in Japan rather than any true creative intent. It's somewhat frustrating. Dekimasu 07:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Dubai TV

Seems we've had presumably false information on this page for around two months now. The anti-Hebrew vandal, User:67.71.19.130, added Dubai TV to the list of Bleach broadcasters.[3] Now that I've viewed his contributions,[4] I highly doubt his honesty. Dubai TV's website is down, so I'm not able to research the claim for confirmation, but we can see from this page's most recent edit that User:63.227.39.10 disagrees with the assertion.

We need to be more vigilant regarding any new facts posted to the page. –Gunslinger47 04:38, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Interesting. There are no Google results for ( "Dubai TV" bleach ) (without the brackets, but with the quotation marks) that relate to the station saying they'll air the series. Also, the situation seems out of place, that station airing Bleach without it being publicized or even listed as a rumor on major fansites and such (I watch a couple), but I hadn't noticed it before. Guess we should all pay more attention sometimes, eh? *Makes a note to keep both eyes, and her Google fingers, on new info added by anons and newer users* Nique1287 04:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I've notified the folks over at Rurouni Kenshin and YuYu Hakusho that they have a similar problem. The same Dubai TV link was added to Transformers: Energon,[5] but in that case, it was reverted without elaboration only 20 minutes afterward.[6] –Gunslinger47 05:01, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

This was done from multiple Toronto IP's including 69.158.148.225, 67.71.19.130, and 64.231.54.40. Hopefully its all been fixed. Gdo01 05:08, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

No, it's still a mess. I'm dropping off messages on the talk pages for the pages I find, as it's still possible that it might be true. Along those lines, I've contacted User talk:Al1976 who appears to be the only other people to ever have placed a Dubai TV link in an anime article.[7] There was also a couple problems with Spacetoon links. [8] –Gunslinger47 05:58, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

There was no verifiability[9], Dubai TV's website has been down for at least 5 months, there is no articles to be found on it, looked over arabic newspapers/magazines/blogs to see, but all I could find was a couple of forum posts, if it's found to be valid, well then I'm sorry and we should put it back. Until then...-User:63.227.39.10 9:01, 6 December 2006

User talk:Al1976 has responded to me, assuring me that Dubai TV airs only Case Closed. –Gunslinger47 05:41, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Sectional redirects now possible

As recently announced on WT:MANGA, it is now possible to redirect to a specific section of a page. This is relevant and helpful to our category here because we have about a hundred different character redirect pages that can now be made more specific. For instance, Luppi (As well as Luppi (Bleach) and Rupi (Bleach)) now redirect directly to the Former Espada section of the Hollows in Bleach page, saving a potential searcher time and energy. --tjstrf talk 07:20, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

This is fantastic. This was my #1 most desired feature in Wikipedia. Followed shortly by category intersects and syntax highlighting of code-comments in edit boxes. –Gunslinger47 10:05, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Organizational changes

I support most of the organizational changes made today, but the lead needs to have some of the publication information reintroduced (both per WP:ANIME and to give the reader context). Also, I think that some of the numerical content (number of volumes, number of chapters) needs to be reintroduced. Information in the infobox should be restated in the article, just as information in the introduction would be. Dekimasu 08:08, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Noitora = Neutra

An anonymous editor recently stated that Noitora's (ノイトラ) name is supposed to be the Spanish word "neutra", which means neutral.[10] I've reverted the edit, but I'd like to see if there's anything to this. Thoughts? –Gunslinger47 09:36, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Opening paragraph and introduction

The opening paragraph and the "Introduction" section say virtually the same exact things: Ichigo is a tough teenager, sees ghosts, meets Rukia, blah blah. It looks very redundant. Paratousen 20:17, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

We have discussions about this on and off but we have never gotten anything done. About 3 months ago I stopped working on a new lead/introduction in my sandbox because the format of the page had changed, but we still don't have the plot summary here that is strongly suggested by WP:ANIME. Does it seem to you like that was heading a better direction before I stopped working on it? I can start again. (Feel free to edit it yourself.) Dekimasu 05:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Jay-Z

Jay-Z(Yeah. The rapper) was included in the main characters list. I took the liberty of taking it out immediately. I don't suppose we need to discuss that one, do you?

EDIT: This is actually minor vandalism by(checking the history of the article) 74.117.148.178. I'm just gonna clean up what he put. --Chemicalist 17:43, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

We appreciate the help by removing vandalism but you don't have to let everyone know on the talk page. Talk pages would be archived every day if that were the case. // Sasuke-kun27 17:51, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Differences

Do you think it would be feasible to have a section for anime/manga differences? Or would that be fit for something like Wikibooks instead? --Zeno McDohl ^(talk) 23:59, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

There really aren't any differences worthy of note outside of the filler. --tjstrf talk 00:00, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

There are quite a few, including scenes missing in the anime (Grand Fisher mask taken off), censorships (arm missing) and so on. --Zeno McDohl ^(talk) 00:02, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Censorships are a given and can be found in almost every anime. Naruto and Dragon Ball, for example, have loads of censorships. Love Hina, on the other hand, would be the perfect series to have two seperate sections (I believe people were talking about making an entirely new article, one being based off the manga while the other based off the anime) due to the major differences. I have not read much of the Bleach manga (only the first five books) so I can't say from reading the manga and watching the anime how different the two are, but I don't think they are so much different than one another that it deserves it's own section explaining it. // Sasuke-kun27 20:51, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Just because it's common doesn't mean it's a reason to not write up a section. There are important missing scenes as I've already stated as well. --Zeno McDohl ^(talk) 21:21, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh and don't forget that entire characters are missing from the anime (gate guards). --Zeno McDohl ^(talk) 00:16, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh the horror. We lost out on some characters that never did anything anyway. Plus, they were in the anime because we saw them get beaten by the Bount. --tjstrf talk 00:17, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Again, just because it's minor is no reason to not include it. Look at this for example. A lot there is just minor stuff. Minor characters, minor event changes etc. --Zeno McDohl ^(talk) 02:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

But being minor is a reason not to include it. This article is intended to present the most pertinent information about the series in 30 kilobytes or less. Dekimasu 08:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Where did you get that limit? --Nate3000 12:05, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

I was paraphrasing Wikipedia:Article size. Dekimasuが...^? 15:24, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I have been trying to keep up with the manga and the anime, and I haven't noticed many differences between minor characters and minor censorship. Stuff that is extremely minor doesn't warrant a section. --Malevious Userpage •Talk Page• Contributions 03:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Introduction section

Do we really need this section? Not only is it nearly identical to the lead, but it's also tucked far in the article, which is anticlimatic. I think it should either be moved to the top and edited not to sound the same as the lead, or removed entirely. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 12:36, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Need help......

