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[Bail o' Lies]

Have a migraine due to that chapter make better opening post later, and fix the posts below.

 

There are as many mistakes in the Boruto manga as there are stars in the night sky.

 

Such that it is difficult to notice, find, explain, and categorize them all. So at the moment I have limited to 6 general topics to focus on those for the moment; as that is what the AI said my summaries mainly complained about:

 

1) Art, though I don't have much of understanding of it, Ikemoto work as an assistant of Kishimoto that work on the background and Kishimoto trusted to run the sequel when he refused to make it.

 

2) Story as something I can understand, so I can notices the issues of.

 

3) Plot Devices that I have a problem with.

 

4) Combat, as this is a shounen battle manga.

 

5) One of the highlights when people talk about Naruto is, its cast of characters. Which the Boruto manga inherited...that it does nothing with.

 

6) Relationships because two relationships/pairings that define the manga is Boruto and Sarada, that should be the core of the story, as her goal is to become Hokage while he wants to become her enforcer, but this is completely neglected to focus on the Bond of Bros between Boruto and Kawaki.

 

But before that lets talk about how Boruto came about, and to do that we have to talk about Naruto and its ending.

 

Now, Naruto was started in 1999 by a young energetic talented but inexperienced mangaka named Masashi Kishimoto. He had incredible luck in two ways his First Editor Kosuke Yahagi, and a content drought in animation during the mid 2000's. Most Weekly Shounen Jump Editors are only on a manga for about two years; even if they are the ones to approve the manga's publication. Yahagi who approved the publication of Naruto, stayed on the manga for an impressive 10 years; from the development of Naruto to until right before the start of the Pain Arc. This gave him deep understanding of Naruto that most manga editors don't have, as he was there from the beginning. Dictating the story's direction at first to young inexperience mangaka, but slowly switching to guiding and advising, that editors are suppose to do, once Kishimoto found his footing. This helped Naruto become the success it became, but this relationship left Kishimoto with a trust in editors most mangaka know not to have. Second, while Naruto was well received and popular in Japan, it was always second to One Piece domestically. However, when it hit the international market, there was a content drought in animation. A lot of popular animated shows had ended and new ones hadn't start up yet. Not only that but its anime competition had problem when they went international. One Piece, was given to 4Kids, a young children's program, where it was butchered to fit their standards. While Bleach due to it being about death was relegated to Adult Swim, a late night program. So, because it had no real competition when it started internationally. It became a popular, well received international success considered the best animated show of its time. To such an extent that it would not be surprising during some years of its run it was the most successful manga/anime IP ever, for a time.

 

However, that led to its own problems as Toonami aired only part one before it was cancelled. Which disrupted the most vocal international viewers, Americans, watching of Naruto. Which affected how they see the story. As they watched part one, which had very little filler, until after The Sasuke Retrieval Arc. When it then had its giant 2 to 3 years of filler before it started part two. So, if they wanted to continue watching onto Part Two, they had to hunt for it either on other stations or online. However, this disrupted the connection the viewers had with the story, not help that filler arcs were more intermixed in part two. This created in Naruto's American Viewership a disconnect with the two parts. Similar to how they see Dragon Ball as an unimportant prequel to Dragon Ball Z, instead of the same story. They see Part One of Naruto as the true definitive story of Naruto and Part Two as just filler. So what was focused on, or more importantly what they perceived to be focus of the story, in part one particularly in the Chunin Exam when viewership was at its highest: hard work, pain of loneness, defying fate, loser nobody dreaming to be Hokage, following your dreams, and the Hyuuga clan. Were seen as vastly more important than what was focused on in Part Two: Restoring Team 7, His Promise of A Lifetime, Bonds, His budding relationship with Sakura, Ending the Cycle of Hatred, Naruto being seen as a weapon and his desire to be recognize as human, and the Uchiha clan. All of that is seen as unimportant filler. That is part of the reason why they are so obsessed with Hinata as the heroine, because if you saw the Chunin Exam. Just the Chunin Exam itself, not even the entire arc, as the whole story of Naruto. Then, it should be no surprise they wanted Hinata as the Heroine and some even declared they saw her as the true main character of Naruto.

