Hey guys. Sorry for waiting to type my thoughts about this ending ... I've been really depressed the last few days. I had an inkling the spoilers were real so it wasn't like I completely broke down and cried, but I have to admit this ending is one of the most painful in this series I've ever experienced.
SS/NH really did become canon, even when everything in this story was against them. Honestly at this stage I'm resigned and laughing through the pain over the ridiculousness of this whole ending, but this still this just really sucks. I never seriously imagined Naruto would end like this. SS I swear was a total crackship, something that should never have been a concern yet somehow this horrible fanfiction happened. And NH ... just what. It bewilders me. NH happening does not feel like Naruto. Never in my wildest dream did I seriously picture Naruto marrying Hinata and having her by his side instead of Sakura while Hokage. This just does not feel right. Not right at all.
It's truly amazing how much Kishimoto has destroyed his series and characters in just a measly 2 chapters. I've never felt more disillusioned on this series up until this point. Everything I thought was true about this series was wrong. Nothing adds up, everything OCC, character assassination left and right, just a complete and total logic fail. There was no development for NH & SS. Not like NS. There was no proper foreshadowing or even basis. How in the hell can something like this happen?This feels like a complete and total asspull just like everything else in these two chapters.
It's horrific to see this and not's just because I never liked NH or SS. The problem is how they happened, not that they happened. The messages they give to this story, something hardcore SS/NH fans are conveniently ignoring. So many characters got assassinated by this ending. Just look at this:
1) Sakura:
Worst case of character assassination ever. Oh my god it's so terrible I want to scream and cry at the same time. Sakura had this beautiful amount of development throughout Part 2. She seemed so much more selfless and so much more empathic to Naruto. She was so strong, so independent, and despite everything the impression was largely that while Sasuke caused her pain she cared more on bringing him back for T7 and Naruto. She even tried to kill him for his sake and Naruto's. This absolutely beautiful, inspiring character. The cherry on top should've been gaining a better perception of love even though she'd always care about Sasuke. The potential was just so strong, ...
Then 699-700 kittented us. The mature Sakura gets totally demolished in just a few panels and can never be recovered. Any development Sakura had or we thought she had disappears in a glimpse. Sakura practically blamed him for nothing and she completely ignores Naruto the second Sasuke's back. What made it worse is Sakura becomes a 12-year old fangirl, just in an older body. She even asks to come with him, willing to leave behind everyone once again and everything she went through with Naruto meant absolutely nothing. This guy tried to kill her, never gave a true damn about her at least the way Naruto did, who she never had a reason to love and Sakura still becomes this lovesick puppy. And the fact Kishi played this for comedy ...! Ugh, it's so OCC and offensive a kitten. As a woman and a Sakura fan, I am utterly disgusted.
Kishimoto made Sakura almost no better than Karin. And now, years later, we have to stomach her marrying Sasuke and having a child with him so damn easily as if Sasuke never even hurt a fly. Sasuke is never even home, hardly interacts with their own daughter, but somehow Sakura is still perfectly content being a housewife, isolating herself, and having a neglectful husband. It's so painful because she is completely okay with it. No self-respect, no real sadness, she is just fine chilling at home cleaning while waiting eternally for her Sasuke-kun. Why, out of everything sacred, is our last image of her in this series this? HOW DID KISHI THINK THIS WAS OKAY? Tragic. Just kittening tragic.
2). Sasuke:
While Sasuke literally gets everything handed to him on silver platter, he was also butchered almost as badly. Sasuke did almost a complete 180 in personality. Redemption for him was a given, but Kishi made Sasuke too remorseful. He would never be the type of guy to be that weighed down by his own sins: more like "yeah I did bad things, I learned my lesson, get the kitten over it". Sasuke never cared a lot of things and he shouldn't now. And the absolute worst is that Sasuke, who was the type of character perfectly content being single his whole life, randomly develops "feelings" for Sakura when she had any significance not limited to T7 and even does the forehead poke OUT OF ABSOLUTELY NOWHERE when that was only exclusive to Itachi. Not even six chapters before Sasuke said he wasn't interested and had no reason to love her. Not a flicker of remorse. Yet Sasuke "loves" her in 699 in a few panels on two pages.
I'd also like to add even a redeemed Sasuke is a neglectful father despite being orphan, a absentee husband, and has a daughter that probably hates him for it, but that I'm not particularly surprised about.
