Ryo Utagawa

Tall and lean, Utagawa wears his wavy reddish-brown hair arched at the front and parted into wing-like tufts above each ear. Maroon eyes sit beneath thin, flat brows, his cheekbones are pronounced, and a narrow goatee runs straight from his lip to the base of his chin, matched by a pointed tongue. He dresses the part of a gentleman in a black-lined purple vest, a dull green tie over a white shirt, brown slacks, and black shoes, keeping the golden pocket watch that is Fried's sealed form tucked in his breast pocket.

At heart Utagawa is a sociopath who sees humans as nothing but food, rating their souls by taste and feeling no guilt in consuming them. He plays the polite, concerned handler whenever sent to retrieve Yoshino Soma, but takes real pleasure in overpowering and tormenting her and the weak in general, favoring the most defenseless target in any group and defending it as sound tactics.

A veneer of class and courtesy holds only while he keeps the upper hand; the moment a fight turns against him or his amusement is spoiled, he lashes out. His deference to Kariya is pure calculation, a means of ingratiating himself while he quietly judges his master a lesser leader than himself. That arrogance and shortsightedness prove his undoing.

Dispatched to bring back the runaway Yoshino, Utagawa stalks Karakura Town feeding on souls and clashes with Ichigo Kurosaki and his friends, at one point seizing a hostage and forcing the powerless Uryu Ishida to trade places before brutalizing him for sport, until Yoshino intervenes. Sent after her again, he brushes off her warning that his ambition will destroy him and leads Kariya to the assembled Bount at their mansion.

When the group finally confronts Ichigo, Utagawa fights him on the clan's behalf, wielding his Doll, Fried, a large golden serpent that can turn any object he focuses on into a biting copy of itself and reshape into a whip, sword, or shield. During the duel he has Kariya seemingly surrender his Bount crest, then grabs it and moves to claim leadership, only to be humiliated when the crest proves a fake planted to expose him. Realizing he has been played, a panicking Utagawa is struck down by Maki Ichinose for his betrayal.