Broken Figurine

There's something wrong with your friendship if you help your friend in labour chase after her husband, and then after delivering the baby not visit in twelve years to see her... but sending glasses is fine. I think Karin lucked out, or maybe Sasuke would have let her follow him--I don't know. Either way, it doesn't erase the problems of her character from the series more like it makes me wish that this was the kind of character we saw after she was stabbed and taken back to Konoha. Would have been nice to see that friendship develop then; and this whole love for Sasuke cast aside especially if she wasn't even going to end up with him...

I see a lot of "well if Sakura is bad then __ is too" but isn't that avoiding the question? Point being is that Sakura's actions should not be blamed on anyone else. At this point of time she is a grown woman with grown responsibilities and just because other characters messed up too doesn't mean she shouldn't get critiqued. 

She's a character. She's only as good as her author, and the reason why people bring up "this person" "that person" is to show that she's a symptom of a greater problem--the author's inability to make his character's act in a way that's accountable, reasonable, and with enough justification that a reader could go "well, I see why they did that from their perspective..."

That's the funny thing about Gaiden; Sarada has taken on our questions and presented them in the framework of the story. Do her mom and dad love each other? Is Sakura her real mother when she looks so much like Karin? Why can't her mom answer questions? Gaiden was supposed to address these issues that largely revolve around Sasuke and Sakura's relationship/family and the result... didn't make sense.

Of course she's getting critiqued--and as redrose pointed out there is an odd fixation on her given that it's not an inherent flaw of personality and character; her actions in Gaiden go well above and beyond it. Sakura's actions and her relationship with Sasuke, like every other character who recieved focus in this story are the result of bad writing. 

Okay, so she's a grown woman with responsibilities. The only thing that I personally disliked was when she punched a hole in the ground and brought her house down. That is irresponsible and it could have hurt her albeit ninja daughter; and quite the over-reaction... but we know why it happened. It was a plot device for Sarada to find the photo, which in turn is another strange plot device... all for the sake of the red herrings. So if we ignore those and focus more on Sakura's relationship and life choices, they're not the most dignified but why should I hate her for them--now at this point in the story? She's living a domestic life after most of the conflict is over, raising her daughter. No evidence shows that she's a terrible mom, and maybe she wouldn't win mother of the year awards but what? What is she doing that most grown women with responsibilities don't anyway? If she divorces Sasuke, she's going to be in a similar situation--unless being a grown woman with responsibilities includes finding a man to marry that might stick around for... or else we'll hate her?

It's poor writing all around. Why did Sakura cover Karin's photo? Because he had to maintain the red herring. Why did Sakura avoid questions to Sarada? To maintain the red herring. Why did no one know the circumstances around Sarada's birth aside from Karin at the end? Because red herring. Why do these 'great friends' Sakura and Karin not maintain contact so that Sarada would KNOW who that lady with the glasses like hers are? Red Herring. 

It's the stupid plot handled poorly that requires the characters to act unreasonably to maintain the drama and suspense. Sasuke and Sakura are just terribly written and nothing fits well together. The conclusion did not satisfy or provide any justification for what the characters did throughout the story. It was all just a wacky misunderstanding!

It is difficult to like any character when their feelings and circumstances are arbitrary. 

I have a sneaking suspicion that Sakura's 'fainting spells' from the beginning of the series are going to come back in. Either as Sakura's pregnant (and that Shizune's mention of it happening since her childhood is a red herring) or as the reason she can't have children. 

 

And as far as raising a child that isn't hers, there's no reason to masquerade as a Sasuke's wife even if she chose to raise his test tube baby. Sakura dusting a house full of Uchiha crap and wearing his clan symbol on his back — if Sarada is not hers and the marriage was never truly a marriage, just an arrangement of convenience for Sasuke — really paints Sakura in a stalkerish light. And she's simply not that way.

 

I don't see her as degrading herself so as to end her career to take care of Sasuke's illegitimate child, pretend she's his wife, and raise his child as hers while he leaves the village forever. Sakura's kind, but she's not crazy.

 

We'll see in the next two chapters what is real and what has been the red herring.

 

And if Kishimoto has Sakura turn out to be this way — stalkerish and giving everything up for Sasuke — then the whole Gaiden has been a red herring centered around Sakura's development, kindness and strength. When all along Kishimoto knew he was just going to leave her out in the cold again.

