Bleach Episode 2: The Shinigami’s Work

While waiting for Bleach, The Thousand-Year Blood War arc to release, I thought I would do a quick breakdown and recap of each episode of the anime.

Arc: Agent of the Shinigami arc / Manga Chapter: 2-4

The Death and the Strawberry

What happens in Bleach episode two

Bleach - 002 Agent of the Shinigami Arc - The Shinigami's Work

Ichigo wakes up the morning after Rukia had given him his powers and he had saved his family after defeating the hollow, Fishbone D and learns his family think that a truck had crashed into their home. They have completely forgotten about the attack. Arriving late to school, Ichigo bumps into Tatsuki and Orihime. Chad offers to assist Ichigo with his home repairs and Rukia introduces herself as the new transfer student in his class. She also threatens him the moment they reunite to keep quiet. She then explains that she is stuck without her powers and needs him to perform her Shinigami (Soul-Reaper) duties. Ichigo declines and Rukia tries to prove a point. Ichigo then tells her what he thinks of her point, and that he won’t just ignore someone in need in front of him. We then see a spirit watching Orihime from outside her house get kidnapped and devoured. He then turns into a hollow. Ichigo and Rukia then witness what seems to be a hit and run, with Orihime being the victim. Rukia notices that Orihime has a strange bruise on her leg but other than that, she seems fine. We then learn that Orihime’s only family, her older brother had died due a car accident a few years earlier at Ichigo’s family clinic.

Ichigo reveals to Rukia that he has only started to interact with spirits recently. Tatsuki takes a regular meal over to Orihime’s home and they have supper together. Ichigo learns that Rukia has taken up residence in his bedroom closet just before she saves him from a hollow attack and forces his spirit out of his body once again. She instructs him on how to defeat a hollow but was not specific enough. In his fight with the hollow in the tight confines of his bedroom, Ichigo is only able to crack Acidwire’s mask, revealing a face behind it. Ichigo recognises it as Orihime’s dead brother. Rukia then confesses that all hollows were once normal spirits like anyone else.

Memorable moments of the episode:

A really memorable moment is the first time Rukia forces Ichigo’s spirit out of his body with her iconic glove. Another is when the spirit, Sora, gets kidnapped and then devoured by the hollows to then become one himself. The final memorable moment was when Ichigo cracks Acidwire’s mask revealing that it is Orihime’s brother and Rukia confesses that all hollows were all once normal spirits.