Tite Kubo's hit series Bleach had plenty of powerful and iconic villains, but the Sternritters didn't quite live up to the Soul Reapers or the Espada. Or even their own legacy.

The Quincy are a clan of Hollow hunters, humans - or so they seemed - with strong spiritual inclinations. They manifest their powers as bows and arrows, vaporizing Hollows with their attacks. However, this disrupts the flow of souls into Soul Society upsetting the balance between the living and dead worlds. The Soul Reapers, attempting to prevent this unbalance, wiped out the Quincy in generations past, and the Ishida family is among the last of them. And, although the Quincy returned as the Sternritters, their vengeful war seemed like a serious divergence from what they could - and should - have been.

RELATED: Bleach: The Quincy, 'Monks of Destruction,' Explained

Yet Another Enemy Legion

The Bleach franchise is known for reusing the same few plots, and the overall story is rather circular as a result. The story went from a "monster hunter" anime to a proper shonen fight-fest as Ichigo and company fought the Soul Reapers to rescue Rukia. The whole "fight the bad guys to rescue the girl" cycle repeated itself when the Espadas rose to prominence, but this time Sosuke Aizen was the clear villain, and the Soul Reapers were now friends of Ichigo's.

It was already a stretch to use that plot twice, but a third go-round is a bit much. Yet again, a legion of enemies dropped out of the sky, except this time, it's the Quincies with the new and unusual powers. The story is the Espadas all over again: freakish enemies with no chance of redemption, led by an all-powerful leader, Yhwach, who threatens the world. And the good guys have to take down these villains one at a time until it's time for the final boss battle.

The return of the Quincies didn't bring anything new to the table, and fights with them were drawn out until they became a real chore, even more so considering readers already know exactly how the story will play out. They've read it twice already, after all.

RELATED: Bleach: The Powers & Symbolism of the Arrancar, Explained

What They Once Were

Soken Ishida in Bleach.

At the start of Bleach, the Quincy were depicted as disciplined archers working in unison to fight Hollows in vigilante action. They were angry at the spirits for devouring their friends and families, and attempting to finish off whichever Hollows the Soul Reapers failed to hunt down. The Quincy were only acting for humanitarian reasons, and were struck down by the Soul Reapers - a tragic end.

This could have led to a story about other families like Uryu's seeking vengeance on the Soul Society on more personal terms, such as taking the Soul Reapers' own families hostage or conducting raids on the Gotei 13 or diverting a Hollow army to the Soul Society as though to say "see how it feels!" The Quincy could have been reborn in the same vein as Uryu's own family, human archers who fight for their own kind. They could have had internal divisions to complicate matters and create drama. They could have had so much more than an Espada rehash.

But the original vision of the Quincy was abandoned in favor of a platoon of weirdos and gimmicky villains who often don't even use bows and arrows. Many of them use swords - which is odd, given how the Quincy are meant to contrast with Soul Reapers in every way - and none of them are sympathetic at all. The Sternritters are given superficial personalities and motives, and worse - none of them match what early Bleach episodes suggested the Quincy were like.

The Quincy could have been a vengeful squad of spirit archers with a righteous claim to exist and fight in the world. But instead, they became one-trick villains who appeared just for the sake of keeping the story going.

KEEP READING: Bleach: The Zanpakuto's Bankai Forms, Explained