Hope everyone had a Happy Fourth, because I've got a story for you!
I went down to San Jose to visit a friend of mine just today, mostly just to hang out and talk. Somewhere along the line, Naruto came up. Now, keep in mind he knows about Naruto from me; he hasn't checked out the series for himself. I've kittened about the ending to him years before, but I don't think he really got all of it since it was mostly verbal. Anyway, he brought it up again, and I talked about it as much as I could, he seemed to be in agreement, mostly because he was curious about what I was doing with my fanfiction reboot.
We go back to his house, and I muster up the courage to show him some youtube clips. I already told him ahead of time who wound up with who. First, I show him the scene where Sakura hugs Naruto after Pain (I tried to find the Promise of a Lifetime first, but most of it was AMVs). I asked him if the hug looked more like friendship or romantic. Though he was a bit torn at first, he ultimately agreed it looked more romantic (I also told him of when Sakura cried out for him after Pain flattened the village beforehand).
Then I told him about Kushina's backstory, and showed him the scene where Minato compared Sakura to Kushina. Then I showed him the CPR scene afterwards. Then I showed him the "For You" ending. I told him about Jiraiya and Tsunade, and how they paralled NaruSaku. Then I showed him the scene where Sakura tried to snap Naruto out of the four-tails state.
After that, I focused more on Sakura. I showed him the time she smashed the training grounds, and when she activated her seal. When I told him the fandom called her useless, he just gave me a puzzled look and asked "WHY!?"
I then showed him the scene where Sasuke stabs her in the genjutsu, emphasizing the manga was more graphic because you couldn't tell it was an illusion. Still, seeing that, he was disappointed in what he saw, and he shouted "WHAT!?" when I told him after they married, Sasuke wasn't there to see his wife OR his daughter.
And of course, I had to follow through with showing him what happened when Sarada met Sasuke. He just muttered "WTF is wrong with this guy!?"
Because youtube was on autoplay, we went to a video showing the scene where HImiwari took out Naruto, and that's how he got introduced to Hinata. In terms of appearance, he was underwhelmed. I brought up how the fandom has made her out to be this sex symbol, and he just looked perplexed.
So, because I thought I should be fair, I decided to show him Hinata's confession, also explaining how most of what actually happened was non-canon. He STILL wasn't moved by Hinata, nor did he think she was particularly attractive.
At this point I was going to decide to take the plunge and find Neji's death, but he could tell I was practically going Super Sayajin, so he just said I could tell him about it. So I did, best I could, emphasizing that this was the moment Kishi claimed sealed NaruHina as canon, and this happened BEFORE the Kushina comparison and CPR.
Finally, I asked him based on all this, who Naruto should have hooked up with, and he affirmatively said "SAKURA! SHE'S THE PERFECT BLEND OF SEX APPEAL, FEMINISM, AND FUN!" I joked and said "Well, maybe you should see that NaruHina scene for yourself, and make your own judgement." His response: "NO! ONE SCENE ALONE CAN NEVER BE POWERFUL ENOUGH TO OVERTURN ALL THAT!"
Afterwards, he encouraged me to do my reboot better.
I also plan just for fun to send him pictures of other anime girls to compare them to Hinata in terms of sex appeal. I think I'll start with the Fairy Tail girls first...