Hello all. I wanted to upload something for Bleach. I have a pic of it's logo. I know how to upload, but I do not get the information about the Summary box. If there are any volunteers to help me upload it, I would appreciate that.

I'll send you (the volunteers) the file of Bleach logo and upload it. Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by GigaSP (talk • contribs) 17:04, 13 January 2007 (UTC).

There's already a logo pic on the page. It's only slightly obscured. – Someguy0830 (T | C) 19:28, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Wasn't there was..

Forgive me if I am being stupid for missing it, but I recalled an article related to bleach that as also a featured article. Where is it... DarkGhost89 05:29, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Shinigami (Bleach) used to be a good article. It was delisted for being too "in-universe". --tjstrf talk 05:32, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

If that was the article, shouldn't it have a note saying it was a former featured article with a date of when it was featured?DarkGhost89 20:36, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

It wasnt a featured article, only a good article. Good articles are only a step down from featured articles, but that article was delisted before it could nominated for FA status. --GhostStalker(Got a present for ya!) 22:43, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

You are correct, I should have read more closely. That was not the article then, I swear I recall an article related to bleach that was featured, but now I can't find it anymore. Anyone remember what it was?DarkGhost89 01:26, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah Nvm... looking back through history, I guess my memory is really messed up or something...DarkGhost89 01:35, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Character debuts

We should put the episode debut of all the characters on the character pages.

For example : Ichigo Kurosaki debut: episode 1

please comment in my talk: User:Envidia

Forgive me for editing your post just a little, but all caps is rude, and some of your grammar was a little off. As for the content, I don't think that episode number debuts are necessary. For one thing, it's anime-centric, which would put an anime-directional bias on the pages. For another, people who watch the anime already know when the characters debut, and people who don't watch the anime probably don't need to know, if they even care, what episode each character debuts in. Nique talk 23:05, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

That would just cause infobox bloat imo, especially if you included both manga and anime debuts. --tjstrf talk 23:09, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Character Theme Songs?

Does anyone know when the character theme songs are played over the course of the anime? --Nate3000 12:11, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Please see here for more information: Bleach media and materials#Music and soundtracks

As for exactly which episodes which song plays in, I doubt many people would know this off-hand. However, if you just want to hear what their theme songs sound like, you can likely get them all on the Bleach OST. –Gunslinger47 14:48, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Update needed

In character list, someone add the arrancar and viazard. About time like. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.12.230.89 (talk) 21:34, 23 February 2007 (UTC).

They are there under hollow and shinigami, respectively. Gdo01 21:37, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

A standardization reminder

Since all our standardization topics have been archived, here is a summary of what the past discussions have resulted in:

We use shinigami (as opposed to Death God, Soul Reaper, Angel of Death, Reaper, etc.) We do not capitalize shinigami, hollow, plus, zanpakutō, etc. We do capitalize Soul Society though. Quincy seems to be a grey area, since the Quincy article uses caps almost exclusively and it was never decided one way or the other. It's lieutenant, not vice-captain. We are using the english naming conventions for characters, given name first. It's also Bleach, not BLEACH.

If I got any of these wrong, please point out the error. This is supposed to be a sort of mini-FAQ, so feel free to add to it. --tjstrf 07:36, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

As the talk page is getting on towards 120KB, I'm about to make a new archive. Assorted new decisions:
1) It's Bleach (manga), not Bleach (anime).
2) Correct character spellings include Bount (pl. Bounts), Yammy, and Luppi.
3) The onmitsukidō is to be referred to as "special forces."
4) The main characters on the page are listed in the order of their appearance.
5) Soul Reaper vs. shinigami is unresolved, but we use shinigami since it remains the more common usage.
6) There will be rigorous fact-checking of new additions to the page.
7) Finestela has proposed a citation format as follows ("The 1-999 is the page number(s) for citation").

• Kubo, Tite (2006). Bleach Official Character Book SOULs. Tokyo, Japan: Shueisha, 1-999. ISBN 4088740793
• Kubo, Tite (2006). Bleach Official Animation Book VIBEs. Tokyo, Japan: Shueisha, 1-999. ISBN 4088740807
• Kubo, Tite (2002). Japanese Version Bleach Vol. 1. Tokyo, Japan: Shueisha, 1-999. ISBN 4088732138

Dekimasu 07:40, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I think it should be SOULs and VIBEs, which is what appears on the actual covers. This is not the same case as BLEACH because it's in all-caps to be inline with Japanese text, while 'Character Book SOULs' is not all-caps therefore there may be meaning to the capitalization. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 11:47, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

New consensus opinions through February 2007:
1) Demon Arts has been superceded by kidō, since all versions of the series use the Japanese term. (User:Tjstrf)
2) Spoilers should not be included in the main article unless they significantly contribute to an overall understanding of the series.
3) The "artificial soul" subsection has been introduced to the character types section, replacing "modified soul" — this is to incorporate other manufactured souls that may not be considered "modified" in the same sense as Kon. Dekimasuよ! 10:59, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Grand Fisher

Is it just me or does anyone else feel that GrandFisher doesn't need his own article? It might be a bit better if it was rewritten by someone who knows what they're doing (no offense, Seth). Anyone interested? // DecaimientoPoético 12:46, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

It does need a serious clean up. It is very poorly written. I'll work on rewriting it. --Malevious Userpage •Talk Page• Contributions 13:53, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I think that he should keep his article, even if an article isint about much, it still has the right to exist. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Letuce (talk • contribs).

