Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

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Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby Yrael » Wed Mar 19, 2008 9:33 pm

***Spoilers ahead - if you're only watching the anime, I'd highly recommend not reading further.***

Dumbledork wrote:If you like Naruto I strongly advise you to stop reading after the Sasuke retrieval mission. You'll be disappointed. Plotholes galore, Naruto is being nerfed spectacularly while Sasuke is becoming God. Sometimes I wonder if Kishimato has been replaced by Toriyama. I got the impression of reading Dragon Ball Z. Ridiculous powerups, unbelievable techniques, the artwork is going down the drain,and you can practically see that Kishimoto himself wants to kill the series.


I was skimming through one of the other threads when this caught my eye. It's been bothering me for some time, but Dumble seems to have put the gist of it into his comment above.

If you've been following the mana, you probably know what I mean. At this point, I'm really, REALLY tired of watching Sasuke pull technique after technique out his ass, then turning on god-mode (aka Sharingan) if that doesn't work.

Meanwhile, we have the person who's supposed to be the focus of the manga, who after THREE years of studying under one of the supposedly legendary Sannin seems to have not learned a damned thing. He's basically cleaned up his act and refined most of his core skills, but I swear if I never see him open up another bloody fight with the kage bunshin technique it'll be too soon.

I mean, we have the Uchia kid and Kakashi pulling out all kinds of crazy shit (I can make blackholes by staring at you, mothafukka!), and what does Naruto get? A level 2 version of the rasengan. Le sigh.

Maybe Dumble's right - maybe he really is trying to kill the series. At least then the pain would be over. :)

/rant_mode_off
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Postby Comartemis » Wed Mar 19, 2008 9:40 pm

Meanwhile, we have the person who's supposed to be the focus of the manga, who after THREE years of studying under one of the supposedly legendary Sannin seems to have not learned a damned thing. He's basically cleaned up his act and refined most of his core skills, but I swear if I never see him open up another bloody fight with the kage bunshin technique it'll be too soon.

That's what Legacy of the Rasengan is for, Yrael. :P
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Postby claymade » Wed Mar 19, 2008 11:06 pm

I've heard this complaint before. But to be perfectly honest (having now caught up on the manga) I can't really see it. Sure, Sasuke is being built up. It's called pumping up the antagonist. I mean, really, think of all the glacier-sized pieces of foreshadowing that Kishimoto has dropped to the effect that Naruto is in fact going to kick Sasuke's ass sooner or later.

(And that's not even getting into the whole "chosen one, initiator of a new era for the whole freakin' world" aspect to Naruto. Or the fact that Naruto's implied final endboss is being foreshadowed as uber on a scale far beyond anything yet seen.)

No, I'm perfectly fine with letting Sasuke have his time in the limelight--for as long as it lasts.

Heck, what annoys me is the manga that don't do what Kishimoto's doing right now. Like Rurouni Kenshin--where the author was so committed to the main character's deification that in the vast majority of the fights, the only attempted tension was created by just loading Kenshin down with handicap after handicap after handicap. Which got exceedingly lame after a while.

The antagonists are exactly the ones that should be made imposing over and against the underdog heroes. For my money, give me a Naruto over a Kenshin any day.
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Postby Yrael » Thu Mar 20, 2008 12:04 am

Oh, don't get me wrong. I definitely don't want Naruto to turn into one of those fanfictions where Naruto goes super sayajin and kills Kami Sama and everything in between. But I'm just tired of the story being little more than a posterboard for K's fishnet and eye fetishes.

Give the main character some bloody development - he's only slightly less obnoxious and slightly more rounded as a ninja than he was before the training trip. Quite having every overpowered technique be eye-based. Give our so-called antagonist (Sasuke) more than two dimensions (asshole and avenger, I haven't seen anything else at this point).

And for the love of god, either have Kabuto killed, or start developing his story more if you're going to insist on keeping him around to lick Orochoimaru's ass every time he gets a booboo. It's been 400 bloody chapters and we still don't know a thing about the guy.
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Re: Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby Jupiah » Thu Mar 20, 2008 4:10 am

Yrael wrote:I mean, we have the Uchia kid and Kakashi pulling out all kinds of crazy shit (I can make blackholes by staring at you, mothafukka!), and what does Naruto get? A level 2 version of the rasengan. Le sigh.