 

Those are my thoughts on this whole series: either the Gaiden is going to turn out to be Kishimoto's apology to Sakura fans, or the Gaiden is going to be one more chance for Kishimoto to make Sakura the scapegoat for everything that's wrong with this manga.

Goodness I hope that's not the way it goes. As I said, it's not so much that she's raising Sasuke's daughter it's the masquerade of being his wife--is she his wife? Why is she living a lie and telling one to Sasuke's daughter if this is the case? Also, if she is a 'stalker' she must be one that Sasuke agreed to because he refers to her as his wife as well. There is just so much that is ridiculous on both sides. Gaiden is just begging for an explanation and they better deliver in these next two chapers.

Maybe Sakura is Sasuke's wife, hence the Uchiha symbol and referring to him as such... and that maybe early into their marriage they receive a shock that Sarada is a product of Orochimaru's experimentation. They bring the daughter back and Sakura agrees not to punish the child and raises her as her own. Perhaps Karin didn't want to, or they didn't want Orochimaru having access to Sarada while Karin is still working under him so they didn't give her a choice. Sakura doesn't have to be sterile for this to happen, it just may be that she began raising a child that isn't her own--but Sasuke is 'absolved' of fault there because it wasn't his decision so it's not grounds to stop loving him or divorce in Sakura's perspective.

There are obvious problems like why Sakura seems to lie about not just the birth but the relationship that complicates matters, but again--if this is all some ruse it's not just Sakura being a loving fangirl, Sasuke has been keeping up the lie around Naruto and others. It may benefit himself, which paints them both in ugly, disturbing light (he doesn't love her and let's her 'pretend' to be his wife so he doesn't have to raise his daughter)... 

I think we do need to wait for Gaiden to explain itself. Is this a terrible pairing and reflecting badly on the characters as it stands? Yeah, Sakura destroying her house and being in a relationship where she needs to lie is already far from perfect. Her status as mother, fertility, and taking care of Sarada has nothing on that. Whether Sakura is Sarada's mother, whether she can be--this whole debate is sort of missing the point. Even if it's the worst possible thing where she's basically a submissive Uchiha fangirl who agrees to pretend to be wife just because she loves Sasuke beyond any shred of reasonability, her care and love toward Sarada stands as a positive. Is she a perfect mother? No, but I don't see her as a horrible one either. 

Okay, there are a lot of problems with Sakura's character but her fertility vs sterility aren't one of them. Her character does not get degraded by Sasuke's and Karin's actions. Why would a mother leave her child in someone else's care? Well, that depends on the circumstances, but I don't understand this argument that Sakura's role as a mother to a child that isn't hers is somehow 'degrading'. Her agreeing to take on and raise a child that isn't hers should be seen as a positive, unless there were some sinister motive to it. And so far, we really don't know the circumstances around this convoluted relationship. 

Let's even consider that SasuSaku do have the off-screen marriage that "my wife" and "my husband" imply. Why would Sakura not say that they've kissed? That is the strangest aversion to a child's question, which is continuously a problem Sakura has when talking about her marriage. If they are husband and wife for what reason does she have to dodge questions with Sarada? I understand that if Sarada is not her biological daughter, she might fumble with explaining the circumstances of her birth such as why there'd be no baby pictures... but questions about Sasuke and their relationship?

Didn't Sasuke and Sakura, I don't know... date? In the gaiden with Kiba we saw Naruto and Hinata walking together; did Sasuke and Sakura do something similar? That they'd have gotten married and had a marriage without kissing, or intimacy, is really difficult to imagine and then be called 'happily married'. There is a reason why Sarada asked about 'kissing' because even she at a young age knows that it's what people in love do. Forehead pokes are not exclusively for people in a romantic relationship, otherwise Sarada would not have received one. She wanted to know about her parents in love.

I think in a way we're like Sarada when it comes to this pairing; we're asking for love, we're asking for the reasonable things expected out of a pairing, but what we're getting is ambiguity while still being assured that they're "husband and wife". We know that Sasuke has been gone for twelve years, so there's a big part of their marriage that's missing, but something had to come before it. There had to be a reason why they're together... but every time a question gets dodged that's becoming less and less clear... because there should be no reason why there isn't a clear answer unless that answer is an awkward "No, we never kissed,"

So if they are together and truly in love... why hide it? If they're not together, then why lie? It's so confusing. I hope something clears up in the next two chapters. 

