Bail o' Lies

So judging by what you guys are saying. They are going for the dark edgy route off the bat? Honestly, it really had no choice. Remember there was nothing from the ending of Naruto, the novels, or anything else made in the last year that would allow for a sequel. Not because they tied anything up but their was nothing interesting from them. The ending was setting up the sequel. The Last was trying to justify nH and The Novels tried to justify the last. The gaiden in the end did nothing. The Bolt movie did even less. So they have nothing to work off of. But they need fans to get interested in their monthly manga in a series that is in a decline. So they need to draw in the fans quick or risk losing everything. What better way then going dark and killing of the previous main character? This is nothing but a desperate act and just shows how far the Naruto series has fallen.

The twists make the story too confusing to actually understand the actual story.

In terms of dreams and ambitions, pretty much every character ends up like that (at least for those who we know had a big goal in mind before) like, for example, Tenten goes from aspiring to be a strong kunoichi like Tsunade to running a weapons shop that clearly isn't that huge when the only panel we see of her shows her being bored in it. Even Naruto's dream/goal of being Hokage amounts to nothing more than being a glorified mayor and part of the reason for that is because Naruto also originally wanted to become Hokage to gain the respect of the village to which he already had from defeating Pein and so attaining the Hokage position pretty much lost its meaning in that regard and so that's where the whole "ending the cycle of hatred" copy/paste from Jiraiya came in and then "changing the shinobi system" at the end, neither of which seems to have truly succeeded either..

The thing is that the reason the ending is so lackluster and the character accomplishments feel empty is because the story goal was very weak.

I keep saying the goal was/should have been "reform the ninja system" because while difficult it is a tangible goal. While "ending the cycle of hatred" is either an impossible goal because that mean removing a large number of emotions out of people among other thing. Or too simple to mean anything. in the case of Naruto the conflict main center around the uchiha and the eventual final fight between Naruto and Sasuke. Especially after the cycle of hatred was introduce. Which makes it seem like hatred only exist in the ninja world because the uchiha ie Sasuke isn't happy and if he was there would be eternal peace, because apparently conflict first spun from the conflict of the two brothers that led to the ninja system, and by resolving that eternal peace apparently because there no other conflict other then the ones the affect the uchiha. Oh wait that didn't happen and it would have been unbelievably stupid if it did. But since that was the end goal of the manga by the end and everything after -one shots, movie and the novels- that was to justify why hinata should get everything she ever wanted. But neither of those things can led to a sequel. Since hinata should have got everything she wanted, and if that conflict between Naruto and Sasuke wasn't resolved what was the point of that ending. That means their is no conflict that can led to a sequel. But the reforming the ninja system would have.

That comment from that interview just showed how much he hated the ending by the time Bolt's movie came out. But it's no longer in his power to change the ending/pairings even if he wanted to. He is the supervisor not the editor or writer. It up to those clowns to decide what happens in bolt not him.

19 volumes sold 50million copies in Japan alone, that's a full million more copies sold per volume than Naruto. I'd say it did pretty darn well. Just a simple way to put those numbers you fall back on so much in another context. 

 

And when Togashi started to struggle with his story he did what any decent author should do. He ended his story. He didn't drag it out for another 5 years or so like Kishimoto did while garnering just as much criticism during those final years. Plus YuYu Hakusho is still remembered rather fondly by many manga fans to this day because it didn't leave a bulk of it's fans with a bitter taste in their mouth quite like Naruto did.

Another way to look at the difference between these two is their other manga and how they are treated by SJ. Hunter X Hunter which is togashi current manga has gone on hiatuses dozens of times. Yet has never been cancelled and never been removed from weekly shounen jump. Togashi can release one chapter every 3 years and they are completely fine with that. Kishimoto wasn't able to take his wife on their honeymoon until last year because he could never get that time off. When he got tired of writing Naruto the quickly decided when & how he should end it, had novels made to continue the story -to pick out his replacement writer-, picked out one of his assistant to replace him as the artist,, had a sequel quickly made up, and had kishi write one shots to give his replacements ideas to work off of. So SJ care about togashi and his story, while they only care about Naruto and see kishimoto as replaceable.

Another thing ultra you don't have to be an expert/verteran in anime and manga to counter what he is saying. db is saying that shounen doesn't have romance  nor is their any shounen manga that focus on romance nor that audiences and the buyers like it in their shounen manga?  What is he smoking? This is completely false. There are shounen romances there are shounen manga that focus on or are about romances. Let just look at some of the most popular manga that are identified as shounen and see what i can find. 