Incorrect, only notable subjects get articles. --tjstrf talk 07:03, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I've said it before, I still strongly disagree with this idea of 'notable' subjects only. It is highly subjective and conducive to needless arguments. Also, Grand Fisher is extremely notable in the Bleach universe, seeing as how he/it was responsible for the death of Ichigo's mother, a major factor in the life and motivation of the main character of the entire series. That alone makes Grand Fisher worthy of an article. DestradoZero 05:37, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

yeah, if we can justify giving EVERY SINGLE captain and vice captain their own article, we can DEFINITELY justify giving grand fisher one. i mean, half these vice captains/captains are complete enigmas. 67.175.45.179 04:55, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Improving attribution

Other than the normal vandalism reversions, the page has become much more stable lately. I still think that there are issues with the plot summary (introduction) and main character sections that need to be worked out, but the stability in the page does have its advantages.

I'd like to propose that we take the opportunity to do better referencing for the sections on character types and settings, using the primary source (the manga and merchandise itself). As long as the notability of the series has been established by third-party sources — and this is clearly demonstrated in the media section — I don't see a problem with referencing plot/situational information with citations from the manga and anime.

Although I want to help with this, too, my copies of the manga are not in the same country as me at the moment. Would anyone else be willing to help me find good manga references for what a hollow is, or how many people can see spirits, or how Soul Society is organized, et cetera? Dekimasuが... 05:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Tj's just added to our standardization section and it's made me realize that it's about time to archive this page again and work out what we've decided lately, which I'm going to do now. (Update: I have recompiled the standardization topics and added them to a template at the top of the page. The old talk section is now in archive 4 Let me know what you think.) I think we have a fairly strong core of information to use to bring this article forward and it may be time to submit it to a peer review. It would necessarily be harsh, but we need a kick. Dekimasuよ! 12:03, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Expanding Storyline

I think that we should change the introduction section into something like "story thus far" and write what has been happening in the story instead of just the first chapter. Ricky 17:57, 3 March 2007 (UTC)Kurosaki Ricky

The thing is, do we follow the anime, or the manga? And do we follow the English release, or the Japanese? It's better to just let it stay an introduction to the story, and let the reader decide if they want to read/experience the series on their own or not. Nique talk 18:04, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Readers already know the story in general, and new readers ought to be shielded from plot spoilers. The characters and setting sections are much more valuable to new readers. Who would a "story thus far" section be useful to? –Gunslinger47 18:10, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I disagree. At the moment the page is very friendly to new people who are just starting to watch Bleach, but it isn't fulfilling all of its role as an encyclopedia article. There needs to be a plot summary introduced at some point, even though it will reintroduce spoiler tags to the article. I started to work on one in... I think... October, by translating the plot summary from the Japanese article. We had additional style problems that point because the actual introduction to the article and the Introduction section of the article were substantially the same. I stopped working on it for some reason, but I definitely think it's the responsibility of the article to describe the complete plots of both the manga and anime. Dekimasuよ! 12:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

But neither is complete, nor planned to be complete anywhere in the near future. Plot summaries are available with a quick Google search if someone really wants to look it up. (A search for "Bleach plot" turns up quite a comprehensive plot summary in the first result for me, albeit not very up to date.) We could go a short way into the 'future' beyond the first chapter or so, but as Gunslinger47 said, who would it be useful to? People already into the series know the story, anyone who doesn't care about the story doesn't need the details, and newbies interested in the story should read it before going through a detailed plot analysis. Spoiler warnings only compound the "Why?" factor of it, because again, either people already know the story, want to learn the story but really should experience it on their own, or don't care about the story. Nique talk 12:57, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

it would also be good if some one added the viazard and arancar to the characters area wich have just recently apeared the latest episode being 123.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.110.120.37 (talk) 09:13, 28 April 2007

Both are already mentioned in the article. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 06:26, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Are we mentioning characters by their first name or last?

After reading through several character pages, I noticed that we seem to have a bad habit of swithcing back and forth between given names and family names. For example, while reading through Gin Ichimaru, I noticed that the page refers to him as Gin and then Ichimaru a couple of sentences later. This can get quite confusing for some readers and something should be done about this. Should we go by their first names? Or their last? Or does it not really matter? // DecaimientoPoético 22:28, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Well for the main characters, I think either is fine but I lean towards given names for them. Secondary characters like the captains and lieutenants should be named by their family name. Arrancar are a mixed bag. Espada are mostly known by their given name but what about the Numeros? Gdo01 22:58, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with referring to the main characters by their first names, especially Ichigo and Uryu due to the re-emergence of Isshin and Ryuken (more so Uryu. I don't think we ever called Ichigo or Isshin "Kurosaki" to begin with). // DecaimientoPoético 21:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

For characters other than Uryu, it makes almost no difference (unless you are writing about the one chapter where Orihime and her brother were both around at the same time). I tend to purposefully alternate between them to make my writing less redundant (Gin one sentence, Ichimaru the next). Uryu should definitely be noted as Uryu in most cases though. --tjstrf talk 21:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Demon arts is now at Kidō

In accordance with a long-forgotten discussion that concluded that all existent forms of the series use the Japanese term, I have moved Demon arts to Kidō. Unless I meet with objections I will be putting this into the standardization reminder later today. --tjstrf talk 21:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

No objections here. I'm glad you moved it. Its just more accurate to list it under the Japanese term in my opinion. --88wolfmaster 21:56, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Manga/Anime Pics

Is there any reason that as soon as an anime picture of a character arrives, it switches out the manga picture? I noticed this pattern, but recently the picture of Ikkaku Madarame's bankai was switched, and my friends and I thought the manga picture looked better. Is replacing it with the anime some sort of rule, or is it just something the main editors of these pages agreed to?72.70.150.230 04:27, 11 March 2007 (UTC)Dan

Generally, the anime gives a better quality image, as well as it being in full colour. That's probably why they're switched out. I don't know though, you may want to look into who's doing the switching (the History button at the top will show you who did what) and, if it's just one person, asking them on their Talk page. Nique talk 04:31, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

As a side note, I've started to go through Category:Bleach images to clean out orphaned fair use images like Image:Grimmjow jaggerjack.JPG and Image:PA.70283.001.jpg. Please feel free to help, or check through them and see if they are superior to whichever fair use images we're using now. Dekimasuよ! 04:44, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Character types: vizard and arrancar?

