Urahara look(s) like some supercharged amalgam of every premodern fictional detective, an effect only magnified by the feeling that in this scene, we're looking at Bleach's own Holmes, Watson and Moriarty meeting as the people they'll eventually become for the very first time.
There's still room for an unpleasant spin on that relationship, as there may be a few gambits that have yet to play out... particularly concerning the perpetually problematic Mayuri.
My working theory at the moment runs like this:
At an undisclosed point in the past Urahara begins to develop the Hougyoku. He creates prototypes but realises that they are extremely unpredictable and dangerous after testing it on himself (in much the same way that he tested the bankai in three days technique on himself).
He and Yoruichi (and possibly Tessai) aren't happy with the status quo in Soul Society and have been amassing power in order to bring about reforms. One of the most recent steps in that strategy is to have Urahara become captain of the twelfth, which gives him the position, resources and budget to press many of his experiments further... including the Hollowfication technique. Perhaps this is another part of the power they were amassing, possibly with the intention of taking on the King himself if necessary
However, he cannot test it on humans souls in Soul Society or Shinigami. This is for two reasons. Firstly, it's dirty work, and Urahara gets other people to do his dirty work for him. By manipulating someone else into doing it he shields himself from the full moral weight, because it's not like he did it with his own two hands. Urahara either accepts that about himself or is deceiving himself about his own motivations. By getting someone else to do it he also creates a scapegoat, a fall guy, someone to distance himself from should the testing be discovered.
Enter Mayuri. A perfect candidate. Mayuri isn't half the scientist that Urahara is (recall the times when he refers to Urahara pulling off what he cannot) but he has no moral compunctions about testing on people (which we've seen before with the Quincy) and also has a proven track record of villainy, or at least rank undesirability (otherwise he wouldn't have been in the Maggots Nest). Kurotsuchi can easily be led to believe that he has gained the upper hand by *discovering* Urahara's most secret research (this was also his goal with Szayel, remember) and seeking to trump his CO as both a scientist (by perfecting the Hougyoku first) and by revealing Urahara's plans to Soul Society (thereby appearing to be the good guy and deposing his Captain). All Urahara has to do is keep that risk contained in order to eventually scapegoat him, using his practised bumbling idiot persona to convince everyone that he really thought that he was just being a decent humanitarian by giving Kurotsuchi a second chance.
However Urahara makes one massive tactical miscalculation. He assumes that Mayuri is easily to control because he is contained. Everyone hates and distrusts him, and he is so misanthropic that he hates and mistrusts everyone else. He assumes that Mayuri will have no choice but to work alone to achieve his goals, and completely disregards the possibility that there might be an even more horrific monster lurking in Seireitei.
Enter Aizen. Mayuri chooses the longer game of delaying his own immediate gratification if he can be much more certain of swinging the finger of blame back onto his own Captain, and he needs to appear to be morally spotless in order to pull that off. He allows Aizen to take the risks for him because Aizen is much more capable of covert operations. Either Mayuri is in the dark about Aizen's long term goals or he is fully clued up and as equal a partner as Gin and Tousen.
On which note, let's consider Tousen's stated motivation, which he says is also true of helping Aizen: "What these blind eyes see is the path of least bloodshed." As I recall that has been used time and again to justify dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that the consequences of that action were not as dire as the alternative because it would be an effective deterrant to further war. That's why both sides in WWII were seeking to split the atom... and what if the same thing is happening here? That there is a race to depose the King, with Aizen, Tousen and Gin on the one side and Urahara, Yoruichi and Tessai on the other. Perhaps Tousen thinks that the opponents intend to achieve it by weight of numbers and diversity of skills alone (three entire divisions, strong allies plus complete control of the Special Forces, R&D Department and Kidou Corps), which he believes will be a bloodbath that the Hougyoku can avert. In effect, Tousen believes that attaining Hollowfication will bring enough power to the table to prevent a full scale civil war.
It's going to be interesting to see exactly how far wrong I am in this assessment, but to the best of my knowledge it fits all the available facts... but of course that's assuming that we have everything we need in order to make the assessment. |
