Niky

@NeonRanger

Sakura's behaviour and feelings are all over the place because they are NOT the result of a character 'development' or of a 'literary plan'.

They are the result of a marketing plan.

Copy and paste my quote from another thread

Judging from the latest interviews and news I think it happened this way (pretty much):

• Kishi wants to leave Naruto.
• SJ doesn’t want let him (too much money lost) but instead plans for a next series (Boruto).
• The Kishi’s assistant (Hinata’s fanatic – Sakura’s hater) comes forward and takes over on condition that Naruto’s love, in the end, is Hinata *COUGHbeggarCOUGH*.
• SJ keeps Kishi as counselor (with associated service charges).
• Kishi says YES and sells Naruto.
• We (fandom, literary logic, story, characters) are screwed.
• The end.

Judging from the latest interview and news I think it happened this way (pretty much):

• Kishi wants to leave Naruto.
• SJ doesn’t want let him (too much money lost) but instead plans for a next series (Boruto).
• The Kishi’s assistant (Hinata’s fanatic – Sakura’s hater) comes forward and takes over on condition that Naruto’s love, in the end, is Hinata *COUGHbeggarCOUGH*.
• SJ keeps Kishi as counselor (with associated service charges).
• Kishi says YES and sells Naruto.
• We're screwed.
• The end.

You're thinking of otaku is that of what western fans have turned that term into. ie the Japanese word for nerd and geeks. What it really means is basically pathetic loser that are a drain upon society. And in a country and a culture that believes putting society's interest entirely before a single person. That's a bad thing.

 

Also if you start using character in anime that proudly proclaim they are otaku as an example that not the case. One that an attempt to please the otkaus so they purchase the stories products. Two they still write them as complete weridos and losers they just use it as an attempt at humor through the otaku's oddities or they should be proud because of their uniqueness. Three some writer may also be otakus so of course they try to make them look better and better perceived in their stories then they are actually in real life.

@DGM

You think 'Otaku' = Passionate about manga, anime and Japan...

But this is a wrong translation of the Japanese word made from the American side.  The japanese word doesn't mean it.

The otakus are NOT just nerds or enthusiasts....

They are more like addicted to drugs. They have no life apart their interests.

What is worse they often merge what they actually saw in manga with real life, with all the drifts which this creates.

Wonder why Sarada went through changes in all different form of story...

It's because they don't know what to do with her... Other than fanservice and breeding, I guess...

A little question:

How can THE SAME PERSON say that the expression “A woman’s body was designed to give birth” is wrong and THEN ship Naruhina and Sasusaku? 

No, seriously... It rather seems like a contradiction in terms.

*THIS IS MY PERSONAL VIEW*

To me now is settled.

This is no IT.

The ONLY NS we'll soon be allowed will be BoruSara (to be shared with SNS). And really, really HARD Hinata-HinaNaru wank.

Through me the way to the suffering city;

Through me the everlasting pain;

Through me the way that runs among the Lost.

Justice urged on my exalted Creator: Divine Power made me,

The Supreme Wisdom and the Primal Love.

Nothing was made before me but eternal things And I endure eternally.

Why do i have a feeling that they purposely do this because they are running out of idea to continue the storyline ....

Its like open a novel contest ... show us your .... novel, so we get inspirations and copy/steal your idea.

And WITHOUT PAYING!

 

And I don't think Kishimoto will be heavily involved. Just creative director or something. Since he's made so much noise about wanting to be finished with the series, I doubt that he'd completely flip-flop and come back for a storyline he didn't care about to begin with.

Uhm... Tricksie dear...

May I remind you that you are speaking about Kishimoto, here?

Honest reply:

What?

