Holes in chests and freaky scary pale masks resembling skulls.
What the fuck is there NOT to love about Bleach!?
Hello!
In the below lines I?ll be sharing 5 different ways I see Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form from the point of view of someone who?s interested in psychology, mythology, symbolism in art, philosophy aaaand also anime.
This blog post is for you if you?ve watched/read Bleach, are a fan of it and more specifically if you loved the Ichigo VS Ulquiorra fight.
SPOILER ALERT: If you haven?t watched up until episode 272 in Bleach then there are spoilers here. You have been warned.
Sidenote: Just because I interpret something in some way doesn?t mean that the creators of Bleach were thinking about that thing when they were making the show. All I?m doing is sharing ways to interpret their art.My hope is just that someone(maybe you) will see things differently after they?ve heard/read another perspective.
Also ? when I say ?Vasto Lorde? throughout this blog post I?m referring to Ichigo?s transformation in his fight against Ulquiorra at around episode 272 in the Bleach anime. (images of Vasto Lorde Ichigo for reference can be found throughout this entire article)
So without further ado, let?s get right into 5 Ways I Interpret Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde Form:
1. Vasto Lorde As a Reptilian Predator
Sharp teeth, sharp claws and big glowing eyes looking at you form the dark.
To me that?s a predator.
And one way I look at Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form is that of a reptilian predator.
He?s got sharp teeth. He?s got sharp claws on his hands and feet. And he?s got big glowing eyes that would frighten the hell out of me if I saw him walking down the street at night.
Also he had a tail in his previous hollow form when training with the Vizards as seen below:
Hollow Ichigo from when he trains with the Vizards. Emphasis on THE HUGE TAIL.
The idea for looking at him like this came to me after hearing Dr. Jordan Peterson ? who?s a clinical psychologist and professor of psychology ? talk in some Youtube video about something related to evolution and psychological reactions to certain stimuli related to predators.
Said in another way: we ought to feel fear when we hear a noise in the dark and we don?t know who?s there. That fear is a psychological and physiological reaction to a stimulus.
And from there I just saw Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form as a walking talking personification of a reptilian predator.
So that?s one way to look at him.
2. Vasto Lorde as a Personification of Rage
Vasto Lorde Ichigo screaming/roaring. (Gif taken from random google search. Moment taken directly from the anime.)
Another way to look at Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form is as if he is the personification of some abstract idea.
You can look at it in another way: Ares in greek mythology is the god of war. And he?s associate with similar things.
So in a similar fashion we can look at Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form as the embodiment of pure rage.
Also ? I?m using ?rage? here because that?s as close as I can get with words to the thing that I?m feeling. It could be ?fury? or ?bloodlust? or some other related thing as well.
Things that support this idea: He pretty much goes headfirst into Ulquiorra and tries to murder him immediately. After the fight he shows no mercy. He?s not thinking, which is associated with rage
Also, in the anime Vasto Lorde uses a Cero which is entirely red. He also roars and the aura around him also looks red. My point with this is that red is a colour associated with rage and that supports the idea that Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form is the embodiment of rage. (or something like that)
3. Vasto Lorde as a Personification of Primal Instincts
Ichigo loses consciousness and THEN we see Vasto Lorde Ichigo.
It?s not conscious. It?s as close to instinctual as I see it. He?s more so an animal than he is a human.
This also ties in with the predator way of looking at him because predators in our world are animals that ? as far as I know ? live on instinct.
And also we know for a fact that instinct is a big word in the Bleach community because there?s a whole big shpeel about it from Ichigo?s inner white counterpart while they?re battling inside Ichigo for control over his body.
So the third way I can twist my perception while looking at Vasto Lorde Ichigo is that of instincts taking over.
4. Vasto Lorde as a Tribal Warrior
Vasto Lorde Ichigo holding Ulquiorra?s hand after having cut if off. (I fucking love this image. I hadn?t seen it until today ?)
He?s a good fighter. Great reflexes. Great composure. No thinking.
Incredible physical characteristics like speed, agility, strength, etc.
It?s as if he?s trained his whole life on top of being the most talented fighter in his tribe.
Tattered clothes, halfway naked, barefoot, sword in hand ? you can?t blame me for thinking of a tribal warrior here.
Here?s a random google image I downloaded after searching for ?tribal warrior?:
Credit to the rightful owner.
Ya can?t blame me for associating the Vasto Lorde visual design with the archetypal ?tribal warrior? idea, can you?
Also:
- Vasto Lorde?s horns in tandem with his mask/head look like a helmet.A helmet is worn by a warrior because its utility is to protect you in battle. So to me it looks more like Vasto Lorde is a warrior because of the visual aspect of him looking as if he has a helmet to protect his head.
- Vasto Lorde?s body and face have markings on them.You could easily see a tribal warrior having such things when going into battle. And to me that supports the Vasto Lorde tribal warrior idea.
Tribal warrior Vasto Lorde confirmed. Moving on to the last interpretation:
5. Vasto Lorde as an Undead Being
This idea is a bit new to me. I have a few posters of Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form on my wall and I was looking at them literally 35 seconds ago and I was thinking out loud about the idea that he looks dead.
What I mean by an dead is that he?s pale, the thing on his head is not a face with a mask but definitely something that resembles a skull.
Eye sockets with no eyes. Teeth. No skin on face. Jawbone and how it attaches to top of skull clearly visible.Okay, it resembles a skull enough for us to say that it?s one way we could interpret what we?re looking at.
Him having a huge gaping hole in his chest doesn?t make him look more alive either.
All I?m saying is that Ichigo?s Vasto Lorde form looks like a walking corpse (with a sword in hand).
Final Thoughts
So those were 5 ways I see Ichigo Kurosaki?s Vasto Lorde form from Bleach.
And yes, this whole post was written because I?m a fangirl.
But I really do hope that you were able to take something away from it by seeing someone else?s perspective.
I wrote this short post because I?m a novice psychologist, psychoanalyst, mythologist and philosopher.
I?m interested in those things but I can?t write/say anything insightful at all because of how new I am to those disciplines.
So instead what I?m doing is writing blog posts that halfway revolve around those discipline (but not really) in the hopes that someone will see me and take me under their wing by mentoring me in those fields.
Alright ? enough rambling.
Thank you for reading ? I hope this was helpful to you.
Leave a response ? I?d love to hear what you have to say!