 

Since I keep expanding this, let's talk about the Chunin Exam Arc. Again, if you looked just at the Chunin Exam. Right before the first exam starts, we are introduced to this nice shy quite girl, Hinata, who is sat right next to Naruto for the first test. She is just so nice and kind that she was willing to let Naruto cheat off her paper. Even though he refuses because he remembers the examiners are watching at the last second. But she doesn't know that, so she just thinks he is being noble. Sakura meanwhile was planning on quitting the exam even though it would anger Sasuke to protect Naruto's dream of becoming Hokage, as the Examiner had threatened that if one fails the final question they will never make it to chunin and Naruto hasn't been able to answer a single question so far. They don't interact during the second part of the exam, The Forest of Death. Instead, we see Sakura chastise Sasuke for being a coward while praising Naruto's bravery in fighting Orochimaru without fear, and then protecting both her teammates while they were knocked out. Then at the preliminaries for the 3 part of the exam. She silently supports Naruto, and recalls how much she admires him, while he fights her teammate Kiba. Sakura meanwhile is openly cheering for Naruto. Just like he did for her fight with Ino, even helping her resist Ino possessing her. Then, when it her turn to fight her Cousin Neji, who is so much more gifted than her, she wants to quit, but Naruto cheers her on, so she fights. When she loses Naruto vows to avenge her lost against her opponent Neji. They talk before the match and he compliments her. Since Neji is his last opponent he faces in the Chunin Exam, this must be the most important fight, right? If you think the Chunin Exam arc is literally only the Chunin Exam. They talk about being bound by fate and defying it. Naruto avenges Hinata. Since this clearly is the end of the Chunin Exam and nothing important happens afterwards. Hinata is therefore the most important female character. She deserves Naruto. She deserves to be the Heroine. No, she deserves to be the true main character. The manga should be renamed to HINATA the second she was introduced. She deserves it. She is entitled to it, in her fans mind at least.

 

However, if you look at the Chunin Exam as a whole. Naruto starts off being punched for claiming Sakura is his girlfriend to a bunch of kids, he is embarrassed by opponents in the upcoming Chunin Exam while making Sasuke shine by coming to the rescue, and the biggest threat of the exam Gaara makes it clear. There is no point in Naruto telling him his name because he is so beneath him. By the end of the arc Naruto is fighting Gaara to save Sakura with people around him assuming she is his girlfriend by how fiercely he is fighting for her, while he is to busy to respond because he is trying to rescue her, Sasuke has been shoved to the wayside forced to watch Naruto fight someone he can't handle then afterwards tell Sakura Naruto was the one who rescued her, Gaara who dismissed him before is terrified by the end that after a speech he changes his world view, and Sakura gives Naruto an admiring look after hearing what he did for her. Sakura starts off as spoiled focused only her desire to date Sasuke, is forced to realize she must take being a ninja seriously to protect the people she cares about, is frightened by Sasuke once he uses the curse seal which is the start of her losing faith in him, makes peace with Ino, and start to look at Naruto and care about him. Sasuke got a taste of power and started down the path of darkness. As for Neji, Hinata, and the Hyuuga clan yes they were important for the arc, but they stopped being mention or involved in the story much afterwards.

 

Please note. That Dragon Ball IP was dormant for most of the Naruto's run. Even if, it was more successful as well as profitable overall, it wasn't really doing anything during Naruto's prime. It was Toriyama's disgust at DragonBall Evolution that he decided to involve himself again in Dragon Ball, revitalizing the franchise after Naruto ended. As far as everyone was concerned during Naruto Dragon Ball had all already ended and wasn't starting up again so it was a non-factor until Super, Kai was just making extra off an already ended IP. That said there are Western Fans that quite literally refuse to watch another Anime besides Dragon Ball Z. While Naruto is considered by many in the West as a gateway into anime and when Toonami ended fans went to the internet to search for more Naruto anime episodes really kicking off streaming being a part of watching anime for Western Anime fans subculture nearly a decade before streaming became mainstream. Cruchyroll was made for the streaming of and then made legitimate by Naruto. In 2009, Cruchyroll went to TVTokyo to convinced them to legally allow them to stream Naruto. Which an executive Yukio Kawasaki allowed on a gamble. So which is more valuable over all then? 

