Madara and Hashirama have a fight on an epic scale then skip stones, and that's about it for this week.
The Good
The art and action in the pages of this week's NARUTO is really top notch. One of the highlights for me this week was the image of the Nine-Tails wrapped in Madara's Susano'o. This is the sort of episode that you look forward to seeing animated.
The Bad
A lot of people like to joke about how LORD OF THE RINGS director Peter Jackson is in desperate need for an editor. He creates incredibly visuals, but has an almost uncanny knack for over extending a story.(I say that as a person who owns all the LOTR Extended Edition box sets.) Masashi Kishimoto seems to be adopting the Jackson film philosophy into manga.
While visually amazing. There doesn't seem to be any justification for putting such detail into this past battle. Not only is it drawn out, but now we're actually going even further back to the childhood of Hashirama and Madara. It's essentially a fourteen page set up for a scene of skipping stones. Someone get Kishimoto an editor.
Was Kishimoto horribly betrayed as a child? Just look through the cast of NARUTO, and it seem that nearly everyone at some point has a childhood friend that eventually turned into a bitter rival who wants to defeat/humiliate/kill them. I think he's trying to go for the tragedy of friends turned enemies, but he's abused this theme to an almost comical degree. Does he seriously lack for any other motive for conflict between two people?
Verdict 2/5
NARUTO has done little else these past few weeks than be an exercise in frustration. I understand why Kubo is dragging out BLEACH, but there has yet to be any justification for suspending the finale to the Shinobi World War for this leisurely paced trek down memory lane. I was almost ready to rate this a three, but my admiration for the art doesn't excuse the lack of plot and direction. If they had only filled in the rest of Sasuke's lines from last week. I'd at least understand what was at stake for the future of this story.
Do you think next week we're going to learn how Hashirama stole Madara's high school crush?
-Kristoffer Remmell ( FoxxFireArt) is a freelance graphic artist, writer, and over all mystery geek.- Follow for news updates: @AnimeVicers/ @ FoxxFireArt
Naruto has been about broken friendships from the beginning. I stopped paying attention to Kishimoto's storytelling a long time ago.
After all these years Naruto's character hasn't even been able to get over his broken "friendship" with Sasuke, and not too long ago it was revealed that the Uchiha become powerful by breaking off friendships and getting depressed!
if you hated this chapter, wait til you read this weeks chapter =_=
@Lurkero: I don't think Naruto has ever been about broken friendships, it has always been about changing the world. At first, when Naruto was a child, Kishimoto constantly showed us things that were stablished in the ninja world but didn't work and how Naruto change them (the very first lesson Kakashi taught the team 7 was about breaking ninja rules in order to make the world better), then when Naruto and Sasuke's friendship broke it wasn't a betrayal, it was about two friends having diferent opinions about how to do things (one was all about hard work and being positive and the other one was all about hate and revenge), and how that clash of ideas separate them. And you can say the same thing about any other broken friendship Naruto has had (even if Orochimaru did betray the village he didn't had a personal issue against Tsunade or Jiraya, he simply thought that his ways were better than ninja world's ways). After that it has become a really simplified and childish version about how international relations, war and ideals work and how there must be a way to change that.
And this is no exception, if you have read this week's chapter you'll see Hashirama's story is about that.
Did you guys noticed that ALL the problems in the naruto universe and caused by someone from the life village?? They must have horrible mentorshipskills just make a diagram. The third- orochimaru(evil) The 4th- obito (evil) kakashi- Sasuke(evil)...not a good pattern leaf.not at all..
As for bleach..idk these last few chapters to me has been so uninspiring bleach use to be better than this..
@tximinoman:
Shoot, you beat me to it LOL!
Anyway, I did enjoy the chapter. As long as there no Sasuke in it, I'll be ok