Currently Running Manga Discussion

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So now Naruto and Sasuke are the reincarnations of 2 legendary Shinobi, who were the sons of that 6-paths hermit or whatever, that we conveniently never heard about until now. What even is the point of this twist when there was no established importance on this backstory that Kishimoto just made up? How much more is he going to pull out of his ass before this is all done?

Seriously, shit like this really makes you appreciate mangaka like Fujimaki Tadatoshi. Yeah I went there. Compared to this shit, even the shitty parts of KnB somehow seem legitimately decent. At least Tadatoshi didn't pull out some crazy plot twist that there was some mastermind in the GOM that was never mentioned before and somehow forced the rest of the members to become complete assholes, and that he's the true final challenge and Akashi was just his puppet. I swear to god, if Kishimoto was writings KnB, that'd totally be a thing.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Well, actually the Sage of Six Paths had been brought up a few times throughout the series, since all the way back in the Hunt for Itachi arc. But the whole thing about his sons serves only to portray Naruto and Sasuke as fated rivals and the inheritors of a long-standing grudge that has existed all the way back since the beginning of the ninja world. Essentially, to show them as "messiah figures" who are now going to write all the wrongs of the past, a bullshit development serving to just to once again continue to beat the dead horse of how awesome Naruto and Sasuke are again and again.

Also, the flashback establishes Kaguya, so that Kishimoto could replace Madara with her to be the main villain of the series, because he realized Madara was so OP that he couldn't think of a way for the group to defeat him, whereas while Kaguya might technically be stronger, she could be defeated in an easier way. So...basically he wrote himself into a corner, and then tried to dig his way out in the stupidest manner possible. The entire twist also destroys the entire mythology of the series because it turns out the entire history of the Naruto universe was the result of an elaborate and needlessly complicated plan shaped by Black Zetsu for the sole reason of bringing his dead mommy Kaguya back to life. How anyone could possibly respect any part of the series after that development, I have absolutely no clue.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Well, actually the Sage of Six Paths had been brought up a few times throughout the series,

Somehow I knew you'd bring this up, CX, but read my post again very carefully. I was referring to his sons who had never been brought up before, not the sage himself.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Alright, so now Naruto is the child of prophecy? That's brilliant. Yet another thing that was never mentioned or hinted at anywhere in the series before. I suppose that Kishimoto just thinks that the word "prophecy" is enough to fool some 7-year olds who happen to read this manga that this was all somehow planned and is super amazing storytelling. God I hate this manga.

[Nel_Annette]

Did you get to Kaguya yet? I don't think you really care about spoilers anymore, so I'll just ask bluntly. 

Prophecies and reincarnation are dickbutt, but everything from the point of Kaguya entering as the main villain (and Black Zetsu's motivations) and just fucking gravy. Crusty, expired gravy.

You know, I've been thinking about it, and I think the last arc I legitimately enjoyed was Hidan and Kakuzu. In fact, I think the initial Akatsuki fights are the arcs I like most. Badass cloaks, each with a special power, they split up and throw down against whoever that arc is focusing on. Naruto being the one to beat him with such a shit move was when I started losing faith in the series personally. It was like a sign of all the shittiness afterward. Konan was the only female member, with that awesome paper power, but only got like one fight that she died in. Nagato's arc would have been cooler if it weren't for bringing everyone who died back at the end of the fucking thing. Deidara was my favorite one, and he wound up randomly deciding to fight Sasuke and fucking died killing himself, with Mr. Perfect getting out with barely a scratch. Fish guy... Kisame? Fish guy struck out on his own in some  "we're training on a turtle" arc and wound up beaten and killing himself... with sharks... ugh.

Maybe I'm just prone to liking groups like Akatsuki and Organization XIII in media, even when the writing's shitty. Badass uniforms and each member having a power that basically makes them a one-man army is always a concept I've liked, I just barely see it executed well.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Somehow....I am not the least bit surprised by that spoiler. It's like I've grown accustomed to Kishimoto's bullshit. In order to possibly surprise me anymore in no by significant ways, he's have to pull something so tremendously stupid that it defies any sense of anything whatsoever, like if it was revealed at the end that Sakura was really the big villain all along. He's literally sunk so low that he's have to pull that to possibly even go any lower.

[Spark Of Spirit]

If Sakura ended up being the main villain then at least she would serve a purpose in the story, even if it was ridiculous. This series has so many characters who might as well not even be there because they don't do anything at all.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

In general, too many characters is a bad idea for any series. If you have an over saturation of underdeveloped and underutilized characters, your story falls flat. The only 2 people who I have ever been known to be masterful at balancing out huge casts are Naoki Urasawa and George R. R. Martin, and even their stories can still suffer from too much going on sometimes.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Of course, we all know who the REALLY, REALLY, REAL main villain of Naruto is....

Spoiler

[close]

[Rynnec]

In general, too many characters is a bad idea for any series. If you have an over saturation of underdeveloped and underutilized characters, your story falls flat. The only 2 people who I have ever been known to be masterful at balancing out huge casts are Naoki Urasawa and George R. R. Martin, and even their stories can still suffer from too much going on sometimes.

I think having a large cast of characterscan work if done right. Which Kubo and Kishimoto don't do well at all. Kishi had the right idea at first by splitting off characters into groups, but fell apart because everything has to be about the main character instead of having each character having their own story.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Hence why I said that Uraswa and Martin do it right, not that it can't be done right. It's just really hard to do. With Urasawa, he knows how to transition between character perspectives seemlessly, whereas Martin writes his characters by structuring his stories through their eyes and giving them each POV chapters. In many cases, though, especially with battle shounenshit, you just get a cluster of characters introduced at once,must we hardly learn anything about most of them, so they just seem like a waste if space.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Well, looks like the fight isn't over yet after all. Even so, the fact that I can't figure out what's going on in it (and I spent time looking at each panel carefully,) just makes it a boring affair, especially with how obvious the end result will be and how cliche and repetitive the dialogue is. Sasuke's motivation is also just so misguided that it's just stupid, and that whole conversation just beat the same points over and over again. It's at the point where nothing pisses me off, but just makes me sigh whatever. At least there are only three chapters left after this.

[Nel_Annette]

I have no fucking idea what even happened this week. So... he absorbed all the tailed beasts chakra to power up a giant laser death arrow while prattling on?
And more flashback panels?

Aaaaaauuughh. Just end already. This battle blows, they're just using giant energy beings to fight.

[VLordGTZ]

I just finished catching up with The Seven Deadly Sins.  The first few volumes were pretty "meh", imo, but it really started to pick up around King's appearance.  Overall, it's a really fun battle-shonen series, and I'll definitely be looking forward to reading it every week.

[LumRanmaYasha]

The newest ad for the Assassination Classroom anime previews the voices for all the students in Class E. I like Korosensei's and Karma's, but Nagisa sounds way too feminine for my tastes. I think they should have just kept the voice actor they had for him in the OVA, since she did a much better job at making him sound gender neutral/ambiguous. The other major characters sound fine enough, though.