What I do think works in this chapter is that Sarada acknowledges she still loves her mother. The flashback between Sakura and Sarada tells me that Sakura did care about her, and take care of her--and in the twelve years that they've been together Sarada certainly loved Sakura. Naruto might say time and such are not important and feelings are real, but that's sort of jumbled. Yes, it's Sarada's love for the person who she considers her mother that matters and not that they're not blood related, but that didn't come from nowhere. It came from time and affection. Sakura watching over Sarada when she was sick and sleeping tells me that it wasn't mere obligation that Sakura 'acted' like a parent, but loved her daughter like one. That matters. The fact that Sasuke is her blood-related father, but hasn't been around to love and care for her is a problem and hence why Sarada was constantly asking about him.

Sidenote:
Naruto never mentions anything like "but Sakura was pregnant how could this be?!" meaning that he wasn't around for the nine months that would have been telling, or for the birth of his two best friends' first child. How detached was he from their lives? The only thing I could imagine was that Sasuke and Sakura were gone away from the village for a long time, and then came back with a baby like yup this is ours. We had her out there, in the big wide world...
 

SasuSaku has to be the most confusing pairing to become canon. 

They got an entire movie dedicated to their pairing, and have kids. The NaruHina fandom used to get very few scenes amid 700 chapters now that they're canon and lovin' it, why would they hurt if there's a halt in content? They'll just wait for Hinata's next mention. Ignoring the pairing like what's happening now doesn't hurt anyone, it just doesn't convince those of us who aren't within the fandom that they're this great couple now--a love story for the ages. 

Handing a divorce and reconciling our pairing would take an enormous amount of skill to pull off and the handling of everything we've seen so far doesn't give any hope. We're safer not being canon honestly. Do I dislike NaruHina and want to see it end up as poorly as SasuSaku? Yeah, but does it deserve to? I don't know. It would be entertaining for me, but not for people who love it. I maintain it's a bad pairing and so far I'm content enough as long as it's not focused on.

Oh my god why is this happening to characters I love?

Listen, I know I made a thread that was 'blaming Sakura' when I was frustrated at fans making her out to be a horrible person for the crime of being with Sasuke, but I think we should all agree that everyone is coming into this story from a messed-up and contrived position. Sasuke and Sakura are both referring to each other as spouses, and Sarada as their daughter. They're avoiding the reality of their situation. Naruto who should really be more in the loop has failed to do something as simple as 'remember' that Sarada wouldn't know about her father. Sakura had the opportunity to speak to Sarada truthfully but yes, she chose to address it by recklessly destroying her own home (because we needed to find that photo of course!) and living some sort of a lie.

There is a big plot hole being dug and we're still waiting for the answer; whyyyyy? Why are they hiding this information? Why are they avoiding the topic? Why the rift between friends? It goes beyond plausibility. All these little complications coming together means that Kishimoto needs a big explanation for them and why the characters feel justified in their decisions. All the 'red herrings' if they are in fact that being built around Karin being Sarada's mother means that again, we need a big, contrived reason for why all the 'evidence' is false and how Sakura maintains she's still the biological mother... 

In either scenario; Sakura being the mother and Sakura not, her behaviour suggests that she at least thinks of herself as one. Yes, her raising Sarada does make her a mother and unless she was absolutely horrible, Sarada's reaction (granted in the heat of the moment) is really callous. Finding out your mother is blatantly lying is difficult; but she's saying "why would she help" this woman who is currently in the hands of the enemy. Karin may be your mom (if this story is to make any shred of sense) but you don't know her. You do however know, and if you're anything worth it as a character, love the woman you're refusing to help. 

I wasn't annoyed as some of you by Naruto's reaction, though he should have approached Sarada with far more kindness, but maybe it's the urgency of the situation--Sakura is still being held in the hands of the enemy. It's Naruto's attitude and policy with Orochimaru I take fault with--and he is being fair in reacting about Sasuke's potential infidelity. It tells me that he didn't know the truth about Sarada, which means this seems to be entirely the couple's secret.

