Why The Past Two Chapters Represent A New Low For The Series

[SageNaruto69]

@C4: i dont know... i like these kinds of naruto chapters. They are the kind that lets you see the whole naruto world. New training? Thats great! waterfall of truth? cool too!
people arent liking this but i cant see why not. its great. Naruto now a hero, not sitting on the emo swing crying for people to accept him. People now enjoy being next to him. Naruto telling the octopus lead me the way! that was the funniest part of naruto in a long time. Kabuto summoning all the akatsuki, sasuke with the EMS, killerbee to train naruto, whats not to like.

This is a great turn of events and is a great arc [so far]. Sasuke vs Gokage [including danzo] - great. Naruto meets sasuke and clash again was great too. I hope now that you look at it with all the points in front of you, you can appreciate it a bit more.

ANYWAY:
MAKE SURE YOU DONT FIND THIS OFFENSIVE IN ANYWAY, EVERYONE HAS THEIR OWN OPINIONS. I WAS JUST SAYING WHAT I LIKED ABOUT THIS ARC.

ALSO:
I HATE WHEN FREAKIN NEW GUYS THINK THAT THEY ARE COOL BY SAYING "YOU'RE ASKING FOR REP? ILL GIVE YOU BAD REP" AND THEY ONLY HAVE LIKE 37 POSTS!
THEY HAVE TO LEARN WHERE THEY STAND. HOW DARE THEY DO THAT TO YOU C4.
JUST IGNORE AND MOVE ON.
THERE NOT EVEN CLOSE TO YOU.

[sorry for the caps its more visible in a way, well they dont call me the CAPS man for nuthing]

[Naruto2921]

I can tell you are in middle school which is why you are unable to understand many things that have been happening.

[kangyuta]

He is clear in what He asks and clear in what He offers. The choice is up to

[KARINISSOSEXY]

Originally Posted by C4 Karura

Ok, let's face it: Naruto's been in decline since Chapter 402. Sasuke's "...to destroy Konoha!" line was the last "great" moment in the series. Since then, we've suffered through Naruto's Plot Win against Pain, both physically and mentally. I won't even start on Killer Bee. And Sakura mysteriously ditched hundreds of chapters of character development (and broke the laws of physics and adreniline) to ensure that Kishi's precious Sasuke survived, and could continue to "grace" future arcs with his "interesting" character.

Sure, there's been good moments: the Five Kages arc (Sasuke-E fight notwithstanding) played several long-predicted cards (Fourth Great Shinobi War, Ten-Tailed Beast, Danzo has the Sharingan, etc.), but managed to make most of them interesting regardless. We got to spend a few dozen chapters thinking that Sakura would kill Sasuke and finally be redeemed in the eyes of the fans. And you can't tell me anyone saw "Danzo-has-the-First-Hokage's-face-on-his-shoulder" coming. (Ok, so someone did predict it, but it was in one fairly small thread that didn't generate many responses until we found the twist out and were awed that the OP had figured it out months ahead of time.)

But through it all, except for the Sasuke-E fight, it was good enough for me to look forward to it each week. That's now changed.








Three weeks ago, halfway through the chapter, we got the "Naruto-learns-to-control-the-Nine-Tails" storyline. Despite the huge build-up over the past few years, the "Controlling" has come off a Contrived Plot Power-Up. I've had to struggle to get through the last two chapters. I'll start from Page 10 of Chapter 490.

