The problem is that kishimoto would never put Sasuke in a situation here he was beyond redemption.
Oh don't get me wrong. I highly doubt Kishi would ever have the courage to go through with something like this. I'm simply speaking from the standpoint of what Naruto would do, based on the personality he was established to have at around this time and the remainder of the manga. A lot of responses here are attributing to what the old Naruto would do, but I think the Naruto deranged and psychopathically obsessed with Sasuke is a different Naruto entirely. And frankly, the dude is at bare minimum a sociopath. This is not me being hyperbolic. This is me making a plain observation.
His "anger" in regards to what Sasuke just did is practically nonexistent. And rather than lash out at him about it, he immediately tries to rationalize Sasuke's behavior. Add Sakura's death to the mix and I sincerely don't believe much would change here in the long term. I'm willing to grant that he might, at best, temporarily blow a fuse or behave like he briefly did when Neji died, but the minute he does the little rasengan/chidori clash and they look into each other's minds, you're gonna have Naruto walking away from the encounter "understanding" why Sasuke did what he did and that it's not his fault Sakura died, but rather the cycle of hatred's fault. Perhaps Naruto would then take it upon himself to swear vengeance against the "cycle of hatred" by putting an end to it once and for all.
Theme: I doubt forgiveness/redemption is the primary theme or, at least, in the form we saw it. Most of the audience would never accept it and the hope is that someone writing it would see that. That said, its these kinds of tests that I wish the manga did. One of the reasons I hate the end is that Naruto's answer and belief system are never really tested, so its hard for me to get behind it. The closest is Pain, but Naruto is bailed out from the consequences by Gedo Mazo. The Third's hesitation on Orochimaru had tragic consequences. Naruto redeems/forgives some terrible people, but it never nukes in his face. His plot armor always protects him. Anyways, I think the theme is totally different or we get a much grayer if not totally dark view of these themes, which almost everything that follows.
Besides obsessed pairing fans who merely looked at things from a "My ship is gonna happen now! Yay!", most of the audience would most certainly reject it. To my knowledge, most of the audience doesn't even buy the "Obito is a cool guy" crap, based on all the memes that have been created since that chapter was produced.
From a thematic perspective, I think Kishimoto actually believed he was having Naruto's belief system tested, which is why we got the infamous and pathetic hyperventilating scene from him. The problem was the execution. Any time accountability even remotely seems to be an issue, Kishimoto immediately cleans the slate by establishing that "it's not the bad man's fault." Which is what Naruto's answer here is when he confronts Sasuke during this scene. Naruto understands why he did it, so Sasuke is not truly at fault. Any time Naruto understands why the bad man did it, the bad man can be forgiven. Which is why I have the mindset that Naruto would forgive Sasuke even if he did murder Sakura. Ultimately, I think Naruto would determine it's not Sasuke's fault and that external factors are to blame for why Sakura died. And if we take into account the fact that Naruto's motivations in regards to keeping his promise to Sakura were retconned downplayed a little over a dozen chapters earlier, her death is really not going to change things to the degree readers might expect. If he can forgive the dude who murdered his parents (and even calm him the coolest guy ever shortly after said forgiveness), he can forgive a dude who murdered the girl who isn't as important as we were lead to believe.
Edited by ThroughWithLove, 24 October 2017 - 02:54 PM.