It would make a lot more sense to me if Sasuke had Sakura under a genjustu, as horrible as that is--because that might explain her shifty behaviour and inability to properly answer questions... and even though she's supposed to be great at them, it's still the sharingan. Then again, would it last twelve years? I don't know that it's possible. Likelier, there's something about Sarada (probably being the special snowflake Uchiha-Uzumaki mix) that puts her in danger so they don't want it public knowledge that Karin is the mother. Maybe there's some sort of prophecy involved with her--I don't know, but if Sarada's life would potentially be in danger then it could justify an absolute avoidance... but then why wouldn't Naruto know about it either?

It is so difficult to try and come up with reasons, and if there's anything I want is that in the end, this dumb marriage between Sasuke and Sakura is over. I don't need her ending up with Naruto, I just hate seeing this facade of a relationship continue. Sakura's biggest flaws revolve around Sasuke. Maybe when this is resolved Naruto can realize the heavy burdens she's been under and they can work on being better people and friends together. Just not... this.

Darling husband was pretty inappropriate given even Sasuke is like "yeah, this weirdness that is our family is my fault" like really, I don't know what excuse the manga plot is using but we know nothing about what makes this relationship work. We know Sakura loves Sasuke to a fault because everyone, even Sarada now, does that in this manga, but... they've been seperated for twelve years. 

Her calling Naruto her dear friend does not bother me aside from the fact he doesn't really act like it anymore given you know, barely mentioning her. He is her friend. Then there is Sasuke, who is her husband. It's those qualifiers that just seem off given everything else we've seen. Darling and dear? Sakura, you've barely been with them at all. 

To be fair toward Naruto for a bit; we don't know to what extent the two families interacted. The thoughtlessly forgetting Sarada's situation is a big red flag but maybe they do see each other every now and again. Maybe they're just busy with their respective careers but when they do get the chance they reminisce, but with family and work life they don't get a lot of chance to properly talk... That's still conflict that needs to be addressed. 

Maybe Sakura and Sasuke, shockingly, had a good marriage before Sakura got pregnant and Sasuke had to go off to... do whatever. Maybe Sakura is riding the coatails of better times that we haven't seen, but given how short this Gaiden is going to be and that you know, SasuSaku hasn't had a movie dedicated to their fantasy love life, we don't see any of that. All we've seen is the sad and problematic. That's why dear and darling is so contrived; it alludes to something the readers aren't privy to, and there just isn't enough time and focus to make that work when we have to contend with rip-off weirdoes.

The villains are just gross representations of villans we've seen before. We have a danzo-type that is an Uchiha, because we've never had an Uchiha villain before, and there seems to be some medical stuff going on like with Orochimaru and Kabuto. They're really uninspiring as conflict. This is why Sasuke has been gone so long? Or is it some weird OTHER thing we haven't seen yet but will explore... in the next piece we get from this franchise.

On a random note, I'm really hating Naruto's new default "..." expression; the one with the slight brow raised? It annoys me. He did it here, and he did it when Sarada was railing off against her dad. 

Sarada is... I don't know. She reminds me of Sakura and that's why I feel like she's the only likeable thing in this whole mess, but at the same time the drama, the way she treats her mother, it's just sad. It's not even that she's the daughter of a pairing I can't respect; I don't really care that she's a SasuSaku baby. It's that there's just something off about her character and her entire introduction revolves around family drama in the same way Boruto seems defined by being disgruntled about his dad. The only reason why Sarada's "are you even my mom/are you two even married?!" outbursts aren't as ridiculous as Chocho's attempts at humour is because the manga is purposefully angling events to make it valid. It's to the point of disbelief that the scenes making us question the validity of their marriage are 'little coincedences' that had to be this way because of x-plot point.

Gee, maybe your daughter wouldn't be so confused if you could straight up answer simple questions like, I don't know, "your father never wore glasses?" 

Also, even if we accept that Sasuke and Sakura have a legitimate marriage, and that Sakura is the biological mother--it's still a horrible arrangement. The father is literally never around; they have no pictures together so Sakura had to crop one together, and her own daughter is questioning whether or not the woman that gave birth to her (???) is her real mom. What, no baby pictures? What is all this hiding and shifty behaviour when Sarada asked about the circumstances of her birth? It's not okay.