Yeah, that whole Kakashi creating blackholes with his eye thing was bullshit. How the hell did he develop a Mangekyo Sharingan anyway?

Also, didn't Naruto gain a lot of control over the Kyuubi's chakra during that training trip? That fight with Orochimaru was pretty wicked (although I think it's frankly bull that Orochimaru could actually hold his own against the freakin' Kryuubi).
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Postby KonokoHasano » Thu Mar 20, 2008 4:15 am

Also, didn't Naruto gain a lot of control over the Kyuubi's chakra during that training trip? That fight with Orochimaru was pretty wicked (although I think it's frankly bull that Orochimaru could actually hold his own against the freakin' Kryuubi).

Utilizing the Kyuubi chakra is apparently harming him in some way.

The question is, did they actually train in anything OTHER than Kyuubi chakra for that time-skip? :?
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Postby Dumbledork » Thu Mar 20, 2008 4:24 am

A lot of virtual ink has been wasted on dicsussing the lates chapters of Naruto at the Fanfiction Forum (and I still read the latest post every day) and I'd recommend reading thoseposts as about everything bad about Naruto has already been mentioned there ^_^
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Postby Yrael » Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:34 pm

Dumbledork wrote:A lot of virtual ink has been wasted on dicsussing the lates chapters of Naruto at the Fanfiction Forum (and I still read the latest post every day) and I'd recommend reading thoseposts as about everything bad about Naruto has already been mentioned there ^_^


Uhh....I'll pass, thanks. The FF.net forums are a cesspool where sanity goes to die.

The reason I posted this here instead of there is that I prefer intelligent discussion. :)
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Postby Rei-chan » Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:56 pm

Honestly I think the fight between Sasuke and his brother was cute and finally someone explained that there was a third of what should be a trio of techniques through the Sharingan. Calling that thing god mode is like saying Blue Mages are the most powerful magicians in an FF game, its handy but hardly unbeatable by any convention. I will however admit that I'm a bit disappointed because I want to see the fall out of the perv's death as well as seeing if Tobi is Obito or not. As for the series final antagonist, it will still probably be Orochimaru in the end through some means or other. That guy seems fairly adept at consuming and overwhelming any thing he can so Kabuto probably won't stay Kabuto for long. In the end the story will go through the same repeating cycle the series seems fond of, he'll have enough peace to have a kid and then Orochi will strike killing him while being taken out at the same time. About as predictable as Harry Potter was in the end.
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Re: Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby claymade » Thu Mar 20, 2008 7:55 pm

Yrael wrote:Oh, don't get me wrong. I definitely don't want Naruto to turn into one of those fanfictions where Naruto goes super sayajin and kills Kami Sama and everything in between. But I'm just tired of the story being little more than a posterboard for K's fishnet and eye fetishes.

For all that he's criticized for loving the Sharingan so much, I don't find it all that much the case in what I actually read. Certainly, between the Sharingan-wielding Kakashi and the shadow-wielding Shikamaru, I know which one seemed to me to come out of their recent cooperation more drenched in pure awesome. The moment where it's revealed just how thoroughly Shikamaru's plan has owned the two Akatsuki--saving Kakashi's neck in the process--has to be one of the most beautiful in the whole series.

Give the main character some bloody development - he's only slightly less obnoxious and slightly more rounded as a ninja than he was before the training trip.

Considering that he's gone, over the course of the series, from a bumbling blowhard who freezes up at the first sign of some enemy chunin, to a seasoned veteran who can calmly go toe-to-toe with an S-class ninja, I think he's entitled to a little slack.

One of the best things about his character development, IMHO, is that it is so very gradual--you seldom even notice it happening, with few of the "180-degree" turns that pass for character development in a lot of other stories. Everything goes bit by bit, inch by inch, naturally--and then suddenly you're at chapter 400, looking back at chapter one and saying "holy crap, is this even the same guy?"

Especially when you consider that the finale is apparently still a ways off, I can't fault Kishimoto for taking it slow--not if he wants to continue developing him 'till the end. He's already brought him a long way, and really, I don't want Naruto to completely shuck his idiosyncrasies for some kind of generically bland Jedi-warrior-sage mentality, 'cause they're part of what make him interesting and fun.