Well it's as I stated above. There are very many things to hold against the other characters for. But they usually have some redeeming factor that mitigates the stigma associated with that particular action or trait. With Sakura, she has her moments of competence and strength, but they're almost always counteracted afterwards with a mistake or oversight that paints the accomplishment in a half-hearted and ambiguous light. I personally believe that these questionable circumstances of feats might have been Kishi's way of portraying Sakura as a flawed, vulnerable girl. She's not some indomitable powerhouse or emotionally toughened Mary Sue with no personality flaws to speak of. The human quality of hers is what is supposed to distinguish her from the others, albeit in the process it makes her seem less competent than those around her.

To me is a matter of perception and sympathy (affinity)...

In my eyes, for example, Hinata has not redeeming factor that mitigates her monstrous selfishness and narrowed heart.

Only, she is scarcely present in the manga and she ceased to be a Naruto character to become some abstract ideals' container to Naruto manga's readers.

That's all...

PRetty much this.

I see only a Naruto-Sasuke big festival, lame villains and a happy - moronic - end!

Okay, I guess we knew that already, didn't we? So, what else is new?

Good, I can go to see Ushio and Tora (the 19th episode - ARRRRRRRRGHH! THIS IS A VILLAIN!! THIS!!! !!).

 

I honestly wonder why I still hang around somedays.

This forum is a safe heaven and its members are like family... It is only normal to want to go home at the end of the day and just relax, isn't it?

 

Yeah, the "brotherly bond" has always struck me as the weakest part of part 1 and the most unconvincing subplot in the entire manga. Don't get me wrong. Naruto and Sasuke were rivals with mutual respect for one another, but this brothers stuff came out of nowhere, more or less shoehorned into the manga during the first VotE fight. After that, with no additional development, we're supposed to believe that it's the most important thing eva eva! To the point where Naruto is going kyuubi-mode at the mere mention of Sasuke's name, hyperventilating, begging on his hands and knees, literally letting someone pound his face to a pulp and wanting to die with Sasuke.    No need for all that brothers stuff. No need to save Sasuke because of some weird bond that had never been fleshed out before. Naruto's virtue and the POAL are sufficient motivations for saving Sasuke.

Look, in all likelihood, the obsessive emphasis on the 'brothers' stuff was only a cover for the more and more obvious 'homoerotic' stuff...

I mean, you realize that Naruto and Sasuke got together to two women that don't really mean anything (love, longing, memories... let alone desire) to them?  

Ohhh! I like this thread! And I do hereby inform you to prepare yourselves - run you fools! - for what will be a LAP

 

I think we can analyze the whole mess in two ways:

 

1- Blame the author don't blame the characters, and this is all fine and dandy but after we've said that Kishimoto is a terrible horrible god-awful writer who can't even remain consistent to its bigger plots point we are not left with much else to say but continuing critiquing the author.

 

2- Try analyzing the behavior of the different characters as if they were almost - but not quite - real. I do actually prefer this one, even if we have to deal with some apparent schizophrenic behaviors, it is definitely more interesting and can be expanded and played with much much more.

 

 

 

Rather than blaming Sakura I'd be much happier to see people frustrated with her behavior. There were some great posts few pages back - but alas I'm too lazy to go back and quote them, do pardon me for that - with which I agreed completely.

 

Getting very frustrated with Sakura's behavior is fine, and even right, but blaming her? Not at all. It's exactly like blaming an abused woman in RL - with all the due differences between fiction and reality of course - someone who's sense of worth is literally zero and that, if we follow Naruto's storyline, no one really encouraged to put things in perspective and see how dangerous and toxic that person was for her.

 

I seriously don't remember anyone, not her family, not Naruto, not Ino or Kakashi or Tsunade or whoever else, telling her to really take a step back and analyze her behavior and realize how bad Sasuke's influence was impacting on her self esteem and her person in general.

 

In this she's very much like a dog, no puns or malice intended, but as a dog gets positive reinforcement for its 'good behavior' so did Sakura, she got 'positive' reinforcement too, because there is this toxic mentality of 'enduring' and so, good girl, endure it, endure it all, atta girl! Have a cookie!

