Kishi hasn't been the best with any female characters save tsunade. In regards to sakura, she has a lot of development involving naruto, Sasuke, tsunade, and a few others. I never said all of Sakura's development was involved with narusaku, I mean in fact it's really just on her own desire after seeing naruto give the promise after failing to get Sasuke back at first, to me the development that occurred for her in part 1 that didn't involve narusaku at all was actually in part one, the stuff she learned in part one that culminated in her to train with tsunade, she didn't do much in part one, but had events that kept bringing her to realize her shortcomings save discovering the chakra control early on, she had her near death experience in the forest of death, saw the gap of the others ahead of her, even seeing how she couldn't do anything. That was personal development on her own, even before the other stuff happened, there was gradual shifting for her to see her own weaknesses. In part 2 yes she became highly invested with naruto, but if that's where her character investment has been thrown too, it's mainly her fate is basically whatever happens with team 7. This otherwise started more or less when sai revealed the stuff in 457 or around there. It's not all like this, though I mean times like the sasori fight or unleashing the seal, that was her own development, showing her talents, overcoming her former weaknesses. Others make an issue of well tsunade and naruto had a hand in healing shikamaru, does this automatically just make sakura unimportant? Power development doesn't define a characters relevance or importance, how the author uses them does. Otherwise Kayuga is more important in the story because her power is greater than his and practically because whatever involves her next with Madara now she is suddenly more important than him. Even if she literally takes over him or something strange happens in the coming chapters since it's like Madara is talking to her, Madara is still the important one over kaguya, hagoromo is still more important than kaguya, by all means she is the strongest person in the series yet she is more if a set piece, she is a powerful character but we only knew about her since 25 or so chapters ago. Sakura has her own personal growth apart from naruto and Sasuke, I mean part 1 was the bigger source of this, in part 2 it's rather well, she didn't have that friendship with him in part 1 as she did in part 2 so is it a shocker to expect most of her development would become intertwined with naruto or team 7s or tsunades? If she wasn't involved in a majority of the affairs in part one, otherwise going over her own weaknesses at first, then she is in part 2. Maybe it's just my perception that her development was meant to be more team oriented but perception can change how you view a characters development. My take is that sakura had to learn her weaknesses and then be there for her teammates, more involved in their growth as the events played out. Is there something wrong with her being a supportive character to the goals of others? Not entirely this doesn't hurt naruto or others nessessarily, but not all Sakura's involvement with naruto means ns either, part of her own growth has been just trying to do what she can for her friends that she could not before but she didn't always have the way or right means to go about it, personal on her end is because she used to be a weak no special talents ninja, what can she do in her abilities to make a difference with it? Part of it is what she can for her friends but otherwise having faith for them to do what she cannot. This is why I see her growth was more team oriented, Kishi initially devised sakura to represent human weakness, her growth in realizing her weakness was part of overcoming this and then going forward with her involvement in both training with tsunade and doing more for her teammates and friends. There have been times when she could do stuff and times when she could not. It's why the speech from 630 isn't merely a ns as most would go on, it also applies just to other events what in my take was, she experienced herself, twice before this like the 4 tails event and the land of iron, she wanted to do more to support naruto or otherwise found she relied to much/did a lot of harm and tried to do stuff all on her own. Her speech was otherwise born of her experiences, in a sense from this, she told others to not rely only on him but also use whatever their own power to win the battle, her role healing naruto at the time was her position, for others it meant defending in whatever ways they could like the majority of them making the earth walls or bee trying to do what he could against the unbound ten tails.