 

Huh. I decided to ask the AI if they knew all Kishimoto's editors. But they say there were only three...wait now it gives me four. Though note that the AI keeps giving me other editors. Apparently the 15 editors I have always said were the problem, as Yahagi worked with Kishimoto for the first ten years, then supposedly the next 5-6 were about 14 editors. Since the normal tenure is 2 years, that means there had to been constantly fights with editors being let go only for a new one to come in and all last on average less than 6 months. According to it, those were the assistants or sub editors. It was always a pain to find info about this and I was disinclined to buy the manga volumes again after the ending to check. Also, apparently, it likely wouldn't have help because their translators had a problem mistranslating the terms. Viz media was also notorious for taking liberties and changing meaning in their translations of Naruto. I think the Gemini ai started to translate Japanese sources finally. As I could never find this info online before, beyond hearsay...Ah I just remembered, how Twitter was doing the same recently and the Japanese Twitter hated it because they now have to deal with Westerners and are constantly being harassed.

 

Kosuke Yahagi (1999 – 2008 / Chapters 1 – 402)

Seikimatsu Leader Den Takeshi!

Hunter X Hunter 

Current Editor-in-Chief of Jump Square

 

Yuka Takemiya (2008 – 2010 / Chapters 403 – Early 500s)

Jump Festa Manager 

 

Yuki Honda (2010 – 2012 / Mid-500s)

Current Vice Chief of Weekly Shounen Jump 

Haikyu!!

Dr. STONE

Assassination Classroom

Undead Unluck

 

Jo Otsuki (2012 – 2014 / Climax to Chapter 700)

Naruto: The Last Movie

Nisekoi: False Love 

Boruto: Naruto Next Generations

 

Always stick to what you know, even if its hearsay, until you can find actual information. Then be willing to change your position after careful consideration of the new information. 

 

Even the editors I am using for this post might still be wrong. So it best to check as this is still hearsay.

 

So, after his time with Yahagi, Kishimoto had great deal of trust in Editors. So when the new editor, Yuka Takemiya, came in he trusted her. Old rumors said that the new editor was such a huge fan Hinata and demanded she become the new heroine. That still might be the case, but given that everything the AI said about her is. She is a trans-multimedia brand manager that focuses less on the manga and more on marketing the brand/IP as a whole. She probably talked to the anime staff, who were always huge supporters of Hinata, and was convinced that Hinata must be a popular character that needs to be the heroine to increase sales. She is apparently the one that would never stop bugging him about Hinata to the point he finally publicly complained about it at Jump Festa 2010. Of course her actions backfired. She was in charge of the Pain arc till around that start of the War Arc. So I believe she is the one that helped to sabotage Sakura's early/premature confession into the False Confession as fans call it.

 

So just imagine Kishimoto had a traditional editor that focused on the story for ten years. Then having to go to this, a girl from marketing, likely always in a power suit talking about her various marketing degrees, that just comes in, probably doesn't ever look at the manga, just starts making changes to everything the second she comes in that she demand everyone conform to, constantly coming up with new ideas on her own that must be adopted while demanding no resistance, speaks using strange corporate buzz words, and constantly shows up with folders filled with spreadsheets, flowcharts, and data points. If you have ever worked at a company...it is no surprise Naruto became such a mess after Yahagi left.

 

Ok. After learning about her. We are taking a look at the other two editors, now that I can finally get info on them before continuing. So I, and therefore you, can see the exact damage they caused.

 

Hiroyuki "Yuki" Honda, is apparently known as a hit-chaser. He just constantly went for big hype moments to boost sales. Going from one hype moment to the next, the bigger the better. He is the reason Naruto lost its tactical fighting style and degraded to Dragon Ball Z rip offs. He was in charge of most of the War Arc. So the random battles that rarely seem to have a point beyond eating up a page is on him. That said he was probably the second best editor because during this time Hinata wasn't really being pushed into the Heroine role. Yes, she was given a bit more panel time but not much else. So he wasn't pushing the change the Heroine plan Takemiya started and Otsuki followed through on.

