“It's a good thing Orihime isn't here. I wouldn't want her to see what I'm about to do to you.”
Uryū Ishida Quotes
2 quotes from Bleach, each with commentary on what it means and why it stuck.
Read the character analysis and its source limits
Uryū Ishida introduces himself through an opposition: in VIZ’s licensed opening of Bleach Volume 5, he names himself a Quincy and declares his hatred of Soul Reapers, then directs that hatred at Ichigo. The school scene that follows makes this confrontational identity only part of the picture. Ichigo barely remembers his name, but Orihime knows their classmate through the crafts club, and another pupil brings Ishida a torn doll to mend. Our reading is that Ichigo’s failure to notice him should not be mistaken for a complete absence of ordinary connections. Ishida can be distant in one relationship and useful in another. Volume 6 places his determination under physical pressure: facing accumulating Hollows, he realizes he can no longer kill each with one shot and that his strength is waning. He insists that he cannot lose, yet also questions whether he is right as he thinks of his master. These pages let conviction and uncertainty coexist. They do not settle the battle or prove that pride guarantees success. The profile that emerges is more specific than an aloof rival: a boy who defines himself against an institution, whom classmates ask to repair small things, and who still has to ask what his determination is serving.
“Ah, Kurosaki. I'm glad to see you've finally realized the importance of a cape.”
He has been wearing white with a cape since his first appearance, sewing his own outfits, and been mocked for it by Ichigo more or less continuously. So when Ichigo walks up in a long black bankai coat, the joke is a debt collected. Uryū's pride is in craft, in the thing done properly, and the properly done thing here is a coat. He is the one member of the cast who would notice, and the one who would say so before saying hello. Kubo, who draws clothes more carefully than most of his peers draw faces, is on his side.
About Uryū Ishida
Guides
Around Bleach
More from Bleach
Read Uryū Ishida's story from the start
Explore Bleach in book form. Check the listing for the edition, language and volumes included. The source beside each quote records where its wording was checked; it may differ from the wording in this edition.
As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Links on this page are affiliate links, which cost you nothing extra. They never influence what appears on this site or what the commentary says about it.
Mayuri has just described dissecting Quincy alive, Uryū's grandfather among them, with the relish of a man reading a menu. He defeats Mayuri, but by the time he is home his Quincy powers are gone, and it takes his father to train them back into him.