Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-10797017-20130624101208/@comment-11051098-20130708140704

Speaking of filling empty Captain positions - there's been some strange things going on there for like 110 years.

The Squad 10 captain was killed before the "Turn Back The Pendulum" mini-arc, and apparently that position was open for several years. And the Squad 3, 5 and 9 captain positions were open for quite some time before Rose, Shinji and Kensei were allowed to come back to the SS and got their old positions back.

Yet, they quickly searched for a new Squad 12 captain after Kirio Hikifune was promoted to the RG. As we all know, Urahara was promoted to this position after passing the exam.

It's a logic in this which I don't see. Depending on how early Urahara achieved Bankai through the 3 day method he developed, he could have been promoted to Squad 10 captain long before Kirio was promoted, and that position wouldn't have needed to be vacant for so long.

The vacancy after Aizen and co. defected could have it's reason, apparently there was no one at captain level who could fill those positions.