Bail o' Lies

I'm not sure he even realizes that they did this with naruto

You may be right and it is always good to look at all possibilities. However, I lean more towards they do know, as even if he doesn't. SP's and Naruto's reputation in Japan is that it...was The King of International Sales. The most likely reason nH/SS happened was that what they thought the international fanbase wanted, while the domestic wanted NS. Here, he is saying ignore the international and just focus on the domestic fanbase.

So what do you think most of the Japanese anime/manga community would take from that?

Of course they do, that's why this statement is both ironic and hypocritical.  It's why they keep trying to bait old fans back with NaruSaku subtext in Boruto, or even why they had Naruto insult Hinata in an episode for choosing to fight beside him over protecting their children and even dedicate an episode to illustrate that there's little to no romance in their relationship. However, they're never going to outright admit that they made a poor decision (based on their own bias as well as their misread of the western audience investment in this ship) that drastically affected the series' quality, popularity and profitability.

I guess your are talking about the anime. The manga outside of Salad becoming all but the official love interest of Bolt hasn't do really anything NS like. Sakura has not appeared at all in part two so far.

Sunk Cost Fallacy.

https://boundinginto...asingly-boring/

"‘Naruto’ And ‘Bleach’ Anime Studio President Rejects Idea That Anime Should Conform To Western Standards: “If You Make Animation With That In Mind, It Will Become Increasingly Boring”

In adding his voice to the increasing number of Japanese creatives who have found themselves unhappy with the ever-growing demands that their works be altered in order to accommodate Western sociopolitical standards, anime production studio Pierrot Co. Ltd. President and CEO Michiyuki Honma has warned that, should his respective medium change its core identity in order to attract overseas audiences, the results will “become increasingly boring”.

Honma, who during his thus-far tenure at the studio has overseen the production of such anime series as Bleach/Bleach: Thousand Year-Blood War, Naruto/Naruto: Shippuden/Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, and Kingdom, offered his thoughts on this hot topic while speaking with Japanese entertainment news outlet Comic Natalie for their anime studio-staff centric interview series, Anime Studio Chronicle.

Huh. Well to be fair they are the perfect example how trying to appeal to a Western audience backfires.

Also 30% of their earnings are oversea meaning international sales. That means 70% of Naruto-Boruto earning's are from The Domestic Japanese Market. So when we see it doing bad (below average) over there, that is most of their earnings already.

Also SP hasn't released an anime movie since Boruto. So they haven't gotten any new movies that would eclipse it like other series have. http://www.narusaku....showtopic=16678

Another issue that Ikemoto has to deal with is the unpopularity of Nail/Kawaki.

In Part One, he was one of the most powerful and competent person in the main cast, with only Madoc and Bolt being able to come close to him. Completely outstripping the rest of the cast due to the favoritism Ikemoto bestowed upon him. As well as ultimately being the focus and core of the story Ikemoto was telling.

In Part Two, he is the biggest Jobber of the entire cast, possibly the worst I have ever seen in a story, constantly losing his fights and screwing everything up. It is even implied that some of the cast besides Bolt are stronger than him, at the very least Cups. As well as, instead of being the focus of the story who is making most of the decisions; it is more the cast is working around him. So he doesn't interfere and make everything worse.

Now you could justify it in story. His decline in power is because unlike everyone else, he doesn't have a dedicated mentor to train him. So while he didn't stagnate entirely, he didn't improve as fast as the rest of the cast. For his decline in competence, it is because of the guilt and stress of blaming Bolt for Naruto's "death," trying to kill him to cover it up, and an obsession with destroying the Otsutsuki within him to justify his actions.

But It is more likely, that during the break between part one and two. They went through the data and realize Kawaki was too unpopular to have such importance in the manga. So his importance in the story has been reduced drastically. So what happened to Sakura but this time it is the actual data instead of skewed numbers to make Hinata the heroine. Oh, the irony. 

Damn, telegraphed since the chapter of "death". So much for so little...

I think that it was an option but wasn't planned and they were forced to add it to give the daughter powers. So she could fight and be a main character. Of course whether I am right or wrong, this is very by the numbers and generic.