• All Naruto has to do to gain complete control of the Fox's Chakra is unlock the Toad Frog's seal, and have a strong will with no hatred! Ok, first: Seriously?! Why have they never mentioned this before? Sure, this was vaugely alluded to in Chapter 370, but it feels like a big retcon of all the times where people wondered how Naruto could possibly control the Nine-Tailed Fox. Second: The whole "Pure-Hearted Hero" is so painful cliched. Making the character like that reduces them to pure one-dimensionality. Oh wait, Naruto was already like that. Never mind...
• Kisame is inside Samehada! This will probably play out vaugely interestingly eventually, but for now that plot point's been forgotten.
• Killer Bee. Why do people find his character interesting? He's entirely one-dinensional (Strong, Pure-Hearted Black Rapper!). His power's generic Jinchuriki stuff, and his Biju being a cooperative teammate retcons a lot of what we'd heard about them. Anytime that he starts rapping, either aloud or in his head, it's so pathetic and Un-Rappy that I just skip over it. Seriously, I found the Filler Jinchuriki Utakata more unique and interesting than him, both in power and personality. I mean, I understand it's a person's personal opinion whether that like a character or not, but what do they see in him?! (I'm actually asking here.) To me, he represents all that is wrong with the Post-Chapter 402 Naruto world.
• That Gay Scene between Naruto and the Toad. I made a thread pointing out the double-entandre lines. ("Hey! Open Wider!" "Why through the mouth? This slimy feeling is making me gag...") Some people said that I was funny. Other people called me "a perv", "immature", and "the reason they're glad they're no longer in High School". (I'm in Middle School.) The fact of the matter is, I noticed it becuase it's so much more interesting to pretend the Gay Subtext is intentional than to see the scene for what it is: another Dull Development in the "Naruto-gets-a-retcony-powerup" storyline.
• Two Random Ninja Guys want Naruto's autograph for their son. (Or something like that.) This scene is annoying, cliched, filler, and (at the time) seems to exist only to drive the point home: "Hey, the villagers like Naruto now!"
• The Re-Five Kages Meeting (thankfully) didn't last long, but it didn't exist for much other than to recap the "Should Killer Bee and Naruto be allowed to fight in the war?" debate, and establish that they'll be sent to an island... somewhere.
• After the Generic Squid jumps out of the Generic Water, the Generic Cloud Ninja exclaims, "It's here!!! Th... This is the thing I was about to tell you to keep an eye out for, and now it's here!!!" Um... Thanks for the Contrived Exposition, but don't you have better things to do while the Squid's attacking than explain, in stilted dialogue, that this is what you were going to mention?
• Generic Cloud Ninja explains that Killer Bee's songs are, "not just any rhymes. It's an original style that combines a rap beat with the melody of a ballad. Ballad-Rapping!" He's clearly in admiration of Killer Bee's "mad skills" at rapping as he says this, which is so sad and depressing that I don't think I can mock this event.
• Guy's (for some unexplained reason) on the boat! I usually find his appearances lame, but compared to the current cast, I really hope he gets to take some screentime away Killer Bee and Naruto to explain "The Power of Youth!!!"
• I'm not going to bother to explain all the things we learn about the island and it's animals, but I will say that it's really, really cliched. (The Gorilla somehow understands Killer Bee's Japanese! Yay!)
• The house is (for the fans) shaped like the Eight Tails! ...Ok, I'll admit it. Kishi made it look pretty cool.
• Naruto raps. ...OH GOD NO I'LL NEVER GET THAT IMAGE OUT OF MY HEAD!
• Killer Bee and Naruto "bump their fists together", the "proper greeting". This feels like a sad and desperate attempt to have Naruto do "what all the cool kids are doing these days!" that's just as out-of-place in the Naruto world as when Naruto and Sasuke did it in the first opening theme.
• The return of Sexy Jutsu. No. Just... No.
• Evil Naruto appears! Who knows, maybe, if I hadn't already filled myself with an intense hatred for this chapter, I would've liked this. But I was just trying to get it over with, and so I saw this event as a cliched, typical Manga Twist.

It looks like the next arc will be focused on an obligatory Naruto/Killer Bee teamup, and I needed somewhere to vent my frusterations with this chapter.


Anyway, I started out just explaining how lame these chapters were, but found it was easier to do jokes about how bad they were instead. I spent about two hours on this, so if you found this funny or interesting, please take 10 seconds to Up Rep me. If you don't, then please comment, as it helps me feel like it was worth it to spend all my time on this.

EDIT: To those who say, "Earn Rep, don't beg for it!" I've found that more people give me rep if I remind them at the end, and given that I spent a few hours on this, I'd say I've earned the right to remind people and get a few more points. Now please don't Down Rep me for "asking for rep".

EDIT 2: Ok, maybe all this is exposition and set-up for the upcoming War Arc, and will be worth it in the end. But that doesn't change the fact that it's painfully bad right now. Does anyone else agree with me?

EDIT 3: -_-... Someone Down Repped me anyway. And to top it all off, they didn't leave a name.

In the words of Killer Bee: "Dude you don't need to shout! You don't know what the hell your talkin' bout!!"

That was horrible.
It was good, but those are bad reasons.....where do I start?
1:) All naruto has to do is not that. He also has to suppress that "evil naruto". It was building up.
2:)Apparently naruto wasn't a 1 dimensional pure character and Kishi was trying to explain that with this "evil" Naruto, are you so blind by your own arrogance you can't see this?
3:) That Ramen Shop scene with the autographs....well if you read the manga, you would know that it was there FOR A REASON.

Dark Naruto: Those Proud Fools...They Just Asked For Your Autograph Just Like That, But They Used To Treat Us Like A Pariah..."

4:) Kisame......No comment.
5:) Eight tails used to be just like what we "all heard about them"....But it explains that that is not the case anymore because Bee took control. Hmmm. Well, damn, maybe this is a reason people like him. Gee, I wonder?
6:) The Gorilla? Really? Youre bringing this up? Now this is just mindless complaining, considering in about every manga, an animal can comminucate with a human. What about TonTon and Pakkun? Or Fukasaku, you didnt say anything about thing about them.
7, 8, and 9:) The whole "fist bump", "Naruto raps", and "sexy Juu" hing just reinforces the last point I made about mindless complaining.