 

Jo Otsuki, is apparently the editor they bring in to finish a manga. So once Kishimoto said he wanted to end the manga he was brought in, so it would be finished in a way that wouldn't negatively affect the brand. So his job was to make sure Kishimoto ended the manga at Chapter 700, once Corporate decided it would end there, and get the story ready for the sequel Boruto. He is the one who ordered Kaguya's creation to tie the Corporate Planned Heroine to the plot and to the planned villains for the sequel. Also, he was the lead coordinator for The Last Naruto Movie; he may have even been the one to ordered it to be about nH. Granted, from everything I recall, it was the anime staff that wanted to make it a Hinata movie. So, even if it was ordered, which I don't think it was the case, its not like there was much pressure needed. He is the one that ordered Sakura not to be able to join the final battle on Naruto's side as she was suppose to be married to Sasuke in like five chapters and her joining Naruto's side during the fight would make the pairings seem even more absurd. Also he was the first editor of Boruto which means he approved the ten months recapping the Movie and likely the five chapters spent with the fire lord's son instead of one chapter like most shouen manga would have done.

 

Wait a minute...Otsuki...Otsutsuki. Was the Otsutsuki clan named after him!? The AI says, no. However, we are dealing with a mangaka whose planned undercover named for Obito was Otobi before Yahagi ordered him to drop the O to make it less obvious.

 

I think I preferred the 15 editors chaos to this, because its clear how Naruto fell. After Yahagi, an actual editor, left Kishimoto got some marketing girl focused more on charts, to a "make explosion even bigger" hype man, and finally Mr. "Wrap It Up How Corporate Wants It."

 

So Kishimoto resisted at first, even getting the other mangaka to help him, because it was obviously a bad idea to replace The Heroine that has been developing a bond with the Hero for ten years. For a minor character that barely got any screen time, at the last minute. But he was gradually worn down over the next 6 years. Also, if it was Corporate's desire because they been told by a data sheet that Hinata would give them more profits. Then, it doesn't really matter what Kishimoto wants. Kishimoto apparently said in interviews he held out ending NS for so long; he didn't even see The Last as The Love Story of nH but The Funeral of NS. Now, what worn him down beside the 6 years of harassment on a 15 year long manga was the death of his father, early in 2014, and the realization he wasn't spending enough time with his family. His wife had to raise their children on her own, while he was a stranger to them, and he could never take his wife out on their honeymoon or a vacation despite being married for 10 years by that point. So his desire to end it so he could spend more time with his family and justified it with, "it is what the fans wants, and if the anime staff, Otsuki, and Ikemoto were willing to do the work to make nH/SS work. Let them."

 

Please note. That he already was planning on ending the series, which is why Otsuki became his last editor on Naruto. It was a mixture of Corporate Desires, his own desire to end the manga, his issues in his personal life, 6 years being told that "this is what the fans want" by the anime staff his editors & some of his assistants, and Mikio Ikemoto supporting nH/SS because he was the one that would be doing the sequel. All of that was what decided the end pairing as well as convince a reluctant Kishimoto to go along with it. He still did chapter 693 where Sasuke laid out why the character doesn't like the pairing.

 

Corporate didn't want Naruto to end. Even 12 years later after it ended, it is still the biggest anime IP for Tv Tokyo due to licensing. The Naruto Ninja Storm games were the Crown Jewels of Bandai Namco before Elden Ring took off. And once Naruto is gone, what manga could Shueisha replace it with internationally at the time? It was the King of International Sales and walking money printing cash chow. They did not want it to end and if it ended they wanted a sequel that would make them the same money. If they are told they will make the most money with nH/SS. Then, that is what they want.

 

Of course, before Kishimoto left he did write the Start of Boruto. As Corporate needed to show he was involved in its making and wasn't completely detached from the sequel. Which is why he was also made a supervisor on the manga. How he wrote the Start of Boruto brought problems that damaged the IP, even if he didn't intend it. The appeal of nH/SS is that they are suppose to be the perfect parings. Sasuke is the perfect dreamy bad boy only I can fix, with Sakura being an insert into that fantasy for its supporters. Hinata was suppose to be the perfect dream girl for guys who wanted revenge against girls that friend-zoned them. Now granted, he likely just wrote them, as how he logically saw them, and how they would act within the story. But, because they were last minute pairings that don't have any real connection or bond in the story. Well that means they are logically, not perfect.  He made Sasuke leave the village to wander around, never visit his family for 12 years, and while he might care about Sarada because she is his daughter. He cares more about his student Boruto than them. Naruto is utterly miserable married to Hinata and his brats are spoiled rotten. This destroyed the primary appeal of those pairings. Corporate couldn't stop it before the damage was done because all they knew is, they had to have these pairings for them to make money. They didn't really understand the appeal and by the time they realized that the damage was happening, it was too late. Those issues became the foundation of Boruto.