I don't see her development involving naruto a lot as a bad thing or purely just instant ns, she has her own moments of growth apart from when she was nothing special, the way I'm seeing things, it's not taken by the simplest of views just saying that Kishi didn't do as much as we thought he would or because something was said it didn't turn out that way exactly, rather than make an issue with what could have been, I try to form a better view of how he actually chose to handle the path he went on, it's not a platinum development path he gave sakura, perhaps to me it is silver, i wish she had more battles or screentime involving her training at least but in regards to the other females he has done fine with her. This may be a shouen series but I don't go exactly by just x amount of battles somehow means importance, I mean tsunade herself has had well, 3 one against orochimaru, she was support against pain healing the village and against Madara even though she lost with the others. Jiraya only had 2 that were actually important, same fight as tsunade and dying against Nagato yet he was a very important character to the series, like itachi even in death it's his views that impacted people more than his power. What makes someone important? The number of battles because it's an action series? There are other ways for people to be important and not be action oriented, by all means if we count itachi, if we have any real important battles,not the small scuffle he had in part 1 or his fake clone in the rescue gaara arc, he has had only 2 real important fights, his with Sasuke and against kabuto and his per poses in those fights were more about putting on ideals rather than just simply beating another. Characters arnt defined in their importance or relevance just because of number of fights or what they learn from fights, or cause in cases like itachi, it's how their involvement overall literally just more screentime and progression along character arc developments. Yes sakura had this from cases like her seeing her own shortcomings to the actions/motives of her teammates in part 1 to training with tsunade, to using those abilities in part 2 in whatever ways she could, to discovering the hard truths from sai, again seeing stuff as her own mistakes to trying to go about it, even if it was in the wrong way, to learning for said bad experiences and resolved to do whatever she can for her teammates, that's what her statement from 573 "were all going to fight together this time" that spoke unity to me, one does not win a war alone, and this is the same stuff itachi told naruto, trust your friends not rely only on yourself. Even in the recent events, her deal keeping naruto alive, though it involved naruto,nshe wasn't going to just give up, the good part of this moment was just that, she did only what she could in her ability until naruto could be saved. We even knew from the outset of this situation that sakura herself could not exactly save naruto on her own, chiyos theory was too far out there and well it wasn't a physical wound, we knew how jinchurki extraction worked for the longest time. The one administering the Dave to naruto would be minato, later obito. She has had her own personal development, more so in part when when it was more about getting her off her feet to stand and learn to be an effective ninja,
This is just my view and while there are something's I wish were different like yes unique cases with her or fights, I don't focus on what we thought could come, I make my judgement based on what we have been given, it's not the best but it's certainly not the worst. Her being more team oriented isn't full blown ns or ruining her individual worth. It's not a s rank development but it's certainly better than others like kiba, hinata, ino, choji, lee, Danzo, minato, and yes, even Sasuke.
To me some of these examples are:
Kiba and hinata are just too infrequent
Choji and ino have just had short term trials they quickly got over, mainly both asuma events
Lee has got a lot of development, but it's just been mainly a straight line of enthusiastic straightforwardness, yes recent events have been well dramatic for lee but it's been like this a lot for him, I can say lee is either over zealous at one moment, down in the dumps at another, and then resolved to action at a different point.
Danzo is just plain a jackass even though he was a considerable figure for the first half of part 2 he had his motives but even seeing how the anime expanded on him, all I see him as is a jackass. Even after Sasuke killed him, he is like the only considerable figure who had connections with orochimaru yet his stuff just faded to dust.
Minato has been given a severe case of guilt this entire war, it's easy to say that naruto brought him out of the dumps but seeing obito and what occurred over the events just leaves him depressed.
As for Sasuke, sakura has at least been better progressed in my opinion, I mean the easiest thing about Sasuke? The easiest thing to say about him is that he has just been given a new target this entire time, he went from itachi to the leaf to naruto to obito to Madara and soon back to naruto. Now there is a bigger way to explain this, Sasuke has reasons for all this constant retargeting someone but to me, in most of his progression, I say he is a warmonger just getting someone new to attack until naruto sets him right. There are aspects i like about Sasuke but his actions as the antihero have been less than ideal in my case at times. He is to me a character that breaks even inbetween how Kishi has progressed with him, I like a couple things but not much. Otherwise I feel indifferent to him but just hate his always needing a new target.
I feel sakura has at least been handled better than Sasuke and his whole I love revenge on a new person relationship. Sakura to me has at least been more straightforward in trying to do stuff.
As I said before, I come to my judgement working with how things played out, not focusing on what could have been or preferred. I don't look at only the negatives either. While sakura has some negatives like missed solo development or action, nothing's going to change that. Her deal with Sasuke has dragged out for a long time but it's also been dynamic and an antagonising factor on her. It's my opinion but to me, I'm satisfied from what we got, it's not perfect but what Kishi has done, i like it mostly by her dynamics but am otherwise upset at other missed things. As I said, if it was a grade, I would give kishis handling of sakura a b+ there are some things missing or otherwise that would have made her better but he still fleshed her out enough to make a difference and give her a decent role in dynamics considering she is a mentally focused character and has given her a form of character structure based on what can she do or accomplish within her own power for her friends. That's how I see it.
Edited by Inferno180, 17 April 2014 - 09:02 PM.
wordless.....