To make my thoughts on this a bit clearer. "Do you believe they planned to give the daughter Kurama when they killed him?" That would require Ikemoto to care about another Next Generation character Kishimoto made, besides Bolt, enough to want to do a story with them.

Part Two has been Ikemoto addressing problems people had with part one to appease his bosses. One of those being that most of the casts' presence in the manga has been nonexistent.

For example, remember Neo-team 7 members Cups, Salad, and Konohamaru barely existed in part one and they were suppose to be part of the main cast along with Bolt & Nail. Konohamaru barely existed, even before Nail appeared, that it would be easy to forget, that he is suppose to be the Team Captain and Jonin Sensei. Therefore, the main cast main teacher and adult role model. Now, he may be involved only because Moegi has been absorbed and one of the tree people wants to eat him. Cups pretty much just hanged around Salad and they barely even talked about let alone developed his story with his "Sun" Bolt; until part two. For Salad, they seemed to actively want her to have nothing to do in the story till the very end of part one, where she is now in the lead to be Bolt's love interest. 

So going off that. She was at best intended to be Moe's civilian love interest, before the executives had enough.

Sorry wasn't sure anyone was going to comment

Honestly, it not much of a problem one could already guess it would happen from last chapter and once you talked about spoilers (which means it was something that either interested or pissed off people enough to talk about.) It was clear what it was. I more just reminding of my policy of not looking at spoilers till the summary so it is an honest reaction and thought at the time. Then edit to fix mistakes. I needed to do something yesterday so I had to cut the ending short and come back to it.

Well Blue, I already guess that when you mentioned the spoilers two days early. Its not like it hard to guess...just kind of annoying. As it is the predictable outcome. No Dragon Ball Super this month. must have went on hiatus while deciding if they should continue it or not.

Summary Time: Chapter 8(9). Nine Tails...is it spoilers if they are not even trying to hide it?

Cover page is Neo-Ino-Shika-Cho...my god, how did they mess this up. Shikamaru's son is suppose to have his mother's eyes, so he isn't just a clone of his father. God, I think Fat Filler has won the worst outfit competition.

Tree-Jenga continues where we last left off surprised that they found the daughter instead of Naruto. Oh, Neo-Ino-Shika-Cho are there too. Tree-Jenga pulls out a book to identify Shikamaru's Son. They chat. Then Tree-Jenga says that Naruto isn't in the village there is only the nine tails' chakra coming from the girl. Tree-Jenga summons tree roots to absorb the daughter just like Sasuke and Moegi...and Shikamaru's son is able to use his shadow powers to free her by pulling the roots off her after they had already captured her...why haven't they tried releasing the other people that have been caught, or is this some contrivance that he was able to release her before she was absorbed? Tree-Jenga compliments the teamwork of Neo-Team 10 as they worked to rescue the daughter. So as he has part of Jenga of the Nice Manners' personality he decides to warn the team that they only plan to eat her but if they continue to interfere, they are on the menu too. Son contacts his father...I am so sick of this constant sensor division telepathic link and the fact that it has become such a major part of the story now.

God the daughter looks awful. She questions why they are going after her...well, she is about as smart as both her parents as Tree-Jenga has said over and over again, that they are after the Nine Tails' chakra in her.

Madoc tries to wake up Nail, and sees Tree-Jenga on the monitor.

Bolt is with Clone Jiraiya....honestly, I question why I have to add that detail to the nickname, at this point most of the cast are just clones of the old cast, even the villains. Clone Jiraiya informs Bolt that his toads see the tree-people in the village...he is actually seeing through his toads through some shared vision...sigh, did Jiraiya even have a power like that? I pretty sure the Toad Elders would have mentioned that the Rinnegan is similar to one of their abilities. Clone Jiraiya tells Bolt to fly to the "Triangles" does anyone know that location in the village?

More back and forth between Tree-Jenga and Shikamaru's Son and he reiterates that he is going to eat her.

Clone Jiraiya sends a toad to Shikamaru.

