Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-5405361-20130408110659/@comment-8488049-20130421070255

The "Darkness" is simply a color scheme Kubo used to reflect the corruption of the soul by his inner hollow, at least that's what I see, nothing special. I believe Ichigo was never truly meant to be a soul reaper, his quincy blood was constantly at war with his shinigami powers, hence his uncontrollable and sporadic reiatsu. Ginjo was also a substitute shinigami, does that mean his father was also a shinigami, I think not. As far as I'm concerned being a substitute shinigami is nothing special, you just have to have some amount of spiritual capability and have been granted the powers by a real shinigami, I'd say Ichigo just had more of an aptitude for it because of his father. I believe his quincy blood is why the Asauchi forsook him a few chapters ago, that is where his "true" powers lie and why Oetsu told Ichigo he isn't a shinigami. From the very beginning Ichigo was a quincy, at least this is my theory.

Note: I say this out of my professional opinion, personally I would love it if Ichigo went off and died in a corner somewhere.