Naruto

Hello everyone Justin here and welcome to another edition of the Otaku Corner where we talk about anime and manga related topics and anything else that gets my interest. Today we’re talking about Naruto. As I’m sure all of you know by now the manga officially came to an end last week making Naruto the first of the Big 3 to end. I gotta say I’m quite surprise I always thought Bleach would end first followed by Naruto and then 10 years later One Piece would end. But it’s probably for the best that Naruto ended first as we could all tell the author was running out of ideas so for this Otaku Corner I’m going to give my final thoughts on the Naruto series.

Now this is a very big and long manga and there’s a lot to cover so I’m gonna do my best to keep my thoughts short and to the point. Overall I thought Naruto was a good manga with good characters, stories, morals and themes although it did have a few hiccups as the series went on. I did like the transformation in the character of Naruto went through. He started off as this troublemaker always causing trouble to get the attention of others to let everyone know that I exist please pay attention to me. I thought that was understandable, I remember getting into trouble myself a few times just to get the attention of others whenever I felt I was being ignored or overlooked but I never went to the lengths Naruto went through. But as time went on and Naruto matured he stopped the pranks and soon enough became a well-respected ninja of his village whose still an idiot but a guy who has a strong belief in helping others and doing good. The only problem I have with this character is his jutsu sucks. His jutsu is so repetitive and simplistic that there were times where I asked myself how does this guy keep winning? He pretty much does the same thing over and over in each fight. Shadow clones and rasegan. Even when he masters how to use the fox’s chakra his fighting style doesn’t change. Get a little more variety in your fighting style man, if a ninja were to take the time to just study his movements and attack patterns he be screwed big time. Another problem I have with Naruto’s character is how he always related every situation no matter what to him always being alone until one day finding a friend. It got corny really quickly and annoying. I get it, the character was left alone for no good reason, you don’t have to keep reminding me this. Sasuke can be seen as the anti-hero of this series. Naruto’s best friend and vice-versa Sasuke is a man driven by vengeance and the power of being emo. Despite Sasuke’s anger and need for revenge being reasonable he made a lot and I mean a lot of dumb and emo choices that made me want to see this guy die a couple of times in the past. Especially at the end with his whole idea of Hokage and being the necessary evil to unite the world. It honestly sounded like he was ripping off Lelouch from Code Geass but the difference is Lelouch’s plan made sense and worked in the end. All I was thinking about when he talked about his ideal Hokage was dude will you stop being emo for one minute and just do the right thing. You got your revenge and uncover the truth about everything. Your clan was evil and your brother accepted the burden and killed everyone in his clan keeping you alive. Which looking back on all of it he really should have told Sasuke the truth from the get go which would have saved us a lot of time and pages from seeing Sasuke being all emo and stupid. Still though I did like Sasuke’s fighting style and he was probably the best fighter in the series.

Sakura, the most worthless female character I have ever seen. I’m serious this girl annoyed me to no end and was a completely pointless character. She contributes nothing to team, all she does is just cry and beat up Naruto whenever he does something stupid. Even when she learns to heal people and gets super human strength she still remains to be a worthless character who contributes nothing to the series. Oh yeah she heals people but that’s it and when she’s not healing people she’s either beating up Naruto or whining about how much she misses Sasuke. Which leads to this question, why the hell does she like him? Think about it, she never gives a solid reason as to why she likes Sasuke. The guy pretty much treats her as an annoyance and even tries to kill her a few times throughout the series so why does she like him? The answer is quite simple, you like him because every other girl likes him. You’re afraid that if you don’t like him you’ll be seen as an outcast and left alone so you create this illusion in your head that Sasuke is your dream guy and ignore all of his faults and the way he treats you. It’s because of this I never supported this couple. If she would have given a solid reason or we saw a flashback of the two interacting and actually having a bit of chemistry than I be totally okay with this couple but we never get that making this couple totally pointless. The rest of the characters are either good or I didn’t really care for them all that much. However, the three characters I liked the most were Kakashi, Shikamaru, and Hinata. Kakashi because he’s just a cool badass teacher who cares about his students and recognizes the many mistakes he’s made in the past but still presses on and does his best to learn from them while still teaching his students his mistakes and even learning a little something from them in the process. Shikamaru was probably the best supporting character. I like how he’s not the strongest or fastest in the group but instead the smartest person in the group who relies on his strategies and clever thinking to defeat his opponents and come out on top. His fights were always the ones I enjoyed reading and seeing how he adapted and read the situation was always cool to see. Honestly if he wasn’t such a lazy bum I think he would have made a better Hokage over Naruto. Finally, Hinata, best female in the series and the one character who even Kishimoto himself admitted should have been the leading lady of the manga. That tells you how useless Sakura is in the series, when even the author of the series wishes he replaced the current female lead with another female lead you know he made a huge mistake. Hinata was just amazing, she had a very sad backstory where everyone even her father gave up on her except for Naruto who never lost faith in her and cheered her on. That’s a couple I can support. Okay, yes it’s small romantic development between the two characters but still it’s a good bases for them to develop a relationship and it gives Hinata a reason to like Naruto. Hinata was that girl you always wanted to cheer for and hoped succeeded in her dreams at the end of the series. Plus she’s just so cute and pretty. Another great character was Jiraiya who served as the father figure for Naruto as well as mentor. He was funny, perverted, and I thought he and Tsunade would have made a good couple. For me his death was the saddest moment in the manga because of how much he meant to Naruto and Tsunade. It was like they both lost something important and valuable to them. Naruto lost his father figure and Tsunade lost not only her oldest friend but the last person who would probably marry her.

