With the subs finally out, I got some time and sat down to watch the movie I've been waiting for since last fucking year. Was it worth it all? Damn right it was.

I'll address some key points beyond. Be warned that the following paragraphs contain MASSIVE SPOILERS, so if you haven't seen it yet, don't read on.

Animation:
The animation in the movie is... jarring, to say the least. This movie was obviously made by 2 studios, which is standard fare, except that it is easy to tell who did what. The first half of the movie is ripe with misproportions and bad frames that make the characters look messed up as shit. Then suddenly the animation gets awesome, and some of the battles near the middle-end are beautiful to watch. Then near the end it gets bad again. Then good, then bad suddenly again. It's so scitzo. Had the animation stayed consistent at the level that I saw near the middle-end, I'd give it a 9 or 10. Here though...

Final Rating: 7
Summary: Two studios create a jarring effect of beautiful animation clashed with poor animation.

Action:
After the first two movies, I was expecting 2 major action scenes and little else. What I got was an action scene every five minutes, and some of them were badass. Highlights included. Zaraki after he loses his eyepatch, Yammammoto going nuclear on the giant monster, Anything involving Urahara, and esspecially the Ichigo/Rukia fight. That one was NICE. Beautiful, fluid animation, all the way through. My only gripe is that Yammammoto and some of the leutenants didn't get more screen time.

Final Rating: 9
Summary: Battle after battle with amazing animation, though some characters get too little time.

Story:
Here's where it counts. And where it fails. Kinda. I was dissapointed to find that bleach movie three follows the EXACT same premise as 1 and 2. "Unknown group who we've never heard of before steal artifact x of terrible power and use it to get revenge against soul society." They mix it up a bit, but not really. The real story is Rukia. Pretty much she rescued these kids, and then got owned before she could name them. They erase everybody's memories of her (and Ichigo due to this) and that drives the plot. There were some cool scenes too. Byakuya and Renji both get some great focus, as does Urahara, which is refreshing. Ichigo's quest to get Rukia, no matter what, is standard fare for bleach, but I still love it. Plus near the end, the whole Ichigo/Kaien reincarnation theory is actually addressed and kinda/sorta made cannon. They don't elaborate, but say it is a possibility. Which is cool.

Final Rating: 8
Summary: uninventive story premise initially drags the movie down, but character focus, Rukia's backstory, and Ichigo manage to make this movie shine.

IchiRuki-ness
Here we go. So the big thing about this movie was that it was supposed to make IchiRuki either cannon, or so close to cannon that it didn't matter. What it really did, in my opinion, was do nothing, or perhaps even the opposite. Ichigo is directly asked 2-3 times about the nature of his relationship with Rukia, and each time he states she is a "Precious Nakama" Rukia also seems to only see Ichigo in such a sense. Oh, and that hug? No, really more like Ichigo beat Dark Rukia, and he's just holding her up. So really? The movie didn't help the IchiRuki cause much. Some might argue otherwise, but from what is readily apparent in the movie, not so much.
No Rating

Final Score: 8
Summary: Unimaginative plot and schizophrenic animation attempt to drag the film down, but solid characterization, awesome fight scenes, and the true spirit of what is Bleach make it shine above all the rest. Plus Zaraki goes ape shit and fucks up a giant octopus. What's not to like?

So there you have it. All in all, good movie.