Oh No. They are alternating these bi-weekly side manga. I'm going to have to read a Boruto spin off story every Saturday until they end...No, wait. This came out on Friday.
Summary Time: Chapter One: Sarutobi Mirai. Since its the chapter title and she is technically a Naruto character I'll just use her name.
If no one remembers, this has already been adapted by the anime. Mirai guards Kakashi and Might Guy while they are on a hot spring vacation. Its suppose to be comedic because she over-reacts with her job of protection them-even running nude into the males side of the hot springs at one point- while nothing actually happens. If I recall correctly.
Huh, both the art and the background are better than the Sasuke manga so far...probably helps that they can just look and copy at the anime if they are lazy. No, I'm not doing a side to side comparison between this and the anime to confirm. I don't watch the anime and I don't feel like going to search for the episodes they adapted the light novel.
Cover page is Mirai in the foreground with Asuma, Kakashi, and Guy in the background. Wow, this person is really able to copy at least the anime art style if not Kishi's. Can they replace Ikemoto with them?
The artist is Natsuo Sai.
The manga starts off with Mirai introducing the world and eventually herself. God, I'm so use to Ikemoto's artwork that I'm impressed by a decent drawing of adult Naruto...the hair cut still doesn't work for him. The story starts off with Mirai as a genin and she just caught a cat...can they think of another D-Rank Mission. She ran so far into the woods that she lost her team. She has a thought of her mother scolding her for running off on her own. She hears something which she thinks is one of her teammates...isn't Shikamaru suppose to be her sensei? Instead, she sees a scarred old man sitting on a stump saying that shinobis are nothing more than relics now, to counter her inner dialogue of wishing to become a great ninja. He was mentally talking to someone and senses her. No wait, after he spots her he was able to analyze that she is a genin (he recognizes that the cat is not a ninja cat...how common is the catching the missing cat missions?) while talking to himself... So, I guess he's got a spilt personality.
He ultimately decides she is no threat and he will be on his way. But, she identifies him as Mezu from the bingo book, an assassin the betrayed 'the Village'...so I'm guessing he is a former leaf ninja. So, he decides he can't let her go now, and to intermediate her; he shows that he is not just one old man but seven scarred men. He decides he is going to shoot her with a revolver...so guns really are in ninja world now, not just the stupid mini-gun Ao had. Oh the main Mezu looks he just stepped out of a Western if you want an image of what the guy looks like. Mirai like her mother can use genjutsu which she uses to try to trap the Mezus. She is so overcome with pride in the fact that she caught them all on her own, she doesn't realize they broke the illusion till they tell her. He captures her, lectures that the era of the Ninja is over, she says it is not, he attempts to kill her, and Shikamaru saves her. He fends them off. They retreat. And they run right into Kakashi, who defeats them all. Oh, this is still when Kakashi was the Hokage. So she 12-13 now and she is...17 in Boruto apparently. So, Naruto at best has only been Hokage for five years. This is the closest I have ever managed to get, in the story, for how long Naruto has been Hokage.
Mirai breaks down crying due to both relief she is alive and shame at her own weakness. She gets a pep talk from Shikamaru...And her teammates and Jounin-sensei finally arrive. So, Shikamaru couldn't even keep his promise to take Asuma's child as his own genin-student like he promised...Did anyone else but Hinata get what they wanted or fulfilled their promises by the end!?
Back at the Hokage tower Kakashi and Shikamaru talk about why Mezu was there and Mirai. Turns out Shikamaru did take Mirai as a student just not as her Jounin-sensei. Kakashi mentions he likes going on 'walks' so he isn't always stuck behind his desk and considers going on a vacation, but they both admit he is too busy for that.
Time passes, Mirai is older, and she stumbles on the cat she caught when she was a genin as well as the students looking for the thing. She sets off to guard Kakashi and Guy on their vacation.
The art was good what you would expect of a spin off manga it looks like the original manga's art, story was ok so far, the fight wasn't that good, and the main character hasn't annoyed me yet.
Next Chapter Nov 11.
Edited by Bail o' Lies, 16 November 2022 - 06:13 AM.