Fairy Tale while it doesn't focus on the romance is a story about Natsu and Lucy their adventures in the guild Fairy tale and their are a lot of shipping pairings. Food wars is a cooking manga yes but it is also a romance manga about Souma and Erina. History strongest disciple kenichi is a marital arts manga but it also about Kenichi and Mui. Nise Kio is a straight up Shounen romance harem manga. Rosario vampire is a shounen romance harem manga. Kimi no Iru Machi  shounen romance manga.  Mahou Sensei Negima was a Shounen harem manga and Love Hina by the same author was a shounen romance manga with a harem. Inuyasha was about Kagome and Inuyasha adventures and romance. Horimiya, To Love-Ru, Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo, Detective Conan, Rurouni Kenshin, Kuroko no Basket, and so on. Their has been romance in Shounen manga for at least 30 years and has continued on even to this day. So what is he talking about the audiences sorry the "mass" -not "masses" for some reason- that read shounen manga don't like romance in shounen manga? If they didn't like shounen stories that have romances in them then one why are their so many and two why are these some of the most well know and popular manga?

SS happening after 693 didn't make sense because sasuke bluntly pointed out her had no interest in her and had no idea why she had any in him.

ok, i fixed it lol. yeah, it's annoying how the creators of naruto were never happy with what they had, and they ruined and changed the story for money...what ever they were on when they made this one shot i want some! but, i think psychedelics', are illegal LOL.

It not a drug more bad advice given over and over to add more and make it more interesting.

Kishimoto: OK got it. i made orochimaru send his son who he created through an experiment -because while i made that "Was he the mother or the father?" joke twice I really can't see people having sex with orochimaru- to the leaf village to become a real boy.

Some Random Jack: Eh not really that interesting try again add more 

Kishimoto: OK add more *does so* here you go

Some Random Jack: Well the fan don't really know mitsuki really yet so how about we give him amnesia so it can be explained both to us and them

Kishimoto: ok he has amnesia so orochimaru can explain he is his son and was created in a lab

Some Random Jack: Still not interesting how about....

And so on till we got this mess. 

Is there ANY creativity in japan the people that work on the Naruto anymore? 

Fix that, and No. Don't worry your clearly frustrated by the fact that this story relied heavily on twist and mysteries to try and keep the audience interested. Without anything really coming out of it or being worth the minute it took to read it.

If anyone cares, May 5th is when Shippuden goes back to canon and we'll see Kaguya make her long awaited appearance.

Didn't she already make her appearance in the storm games? Mami Koyama Japanese Cissy Jones English. Also didn't they already also finish the entire story in those games as well?

You know it's sad when it hear that NaruHina was planned since the beginning, and I'm over here going like so why the hell did they not talk to each other after the war because most would assume that brought them closer when instead it got brushed aside making Hinata reverse in what she was at the beginning of Part 1 and 2.


I mean honestly, how would your perception be if Naruto and Hinata interacted from the beginning of The Last with idk having some growth in their friendship and them paying their respects to Neji, and maybe showcase how Hinata is more open to hanging out with him to a point of even going to lunch with him or something like that.. Idk that's just me I would've kinda bought it and be somewhat okay, but I still would've believed NaruSaku should've been the seal deal in terms of who Naruto ending up with someone.

You know where that's coming from right? The rumor about hinata being planned since the beginning, In one of the early volumes kishi put some art of hinata in a sundress on one of the volume author note sections. So people saw it and started to claim that kishi had planned hinata from the beginning and that she was either suppose to be the heroine or was suppose to be a civilian that naruto fell in love with or some other bs. The reason they know about that author section is that the first couple of chapters in scan sites just took the pages from the volumes instead of from weekly shounen jump mag. So that were that rumor is coming from. I seen people debunk it and say that the image was about how kishi was showing one of his assistants how to draw a new character, who became hinata. 

If you are talking about kishi and one of his comments if it after the ending. He changes his stance every other interview, especially when it was before the last. So best to ignore it.

What happens in Bolt will ultimately be up to Kishi as a supervisor, those two clowns as artist and writer, and who ever their editors is. -There are now at least 4 people working on this manga not counting assistants.- It is ultimately be up to them whether we get platonic NS or romantic nH thought ultimately we will still get NS clone with BS no matter what.

For Hinata we have the fact that most likely 3 of those 4 are hinata fans, and the fact that a lot of the novels have been trying to praise nH as the perfect couple.

For Sakura we have kishi who after what he went through for the last year probably hates the ending pairing as much as we do. The fact that anytime he has had to write or talk about either of the end pairing he has either bashed and or remove any notion of any romantic interest between these pairings. The "success" that the Naruto franchise has had since Hinata became the heroine. and the incident with that character poll on Japanese Twitter. Remember hinata only managed to come in third place after rigging poll with false accounts, and she still came be hind Sakura the so called hated character and kushina a clone of sakura. This became big enough on Japanese Twitter that we heard about it. It wouldn't be too impossible for someone at SJ or SP to hear about this then spread the news around. Image what they think about this new.

Also as much as SNS like to complain that kishi stab them in back. They weren't betrayed anymore then any other fan the cared about the plot in the story. Sasuke was largely unaffected by SS since he barely interacted with his wife and daughter, and with the Bolt movie they can just fantasize about Naruto and Sasuke realizing their feeling for each other and having a secret love affair they already have a tower they met at that only a select few know about. It was our pairing that got hoses, and our characters that got destroyed for these kitten end pairing. So ultimately if they did NS it a last restore of the desperate. 