 

I do believe she'd have some obvious self-worth and self-esteem problems, as said in a previous brilliant post, and that's the POINT of her character, because becoming 'stronger' doesn't simply mean learning to shatter the earth with a punch or becoming a physically stronger and deadlier shinobi, she had to overcome her psychological problems. We, I, thought she did, but nope apparently she tired, she almost did it, she was there, but she didn't succeed (we can thank the all-mighty 'pen-holder' for last the minute out-of-the-blue changes here).

 

That's why I'm a bit perplexed by what some people say, I do understand and agree that she isn't blameless, saying that would be stupid, but the 'she made her bed, now she should lie in it' attitude is a bit cruel, at least imho. I pity her, I pity her very much, she's stuck in a ugly situation and she doesn't have the strength the psychological fortitude, or even the stimuli and the help, to get out of it.

 

When dealing with a situation such as hers it's easy for a 'stranger' to think she should get out of it, that the decision to get out of 'it' should be an easy one to take, but in truth when one is in the loop it is not easy to get out of it, especially if she lives in an environment that doesn't help her at all, and that is even detrimental as it pushes her in the exact opposite direction.

 

As for guilt-tripping Sasuke.....(she might have tried, I honestly don't remember and should go back to check the chapters, but I'd actually rather go gurgle some turpentine) I don't see how that would even come to be, I mean, he really really doesn't give a fig about her, she could be hysterically threatening to fling herself off the Hokage mountain and he wouldn't spare her a second thought. Those two, as they were developed by the author, are clearly WRONG for each other, a proper textbook case of toxic relationship.

 

As for the issue of Sakura's fan defending her until and beyond reason, you are right - I just spent one odd hour trying to psychoanalyze her behavior into something that makes sense and this must account to something - you are absolutely right! But as said before it's because many of us perceive she's been given, again and as always, the shortest end of the stick and in that ends-backward finale, hers is the really sad story.

 

Hinata has all she ever wanted even if she lacks the grey matter to understand that her 'ending' was quite pathetic, and Naruto, if he de-glues his bum from the Hokage's chair, has a super-moe subservient (scarf-knitting and cake-baking) wife that thinks the sun shines out of his as* and two healthy children, however ugly and unlikeable. He has a family, he has his position as the Hokage, and apparently he's still in contact and in good relations with Sasuke. That's pretty much all Naruto wanted, even if the girl is the wrong one and all seems kind of 'wrong'. Everyone else in Konoha is married and eventually spawns children and, unrealistic, cavity-inducing and cliché as it sounds is mostly happy.

 

And Sakura is still the practically single-mom housewife, with loans on her back and a Houdini-esque husband, whom she hadn't even seen for 13 years before the start of Gaiden and who goes away again just the day after returning for the first time, and he didn't even return all that willingly, but came back due to circumstances out of his own control......

 

Peeps, sincerely, as the super-corny, unrealistic, cavity-inducing and cliché finale....one must admit hers kind of sucks. This is what I perceived from Naruto 700 and onwards, it might very well be my interpretation of things, but be as it might be I do truly think it sucks, and that's why I'm frustrated with and aggravated by Sakura, that's why I pity her, but blaming? Nah.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Or we could simply say that this is all Kishi's fault, but that would mean I spent an hour writing about nothing....

 

And where would be the fun in that? And more importantly, this fandom and this place, practically a year after 'THE THING', should be more or less deserted because after some time talking about how bad of a writer Kishimoto is - and I do think he is bad, I do, I do, I do - there would be simply nothing more left to talk and debate about, and honestly I'd rather see this place not abandoned.

 

Now, I'm beat and I'll happily march off to bed. I hope the english wasn't too contorted, and G'night/G'day/G'afternoon to Y'all. 

  This... This is...

Lady Lys... You are the best!

And to think that the SS fanartists depict this couple as safe, comfortable and loving ( ) and even with a second, loved, pink haired child ... 

And yes, I am frustated with these farces, particularly when I find them in the places (sites, blogs, tumblrs, forums...) I don't expect they are.