Storywise the manga was good I liked how the first arcs introduced us to the characters and showed off the fighting in the series. The first part of the manga served as a setup for the events to come letting us know these are our characters, this is what makes them tick, and this is what they’re like. The second half is where shit got real although I will admit Naruto learned nothing during the 2 year time skip. I was hoping that during the time skip Jiraiya would teach Naruto how to use the powers of Kurama or better yet control him but instead he just learned how to make the rasegan bigger. What were you doing during those two years!? Hell, Sakura learned more than him during the 2 year time skip. I also liked how the second half expanded on the ninja world showing us the various villages and leaders and of course the Pain arc was hands down the best arc in the series and was the highest point in the series. After that arc the series did start going downhill. At first it was promising with the war and stuff but it kept getting sidetracked with pointless back stories, the revival of characters who didn’t need to be revived, and Kishimoto just writing himself into a wall by bringing in Kaguya when the main villain should have stayed as Madara. Seriously you had a good setup with Madara and everything and yet he screwed it up by bring in Kaguya who’s appearance was completely random, made no sense whatsoever, and lasted way too long. I’m still confused on how they managed to beat her and honestly didn’t care about her part of the story. Luckily, Kishimoto bought it back around near the end by having Naruto and Sasuke finally settle their differences and become friends once again resolving everything and leading to the final chapter which I have to admit felt rushed. We see a lot of things and get a lot of information thrown at us and all I’m thinking is slow down let me savor this moment. Pretty much everything we wanted to happen in the end happened. Naruto and Hinata get together and have 2 children (thank you Kishimoto), Sasuke and Sakura get together and have a girl who might have a crush on Naruto’s son, Shikamaru and Tenri get together and I’m just gonna say it this was my second favorite couple in the series. These two are just perfect for each other. Naruto becomes Hokage and a lot of other stuff you wanted to see happens in this final chapter but like I said before he rushes through all of it and doesn’t give us time to let it all sink in. But despite all of this I felt the series ended on a good note and I like the shout out Kishimoto did to One Piece on the last page as if to say he wishes Oda the best of luck in the future and that he respects him.

So overall I thought Naruto was a great manga. The manga did have problems with characters making dumb choices, a lot of talking when there should have been action, a few things that weren’t explain fully, and plotholes here and there that really bought down the series. But despite all these problems one can’t deny that Naruto was still a great manga to read entertaining us for 15 years and for a lot of people was their doorway to anime and manga. While I still prefer One Piece over Naruto I won’t deny how good and important the series of Naruto was to the manga industry and will miss it dearly. I have heard there’s going to be a spin-off of the series coming in 2015 which will focus on the children of Naruto and the others so I look forward to seeing what they do with them. Now the real question is now that Naruto is over who’s going to replace it in the Big 3? My initial thought was Fairy Tail but after thinking it over and hearing what other people have said I think a lot of other mangas can replace Naruto in the Big 3 like Magi, Hunter x Hunter, Nisekoi, Toriko, Shokugeki no Soma (which is a surprisingly engaging read. I didn’t think I would like this series all that much when I first started reading it but it’s great), Denpa Kyoushi, Attack on Titan, Akame Ga Kill has been great, and Nanatsu no Taizai is always fun to read. I would also like to throw in Highschool DxD but I think you’re better off reading the light novel and I would say Kuroko’s Basketball but I heard that was scheduled to end soon as well. Well whatever series replaces Naruto, that manga is gonna have a lot to live up to. In conclusion Naruto was a series that started off good, got a little rocky around the middle and near the end of the series, but ended on a good note and will be missed. Let me know what you guys thought about the series or which manga you think will replace Naruto in the Big 3. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.

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