On a side note, Naruto's face really annoyed me when Sarada was questioning her father. What the heck? This is the guy that punched his dead-spirit father when he met him and yet has a weird eyebrow raised when a girl calls her father out on not being around--the same father that just nearly stabbed her?? Oh, and once again Naruto zeroes in on 'Sasuke' being an exceptional ninja, but no care given that the woman raising this little Uchiha mystery was called into question. She knows that's her dad you dummy, how about we assure her about her mom, hmm? That would require not thinking about Sasuke for a second--a difficulty I know, but come on.

I want to think that if Sasuke killed Naruto, that would always be the line crossed and even Kishimoto wouldn't make Sakura still love/be with him. I want to think if Sasuke killed Sakura, that would be a line crossed and Naruto wouldn't forgive Sasuke. I want to think--but the manga is really strange about the issue of Sasuke and as we've seen with the ending, part of me worries that my two favourite characters would always  fault in that matter.

It really makes me wonder why if Naruto can remember that Sasuke never wore glasses, Sakura can't. She used to be obsessed about him; she doesn't remember their academy days together? It's only for the purposes of drama that Sakura couldn't answer that--because Sarada had to have pressed the argument in order to find the picture. From Sakura's character P.O.V it makes no sense she couldn't answer that question. It's really suspicious not on marital grounds, but on memory. What, he had bad eye-sight as a kid that went away when he activated his sharingan or something? Usually eye-sight gets worse with age, not better. She's one of the best MEDICS she ought to know?

Then there's Sarada. I can see how she resembles her mother in behaviour--her mother that raised her. Biological mother or not, Sakura was there for Sarada all her life. Sarada may have picked up her mother's habits. Disturbingly, Sasuke has the tendency to raise a sword at the women closest to him in life. He's stabbed Karin, tried to stab Sakura twice, thrice? Sarada, who looks like Karin acts like Sakura, his daughter, being threatened by the same weapon that endangered her mother(s). I don't think he will, of course, and I'm sure the matter will resolve itself next chapter, but it's so annoying that Sasuke once again is the source of conflict. 

On Naruto--he's weird talking about their old lives like that, especially since we know he's leaving out crucial information in Sasuke's character assessment. It's also weird that Naruto momentarily forgets that Sarada would know nothing about her father because 'oh he's been away since forever'. To forget a detail like that is indicative that he doesn't connect with Sakura and her little family. They must not talk about her issues because how do you forget that your best friend is dealing with an absent father situation?

Naruto isn't very much of a good friend to his precious team 7 comrades. He's made his own life now and is busy being hokage dealing with who knows what. I think when this whole big war was over, I was hoping to see the older generation interacting; being friends, being happy. We've gotten the opposite.

I'm a huge fan of Sara who IMO was a far better alternative than what they had/have with Laurel as Black Canary. You can't have Nyssa train a woman less than a year and suddenly she can take three people at once at from The League. Killing her character was the beginning of the downfall of Arrow and I stopped watching--not just because they killed her, but because they handled it so poorly. I like the comic character Black Canary. I do not like what they've done with her in Arrow. You should never tell the story of a DC heroine like her within the framework of her established male's equal. Sara was Oliver's equal because they started at the same point and diverged on their own separate paths, to meet again as established vigilantes.

I do want to see how they handle her now. Black Canary, White Canary, whatever--I only acknowledge the one that makes sense and I'm glad she's been ressurected. Nyssa al Ghul is known for her potency with the Lazarus Pits. It made no sense to me that they didn't go that route and now I'm glad to see it's been fixed. I've been wary of their writers since season 3 of Arrow has been one big mess, but I might give this a go.

The talk between Boruto and Sarada was kinda... weird? I don't know, it was oddly intense about delivering lunch when I don't know what issues Boruto is having in his family. Why did he think about his mom (and her rather unfortunate haircut) in that instance? Also Sarada mentioning when a 'special person makes lunch' in reference to his mother was also kind of awkward--what does she know about their love-life and marriage? The only thing that really made sense was that she wanted to use it as an excuse to go off after Naruto, and that she might think he's being unreasonable when he (unlike her) has a father he can deliver lunches to.

Sarada is becoming more likeable but the situation around her is really bad, which is unfortunate. I also have zero interest in this new Uchiha kid >.>

Kakashi and the photographer bit was likeable, but I don't like how team 7 feels now. It's the same pretty much, but with everything that's happened my nostalgia has been tainted I guess. It makes me sad to know how they grew up, especially when I see Sakura. Kakashi is pretty cute, in persnonality and appearance, though.