#also: Tatsuru but I think I'm the only one who ships that

[troius]

What are your favourites relationships in bleach? It’s not necessarily “what do you ship” but of course I would be glad to hear if you have any ships in bleach

I’m definitely interested in which dynamics do you find the most interesting and worth reading into?

I'm going to focus on romantic relationships here, because that's what it seemed like you were gesturing at, but I'd be happy to talk about any others in another ask! Under a cut because it’s long:

I'm actually fairly boring on this front, because the relationships that I most like...are the ones that have the most time spent on them, lmao. So you could say that I'm not actually that discriminating when comes to what I like, I just like Bleach, and I like most of the relationships there as a result.

For example, Ichigo and Orihime's dynamic is great. It's a very classic shonen manga romance (the sweet, pretty girl is in love with the protagonist? no way!) but Kubo really does a great job characterizing the two of them and developing it in a believable way. I've talked a lot about the downside of Ichigo's desire to protect, but I do think that has a certain appeal to Orihime, somebody who has very much been a victim of circumstance in her life up to this point. And while Ichigo more or less refuses to consider himself a sexual or romantic being at this point in the story, I think Orihime's effusive and unconditional affection (even when he "fails to protect people") is something that means a lot to him, even if he's not the best at showing it. I'm really interested in following it as it develops further.

Renji and Rukia's relationship was honestly one of the best parts of the Soul Society arc, and "I'm not letting go of you" might be the best moment in the whole arc. The story of how they fell apart, and Renji's long journey back to feeling worthy of Rukia, was masterfully done, and I loved every step of it, especially in how his redemption was not in fighting, but simply being there for her. But I'm sort of struggling to see where it might develop further? At this point, they might as well be together already, and if they're not it's only because they're too stupid to figure it out.

Moving on, part of the reason the Renji/Rukia stuff worked so well in Soul Society is that it heavily paralleled the Momo/Toshiro and Gin/Rangiku dynamics that were also permeating the story. And while I'm not really enamored with Gin and Rangiku's story, except to the degree it affected Rangiku's character, I find the Momo/Toshiro stuff fascinating, especially as it drags in Aizen, who I think gets underplayed here. It's a dynamic that's all kinds of messed up, because Aizen more or less grooms Momo to not just be his unthinking tool, but also as a means of screwing with Toshiro, and the damage this sort of thing does to young, developing sexualities can't be overstated! But that's sort of what makes it compelling-- you want to see if Toshiro and Momo can find their way past Aizen like Renji and Rukia did, and not collapse under his machinations like Gin and Rangiku.

And finally, I'm not sure whether this will actually go anywhere, but Ikkaku and Yumichika's dynamic is truly wild, written under so much subtext and symbolism that you could pretend it wasn't there if not for the consistency of the imagery. These dudes spend all their time with each other but suppress their powers (which as always in Bleach, are symbolic of who they are) so as to better fit in a conventionally masculine environment commanded by a man who is defined as being unable to even recognize his own inner self! These guys are absolutely in love! But also absolutely not dating, and are in fact somewhat self-loathing to a degree, and while I know a Jump manga is probably not going to have an impassioned declaration of gay love where they say screw the rules and unleash their full powers, that is the natural conclusion to everything Kubo's written up to this point, which is fascinating in its own way.