Over the last few weeks we seem to have lost our consensus on incorporating arrancar in the section on hollows and the vizard in the section on the shinigami. I think we should discuss this a bit before moving forward. What are the advantages to having them together? What are the advantages to having them apart? Dekimasuよ! 08:28, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Given the complexity of the Bleach universe and that this is the main page, which is supposed to be an overview, I would prefer they be kept together. There's already too much complexity and not enough context in that section.

I'd also appreciate it if we didn't italicize shinigami every single time it appears, since it makes the text annoying as hell to read due to overformatting. --tjstrf talk 08:40, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me this has to be all or nothing (or else it just looks messy); see the section I was writing below when you posted this. We would need an actual reason to remove the italics, as far as I can tell. Dekimasuよ! 08:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

You have to understand though that if its kept together that someone who just started watching the show (or someone who is just getting into it) might not know what Vizard/Arrancar are and therefore if they are just merely included in the section then they might not see the brief descriptions of this. I do not necessarily argee with having them completely separated as they are a sub-class which is why I came up with the compromise of the subset group (but it seems that was reverted. although I do not know why since those who wanted the seperation got it with out the repeating, and those who wanted to keep them together still gets the feel of them being together). As for the italics, there is no need for every other word to be italized --88wolfmaster 03:49, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Italics

The reason for having italics on death gods, soul slayers, etc. is that they fall under WP:MOS#Foreign terms. It says "Wikipedia prefers italics for phrases in other languages and for isolated foreign words that do not yet have common use in the English language" and goes on to imply that this means inclusion in an English dictionary. There doesn't seem to be any specific directive or consistency at WP:MOS-JP, which may mean something was overlooked there. I discuss things quite a bit on that page and will bring it up.

Since the words we are talking about for this article do have English names (they're just not the ones we are using for these articles), I don't see how we can justify removing the italics. The broader article on shinigami, for example, uses italics throughout; it's not a term made up for the Bleach series either, so we don't have that to fall back on as we might for "arrancar" or "vizard". I don't find it to create any legibility problems myself. Dekimasuよ! 08:43, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

New Plot Article

I feel that we should create a new article which specifically talks about the plot of Bleach so far, including what is happening and what is about to happen. This article should be similar to the article of the Plot of Naruto and the Plot of Naruto: Shippūden.

So instead for other users to look at certain character profiles just to get an idea what the character itself 'contributed' to the overall plot of the story, there should be an article which highlights every single storyline and the events that happen/about to happen. After all, isn't Wikipedia meant to be an area where everyone can view information easily and quickly? --Omghgomg 09:41, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

We have one. List of Bleach episodes. --tjstrf talk 10:07, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

There's that one. But what if people wanted to look for further 'spoilers' that have not been released in the anime, only in the manga? Then where do they look for the information? --Omghgomg 07:49, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Presumably they read the manga. If they want to know about a specific character or aspect they can find it in the relevant article, but if they really want a complete detailing of the plot it's not like it's difficult to find scanlations. --tjstrf talk 08:03, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

The problem with that is that some people may not feel right reading scanlations for ethical reasons (I wouldn't know, since I'm fine with scanlations and am looking into typesetting). It shouldn't be too difficult to add information from the manga storyline with a small disclaimer acknowledging the source of the information (ie, a small mention that the following storyline is derived from the manga, and may differ in the anime, etc). DestradoZero 05:45, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Why would people who don't feel comfortable reading scanlations feel comfortable knowing what happens in the manga based on the summaries of people who read scanlations? Or you can always learn Japanese. (^^)b Dekimasuよ! 02:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

yes i'm sure learning japanese is so much easier than us creating a "plot of bleach" page or pages lol. no, of course we need to create a "plot of bleach" page (or pages, presumably one article per arc or something to cut down on size). then we can get rid of all the extremely disorganized/overlapping nonsense we have in each and every character profile. the problem is people are TRYING to write down a "plot of bleach" but we are doing it CHARACTER BY CHARACTER, and this is pretty chaotic. we need a single set of articles for the plot of ALL characters, definitely. obviously it will be significantly abridged version from the manga. (to avoid apparently getting into copyright issues vis a vis the plot of naruto page, right now is going through that stuff) 67.175.45.179 05:02, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Bleach: the name

Does anyone know why Bleach is called what it is? (at least in English…) Article as of 16 Mar 2007 makes no mention. I suspect either: (deliberate) mistranslation of "Burīchi", which could instead have been "Breach"; or a symbolic reference to bleach, as the shinigami are responsible for "cleansing" hollows.—Nahum Reduta 13:12, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

We've had this discussion numerous times. There is no official source, therefore anything so far is speculation, however, users have stated that it could possibly refer to Ichigo's bleached hair. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 13:54, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

From my own reading of the manga, Kubo goes out of his way to use certain verbs at key points in the manga (someru, to dye, and sarasu, to bleach) in reference to conflicts between good and evil. Due to that, I'd thought the title was a reference to "cleaning" evil, although I've never tried to search for any sources. Maybe we should look around in Japanese... or do you know that Kubo has never said anything about it? Dekimasuよ! 02:49, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