 

Not helped that the pairings were only allies because their goals aligned. If NS happened than neither of their pairings could happen. But if either nH or SS than it was likely the other could happen as well. But they don't like each other for a fundamental reason. SS self insert into Sakura, nH fans hated Sakura for her being a friend-zoner, they see Hinata as a better woman than Sakura therefore a better woman than a fan that see herself in Sakura, and that she is lesser than their dream girl. So of course, they now fight over which of them is better and that chases off the fans that want a good manga. That hadn't already left due to the ending.

 

Now, we can finally get to Boruto and Ikemoto. Ikemoto clearly took the job because he thought, it would be easy. There was zero risk of it being cancelled, because it was just suppose to continue on for years, so they could milk the IP. Kishimoto to make sure Ikemoto wasn't overworked, made it a monthly manga instead of a weekly. However, there is clearly part of Ikemoto, that despite taking on Boruto for a safe paycheck, wants to do his own manga. Also he clearly sees Kishimoto as just lucky, that he is better than Kishi, and he can do better than him. That smug arrogant slothfulness could only work if the IP is healthy enough for one to coast off the brand. Even then, that's not a good idea. Naruto however, had structural issues that needed addressing that the ending made worse.

 

Not helped that this slow approach that just assumed Boruto would be successful ignored up and comers like My Hero Academia. Around 2016, streaming anime really took off and restored international interest in anime. Allowing anime that normally wouldn't be even known to dedicated anime fans, to hit the mainstream. Look at One Piece. Which in an interview around the time of the ending of Naruto, in 2015, Oda admitted that he had long accepted that his story didn't seem to have international appeal compared to Kishimoto's Naruto. It was finally able to achieve international success, that it was denied a decade before, allowing it to surpass Naruto because of streaming, global theatrical releases of its movies, and the Live Action adaptation. So, by the time Boruto anime even started, in 2017, it was already replaced. Worse Boruto was facing something Naruto never faced, competition. 

 

Mind you, while Naruto never faced competition internationally, it was still number 2 in Japan behind only its rival One Piece. So, even if it was released into the Era of Anime Streaming or had competition when it originally aired. It would have been able to hold its own. It wouldn't be the biggest anime ever, but it would have held its own. Boruto cannot. Hell, the changes to seasonal anime probably would have helped it as that would have given SP less time to focus on Hinata, no weekly anime putting stress on the manga, and not being the sole international money maker would remove a lot of demand from it.

 

Despite the Corporate's disappointment in Boruto for a time new successful IPs that were able to surpass it constantly with little effort manage to distract and appease them. So, they were content to leave Boruto on the backburner while they profited from their new money makers. Of course that only lasted as long as one of those IP were running. A change from the Big Three era to the current era is, that mangaka don't want to spent over a decade on a constantly expanding story. So, they often single out the big bad that needs to be defeated to end the story early on and work their story towards that fight. So, they could end the story logically when they wanted it. When that happened Corporate would return their gaze to Boruto and find only disappointment. An IP that used to produce a hit movie every year. Hasn't made one in over a decade because its biggest hit wouldn't even register as a success now a days. An anime that is more filler, about 75%, than plot; that even makes Naruto's infamous filler arcs, about 41%, seem modest. No major games in over a decade. Naruto that used to average 3.1 million per volume, while part one of Boruto average around 100,000, and then its part two 50,000.

 

