Sav from Australia

I wanted to post a thread to vent for a while but I could not think of anything to add.  I did not see a thread with the specific question:

"Can Naruto still be considered the hero of the story that we knew for all these years?"

Now, I have seen alot of people talking about this, touching on it.  But I wanted to start a specific thread.  Because, at the end of the day, the manga was called Naruto.  He was supposed to be the main character.  Did he achieve his ambitions?  Did he 'succeed' according to the standards he set for himself throughout the manga?

1)  Become Hokage

Well apparently that fanction they are calling Ch 700 shows he becomes "7th Hokage".  I thought the strongest become Hokage, the one acknowledged by all, etc.  How is it that Kakashi gets there ahead of him.  Does not make sense.  It can be debated he was a bit of a dumbass, but it was ever thus.  Thats what support like Shikamaru is there for.

2)  Succeed in Jiraiya's quest

No idea.  I did not recognise any resolution, am I missing something?

3)  Promise of a lifetime

Hmm, he did beat Sauce did he not?

4)  Sakura

Errr...

The way I see it, the hero is the hero because he does the things that others cannot do.  Especially in a 'shonen' story.  The hero is a not some weak, lame, flip flopping MC, that would be a different genre entirely.  And the hero gets the girl.  The hero always gets the girl.  Thats why we like these types of stories.  The hero always gets the girl.

In answer to the question, the Naruto they gave us at the end is not Naruto at all.  Its some caricature of Naruto.

The Naruto we all knew would have got the girl he wanted.

And that, more than anything, is why this manga will be forever ruined.  Because OOC and insulting endings do destroy everything.

And the most disgusting thing is the delight on the Internet by so many.  There are so many people happy that Naruto and the others had their characters destroyed.  That just shows me that people cared more about their shipping than character development.  We followed NS because it was logical, plot driven, backed up by character development.  Its all a bit of a joke.

Kingdom is a manga that I was first exposed to via the Kingdom anime series.  Its Seinen, Historical, Action.  I think it is one of the most underrated series around and definitely the most underrated that I have been exposed to myself.  The manga story flow is good, characters are great, art (in my amateur opinion) is nice, there's comedy, action, realistic progression of plot and characters, what's not to like.  And it is epic.  Epic!  I can only compare it to Dynasty Warriors (the game) vs Red Cliff (the movie) - but it far better than both in terms of its depth and delivery.

The main character, Shin, reminded me alot of Naruto in his general manner - loud and a bit dense.  Also, despite being somewhat a baka, just like Naruto, he develops a greater understanding as he progresses.

The main female characters who support the male character are also nicely developed.  I find I like the two current shipping prospects alot more than Sakura, for instance, because they come across as more mature, more sincere and generally more likeable (please do not take offense, this is my opinion and how I see women in general and they strike me as stronger, more balanced women, that is all).

As I did not see an open thread, I thought I would post this here.  Hopefully after reading this you might be intrigued, seeing as you like Naruto (you are on a Naruto forum after all ) and give Kingdom the manga or anime a try.  It is good fun and a really well written story.