In Bleach, black and white have reversed symbolism. "To bleach" would figuratively mean a decent into darkness. And, yes, Ichigo's hair color is a bleached, peroxide strawberry blonde. –Gunslinger47 21:34, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I am pretty sure Ichigo's hair is supposed to be that color naturally. Dekimasuよ! 16:02, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

It's said pretty early on, isn't it, that his hair is naturally orange? Karin's hair is really light, and his mother's hair was light too, so it could be a reference to people thinking his hair is bleached, but it's not a reference to him bleaching his hair. Nique talk 16:31, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I think it's that color naturally. He says in the 11th episode (according to Lunar Anime's fansub), "With this orange hair, all kinds of things are tougher for me," leading me to believe it's something he has to live with, that's out of his control. Besides, what sick person bleaches their child's hair (referring to when Masaki was still alive). Some theories I've heard state that "Bleach" has to do with the "bleached" color a ghost is, or how the shinigami "bleach" the hollows into normal spirits. Another one, which is rather interesting, is that Tite Kubo is a big Nirvana fan, and named the series after their debut album, "Bleach". I'm not saying I support both of these, just saying what I've heard. Jezebel Parks 19:13, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I was speaking strictly of its color. It is identically colored to peroxide strawberry blonde, despite being his freakishly natural color. –Gunslinger47 19:04, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

the name "bleach" is clearly a double entendre of sorts, reffering both literally to the presumption that ichigo (and indeed orihime) have "bleached" hair color, and also to the fact that as a soul reaper one "bleaches" the hollows. 67.175.45.179 05:04, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Illegal to gain powers?

in the article about shinigamis it says this : "A group of shinigami known as the vizard have also obtained hollow powers through illegal means," should illegal really be the right word to use? Letuce 21:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

I believe the manga stated this. There is really no other word I can think of except perhaps forbidden. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 22:32, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

um i could view forbidden as being a better word, but from what i get out of the story of getting vizard powers... they arent really doing anything wrong from what i can tell... Letuce 00:26, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

The shinigami have killed people for lesser offenses. –Gunslinger47 00:30, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

well the vizard are actually NEVER referred to by any of the soul reapers in the entire gotei 13 at any point in the entire storyline thus far, but PRESUMABLY it is one of their overly strict rules - remember they were going to kill rukia for ACCIDENTALLY giving a human her powers *in order to save the human's life from a hollow*, a seemingly irrational sentence indeed. so it would appear that they would definitely look down on "becoming more hollow esque" as something inherently disgraceful, and impure, and so punishable/forbidden/illegal/etc. 67.175.45.179 05:08, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Change Title

Instead of Bleach(manga) -- it'll be better to refer to Bleach(anime). After all, the Bountou did not appear in the manga (or as far as I know). KyuuA4 16:56, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

The manga was the original medium (most important factor), is the furthest ahead in terms of storyline, and is possibly the most popular medium as well. Hence, manga instead of anime, and why it should stay that way. (Also, please create new discussions at the bottom of the page, or use the little + button next to Edit this Page to create a new Talk discussion in the proper format.) Nique talk 17:07, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

We cover content not yet in the anime, so that would be equally inaccurate. Nique has it right, the manga is the original material and has priority because of that. --tjstrf talk 17:57, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

See Talk:Bleach (manga)/Archive 3#Bleach (manga) vs. Bleach (series). –Gunslinger47 02:38, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

how about Bleach(manga/anime) ?? Letuce 07:34, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

But why? Anyone reading it will know that it encompasses the manga, the anime, as well as the musical and the games. It should stay (manga), for the reasons outlined in the above-linked discussion. Just because it doesn't say "anime" in the title, doesn't mean it's excluding the anime, it just means the anime didn't come first. Nique talk 14:30, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

To clarify the earlier debate: there was no consensus to move, therefor it stayed. –Gunslinger47 23:43, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

No consensus here, perhaps, but when the issue was brought up at the project page they endorsed the title and we are currently used as an example on WP:MANGA for dealing primarily with the original form of the subject:

"Article introductions should be primarily about the first format of a work (usually manga) and not about the most popular format of that work (usually anime). For example: "Bleach is a manga series, that was later adapted into an anime series", NOT "Bleach is an anime series, based on a manga of the same name." In cases where title disambiguation is necessary, a similar guideline should be followed."

So I'm pretty certain that we are at the correct title right now. --tjstrf talk 05:41, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

i really don't see anything wrong or misleading whatsoever about doing "Bleach (manga/anime)" after all 'manga' still has precedence, and that clears up the whole bount issue too. 67.175.45.179 05:09, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok, so as I see it, these are the two best options (in my opinion, at least): 1) Leave it the way it is, or 2) Change it to Bleach (series) so that we don't have to worry about forgeting about the musical, or the games, or the anime, or anything. Fair enough? // DecaimientoPoético 05:18, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I am for keeping it the way it is. This article is about the manga and its plot (this includes anime additions), it doesn't talk about the musical or games except to mention that they exist as other related products. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 08:31, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I am also for keeping it the way it is. The plot changes between the manga and anime are very minor, and it seems fair to give precedence to the format that spawned the franchise. Other articles that employ "series" in the name (usually about video games) are separate from articles about the individual formats and are set up more like what we have at Bleach media and materials. They tend to just explain what the different formats are. Dekimasuよ! 04:13, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Needs a plot summary

In all honesty, this article should have a summary of its' plot. For gods' sake, even Naruto has its' plot summarized weekly. Anyone with me on this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 216.55.218.183 (talk) 00:32, 23 March 2007 (UTC).

I disagree. Not only is extensive plot summary verboten according to policy, but we already have a nice episode list. For information from the manga, it is just as little work to download the manga and read it than it is to read a plot summary we wrote, and more complete and accurate. --tjstrf talk 00:54, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Plot sections are really only needed in cases like Neon Genesis Evangelion where you have people searching Wikipedia trying to find out what the hell just happened. The plot of Bleach is pretty straight forward, however, so I fail to see the need for one.