Give our so-called antagonist (Sasuke) more than two dimensions (asshole and avenger, I haven't seen anything else at this point).

Besides "asshole" and "avenger" there's also clearly "friend" buried deep in there somewhere--and I, at least find the dynamic pretty interesting. The part of him that would have given up his vengeance in order to stall Gaara so that Naruto and Sakura could have fled. The part that didn't let him kill Naruto. The part that still makes him hold onto some remnants of Leaf ideals even now.

Jupiah wrote:Yeah, that whole Kakashi creating blackholes with his eye thing was bullshit. How the hell did he develop a Mangekyo Sharingan anyway?

The generally accepted rule is that you need to have killed your best friend in order to possess the Mangekyo. I'd say Kakashi fulfills that without too much trouble--for all that it was indirect, and somewhat retroactive. He, at least, seems to view it in that light--and really, that may be all that's needed.
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Postby Siden » Thu Mar 20, 2008 8:25 pm

I can understand building up the antangonist, it is the only way to make them more than a monster-of-the-week really, but since Sasuke does not appear to be that antagonist and instead appears to be just a stepping stone or diversion, then why the heck are we wasting so much time on him? Hell, Naruto couldn't beat him without going Kyuubi before the time skip, so why the hell does he need to be so much stronger now? What purpose does pumping him up so much serve? Because Kishimoto has a Sharingan fetish and apparently took lessons from Toriyama's School of Character Non-Developement? And has now run out of ideas so he has to resort to the old routine of blowing crap up and handing out stupid-pills and power-ups?

Develope and expand upon some of the other cast members instead of Sasuke and Kakashi, and stop with the ridiculous techniques and show us some real fighting, then I'll be happy. They're supposed to be ninjas for crying out loud, not super-powered aliens that blow up moons and stuff. Though I will support claymade in that there has been some gradual but significant developement with Naruto himself, and Sakura at least seems to have stopped being a waste of ink, the rest of the characters don't seem to have changed much or at all.

And please don't get started on the Kyuubi power nonsense. If you have to pull out the "hidden power" trick just to accomplish anything, it stinks of bad writing. Now if it only came out in the "OMFGWe'reGonnaDie!" moments then I'd be a little more tolerable of it, but Naruto has had to use it in nearly every damn fight to win. (Haku? check. Neji? check. Gaara? check. Sound-Five/Sasuke? check. etc.)
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Re: Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby Yrael » Thu Mar 20, 2008 10:21 pm

claymade wrote:For all that he's criticized for loving the Sharingan so much, I don't find it all that much the case in what I actually read. Certainly, between the Sharingan-wielding Kakashi and the shadow-wielding Shikamaru, I know which one seemed to me to come out of their recent cooperation more drenched in pure awesome. The moment where it's revealed just how thoroughly Shikamaru's plan has owned the two Akatsuki--saving Kakashi's neck in the process--has to be one of the most beautiful in the whole series.


For what it's worth, I wasn't referring solely to the Sharingan when it comes to Kishimoto's eye fetish. The majority of the major players have some sort of eye freakiness going on. You have the Sharingan, the M-Sharingan, Orochoi's freaky snake eyes, the Byakugan, Pein's swirly eye deal who Jirayiya spoke as though were the eyes of God himself, heck, even Naruto's eyes go all fox red when he goes Kyuubi, and the same with Gaara.

Sidan wrote:And please don't get started on the Kyuubi power nonsense. If you have to pull out the "hidden power" trick just to accomplish anything, it stinks of bad writing. Now if it only came out in the "OMFGWe'reGonnaDie!" moments then I'd be a little more tolerable of it, but Naruto has had to use it in nearly every damn fight to win. (Haku? check. Neji? check. Gaara? check. Sound-Five/Sasuke? check. etc.)


That's more or less my biggest beef with Naruto's progression. Throughout the entire manga, there are on a very few instances where Naruto does anything worthwhile or shows any amount of Ninja skill that doesn't involve him going apeshit with the Kyuubi. Even at the Valley of the End, Sasuke was dancing circles around him until he started pulling on the fox's chakra.
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Postby Nekomata-sensei » Thu Mar 20, 2008 11:13 pm

Well, they do say the eyes are the window to the soul. Although in Naruto or Garra's cases not neccesarily their own souls.

Personally, I have liked the direction Naruto manga has been going. And I think it make sense.

