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3 days ago
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As one of the most memorable comebacks of all time, Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War can easily be considered the peak of the entire series. From stunning animation and soundtrack to the exciting fights one after the other, the hype was unreal and inspired many new fans to finally give Bleach a chance. As amazing as Thousand-Year Blood War has been so far, there’s one aspect that was better in the original anime series, as Masakazu Morita shared during an interview.
Uryu and Ichigo in the original Bleach anime | Credits: Studio Pierrot Co. Ltd. The Ichigo voice actor shared his experiences with the anime along with Noriaki Sugiyama, the voice actor of Uryu Ishida. Sugiyama and Morita spoke at length about their time in the recording studio, sharing some things about the original series that remain special and irreplaceable.
Masakazu Morita shares his experience with the original Bleach anime
Bleach anime started its run in 2004, and Masakazu Morita has played Ichigo ever since then. He has added his own flair to the character, leaving an indelible mark on fans with his performance. Noriaki Sugiyama and Morita discussed the experience of recording for the first cour of Thousand-Year Blood War during a special cast interview. Morita shared that the recordings were done separately and some parts had him wishing to record with his co-stars.
Renji and Ichigo during their time in the Soul Palace | Credits: Studio Pierrot Co. Ltd. Sugiyama shared that he could tell from the audio that such parts were not recorded together. The only scene that the voice actors recorded together from the first cour was Renji and Ichigo’s training in Soul Palace. When Morita was asked about any special memories from the original series, he pointed out the one advantage that made the original Bleach anime superior to Thousand-Year Blood War.
When the “BLEACH” anime series first started, we only had the script in hand until the day of recording, so I think we were able to act while feeling each other’s performances more than we do now.
The actors could record together, which made it easier for them to understand the energy and curate their own performance accordingly. This created a great synergy between them. Moreover, back in the day, they only had the scripts until the recording day when they could see the videos.
There was no time to practice after seeing the videos as testing and recording were the subsequent steps. So, performing together helped them prepare better for the scenes. Scripts were the only aid available to the voice actors before recording, and having handwritten made a great difference, as the voice actors explained.
Here’s how handwritten scripts made a difference
A still of Ichigo and Orihime in the original Bleach anime | Credits: Studio Pierrot Co. Ltd. The Uryu voice actor shared how the beautifully written characters (kanji) were difficult for him to understand, so he had to rewrite them often. Whereas Morita shared that he enjoyed handwritten scripts as they conveyed the personality or excitement of the writer. He mentioned how some parts were written in a slanting motion giving hints of specific feelings of the writer.
This aspect of handwritten scripts probably helped the voice actors in crafting their approach, as they had direct input from the writer. It’s safe to assume that this was another factor that made the original series special, as everybody had the convenience of working together and making alterations to accommodate one another. Whereas the pandemic limited everyone to their own devices during Thousand-Year Blood War anime.
The entirety of Bleach anime is available to stream on Netflix.
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