Kishimoto was brought back after Samurai 8 flopped. However, he grew to hate other people interfering with a mangaka due to his own experience. Apparently, after the manga ended he finally looked into the fanbase to see why they wanted the ending the way they did; instead of just relying on the people around him. He was not happy with what he found. He already understood SS was, "the dreamy bad boy only I can fix," which he found cliche and always hated the pairing. But, he finally realize that people wanted Hinata, if for nothing else her big breast. As in an interview he asked someone who their favorite was, they said Hinata, and he immediately went "oh you like big breast." When before that he constantly for years said he didn't know why people like Hinata 'when she didn't do anything in his story.' Sacrificing his health, his mind, his time with his family, his story, and his reputation for that would not make anyone happy. Just put yourself in his shoes for a moment. You have been working on a manga for ten years (1 year pre production 9 writing and drawing) as far as you know its a huge international success and everyone loves your characters. A new editor comes in and says you have to change out your heroine because she is too hated and replace her with a side character you forget about most of the time because she is so minor in the story. As she is apparently too popular to be a side character. You ask, "how Sakura is hated and how is Hinata so popular?" They can't give you a straight answer. You spend 6 years trying to fix the apparent flaw your heroine apparently has, so you don't have to upend your story. Every time you try something, the people around you simply say, "it won't work". You ask, "what makes her hated by the fans and how can you fix it?" They reply vaguely, at best they show you foreign Youtubers. As everyone knows Sakura wasn't hated domestically or you would have heard it before. So you listen to these guys videos, to try to figure out why they hate Sakura. You watch tens, dozens hundreds maybe even thousands of these videos about why your heroine is hated and why they like this side character, but you can never figure it out. That's because if they said the truth on one of their online videos, they would be called a pig. They rely on audience presumptions, that the viewer already knows the issues before they even think about watching the video. So, they never have to say it, as people watching should already just know. Which doesn't help trying to fix the issue when you still have churn out a chapter every week. So when the manga finally ends with the pairings they forced you to have. You go online to see why people liked Hinata and hated Sakura. You find what the people around you wouldn't tell you, it was the size of their breasts. Sakura was so hated because her bust was modest while Hinata was popular because hers were large. It a bit more complicated and nuanced than that, fans didn't like that she didn't get into fights often enough, she didn't seem to do anything, that she hit Naruto, that she was still pining after Sasuke instead of moving on to Naruto, but when you boil it down. It really just comes to how big their chest are. So he couldn't fix the "real problem" by the time his new editors were bringing it up. To fix it, he would had to have known before the start of part two. So he could to make Sakura's breast so large, that she'd knocked Naruto out with them instead of her fist. And all he needed to do to make sure Hinata remained a side character, was make her flat chested; to the point when people looked at her, they thought of a cutting board. Granted maybe not that extreme, but at least enough that when the anime animated Sakura they don't remove her figure entirely and treat her body like it is a straight line. Remember that when Ikemoto drew Hinata with a modest bust in the Boruto manga, her fans went apoplectic. Could you bring yourself to care afterwards beyond getting your paycheck? 

 

Now also think of this. While he was searching online to figure out why they hated Sakura and love Hinata. What was happening to the Naruto-Boruto IP? It was suffering a backlash due to the pairing changes. Almost immediately after chapter 700 large portions of the audience spoke up wondering why did Naruto ended that way it did and made clear. They didn't like the Ending. They asked questions and the answers they got did not please them. They made their displeasure known, and it became clear most of the audience did not hate Sakura. Some loved her, most liked or were fine with her; at worse she was tolerated. They only people that hated her were the Anime Staff and the international fans that have been pirating the story for years. They were always really anime watcher that follow the story how anime told it, and only read the manga for spoilers. They openly bragged that they pirate your story and even though you made the ending for them. They feel no inclination nor obligation to start financially supporting it. Also, it becomes pretty clear that the people that are leaving because they were unsatisfied with the ending were the fans that actually paid for it. As quickly sales go down. The Naruto volumes average 3.1 million, on their first week it was rare for a volume not to sell a million copies. The last volume 72 sold about 800,000 on its first week despite being the last volume, and pretty much volume sales have been declining ever since. Would you be working yourself to death to fix something for corporate when it was their fault, and if they had just left you alone in the first place they would have gotten what they really wanted? Also, he felt he owned Ikemoto for taking over the sequel. So he supports and gives advice if Ikemoto ask, but did not take control to turn it around. So him being brought in changed very little.

 

They ended the anime as the staff were sick of making endless filler. The irony is that it was their fault they were in such a situation.

 

So they ordered the end of part one and moved the manga into part two to shake up the story. It didn't help. As there is nothing that can really turn Boruto around.

Edited by Bail o' Lies, 21 August 2026 - 06:10 PM.

[Bail o' Lies]

1) Art.

 

It is important to remember first off that Ikemoto was an assistant of Kishimoto since the beginning of Naruto. His job was background and pretty much anything Kishimoto needed finish when he was tired. To be honest, I am not that good at drawing nor do I know much about the techniques. That said, I can at least tell when something looks bad, and that is often in this manga. But generally, I comment on it when I am typing the summary and looking over to the manga and can only think one thought...Wow, that looks bad.