3) Naruto:
Yep, Kishimoto also found a way to kitten up his own MC. This is just getting sickening at this point. Despite saying once himself that he would confess to Sakura should he ever keep his promise, he chickened out on his word and just gave up. Naruto, the character that was supposed to never give up, gave up. The theme in his story was surpassing the previous and it was clearly foreshadowed through Obito and Jiraiya Naruto would never give up on winning the girl he loves and eventually earn her love. That was the morale of story and therefore the morale of Naruto's character. Yet what does Naruto do? He totally lets go of any effort to hope for Sakura's love and instead just settles for the easy way out: Hinata, who by the way a girl Naruto never had any attraction to until this asspull of an epilogue and The Last happened. Hinata literally symbolized something handed to him, with no effort, making him lose any determination to go for the girl he supposedly truly loved.
You could say Naruto found a girl that loved him. You could say he probably does really love Hinata no matter how random it is. You could say he might be happy, but from a consistency and story angle Kishimoto just kittented on Naruto's character. Naruto does not give up. He's not supposed to give up on anything, even love. He's not supposed to go the "easy way". And thanks to Kishi Naruto looks like a joke who can't be consistent and is failure in the eyes of the themes. No matter what bullsh** NH fans say, there was never no denying this and there certainly isn't now.
Also Naruto, OUT OF ALL THE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD, is a neglectful father who puts work over family. He always so desperately wanted a family, but apparently won't make time for them. His son has to act out to get his attention just the way Naruto used to yet he shows no extreme empathy and just says deal with it. Naruto knows exactly how it feels, but won't change a thing. Horribly OCC and degrading of him. Naruto would never be that neglectful, at least to his own kids. Why couldn't he just make Bolt a damn Shadow clone for him? Is it really so hard?
4 & 5). Hinata & Neji:
Hinata has no purpose in this story other than loving Naruto, making his babies, and being a housewife. She had so much potential, to rise as leader of her Clan, be stronger than Hanabi and maybe even be a better mother with her own children (Bolt is neglected which is also her fault) but instead all of that is tossed aside because Hinata is just a tool. Love and being a housewife is all that matters to her, screw any other ambitions. Like Sakura and Karin, Hinata never learned anything. And what makes it worse is that it's encouraged. Hinata gets "everything she wants" while inadvertently damaging Naruto's very core character and to always be a shell of what she could've been.
And of course there's her cousin, a noble ninja who died saving her life, but only ever did as a plot device for NH to happen. It was to give them an excuse for Naruto and Hinata to be closer. Even Bolt being named after him feels like an insult. Neji was a good character who deserved much better but apparently all he was reduced was a crutch for NH. Makes me sick.
And to add insult to injury for NS fans, Naruto and Sakura have no closure. In fact, by the timeskip, they have almost no semblance of a relationship of any kind. Even that wonderful friendship they had, all their understanding of each other, is totally gone because Kishi had to swap out Sakura with Hinata and Naruto back with Sasuke. And it's done easily, like Naruto's feelings and Sakura's never existed. That is just so bad. We can't even enjoy them as a friendship. Sakura was supposed to be heroine yet that is hardly recognizable now because all the Hinata wank (a whole movie about NH romance? Really?!). It's just so painful to see their close friendship get such a drastic decline all because of SS/NH. Even in the promos in the Last they seem so distant ... just the fact Naruto so easily replaces Sakura with Hinata is just rubbing salt in the wounds.
This ending has to be the worst ending I've ever seen. I'm officially done with Naruto. I won't watch anymore of the anime or read the manga again. Definitely not gonna watch the Last is all it's gonna be is a huge retcon and Hinata as heroine. This was a huge disappointment and I regret that I ever got into this series to see it end like this.
I think Bleach and OP are going to be my therapy from now on. No complications, just simple friendship, battles and mostly important without romance. Naruto's romance was so bad I don't want to ship anything anytime soon. I will drown myself in shows and manga/anime much better than Naruto until I move past this kitten and officially don't care anymore.
I'll still be active on this forum though. We're still a family and we've been through too much to lose that.And there's only so many jokes of this craptastic finale to make, it's just fun to pass up lol.
But this site and NS will be my only connection to Naruto. If I could burn the memory of this series out of my mind, I would.
THIS