I started reading Bleach when the Soul Society arc was just beginning, so I've lived with it awhile. There is absolutely no doubt that for a while it was excellent. Lots of great, creative, lovable protagonists; many varied and intriguing villains; plenty of cool abilities to go around between the two; a cool premise, developed and expanded well; and above all, mountains of style. Kubo knew how to structure a chapter, for one; as well as how to build suspense and plot, getting you to really care for his characters and seriously get scared when they went up against someone much stronger than they. He also just had (still has, really) a cool and unique artstyle.
The Soul Society arc was, overall, a shounen masterpiece, and I readily admit that. Signs of wear began to emerge even near the end of SS though (a friend of mine and I once had a very long discussion about where Bleach started to go wrong, and ultimately we agreed it was at the Renji vs. Byakuya fight) - but at that point it wasn't too big a deal yet, since right on its heels you had amazing massive plot twist revelations about Aizen. But already things were beginning to go wrong. There were one too many overly dramatic fights in which a character would practically die... then get up again a few chapters later and have another even more dramatic fight, then again die... but not, of course, since he'd just reemerge soon after - only to die! and so on and so forth.
At that point I began to stop caring for the characters, and I think that's where Bleach's spirit has completely faltered. One of the amazing things about Soul Society arc is the sheer number of downright awesome characters involved, all of whom I either genuinely cared for or at least was intrigued by. There were villains that I actually feared. Since the end of SS, however, the series has become a rather pathetic parody of itself. The fights now are complete jokes. They're stupidly predictable, and even on the off-chance that something cool or unexpected happens, it's quickly bogged down in the same old formula of long stretches of chapters and taunting and side-stepping and swords clashing and Ceros being fired followed by characters almost dying. It's an endless repetition of "look, I got you now!" "oh no you don't, I've got you!" "but look at this cool move of mine" etc. etc.
This kind of thing can be done well, it's a shonen staple after all, but Bleach sure as hell doesn't anymore. All the characters and villains act pretty much the same now. Just about all emotional connection I ever had with any of the characters has been severed by dull, painful repetition. It hurts all the more because every once in a while I'll flip through my SS volumes and remember how good the series one was.
There IS still stuff Kubo does right. Every time the Vizored appear, for instance, I suddenly find myself thoroughly enjoying the manga again. That training arc of them with Ichigo? Absolutely kickass. The entrance into Hueco Mundo, too, though in many ways a recycle of SS, got me excited too (it didn't take long for that feeling to die down, though the arc had its decent parts later on as well). As others have said, the Pendulum chapters were very cool too - actual interesting plot revelations took place. But 99% of Bleach now is just the same old stupid meaningless going-through-the-motions. I would love for it to crash to the bottom of the magazine so that it could either free up space for other series that are actually worth reading, or have Kubo realize that he's pretty much gone to shit and that he better clean up his act or just get the hell out of the magazine.
Toriko, on the other hand, is fresh, unique, charming, has done a great job of building and introducing its world, has very likable main characters, exciting fights, clever dialogue, intriguing villains, awesome art & backgrounds & character design... I could go on. For all I know, Toriko can take the path of Bleach and become crap at some point in the future - but for now it's very promising, perhaps even moreso than Bleach was (though that's a matter of purely personal preference).
If you want to continue this convo, though, it'd probably be better to do it by PM, since this thread isn't really suited for very series-specific discussion.