Nail finally wakes up and senses Bolt...please be smart enough to do enemy of my enemy against the tree people...Nope. He tracks down Bolt and they fight. Nail is no match for Bolt, I swear Nail has been beaten by everyone he tries to fight in like seven chapter out of nine so far, but Bolt is forced to flee because he can't control his karma when nail activates his.

Tree-Jenga fires off a Biju ball. Sarada and the Clone are going to join the fight...WHERE ARE THE ADULTS!?!?! One of the problems story wise with having every single fight in the village is the longer its drawn out the less sense it makes for more adults not to come in and join the fight. Where is Sakura? Where is Lee? Sai? Shino? Konohamaru? Kiba? Chouji? Temari? Are Shikamaru and Ino the only two adults left in the village? Not only that but these Trees just walked into the village and were met by squads of ninja. There should never been a stop to having more leaf village ninja fighting them because, they know where they are. From what I recall from the chunin exam, the plan when the village is attacked is first escort the civilians to safety, then counterattack. They tried to do that during the Pein attack, he just overwhelmed them. Here, you see civilians just milling around. From what I recall, Naruto tended to avoid having big fights in the village as shown and explain during the Itachi-Kisame vs The Teams Jounin-Sensei. That it is a bad idea to have a long drawn out fight in the village as more and more powerful ninja will sense the fight and come to help their fellow villagers. Here, in the sequel, almost every fight is a fight within the village. It increasingly makes the story unrealistic as the thought pulls you out of the story. As it reinforce the fact that the plot doesn't make sense and is built on contrivances.

Neo-Ino-Shika-Cho flees with the daughter...and at the end of the chapter the daughter is brought into her mental world to have a talk with a tiny Kurama....so lets start with something simple, was this planned all along? I suspect, no. This was not planned all along this was added to allow the daughter to be involved in the story, by giving her a super mode and skill sets so she can join in on the fights from now on...I am already resigning myself to that. However, it is reasonable enough through contrivance for people to think it was. Since, it can be seen as a kill and then later revive a character for two ratings boost.

So now the two problems with this revival and its cause.

We were informed in Naruto that when a Jinchuriki dies the tail beast that resides with in them would also die, but would reform itself over time. This happened to the Three Tails Isobu when Rin died. Kurama's baryon mode or Suicide Nuke Mode as I like to call it; anyways it was implied it was different in that it would burn through all the Biju's Chakra and cause them to permanently die. Now next chapter they are going to probably do everything to try and dismiss or justify this. But for the moment. If it doesn't kill the biju and allows them to escape their host without killing them either, why didn't the tailed beast use it in the century they were used as weapons by the villages? Just tell/trick their host about this super mode then go into hiding while they assume the tailed beast is dead. Now they are probably going to make some excuse, that he would have died but their was traces of his chakra in the daughter, and it allowed him to reform. Which leads to another question, why didn't he also reform in Bolt? This also leads to a problem as Naruto was suppose to be The Last Jinchuriki, now Kurama will carry on through his lineage as a convenient super mode for all time. Won't the other villages just be so happy to hear that?

Second this is clearly and ordered over reaction to the over focus on Bolt and Nail in part one. In Part one, incase anyone forgot, it was pretty much Bolt and Ikemoto's new characters, which were mostly villains, that were important. Which means it was pretty much just Nail and bolt for the main cast. The rest of the cast as in the old cast from Naruto and the next generation which are the side characters are almost completely ignored. Not help that neither Bolt or Nail are fan favorites, in fact they are largely disliked, that could justify the over focus on them. So part two Ikemoto was order to focus on more characters. So far it seems to be Bolt, Nail, Salad, Cups, Hime, Moe, Daughter. Fat Filler, Blond Sai, Shikamaru's Son, Konohamaru, Clone Jiraiya, Shikamaru and Ino. 14 characters at the moment, that is too many especially given Ikemoto's writing ability, and the fact that Part two may only have 40 chapters. Naruto main cast was normally 4 Characters: Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura and Kakashi, and Kishimoto struggled with even that.