Which Was the Better War?

[Serocco]

I know, the very name sounds like an oxymoron. War is hell and all, but I only mean it in... which war in Bleach was executed better? I'll exclude the Quincy Massacre, as we've yet to see it.

I'm talking about the wars with the Arrancar and the Vandenreich. Which had the better overall portrayal? This includes the build up, the fights, the commanders' strategies, the mid-battle tactics, the politics and the climax (the invasion of the Seireitei will count until further notice).

 

[Andygoesrawr]

To be honest, the Winter War was kind of pathetic. Nobody really got anywhere.

Harribel was defeated by Aizen, Baraggan was defeated by somebody who isn't even affiliated with the Shinigami, and Starrk just kinda went blergh and was defeated. And then Aizen went along and decimated the Shinigami.

The Blood War has been really good so far. The Quincies clearly overpower the Shinigami, and they're teaching the Shinigami important lessons in not relying on monumental power to defeat an opponent.

Plus the Vandenreich are overall better characters. Harribel was the most boring character in existence, Baraggan was okay but still really blasé, and Starrk was again better but he was just so boring and was pretty much a copy-paste of Shunsui with a little girl added in to add some more depth to his character. The Vandenreich however have some really interesting characters, such as Aes Noedt and the sadistic Bambietta. The rest of 'em I'm not hugely into but they still all have great character design from what little we've seen of them.

Also the Blood War has given us some good character deaths. It's rare for Kubo to actually kill off a character, so it was good for at least Chojiro to die. Even then, Kubo didn't let him go without doing a bit of character development after the fact. And then we have Kira who may be dead, Yamamoto's death (it was okay - at least the lead up was epic), and Unohana's on the way. Unohana's may not be a direct result of the war, but it's to further the Shinigami's war power so I'm counting it.

I voted to wait until the end to see, but so far the Blood War is definitely in the lead. The Winter War was just a display of power for Aizen; neither the Shinigami nor the Arrancar got anywhere.

EDIT: Just realised it might seem like I'm trying to bash Harribel, Baraggan and Starrk. I'm not. They all have aspects which make them good characters, I just personally find them very boring when compared to other characters

 

[Serocco]

The Winter War was essentially a series of Aizen and Urahara trying to one-up each other in the same way Mayuri and Szayelaporro did.

Needlessly complex. Filled with some pretty bad tactics by Aizen (could've sent the Espada to destroy the pillars right off the bat) and Yamamoto (could've used Bankai from the start).

For starters, Aizen's "brilliant" strategy was to trap Ichigo's crew and four captains in Las Noches... at the expense of half his army. The Captains and Espadas were just staring at each other while the lieutenants battled the Fraccion.

Some of the fights were cool, yeah, and some of the characters got more exposure, but it felt way too complicated and forced, compounded by how barely anyone on the Shinigami side died.

 

[Ra]

I want to wait until I see some more before I make a full on opinion, but from what I see, Yhwach has had more than 1,000 years to plan out his attack where Kubo titled the Vandenreich a resurgent power.

As for Aizen, he'd been building his troops and running off to Hueco Muendo while experimenting with others and had the entire Soul Society deluded into thinking he was the most peace loving man out. As for the Winter war, it was quite a cold war until the events of FKT/Gotei 13 appearance and that is when I enjoyed the battle between the Arrancar vs Shinigami.

The Soul Society invasion was quite paced and very out of the blue which fits the Vandenreich's scheme and distilled a lot of panic in the Gotei 13.

So far so good, I like both but I will wait until the next battle before I make any further judgements.

 

[Ice_Peach_Blossom]

I know a lot of people put down/complain about the Winter War, but I don't care; I really enjoyed it. The Winter War is what got me back into Bleach after forgetting about it for about a year. That being said even though I loved that arc (and always will) a part of me thinks the Blood War may turn out to be the better arc but it's still too early to tell.

 

[BlackSoul]

it's hard to judge the thousand year blood war just yet since it's only been going on a short while in-universe and IRL.

SO FAR however I strongly prefer the current war with the enemy bach and VR.
aizen's build up for war was interesting but the whole arrancar arc just dragged on. then came FKT who, again, dragged on and on. in the end it was everyone vs. aizen and yet they still couldn't do a damn thing and had to rely on a 15 years old substitude shinigami to save their collective ass. that's kinda pathetic.
but well, ichigo's the main protagonist so of course he was the one who had to save everyone and everything.

either way, since the previous "war" was around just too long so the characters got dull and I lost interest this new war is much faster paced and we're not yet so annoyingly overfamiliar with the new VR characters. aizen waited until he started the war, waited and waited but bach attacked at the first opportunity and quickly laid waste to SS.
very different approaches and I'm clearly in favor of the VR version. nonetheless, this war and arc hasn't been going on for that long so things can always change for the better or the worse.

 

[my2kb22]

I don't need to wait till this war is over..... its obvious to me that this'll be a better war than the previous one which isn't actually a war but some sort of a chess game played by aizen against gotei13 and his allies in order to obtain his ultimate goal...... to transcend both shinigami and hollow and reach a form beyond anyone can imagine........ in order to defeat the spirit king and seat on its throne, everybody was used like a diversion for his own purpose to evolve, his "precious espadas", the gotei13 shinigamis current and former,gin, ichigo, etc....

Note: the bold statement is where aizen failed lols......someone is beyond his level of existence which is ichigo....... well after he got defeated he could not even reach the spirit king hehe

 

[Serocco]

Note that I'm also including the entirety of the Hueco Mundo arc as part of the Winter War.

 

[jofosho999]

Is it really necessary to ask this question? The current war will clearly surpass the "Winter War" simply because its actually a war. Good guys are actually dying. A very significant one (Yama) has died. And the arc just started. Who died in that last war again besides bunch of bad guys? That wasn't a war. It was a battle royale with Aizen using that "war" to simply become a transcendent and fight the Soul King. We are bound to be headed towards that same direction with this current war, but at least we get a few casualties along the way that also involves good characters. For the sake of argument though, this arc barely started. I enjoyed the WW and deceide arc. Stark was one of my fav characters in bleach and seeing bunch of characters reveal their full powers, etc. But it wasn't a war.. Aizen ended up killing two of his men (Gin and Tousen), taking out Harribel, and then just KO'ing the rest of the shinigami. If anything, that arc was simply to display the awesome power of aizen and ichigo at the end.

 

[Minerva]

The SR have done more damage in the space of minutes than the Espada did in ... what, a day or so battles. No contest. Even at only two confirmed Shinigami deaths, that is two more than all Aizen's forces managed -- and there's more than two confirmed deaths out of Aizen's forces. Gin is dead, Tousen is dead, most of the Espada are dead, countless Fraccion and other random Arrancar.

Aizen himself has a horrible track record when it comes to killing. Harribel is still alive. He also never got as far as actually making the Key that was the entire purpose of the arc, and the whole matter has been shunted aside until now: what would he have ended up with had he managed to make that Key? Certainly not the inanimate object he was hoping for, as we now know. Still waiting for Kubo to pick up that loose end ...