10:) You're the reason I'm gglad to be out of middle school.
11:) Don't ask for rep....XD

[ANIMELVR4EVR]

umm i didn't read it all 'cause it was too long but i would have to diagree with you. Sure it's a little cliched but i think that made it more interesting. The whole kisame in samehada part was forgotten was probably (big probably) because there is so much about controlling the kyuubi and the fact that probably no one has realized it yet.

[Defcon]

Naruto isn't getting worse or better.. it's always been entertaining (except for the fillers ).. Only problem is, we only get to see so little each week, and sometimes it's frustrating :P I understand if some parts don't really add up to the storyline but hell, sometimes you need to stand still and view the surroundings.. I myself found it pretty cool that villagers asked Naruto's autograph, since he's finally making a name in Narutoworld.

[Zazuro]

I'll have to disagree. I actually like where this is going and it gives interesting things there and there. I don't think these past few chapters was going downhill.

Sasuke was going to get EMS anyways. Naruto was going to control Kyuubi anyways. Madara would want control over the world anyways. Pain would have lost to Naruto anyways. We all saw it coming. Pain was going to destroy Konoha, he did it. Sasuke wants revenge on Itachi, we all knew he was going to his his revenge. Itachi did die. We all knew that the Akatsuki would die anyways. Danzou(hence...bad or good..) he was gonna die sooner or later.

Heck, I even knew Kakashi would try to face Sasuke alone....

Every manga has it's up and downs. Bleach is worse than this. Bleach have way too many plotkais and so forth. I personally liked Naruto better than Bleach, any manga out there.

Read the underneath of the underneath.

PS: Don't ask for rep. You'll get the exact oppoosite if you ever mention about it in your posts. Even if you worked on it for awhile, it's all a big worthless wasted time to even pull that crap out of nowhere.

We all have different opnions, that's why we have discussion threads, the WHOLE forum thing was the point. It's okay to give your opinion on it but make a whole new thread to sum up almost everything that happened since almost past 200 chapters? That's bull.

[Sasori_X]

I'm gonna give this a try.

Originally Posted by C4 Karura

Ok, let's face it: Naruto's been in decline since Chapter 402. Sasuke's "...to destroy Konoha!" line was the last "great" moment in the series. Since then, we've suffered through Naruto's Plot Win against Pain, both physically and mentally. I won't even start on Killer Bee. And Sakura mysteriously ditched hundreds of chapters of character development (and broke the laws of physics and adreniline) to ensure that Kishi's precious Sasuke survived, and could continue to "grace" future arcs with his "interesting" character.

Agreed, Kishi tries to hard for character development that they seem pushed rather than doing the developing part. I mean what the heck is up with the Villains turning good by just talking to them? It makes you lose the "bad ass villain" reputation. And Sakura's only shining point was with the 100 puppet Sasori fight with Chiyo.

Sure, there's been good moments: the Five Kages arc (Sasuke-E fight notwithstanding) played several long-predicted cards (Fourth Great Shinobi War, Ten-Tailed Beast, Danzo has the Sharingan, etc.), but managed to make most of them interesting regardless. We got to spend a few dozen chapters thinking that Sakura would kill Sasuke and finally be redeemed in the eyes of the fans. And you can't tell me anyone saw "Danzo-has-the-First-Hokage's-face-on-his-shoulder" coming. (Ok, so someone did predict it, but it was in one fairly small thread that didn't generate many responses until we found the twist out and were awed that the OP had figured it out months ahead of time.)

Once again, Sakura always sucked as a character. And most of the wierd and bizarre things that have been happening to the story (IMO) were caused to disrupt people of their theories. Because apparently when I go to most forums, almost none of the theories were ever correct.

But through it all, except for the Sasuke-E fight, it was good enough for me to look forward to it each week. That's now changed.

That fight was fail when Sasuke's plot armor kicked in.


Three weeks ago, halfway through the chapter, we got the "Naruto-learns-to-control-the-Nine-Tails" storyline. Despite the huge build-up over the past few years, the "Controlling" has come off a Contrived Plot Power-Up. I've had to struggle to get through the last two chapters. I'll start from Page 10 of Chapter 490.

Meet Bleach, except with make believe ninjas.

• All Naruto has to do to gain complete control of the Fox's Chakra is unlock the Toad Frog's seal, and have a strong will with no hatred! Ok, first: Seriously?! Why have they never mentioned this before? Sure, this was vaugely alluded to in Chapter 370, but it feels like a big retcon of all the times where people wondered how Naruto could possibly control the Nine-Tailed Fox. Second: The whole "Pure-Hearted Hero" is so painful cliched. Making the character like that reduces them to pure one-dimensionality. Oh wait, Naruto was already like that. Never mind...