One thing people seem to not think about so much is just how far behind Naruto was before the timeskip, he either couldn't read, or was incredibly poor at it, his handwriting was horrible, his taijutsu little more than brawling with some advanced ninja moves sloppily thrown in relying more on Naruto's prodigious strength, stamina, and reflexes than any sort of fighting form, and he generally lacked the grounding in the basics to give him the room to properly advance and utilize his skills.

After the time skip he demonstrates plenty of competence in taijutsu, he seems to be better at it than Sakura, if worse than Sai, he's still good enough that the gap in their power wasn't enough for Tenzou to tell them apart when Naruto made a fake Sai clone until he started using Rasengan.

On top of this, he seems to not only know how to read, but can read adult level literature and if not like it, still understand it, and write nicely enough to make likely delicate things such as seals.

It has been implied that he might possess more Toad summonning related techniques as Jiraiya was sending toads to Naruto.

Also, Naruto has developed enough skill in stealth and strategy to outmanuver Akatsuki's most likely most experienced member, and defeat him with a close range technique that is highly difficult to pull off. Ninja combat is laregly based in these sorts of diversions and stealth use, making Naruto a master in the area ninja most excel at, even Sasuke fights Itachi this way in the current arc.

The key factor to remember is that as powerful as you can get, in Naruto, people don't really get that much tougher. In DBZ there is a need to create more and more powerfull attacks because the enemies become insanely more resilient. In Naruto, even Akatsuki members could be crippled by a well placed exploding tag that they don't notice, which is standard gear for even the lowest of genin. There are also artificial limits on a person's speed, after a certain point, you just don't get faster without the gates, or some sort of speed jutsu, which the existence of such things seems to be mimimal, because the body can only be trained so far. Naruto can break these limits with the Kyuubi's power, this is a wall not even the Sharingan can break now that Naruto is actually skilled at taijutsu, even Orochimaru didn't dare let Naruto get close enough to beat on him. The Wind Element added to rasengan essentially makes it an ultimate attack, you can't really make an attack stronger than the strongest manipulation with the strongest element for attack, there is no point to have any more powerful jutsu for attack now that Naruto has this technique, and defense is largely provided by stealth, speed, regeneration, and shadow clones. Plus, by not utilizing all sorts of high level ninjutsu, Naruto extends his ridiculous stamina, and can wear down even the strongest of ninja if he can survive long enough, and he can no longer be defeated by simple tricks like being more skilled or experienced so that people can grab him or smack him around despite his superior strength and speed, or defeat scores of his clones at a time with anything but wide area ninjutsu.

Naruto's only weakness is currently genjutsu, but as Sasuke, someone who has obviously now mastered genjutsu, is his a soon to be faced major enemy, or at least seems to be so, it is likely that Naruto will soon end that weakness, and become a real S-class ninja.

Plus Naruto has discovered his own version of shortcut/powerup style, with Kage Bunshin learning, to counteract the sharingan, and learn a ton of techniques and master them in a short while.

Even so, it's better to have a good grounding in the basics and a pocket full of ace techniques to pull out against foes that the normal stuff doesn't work on, than 1000 techniques which are mostly redundancies. Kakashi was well on his was to becoming a S-class ninja, allready a jounin, before getting his sharingan, afterwards, he got kind of lazy it seems and became the copy nin whose weakness was stamina and plain old taijutsu, some sort of incredible one hit wonder who wears himself out in a single battle in which his performance is questionable, given his previous talent levels and how much time has passed, it's like he hasn't really progressed since he got the sharingan and first used the chidori with it, except to a limited degree thanks to pure experience, and his regular, seemingly forced battles with Gai, when Kakashi might have once had the potential to have been sannin level by the time Naruto entered the academy, given his own and his father's reputation, and who his teacher was. Intead he became the master of half-copied fighting styles and last-ditch risky assasin moves.

Sasuke and Itachi both seem to have very strict limits to their chakra, much like Kakashi, and they both waste it with overly flashy techniques and contests of their limited power, and all or nothing strategies, Sasuke showing only slightly more wisdom in his strategies, and specific counters which use more energy than the technique they are countering half the time.