 

 

 

Great post. Yes, it does show how ridiculous the ending was. How out of character and incongruent with the plot.

 

It's crazy too, because the beginning of the series was about Naruto and Sakura and their world, the new generation surpassing the old, pushing back against the old traditions that put people down and held them back (like Neji and the Hyuuga). Whereas the ending is all about how the roles reflect traditional Japanese stereotypes or current social mores in Japanese life. Posters often link the ending ships (heroic guy finally notices long-suffering girl) and the characters' choices and behaviors to some present-day Japanese attitudes.

 

I wonder when Kishimoto shifted from making a manga about a character that breaks new ground, challenges the old system and prevails to usher in a happier, more peaceful era...to a manga where the main character follows the same path as everyone else before him, becomes the same as the previous generation, gives up on his sworn goals, and ends up in an unfulfilled life.

 

I wonder when Kishimoto changed his story from a fantastical hero's journey and "how it could be," to a reflection on real life and what it's like to "accept the way it's always been."

 

After reading that post, I can't help but feeling Sakura was the one who was punished most out of the group. But then again, neither Sakura nor Naruto (nor even Sasuke) had a happy ending.  

The ending because of executive/editorial mandate, and kishi himself giving up is probably the closet answer we are going to get.

Because they got what they wanted -nH- and they don't care about anything else.

I'm finally back to writing again.... chanting *not going to make kishi's mistakes, not going to make kishi's mistakes!*

 

Yes, I've wondered to if the dramatic story shift isn't because of Kishi having to work on it exclusively and continuously from about age 20/21 to 40/41. There's a lot of differences in those ages!! Single to dating, married to having children!! And I definitely think that softening, becoming more aware of Japan's social issues right now leaked into the story and characters.

 

It's a shame he couldn't have stopped at some point, taken a break, let the story breath, then gone back and read Naruto from the beginning again. Maybe he could have remembered what the story was about before committing to an ending that was so out-of-whack with the main hero. 

He knew the parings were and why nH and ss didn't mesh with his story. That's part of the reason why the last chapter felt so miserable. Also you can blame the pairings on his staff. Which led to both it and the last abandoning all the morals and character arcs so hinata could get what she wanted. So that all depends on if he caved to them or not.

Now before the ending that maybe different. Since like i said the goal of naruto before pein arc could be summed up as "Reform the ninja system" after the pein arc it was all about "ending the cycle of hatred" -after minato gave his speech about that and early jiraiya mention the prophecy it what naruto's arc became about other then sasuke- and I'm honestly not sure if it was kishi or the editors who did that. Either because kishi didn't know the goal of Naruto becoming hokage and the message it was suppose to send (stand up to corruption and reform you system of government if it is corrupt) because yahagi was incharge of that. Or if every new editor saw those bits and thought that was the tangible (or at least the check mark goal to say he did accomplish the thing he set out to do) end goal of naruto other then saving sasuke.

Any person who has watch/read even a bit Naruto and did not immediately think "Hinata deserves everything" knows this ending is bad and was clearly a cop out cash grab. Even nH and SS know it deep down. They just don't want to admit it. They way they try to deny it is say that kishi is a troll. Kubo of Bleach is known for trolling his fans. So when ever something weird happened in Naruto people would say that kishi was trolling his fans, because they assumed he was doing the same thing Kubo was doing. This claim increased more frequently the further along the manga went especially after hinata and sakura confession. The reason they say he is a troll is because they want to believe. That kishi was setting up NS for 15 years just to drop it by the end so he can laugh at the fools who bought it. Then he subtly was setting up nH and that the fans who supported nH "got in on the joke" and learn what Naruto was really about. Then after having this big laugh he would get serious and give his "true" fans the story the deserved with bolt.

That is what they desperately wanted to believe. The problem is that reality does not match up with their fantasy. They picked and choose what kishi has said in his interview ignoring the fact that he can't stay consistent in his answers. They think he was trolling SS in the gaiden despite the fact it was obvious that he was tearing it apart because he hates the pairing. (why would he hate one of his two beloved pairing he was setting up for years?) The believe that kishi had major involvement in the last despite that fact that he only did the character designs and his only request was that Naruto remain the main character in the movie. He clearly want bolts to happen and is secretly the one working on it, despite the fact that he keeps say he is done with Naruto and is just handing it off to those clowns. And so on.

And the reason they want to believe that kishi was this troll the spent 15 year preparing a joke instead of actually writing the end pairing romance is the same reason they now keep shouting that we should shut up and respect kishi's authorial intent. They don't want to admit that it is obvious that nH only happen because of executive/editorial mandate, and was completely against what kishi want for his story he spent 15 years working on. Because that  would mean one they got a hollow victory with the ending, and two that they were wrong for years about the end paring. And in their minds (the same one who need a safe space on college campuses) they can never be wrong.