User blog:Silver-Haired Seireitou/Revisiting the Fanon Canon

As promised, I've prepared a blog to discuss my thoughts regarding the Fanon Canon now that it seems interest has sparked once more. I'd hate to lose that so let's strike while the iron is hot, shall we?

I've split my thoughts below in the following sections, so please read along, and at the end of it, I want to hear your thoughts, concerns, and suggestions for moving forward as well. So let's get into it, shall we?

Why Things Fell Apart
I'm sure there's a lot of answers to this. A lack of interest, disconnection between eachother, too many plots going on at once, too many future plots being invested into before the current arc was finished, and so on. We want to pin the blame on something, but does it matter? Things fell apart. And that's all that matters. Now we just need to revisit the problems that need to be resolved, so that we can move forward from here successfully.

My thoughts on why it fell apart is simply that we lost sight of what the FC's main plot focus was supposed to be. We were excited about the Sternritter under Zennia (I think that was his name?) and his Sternritter, then Kraven and his Yokai replaced him, then we had Raian and the Wolves, Rosa ended up replacing Kraven for a bit, and from there, our attention drifted all over.

But here's why this was a problem? The multiple cast of characters? No.

The problem is that the main focus was never Kraven, nor Raian, nor Rosa.

It was supposed to be the Soul Fragments.

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I want you all to consider the following, alright?

What is, hands down, the best arc of Bleach?

The Soul Society arc.

Now why was that so good? Because of Ichigo's growth? Because of the progression of battles? No!

The answer is that there wasn't a focus on a main good guy. And there wasn't a focus on a main bad guy. No one character had the spotlight.

The focus was Rukia's execution.

We had Ichigo's group charging forward. Renji struggling with the idea of contributing to his childhood friend's execution. Byakuya struggling between his duty and his promise to Hisana. Yoruichi, who was clearly acting on Urahara's behalf while there, but also serving to help Ichigo's group. Urahara, who knew Aizen might try something. AIZEN, of course, who was playing manipulative head games with Momo. Ukitake and Kyoraku, who while they had late involvement, also sought to stop the execution. Hitsugaya who was investigating the entire issue at hand.

And yet, for all of these characters off doing their own thing, one focus connected all of them. Rukia's execution.

That's how you make a compelling story.

And this is where we went wrong with our FC. We kept jumping back and forth between characters being the focus that we forgot that the FC wasn't meant to focus on a single character's actions, but rather, a single circumstance that characters are responding to. The Gotei obviously need to address the Soul Fragment issue. And Kraven wants them for his own sake. When the focus is on a situation instead of a character, it doesn't matter who is the "good guy" or the "bad guy", because no matter WHO gets involved, the situation has not changed, and therefore, the focus remains consistent no matter what.

What Should We Do?
I think we need to return focus to the Soul Fragments. Very little of them have been made, but that doesn't concern me; they can be NPCs. Their identities don't matter. In terms of Rukia's execution, her power or abilities didn't matter, but her connection to others is what drove characters in the story.

The main focus of the FC — at least for the first arc — has to be the Soul Fragments. It doesn't matter who the "villain" is, so long as this remains a constant. Both Kraven and Rosa can serve as antagonists, and we can bring in other groups as well, but we must never lose sight of the focus. Before, too much attention was given to the conflict between Kraven and the task force, which is why things died out.

Therefore, I believe our first step should be to decide on a proper number of soul fragments. 50 seemed really... high. Honestly, a number between 10 and 20 should do the trick just fine. We need to reinvest some time in determining how to go about the creation of these characters. If necessary, I will take it upon myself to make all of them, because as I said, who they actually are or what they can do doesn't matter. What matters is their existence as a soul fragment, and what connections they might have to other characters; more than likely, to human characters like Fullbringers.

That needs to be our first step, before anything else.

In other words, this will be us defining our plot focus.

How About The Cast?
With the understanding that the Soul Fragments are the plot focus, in the same way that Rukia's execution was the focus of the Soul Society arc, we will then need to define the major characters and their role in this story.

The Gotei 13's stance is perfectly clear. These are fragments of Yhwach giving humans supernatural powers. That is definitely going to become a problem if it remains ignored.

So I think we should keep the task force. Kazuya's beef with Kraven makes for a good conflict between their groups. But I want there to be Captains and others who are taking an initiative of their own, just like in the Soul Society arc. Some might be asking, why is the Soul Society so worried about a few humans gaining supernatural powers? Why does this demand the mobilization of a task force? Or better yet, some might think Kyoraku's decision isn't enough of an answer to this situation. Some Captains might take it upon them to investigate further into these soul fragments, perhaps even attempt to take it upon themselves to enter the human world and search for them themselves.

The point is, I want you guys to think about your characters' role by answering this question: Why do they respond to the existence of these Yhwach soul fragments and the implication behind such a circumstance?

Would they just sit still and wait until they have been ordered by Kyoraku to get involved? Or would they take some kind of action themselves?

And that's just the Gotei 13.

I want to keep the Osaka Explosion in effect. Why? Because it serves as an excellent way to give human characters a clear understanding that some serious shit is happening. To the high-spec human beings, such as Fullbringers, who have spiritual powers, this will be a matter they may feel needs to be investigated. And to the soul fragment wielders, most of which are humans that probably didn't have powers to begin with, they may feel this is connected to their sudden gaining of supernatural awareness.

So many possibilities, and yet, everything is connected and tied together in a neat little bow.

That is how we must proceed.

Concluding Thoughts
I would like to start off the FC again with two things in mind: the Soul Fragments must be kept as the consistent plot focus, and the Osaka incident has become a sort of opener to cause high-spec humans, spiritual beings, and soul fragment wielders to have a reason to eventually cross paths.

Now I'm interested to hear everybody else's take on this, so as always, comments are more than welcome below. --Silver-Haired Seireitou (Dosvidaniya, tovarisch.) 04:24, November 8, 2015 (UTC)