Out of curiosity, what use would you have for a plot summary? –Gunslinger47 17:29, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

If you really need one, here's a one sentence summary of Bleach: Ichigo and his friends travel from world to world rescuing their compananions, meeting well-drawn people with unique and varied character designs, breaking things, and occasionally encountering unexpected plot twists. --tjstrf talk 18:55, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

we have an introduction, therefore a plot summary is not needed (this being the main page and all).--88wolfmaster 05:18, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

i agree we should have a plot summary, significantly abridged form of the manga. an episode list just does not cut it i'm afraid. and it is a lot more accessible for newbies to read about a plot on wikipedia than to hunt down scanlations of manga, for sure. it might inspire people to go out and BUY some manga volumes, if we had a decent plot article. 67.175.45.179 05:12, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

As has been pointed out a number of times, and with good reason, we don't need a plot summary. To sum it up: anyone that interested in the plot can read or watch the series themselves (in another discussion you mention learning Japanese; there are scanslations out there for people who don't know it), and anyone who's read or watched the series or who just doesn't care about the plot will find the plot summary useless. Just because it's true doesn't mean it needs to be included on Wikipedia. We should stick to the intro and the sheer volume of plot covered on the episodes page and the character pages. Nique talk 15:15, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

WP:GA?

While it will always need updating and tweaking, Bleach (manga) has long settled into relatively stability. We currently meet most of the content criteria for Wikipedia:Good Article status (take a look at similarly classed Elfen Lied and Death Note), and it would be great if we could undergo a preliminary review for promotion sometime in the next week or so.

Earlier today I took a look at the organization setup given at WP:MANGA, which we are expected to comply with in order to earn Good Article status, and saw that brief descriptions of the main characters are expected. To avoid excessive length, we should probably summarize the characters in a few sentences or short paragraph each. --tjstrf talk 20:35, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

I made a list of things that needed to be done, and this was one of them... it must be in the archive now. But as I said in the "Improving attribution" section above, this can't get to GA status without citations. Almost all of the content description in the article is completely unsourced. Dekimasuよ! 02:43, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Could somebody who can actually tolerate Rukia's character please write her a brief character summary? Everything I'm coming up with is decidedly negative POV. --tjstrf talk 23:37, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

We worked quite hard to make the main article spoiler-free. I hope it can stay that way. –Gunslinger47 00:28, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Believe me, I'm trying. It's pretty hard to write about Urahara without giving spoilers, but I think I managed pretty well by simply saying he's a mastermind who knows a lot about the spiritual world. --tjstrf talk 00:35, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

How about overviewing the characters from an out-of-universe perspective? Explain their significance to the series and their importance to the narrative. In a general sense. For example, Rukia's situation at the end of the introductory arcs is rather complicated and doesn't really need an explanation here. What's important is it serves to pit Ichigo against Soul Society, setting up the first real antagonists of the series. Prior to that, you just had the (predominantly) unorganized hollows, who stood as mostly generic menaces.

That aside, explaining who she is rather than what she did might prove more valuable. She is a 300 year old woman (despite her adolescent frame) who grew up, orphaned in the slums of Soul Society. She has an almost sibling relationship with Renji. She suffered great trauma from the death of her idol/crush Kaien, but Ichigo slowly rescues her from her depression. Something like that. –Gunslinger47 02:01, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Mentioning that she pits Ichigo vs. SS doesn't make much sense unless/until we update the introduction section to say that he has to go rescue her. Otherwise, though, that is a sensible group of things to add. --tjstrf talk 02:26, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

An out-of-universe perspective would be great, but that requires sourcing too. We are probably safe if we say "protagonist" or "antagonist", but sentences like the one I added to the bottom of the character types section several months ago when I was new to the site ("Encounters between roaming and displaced characters are a driving plot force in Bleach.") aren't really acceptable without attribution. Dekimasuよ! 02:46, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Shh!!! If you don't mention it then maybe we can keep it in based on it being true rather than attributable! :) --tjstrf talk 02:50, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

But really, if this article is going to be ready to for good article status, we should thoroughly cite the plot points from the manga itself (that should be fairly easy) and track down as many third-party sources as possible. I'd also suggest that we should send this to peer review before sending it to GA review. This article is often listed in the top 150 Wikipedia searches, so we would probably get some responses there. Dekimasuよ! 02:55, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think any other Good Articles use the plot citation system, but it certainly wouldn't hurt anything since we are a bit short on cites in general in this article. The only other place I know that uses plot citations is Wikipedia:WikiProject Final Fantasy, and they take the imo slightly insane step of putting HUGE quotes of game dialogue into the references. But hey, they practically have half their articles featured, so they must be doing something right. --tjstrf talk 03:38, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I am terrible at writing personality descriptions. Will someone give me a hand in the short description for Kurosaki ichigo and Kuchiki Rukia? I also left some "invisible" commentary under Rukia concerning something I want to add but think may be considered spoilers. Take a look and tell me what you think. 71.226.56.79 01:23, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

The only note currently there is asking for infomation on her personality. The summary provided does not require this so I removed the note.--88wolfmaster 05:30, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I dealt with the request already. My apologies, I should have said something so that you didn't waste your time. --tjstrf talk 05:37, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

It was not a waste of my time.--88wolfmaster 06:18, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

i take an issue with calling renji abarai an "elite" shinigami. at the time he is introduced, he's hardly that. 67.175.45.179 05:15, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Lies and deceit! Have you considered how many Shinigami there are? Kenpachi's duel with the previous 11th captain was overseen by at least 200 men, and there are 13 divisions plus their support staff and the other groups of shinigami like the covert ops. At minimum that gives us a couple thousand shinigami, probably far more. Now, of all those shinigami, Renji is ranked within the top 26.