While they are capable of wide scale destruction, it's about as much as Naruto could do by going Kyuubi or summoning Gamabunta or a huge throng of clones which all throw a collection of exploding tags, likely for much less of Naruto's overall power. As his foe is not indestructible, and Naruto at some points might as well be, and is skilled enough to avoid all sorts of certain death, Naruto will win if his foe can't stop him from closing and finishing them off, or trap him in a genjutsu.

Personally, I don't think Sasuke was powered up as much as the whiners believe, and Naruto was powered up much more than it seems. All things considered, Sasuke's growth, due to chakra limits, seems to be linear, even if a steep incline due to the Sharingan, Naruto's on the other hand, seems exponential, and they aren't really that far apart if you negate the genjutsu factor, which Naruto allready knows some strategies against.

Sasuke's powerup was to put him at S-level, and was acheived with a bunch of cheap powerups, like the cursed seal and white snake power and drugs and rituals, Naruto on the other hand naturally grew into S-class level, just by filling in the weak areas of his basic skills that should have been learned in the academy.

Also, Naruto is implied several times to have more new jutsu than have been displayed, such as his conversation with Konohamaru about new perverted jutsu, or Jiraiya's conversation with the seal frog, and Jiraiya's comments on Naruto's progress and Jiraiya's personal displayed power and skill.

I think a lot of the arguments going around are un-grounded, Sasuke looks cool in a flasy, fanboy sort of way, but Naruto is the one with the winning abilities.
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Re: Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby Shadell » Thu Mar 20, 2008 11:36 pm

Yrael wrote:For what it's worth, I wasn't referring solely to the Sharingan when it comes to Kishimoto's eye fetish. The majority of the major players have some sort of eye freakiness going on. You have the Sharingan, the M-Sharingan, Orochoi's freaky snake eyes, the Byakugan, Pein's swirly eye deal who Jirayiya spoke as though were the eyes of God himself, heck, even Naruto's eyes go all fox red when he goes Kyuubi, and the same with Gaara.


I'd like to point out that a large number of manga place a large value on eyes or eye techniques. I think its something more unique to Japan then Kishimoto. Besides, half of those you listed are aesthetic only. Would you rather everyone had identical looking faces?

That's more or less my biggest beef with Naruto's progression. Throughout the entire manga, there are on a very few instances where Naruto does anything worthwhile or shows any amount of Ninja skill that doesn't involve him going apeshit with the Kyuubi. Even at the Valley of the End, Sasuke was dancing circles around him until he started pulling on the fox's chakra.


Plenty of events exist. First chapter against Mizuki, First fight with Zabuza, beating Kabuto with Rasengan, first using the Rasenshuriken, etc.

Besides, the fox's chakra is Naruto's trump card. Would you complain about Gaara using his sand all the time, Sasuke pulling out sharingan, Negi using byakugan or Rock Lee relying on the Gates if he got into an intense fight. Kyuubi chakra tends to work, so why logically would Naruto stop using it.

Seriously, unlike most fanfiction that power up characters, very few Ninja in the series use 80,000 different techniques from all five elements. Kakashi is quite possibly the only character we've seen use more then 2. Hell, being able to use all five elements would make someone a genius. Using two is one of the major qualifications to become a jounin.

Yet so many fanfics make it out like the only way to get stronger is to learn massive amounts of jutsu with no common theme or strategy. Naruto improved upon his tactics during the time skip. He's become far more tricky in using his kage bunshin, and *gasp* he's gotten more in touch with his strongest possible weapon, the fox's chakra. He certainly shouldn't use that or anything.

The bottom line is, most characters in Naruto use a very limited selection of attacks. (Naruto is actually on the upper end of the diversity scale since he has Kage Bunshin, Rasengan, Summoning, and Kyuubi chakra to fall back on.)

Even ignoring all that, the manga has created a valid reason to have Naruto move away from using the Kyuubi chakra to insta-win every fight against people far more experienced and stronger then himself,

Develope and expand upon some of the other cast members instead of Sasuke and Kakashi, and stop with the ridiculous techniques and show us some real fighting, then I'll be happy. They're supposed to be ninjas for crying out loud, not super-powered aliens that blow up moons and stuff. Though I will support claymade in that there has been some gradual but significant developement with Naruto himself, and Sakura at least seems to have stopped being a waste of ink, the rest of the characters don't seem to have changed much or at all.


