This is part one of a character analysis on the Bleach side character Kenpachi Zaraki. It contains spoilers through the early Arrancar arc, around chapter 214/volume 24 to be safe (in anime terms, the Arrancar Arrival arc up to Episode 131).
The first panel we see of Kenpachi Zaraki where we really start to understand what he’s doing here is stark. He crouches on top of a roof, an empty, bright sky buttressing his hair spikes. There are no clouds, no sun, no birds. Instead, his fraying robes pierce the solid white behind him. In the official English translation, a mangled rendition of the word “DOOM” encloses his frame.
In most battle shōnen I read, an entrance so clearly designed to intimidate leaves me with the taste of forced writing in my mouth and a small modicum of cringe tightening my shoulders. Bleach surprisingly avoids such a pitfall. At this point in the first real dramatic arc, I am so primed and ready for his appearance that it genuinely makes my blood go cold.
Perhaps, unlike so many series that have tried this approach and fumbled, the world has responded to his presence and shaped itself around him. Of course he fulfills the role of the headstrong warrior-type mini-boss that the protagonist must overcome as a test of strength (Uvogin, anyone?). But even in the beginning he is so much more than his trope. Bleach earns the right for us to fear him.
Joke Not With The Abyss
He was one unconventional weirdo among many. The Captains are the clearest windows we have into the Soul Society in the early series and Tite Kubo depicts them as an array of splintered worldviews, rather than the unified military front we might have expected. Ranking officers mostly avoid Kenpachi, or distrust him. They often back down from arguments with him post haste to avoid his temper. Further in the arc some Captains spitefully reveal their long-held suspicions: would he go so far as to betray us, the Captain-Commander, and the word of law? Byakuya and Gin are the exceptions, but this is no reassurance. Gin is shown to be duplicitous at the best of times. Byakuya is a cold, classist pretty boy who approved of his own sister getting sentenced to death – being unfazed was his modus operandi from the beginning.
Early Bleach is more often then not a comedy, so Kenpachi’s funnier traits are used as a pressure valve for the series’ tone when he is involved. His unflinching trust in Yachiru’s abysmal sense of direction leads his contingent all over the place. His insistence on instigating even when he’s tied up and being dragged away fits perfectly with Kubo’s comedic style. For a long time I could never really place why I felt Kenpachi’s wasn’t the butt of the joke in quite the same way as, say, Uryu, who is just as self-serious, but also the shining star of the high school sewing club.
The best answer I could come up with is his motivations.
What Do You Give To A Man Who Kills Everything
Even though he is impulsive and disobedient, he knows what he wants. We, too, know what he wants. It’s impossible to ignore. To the plot’s benefit, his desire for a fight to the death is exactly what Ichigo’s party is trying to avoid. The jokes once made at his expense also established his relentlessness and unpredictability.
The question is never whether he shows up to halt their progress and potentially their pulses. The question is how soon. From the moment he runs out of the captain’s meeting to hunt them down he is a loaded gun. His subordinates follow him down wrong street after wrong street, and even the shinigami who are nowhere near him when they come across Ichigo and his friends still find ways to contribute to our expectations of Kenpachi’s character.
Virtually everyone the protagonists run into give insights into the 11th company’s reputation. They are hooligans, bullies, and could be called delinquents if they weren’t constituted from the eternal life force of what appear to be middle-aged men. For the most part the invasion party easily brushes them aside. The officers of the 11th are a different story. They keep a counterbalance to this bluster and rage – they all have deep ties to restraint.
Misery Loves (11th) Company
Yachiru, in contrast to her happy-go-lucky, bubbly, honest personality, is almost the personification of narrative restraint. She is an enigma. Kubo keeps us in the dark about her powers, her history, the details of her relationship with Kenpachi, the reasons why he seems to trust her implicitly, and we are even missing evidence that she fulfills any duties as vice-captain. Meanwhile, Ikkaku reveals himself slowly. He makes a good showing against Ichigo, but his depth only fully appears in the next arc. He purposely avoids activating bankai against Edrad to make the fight more fun. This serves a double purpose: it expressly fulfills a prideful requirement of his warrior spirit and it keeps his true abilities hidden from his peers. The pace of his narrative growth also mirror his bankai’s characteristics. In his own words, it’s a slow starter.
In the same night of the same arc, Yumichika reveals to Charlotte that he avoids releasing shikai to prevent the company from ridiculing and disrespecting for his kido-type zanpakuto, despite its absurd killing potential. And, I must admit, while both Ikkaku’s and Yumichika’s actions reflect their personalities to varying degrees that are consistent with Tite Kubo’s skill for writing moving characters, neither come close to the sheer depth to which restraint has shaped Kenpachi’s life.
Too Much and Not Enough
Kenpachi is bored. He is, in the ever quotable words of Thanos, inevitable. He could have been the epitome of all those shōnen tropes of absolute-power-causing-existential-crises-absolutely. You know. The ones that have been neatly summed up and lampooned in One Punch Man. Instead, Tite Kubo decided that Kenpachi would value one thing more than his strength – his ability to enjoy himself. At the time of me writing this, Saitama’s past in One Punch Man is only briefly touched on, not enough for us to sustain deeper questions. What made Saitama continue training? Why did he fly past the threshold of overkill, and did he notice when it happened? For the running bit of the series’ premise to survive, that question remains off-limits.
However, despite how I might wish the contrary, Bleach is not about Kenpachi. It’s about Ichigo, a similarly powerful fighter who is coming at the same question of power from the other side. Despite his plot armor and ever-evolving family tree of lineages and inherited powers, Ichigo rarely has enough strength to do more than eke out a Pyrrhic victory. His friends don’t die, yet he never really wins. Quite a sobering contrast: Kenpachi always has too much strength to feel challenged and engaged. He resorts to intentional self-sabotage to feel a sense of purpose.
The Context of His Dread
So, perhaps the reason Kenpachi’s dread is so convincing is because he feels it too. Dread permeates his every motive. The fashion statements he makes that seem absurd by our initial understanding of his character are all strangled attempts to even the odds. His eye patch? A power limiter. The childish bells on his hair? A sound cue to help his opponent. This is the level at which he can simply enjoy himself. The joke of him challenging Byakuya takes on a new light with this consideration. Perhaps Byakuya would actually be strong enough to give his being some form of meaning. Captains Tosen and Komamura weren’t.
To Ichigo’s credit, he is the catalyst that begins the subtle shift in Kenpachi’s worldview. It takes place over multiple arcs and is far less dramatic than others but in my opinion it has no less satisfying of a payoff. Once Ichigo renders him unable to continue, Kenpachi lays flat on his back. He questions his sword and asks its name. After coping through endless thrill-seeking and bloodthirsty hedonism, he begins to wonder what fulfillment comes of self-knowledge. Could it be more valuable to directly stare at the sour parts of oneself rather than distract from them?
Part 2 of this Bleach character analysis coming soon. Check here for more blog posts, or leave a comment down below!