Really, people... Renji may have a reputation among the fans as a jobber, but saying he wasn't an elite is just silly. (I'd argue that even Hanataro is an elite shinigami, seeing as he's a seated officer.) --tjstrf talk 04:39, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Two wording disputes in the character summaries

There appear to be two disputes in the character summaries that I can't see a simple way to deal with by rewording, so I'm bringing them here.

1. How do we describe the process by which Ichigo becomes a real shinigami? I prefer withstanding death to unlock his own shinigami abilities because it gives a concise but accurate summary of what he actually did in order to gain them. 71.226.56.79 prefers to just say by unlocking his own latent abilities but I'm not going to put words in his mouth as to why.
2. Uryu: The last Quincy or supposedly the last Quincy? I wrote the former, because that is how he introduces himself and because the "supposedly" is sort of odd sounding. Additionally, he is one of the two contenders for the title and if you listen to Uryu's definition then he is the last because his father isn't active and doesn't uphold the traditions. Ryuken says he's the last Quincy because even though he doesn't like the title he is the only current Quincy to master every technique.

Comments? --tjstrf talk 02:48, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Ishida is a Quincy, and Ichigo is a shinigami. We already have the introduction. We should write the sections from an absolute context if we can, not just in a style of plot introduction/overview. –Gunslinger47 03:07, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Honestly I kind of like it the way it is now as "Uryū Ishida is actually a Quincy, descendant of a line of priest-like hollow hunting archers." It avoids the problem entirely. You could probably also get around it by saying he introduces himself as the last Quincy. I consider both Ryuken and Uryū Quincy because they both have the powers. 71.226.56.79 17:43, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's relevant to the main article whether Ishida is the last Quincy or not. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 17:49, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

One other thing not related to the above but could cause a wording dispute later: I used "dimensional" when describing the "fabric" that separates the places in the settings section. While I don't know if it's official wording, it is more clarifying than the vague standalone word "fabric." Per WP:Bold I went ahead and did it anyway. Don't hold your peace if you object. 71.226.56.79 17:57, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

1. I would have to go with by unlocking his own latent abilities just cause it doesn't give away to much plot. 2. There is no need to avoid the subject, Uryu is the last Quincy (whether his father practices or not) because he is the last of thier family line.--88wolfmaster 05:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

are you referring to when rukia makes ichigo a shinigami, or when urahara re-makes him a shinigami? in the first case, clearly ichigo is NOT "unlocking his latent powers", in the second case he definitely is. in the first case he is just TAKING OVER someone else's powers. 67.175.45.179 05:18, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Something I'm confused about: Flying characters

I have been slightly confused about this for a while. Why is it that some characters appear to be able to "fly" some of the time, but not other times. Two particular instances that strike me are Ikkaku Madarame in episode 118 and 119 (I guess this could be part of his bankai), and Ichigo while fighting the bad guy (name escapes me) in the Sealed Sword Frenzy OVA. I will assume that the vizard and the arrancar have some sort of natural ability to do that since D-roy said something like that when fighting Rukia, but what about the shinigami? The way it looks to me is that they kind of force the air to solidify under their feet when "flying" rather than actually floating or hovering. Is this present in the Manga? Has anyone else been kind of confused about this of is it just me? 71.226.56.79 18:09, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

It's definitely present in the manga. In fact, the first use was in Ichigo's fight vs. Acid Wire when he recovered from a blow by braking against the air. It's not actually flight though, but rather running/walking/standing on the air using their spirit energy. The "air-stepping" technique is presumably part of the same class of technique as shunpo, so they are concentrating reiatsu at their feet to form a surface to stand on just like shunpo concentrates reiatsu in the feet to accelerate them. (I'm assuming it's in the same group as shunpo because the Quincy skill hirenkyaku does both.) --tjstrf talk 21:14, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems spiritual matter can move through solid matter, so where you stand in relationship to the ground is somewhat irrelevant. It appears easier to push off of solid matter or other spiritual matter, however. Especially for travelling over a distance, as evidenced by the necessity for Yoruichi's wing-thing that she gave Ichigo in episode 41. –Gunslinger47 07:02, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

References formatting problems

I think we need to change the standard reference format for the manga citations. Since we necessarily rely on manga scans at least for recent information which is not yet compiled into volumes, the current format is unacceptable both because it makes all the page numbers inaccurate when we convert from the previously used volume, chapter, page form and because it is inapplicable to all chapters which have not been republished in tankobon form yet. And yes, the page citations are necessary. --tjstrf talk 01:33, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I have changed them somewhat before readding them, because I noticed the problem with the chapter numbering, but since all of the citations are from the tankōbon, we should be able to use the exact tankōbon page numbering. The problem is that if we cite individual chapters, we should be citing Shōnen Jump instead. That's actually no problem at all for new stuff; I buy it almost every week. Just let me know if something is needed. Since my manga volumes are in a different country from me, though, it would be nice if someone could figure out the correct page numbers from the tankōbon for the citations we already have. Dekimasuよ! 01:46, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I mostly agree with you in principle, but think that the chapter reference does need maintained in some form or another even if we do convert to volume page numbering. Looking at what you've done, that does seem like a good temporary solution.

Another possibility I'd thought of, considering that the actual names of the volumes are not "Volume X" but rather things like "Quincy Archer Hates You" was making use of our List of Bleach manga chapters and section anchors (either the arc ones or {{anchor}}) to create a format like this:

Bleach manga volume 4, chapter 28, page 18.

Then the ISBN numbers in both Japanese and English, actual volume title, etc. would all be available by following a simple link at the bottom of the page. Full and precise information could then be incorporated without being messy. --tjstrf talk 02:03, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the references should be self-sufficient. Linking the article on the chapters as an addition is a good idea, but I think the citations on this page itself need to retain all of the information necessary to verify the information on the page, including the author and publisher. For the time being, I'll get the tankōbon page numbers the next time I'm at Book-Off. Dekimasuよ! 02:50, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

edits to make this a GA

Ok here are some suggestion I have to raise this to a good article

1)The introduction section she be merged with the lead section. The introduction section expands on some information presented in the lead section but not to the extent of requiring its own section. Or: move all the media section into the lead section and move all introductory/plot summary type information into the introduction section.

