4/5 Battling Bounts
  by E. A Solinas (MD USA)
After a little spurt of comic relief (complete with booby traps), "Bleach Volume 20" hurtles back into the conflict with the Bounts, except the enemy now have a new weapon to suck souls from the living. The fourth episode is way too heavy on the flashbacks, but otherwise it's a solid introduction to the Evil Plan of the Bounts, whose individual members start to show their personalities.

Kon, Noba, Ririn and Kuroudo decide to booby-trap Ichigo's house in case of Bount invasion, but Ichigo is unimpressed ("Great, they can wash their hands") and wants them to take them all down. Deeply offended, the three new modsouls decide to show Ichigo the error of his ways -- of course, it backfires spectacularly.

Meanwhile, the mysterious new dolls -- called "bitto"-- have started sucking the souls from living humans (and yes, I do love that phrase), which increases the Bounts' powers but also acts like a drug to their bodies and minds. It also causes some nasty division in the Bounts' ranks, as one of them tries to refuse the living souls -- and a high-flying Kariya shows his nastier colors openly.

Hitsugaya sends a team of lieutenant-class Soul Reapers to the living world, while Ichigo and his friends go patrolling to find the bitto. Renji is badly injured by them while saving a young boy, and Rukia and Orihime are yanked into a fight with the Bount Yoshi. And when Ichigo's buddy Keigo is attacked by the Bitto, Ichigo enters a very personal duel against the Bount Koga and his newly supercharged doll, inspiring Koga's memories of another young man he once knew.

One of the things that annoys me most about the "Bleach" filler episodes is the flashbacks -- while the series has always had plenty of flashbacks, the fifteen-minute saga of how Koga's teenage buddy Cain died a century or so ago doesn't really add anything to the storyline. It also interrupts a truly awesome fight scene between Ichigo and a newly superspiky Dalk, leaving the episode feeling choppy.

Other than that, this quartet of episodes is fairly solid, with an even balance of horror-action (as the bittos swarm over Karakura town and turn people to dust) and comedy ("FEEL THE POWER OF JUSTICE!" Ichigo bellows when using a magic headband, right before it slams him into a chainlink fence). And there are some nasty fights brewing, especially since Ichigo doesn't seem able to defend himself against Dalk, while Orihime and a handicapped Rukia are faced with a Bount woman with a talking fan and sword.

Obviously Koga is the one with the most character development in this one, with the story of a dead surrogate son who is probably never going to be mentioned again. But Kariya starts really showing his true colors when he has the living-soul juice, becoming cocky and casually brutal -- even forcing the juice down the throat of poor Mabashi, who apparently starts cracking like an egg because of it.

And the gang of modsouls provide some comic relief when they set up their cute yet silly little traps ("My trap's a success! It does more than trap the victim -- it makes them fall face-first into a pie!" Kon rejoices), and masquerade as a Bount doll in their little bug-armor costumes. It's a frothy little story, but it's cute and rather funny -- especially when Rukia is being tickled senseless by bunnies, and Renji finds himself swinging around a broom instead of a sword.

"Bleach Volume 20" is a solid start to the real battles against the Bount, albeit marred a bit by a pointless flashback that grinds everything to a halt. Still, has enough action and comedy to be fun.