Episode 287 - "This entire episode is nothing but regrets."

That's a direct quote from the episode, and it couldn't be more appropriate.

Seriously, don't watch this episode. Not even Yoruichi's very, very, very, very, very, very brief cameo salvages this train wreck, save for the easy jokes about Ichigo and the gang riding her. If you are looking for the basic plot, it's just a microcosm of the SS ar with turbans. That's it, that's fucking it.

What the fuck where they thinking? Who thought this was a good idea for an episode? Why did they just they just throw it in in the middle of an arc? Bleach is coming apart at the seems.

Isane/Unohana fans will like the ending though, so I guess there's that.

isane/unohana ftw!

the rest of the episode insulted me. and gave me a very large bruise on my forehead from headdesking too hard.

Were you two expecting Shakespeare or something? Did you forget for one brief moment what you were watching?

It's a filler episode, and as filler goes it was actually pretty good. I liked it. An episode where Bleach takes a break from the endless fighting/pwning/general tedium and pokes fun at itself. Or is that not allowed? I would rather we had an episode like this than a random crappy episode abd out Karin and the other brats left over in Karakura.

And I would much rather they put in the odd filler episode during the FKT fights than power on through them only to be forced to have another lengthy filler arc because they've caught up with the manga.

You guys are taking this way too seriously.

I would be different if there were good episodes to balance it out, it would be different, but the FKT arc has been pretty shitty.

I'm also not a fan of meta-humor. I find it insulting. It says to me that you aren't taking what your doing seriously, so why should I?

I'm on the opposite end of the scale, I think it's healthy to take the piss out of yourself and I don't see it as not taking the work seriously at all. I find it insulting when something treats itself so seriously that it's lodged up it's own arse.

Bleach is hardly high art, it can easily afford to make fun of itself.

There's a difference between meta-humor and taking the piss. Meta-humor takes you out of the work, like in Scott Pilgrim when characters would reference events in previous volumes by saying "Don't you remember that back in volume (#)?" and your supposed to go "Haha! It's funny because it's a comic and they referenced that!" And that's what I mean about not taking things seriously; opening lampooning your own foundation.

Taking the piss is closer in nature to parody, which wasn't what this episode did at all. The whole gag of the episode seemed to be "It's funny because it's anime and anime is kind of crazy! Teehee!"

But it's also a matter of the fact that making fun of itself in a fundamental level isn't something that Bleach does regularly, so when it does happen, it comes off as more of a "fuck you" than a wink and a nudge.

I was going to write a long reply, but I actually can't be arsed. I don't care enough to argue the finer points of humour, or why this episode was shit/good/apparently completely insulting/whatever. I don't take Bleach that seriously. It gave me a bit of a laugh while I ate my breakfast this morning and that is all that matters to me.

I won't even bother with it soelely because I can't stand breaks in action. Even as brief as one episode. Sometimes as brief as dialouge. That's why the ZUT and NCSA arcs irritated me. At least the Bount Arc was made kinda-canon by integrating the new mod souls into the rest of the arc. I'm still trying to figure out where the hell in the timeline the NCSA and ZUT arcs belong. They seem to be before the arrancars attacked yet after the eventual death of Aizen. Obviously both are impossile, hence why they irritate me. Hell, you can put the movies in the timeline, but nooooo not the fucking filler arcs.