Agreed, Naruto has been a 1 dimensioned character since the start. So this did not surprise me as much.

• Kisame is inside Samehada! This will probably play out vaugely interestingly eventually, but for now that plot point's been forgotten.

The only thing that bothered me was, what happened if Killer Bee didn't take the Samehada? Kisame said it himself that the sword siding with Killer Bee was unexpected, so how on earth would Kisame be able to infiltrate the village?

• Killer Bee. Why do people find his character interesting? He's entirely one-dinensional (Strong, Pure-Hearted Black Rapper!). His power's generic Jinchuriki stuff, and his Biju being a cooperative teammate retcons a lot of what we'd heard about them. Anytime that he starts rapping, either aloud or in his head, it's so pathetic and Un-Rappy that I just skip over it. Seriously, I found the Filler Jinchuriki Utakata more unique and interesting than him, both in power and personality. I mean, I understand it's a person's personal opinion whether that like a character or not, but what do they see in him?! (I'm actually asking here.) To me, he represents all that is wrong with the Post-Chapter 402 Naruto world.

Simple, cause he's black, actually looks old for his age, raps, and is pretty funny. But this is all opinionated.

• That Gay Scene between Naruto and the Toad. I made a thread pointing out the double-entandre lines. ("Hey! Open Wider!" "Why through the mouth? This slimy feeling is making me gag...") Some people said that I was funny. Other people called me "a perv", "immature", and "the reason they're glad they're no longer in High School". (I'm in Middle School.) The fact of the matter is, I noticed it becuase it's so much more interesting to pretend the Gay Subtext is intentional than to see the scene for what it is: another Dull Development in the "Naruto-gets-a-retcony-powerup" storyline.

Lawl, frog in the mouth.

• Two Random Ninja Guys want Naruto's autograph for their son. (Or something like that.) This scene is annoying, cliched, filler, and (at the time) seems to exist only to drive the point home: "Hey, the villagers like Naruto now!"

Now the villagers like him. I don't see anything wrong with it. At least they weren't trying to burn him to the stakes or anything.

• The Re-Five Kages Meeting (thankfully) didn't last long, but it didn't exist for much other than to recap the "Should Killer Bee and Naruto be allowed to fight in the war?" debate, and establish that they'll be sent to an island... somewhere.

Tsunade was the one fighting to get Killer Bee and Naruto to the front lines so I didn't see it to much of a waist of time.

• After the Generic Squid jumps out of the Generic Water, the Generic Cloud Ninja exclaims, "It's here!!! Th... This is the thing I was about to tell you to keep an eye out for, and now it's here!!!" Um... Thanks for the Contrived Exposition, but don't you have better things to do while the Squid's attacking than explain, in stilted dialogue, that this is what you were going to mention?

But its going to kill us...... 10000 leagues under the ocean anyone?

• Generic Cloud Ninja explains that Killer Bee's songs are, "not just any rhymes. It's an original style that combines a rap beat with the melody of a ballad. Ballad-Rapping!" He's clearly in admiration of Killer Bee's "mad skills" at rapping as he says this, which is so sad and depressing that I don't think I can mock this event.

Its enka bro!!

• Guy's (for some unexplained reason) on the boat! I usually find his appearances lame, but compared to the current cast, I really hope he gets to take some screentime away Killer Bee and Naruto to explain "The Power of Youth!!!"

He's there to foreshadow the Kisame vs. Gai thing. (I can bet you, this is going to happen).

• I'm not going to bother to explain all the things we learn about the island and it's animals, but I will say that it's really, really cliched. (The Gorilla somehow understands Killer Bee's Japanese! Yay!)

He's been practicing on the island for awhile now so this is understandable, to a point.

• The house is (for the fans) shaped like the Eight Tails! ...Ok, I'll admit it. Kishi made it look pretty cool.

Is this a complaint or what?

• Naruto raps. ...OH GOD NO I'LL NEVER GET THAT IMAGE OUT OF MY HEAD!

Better than the mainstream rap we get now....

• Killer Bee and Naruto "bump their fists together", the "proper greeting". This feels like a sad and desperate attempt to have Naruto do "what all the cool kids are doing these days!" that's just as out-of-place in the Naruto world as when Naruto and Sasuke did it in the first opening theme.

They're brothers now... no?

• The return of Sexy Jutsu. No. Just... No.

Yes. Just.... Yes.

• Evil Naruto appears! Who knows, maybe, if I hadn't already filled myself with an intense hatred for this chapter, I would've liked this. But I was just trying to get it over with, and so I saw this event as a cliched, typical Manga Twist.

Meet Bleach, where the main protagonist must be his evil half in order to get his power.

And please don't say things about repping you up. I was going to rep you, until I saw it and I figure (this is how this person's been getting reps?) Why should I bother?