2)Create a subset of shinigami and hollow (repectively) for vizard and arrancar. They are two major character types and with the current setup they are not properly addressed. What I mean to say is: bullets are employeed to make the article easier to read. But because vizard and arrancar are just a sentence at the end of shinigami and hollow (repectively) you can completely over look them. This is wrong do to the fact that they are major character types important to the plot. (this actually happened to me a while back, before I started editing wikipedia).--88wolfmaster 06:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Notes on kanji and voice actors

We had decided previously not to use kanji on any series-specific words that have their own pages. However, we've added the kanji for Ichigo's name when we already link to Ichigo's article, where that information can be found. I think using the kanji for the main characters is a good exception to the rule, but I think care should be taken that it doesn't spread to every term throughout the article.

Also, I don't think it is mandated by WP:MANGA to show the names of the voice actors on this page, as long as they are shown on a page. When the contents of the article become so long that we have to break out new articles, it is up to us what remains in the summary on the main page. Personally, I think it is good to have the names of the voice actors on this page too, but I don't know if we need to use the template. If we can incorporate them back into the main text, we can more easily use a bulleted list without breaks like the one we used for the other sections, to keep the formatting consistent throughout the article. Dekimasuよ! 01:51, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Hm. I have no strong stance for or against either of them, despite my edit. –Gunslinger47 02:03, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Keep the voice actor names, they are to the side and out of the way.--88wolfmaster 02:17, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

They aren't to the side if the text is pulled up to start on the same line as the name, like it is in the other sections. Then they are in the middle and in the way. Dekimasuよ! 02:18, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

well i can just tell you how i read. I tend to skim things to find the part i'm looking for so when I see the names I skip down to the info paragraph. thus the kanji, japanese name, and voice actors are out of the way.--88wolfmaster 02:35, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Bulleting

We need to have a short summary above the listings for each character, just as we have a short summary above the listings for each character type and each location. Once that is added, it will look better to have a bulleted list that mirrors the formatting of the other sections, because otherwise the headings won't appear to be broken-out text. I'm not going to readd the bulleting now, but I'd like to see posts on the talk page first to discuss new edits rather than seeing reversions... especially since there are so many big changes going on here at the moment. Dekimasuよ! 02:14, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I seems that definition lists work best for the characters because there is quite of bit of text on the first line. For the other two sections, the bullet lists look better because their section names are only one or two word. The surrounding paragraphs also give a nice framing effect. I don't believe there is any reason to have all three lists use the same list type. –Gunslinger47 02:18, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

That's part of what I'm saying. There should be surrounding paragraphs for the section on the characters as well. I also suggest that even if we retain the information, we shouldn't retain the animevoices template, which eliminates the extra text. Incorporating the voice actor information into the character descriptions also encourages the necessary out-of-universe perspective. Dekimasuよ! 02:22, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Do you remember when we talked about having the sections for main characters and character types merged into "characters", with the current sections as subsections? Maybe we should work on that now. In any case, I am also starting to wonder if the character types section should be above the section on the main characters. The character types section explains a lot of the information necessary to understand the descriptions of the characters. As it stands, we say that Ishida is a Quincy before we explain what a Quincy is. Dekimasuよ! 02:25, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

if you wish to talk about this lets talk about this. A non bulleted list just looks more professional. the titles/names clearly stand out. in reguards to a short summary for the character section i believe its not necessary because main characters is straight forward and should need no explaination. in reguards to the summary for the setting section it needs editing because it does not properly lead into / transition to the specific settings. voice actors need to be included (i'm impartial as to how as long as its not overbearing). character types would go better before main characters but not merged (as that would just be confusing).--88wolfmaster 02:31, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

You might want to make it a little easier in your posts to see what you are stating as opinion and what you think is grounded in policy or guidelines. I've already stated above that voice actors do not need to be included based on the guidance of WP:MANGA. It wouldn't be a straight merge; rather, it would be reorganized into subsections. Since we are linking to a main article, we need to summarize the contents of that main article rather than starting a list at the beginning of the section. It is also an opportunity, if done correctly, to explain why the characters that are in the section are there. People adding, deleting, or reordering characters in the main characters section is one of the major problems that we have with this article.

I disagree that a non-bulleted list looks more professional; however, WP:MOS states that there shouldn't be bulleting if every paragraph in the section is bulleted, so I am content with leaving it out until a summary (which I believe is needed) goes in. Dekimasuよ! 02:42, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

i've voiced my opinions and all i asked is that they be considered. Moreover just because you do not have to include voice actors does not mean that you have to exclude them either. I am more than happy to concede to your subsection idea if that is the consensus. i dont care about the particular format as much as having a well orgainized, straightforward, and easy to read/understand article.--88wolfmaster 03:07, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I already said this in the section above, but I believe having voice actor information is good for the page, just not required. The template is not required. Dekimasuよ! 03:24, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

IGN reviews: Reliable? Worth mentioning?

Website-of-everything-geeky IGN has been nice enough to give us several (3 to be exact) reviews of the Bleach manga[11]. (They were all written in the last couple months, and one in fact was added in the last day, so it's no surprise we previously missed them.) Two are of the most recent English volumes while the third is on, of all things, how it compares to the anime adaptation. Since IGN is a business, their writers are presumably professionals and thus "reliable sources" for opinions, but like all professional rather than fan-written reviews they aren't the most accurate thing ever as far as facts about the series content go. I'm also not sure exactly what we would do with them. Any opinions, suggestions, or other attributable review sources we could use? --tjstrf talk 20:15, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

While I'm on the subject, [12] looks like it might have some decent stuff. (For instance, Bleach Volume 17 was apparently #1 manga in North American sales this February.) --tjstrf talk 21:48, 28 March 2007 (UTC)