side note: mangapanda's translation on page 8. "He was...my brother's wife" LOL, What? Just let that sink in. I know they said the Ise family was women only, but damn. Jokes aside, I know it was just a typo, missing an "S".
So...Ise Nanao is Shunsui Kyoraku's neice then, since her mother is his brother's wife. There's no going back on this now that it's been published. Although if in page 13 she is referring to him, then that's just fucking creepy af with this new revelation, given the incest nature of it all, on top of the age difference...I know they're souls that live from centuries to millennia, but still. We've seen Shunsui look the exact same (before the time-skip) with Nanao when she was no taller than his knee (when Lisa was still lieutenant). Unless she was referring to whomever she would come to love in the future, and Shunsui simply smiles as a father-figure. OR, it could be that Nanao's mother had her from a previous marriage, then married Shunsui's brother, making Nanao, Shunsui's step-niece...but then there's that age difference thing again that I can't seem to get over. Tite Kubo, you be screwing everything up.
Nanao looked pretty badass though, with her Zanpakuto paddle ready to spank whoop some ass. Oh god. That reminds me of religious schools that use the paddle to disciple students to this day...is that why it's a literally a giant paddle (because of the the Ise family being a Shinto one)?. Nanao can play freaking Cricket with that thing.
JPthugnificent said:
G_Spark233 said:
This sort of felt like it came out of nowhere [...]
You know, this is what I felt like recently in Bleach all the damn time.
Only recently? I've been under the assumption that Tite Kubo has been pulling shit out of his ass from the very beginning, especially with each of Ichigo's new power-ups when he gains new abilities. I swear he just makes everything up weekly, retconning things as he goes along, like with this latest chapter. All the romantic-tension that's been built up with these two characters up till now, just got a whole lot more awkward.
I bet Kubo's conversation with his editor went something like this:
Kubo: "I've run out of ideas. You know what? Nanao's never been given a Zanpakuto yet, and this has been dragging out too long, so let's give her an almighty sword to just end it all. But I need an excuse to introduce it. Let's recycle those filler character designs, making them canon! And you know what would be hilarious? If Nanao and Shunsui were related!"
Editor: "That's nasty. But whatever you're smoking man, people will eat that up like Star Wars fans."