Most of the story arcs focus on main characters. Naruto is fundamentally about team 7, the cast of the show is huge, and quite frankly Kakashi's gotten a less time and development post time-skip then even Shikamaru. (At least in the manga, I don't watch the anime.)

At the moment Sasuke is Naruto's goal. He's being built up as a contrast to Naruto because the two are rivals and will likely remain so. The current story arc (Making Hebi through Itachi fight) is the first real time we've had any prolonged sight of the character since the time jump.

A huge number of series have long story arcs that don't feature the main character at all, (Vagabond for example). Furthermore, the plot require Sasuke to act eventually. (Or would you rather just have someone make a side comment, oh yeah Sasuke apparently killed Itachi, no big deal, not like they've been foreshadowing that fight since chapter 3/4 or anything.)
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Re: Naruto Manga Progression *Spoilers!*

Postby Siden » Fri Mar 21, 2008 1:29 am

Shadell wrote:Besides, the fox's chakra is Naruto's trump card. Would you complain about Gaara using his sand all the time, Sasuke pulling out sharingan, Negi using byakugan or Rock Lee relying on the Gates if he got into an intense fight. Kyuubi chakra tends to work, so why logically would Naruto stop using it. Seriously, unlike most fanfiction that power up characters, very few Ninja in the series use 80,000 different techniques from all five elements. Kakashi is quite possibly the only character we've seen use more then 2. Hell, being able to use all five elements would make someone a genius. Using two is one of the major qualifications to become a jounin.

Oh don't get me wrong, I honestly think sometimes that there are too many different techniques already. And yes, I would complain about Gaara's sand or Rock using the gates, but that is more personal oppinion than any real definitive flaw of the series. At first I loved the series, and accepted the Kyuubi chakra as a useable and acceptable plot device. Even the Sharingan didn't bother me at first, cause just looking at the Wave arc showed the limitations of it and really kept it in check against the only other two "super-powers" at the time (Kyuubi-chakra; Haku's ice powers). The came the Chunin exams and a whole slew of new "super-powers", starting the slide into the realm of gimick driven combat. I was relieved see Tenten, Rock, Kankuro, and Temari in action, cause here was a group that were unique without having "super-powers". Each specialized in something that any other cast member could learn, but had trained in it to such a degree that they were in a league of their own. Zabuza and Kabuto are among my favourites of the villians for the same reason.


Most of the story arcs focus on main characters. Naruto is fundamentally about team 7, the cast of the show is huge, and quite frankly Kakashi's gotten a less time and development post time-skip then even Shikamaru. (At least in the manga, I don't watch the anime.)
At the moment Sasuke is Naruto's goal. He's being built up as a contrast to Naruto because the two are rivals and will likely remain so. The current story arc (Making Hebi through Itachi fight) is the first real time we've had any prolonged sight of the character since the time jump.

Develope the whole cast? No no no, that would be insane to attempt. But the author could have used those 400 chapters to better develope the main characters and to at least flesh out/develope some of the secondary cast (secondary cast = supporting / antagonist characters: Sannin, Akatsuki members, ect.). Trying to do anthing with the tertiary or quartiary cast (other teams, random characters) would be something best done in supplemental materials like sourcebooks or short-stories.

Furthermore, I'm not saying that there has not been lots of developement in the main cast, but it feels like it is a lot less than there is when you look at how many chapters were wasted on drawn out scenes and diologue that turned out to be useless later on. Eg: ~23 pages of the Naruto/Neji fight in volume 12 are backstory for Neji or dialogue not directly related to their fight. Interesting material, and it fleshed out the Hyuuga clan and Neji's backgrounds. But why all that space used for an issue that is resolved right away, and for a character who does not get anymore on-screne developement or exploration? Why not use that space on the characters that actually affect the plot, as opposed to those that exist to be used by the plot / as plot devices.

On Sasuke remaining Naruto's rival: I really hope that is not the case. For dramatic purposes, the best way to deal with Sasuke is to either go for the "redemption and sacrifice" route, or have him and Naruto go at it in one final brawl. I really hope they don't pull a fanfiction manoeuver and let him come back to the Leaf or something. Traitors are hunted down and executed, not allowed to return like shit never happened. Heck, that would be a great dramatic moment: Naruto fights against doing his duty or following his heart. Both options having bad consiquences.
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