 

An example, often characters have the same very round faces. That shall be round, no matter how they are position in the panel. Even when they are 3/4 pose, their faces will still be as round as if we are seeing the whole thing. The round faces also make it hard to tell the characters' age. As normally unless a person is fat, round faces are normally when someone is young and still has their baby fat. So his characters, especially his females, have this perpetual toddler-like face even when they are suppose to be teenagers or even adults. Which is even weirder that no matter their age; he will give his female the bare legs of a 25 year old. Face of a toddler, body of a child, and an adults bare legs describes most of the figures for his female characters, no matter their actual age.

 

A trait of his art that sticks out is, his nose holes. Anime/Manga artist will often not draw detail noses on their characters. As it is rarely the most appealing part of the face and can look weird on cartoon characters. Often, they will mark their characters with circles or triangles to show they do have noses, that they are not drawing in detail. Ikemoto is the first I have seen that has instead decided to draw the nasal holes to show his character has noses he is not drawing. And, it is clear why most don't after you look at his art. As his characters just have these two weird black holes on their face that look off-putting.

 

Due to the fact that his faces are so bad and he can't really draw them. He is bad at showing and changing their expressions to show emotions. Often characters constantly have a very neutral expression regardless of what they are saying or what is occuring. Helping to make the story feel incredibly bland, flat, and emotionless. The most infamous example is, Naruto's reaction to Kurama's death in part one. I have seen people show more distress over eating slightly burnt toast, than he did over a friend that has been with him his entire life dying right before his eyes.

 

As for the designs for his characters, they also don't look that impressive to me. He apparently copies designs from Korean pop fashion magazines, as he thinks that is what is hip. Often, his cover art looks like a cover of a fashion magazine, likely traced. However, he doesn't get how they are cool, why they work for Pop idols, but don't work for his ninja characters. For example, baggy pants, loose jackets, and so on are not something ninja or really anyone should be fighting in. Kishimoto's characters tended to wear sporty clothes and if they had jackets they zipped them up. Then, it doesn't help, that he likes his designs complicated with a lot of unnecessary flair that just takes longer to draw and more likely for mistakes. For example, in part two Boruto is on the run, hunted by the entire world due to being accused of killing Naruto, but his shirt (which is the most notable part of his outfit besides his cloak and pins) is a fancy expensive looking dress shirt. Is he supposed to be on the run, or on a runway? Also, while it was someone else that noticed it elsewhere. I do agree with them. That the reason his characters wear those baggy outfits is likely to hide their bodies during fights. So the reader doesn't notice Ikemoto's mistakes when trying to draw the human body in combat.

 

As for, if I hate any silly character or their fashion designs, like say Hirohiko Araki's JoJo's Bizarre Adventure? No. I don't. Araki can clearly draw. His designs and poses while often strange/silly still are clearly intended, consistent, and expertly drawn. He took his liking for strange fashion choices of models and music stars and poses of statues made them his own. Then turned it into an iconic look for his manga. If someone doesn't like it they wouldn't read it, but it is recognizable. Doesn't help that Ikemoto seems to "take inspiration," try to copy, Araki's art style, which just makes him look like a poor copy instead of his own artist.  

 

From what I can tell from the tone of the manga, Ikemoto wants his art to be seen as better than Kishimoto's, by being more realistic. However, he can't draw consistently and his characters are constantly off model. Not helped by, not having a singular design philosophy for his cast. He has Kishimoto's characters that he modifies to look more realistic while trying to keep some traits of Kishimoto's art style to try to make them recognizable. Which doesn't help, as it makes them look off as they can look similar due to certain retained features while at the same time so different, they are unrecognizable. For example, Sakura was given his female faces and hairstyle, so the only way to recognize her is her forehead seal. Don't see it and you could mistake her for Hinata because they have the same haircut and face. Then, he has his own characters that are so wildly different from the rest of the cast, they look like they are from a different manga. For example, Clone Jiraiya looks like he belongs in Vinland Saga. Which could work if he kept it to the villains to make them more foreign and alien but he hasn't. So, this mingling has left a constantly feeling of permanent inconsistency in the art.

 

His character's hair is often why I ascribe him having an attempt at the more realistic look. As often, it is the most detail part of the character. Often, to the rest of the arts detriment. As it common for a character to have really realistic hair on top of a poorly drawn cartoon head. Doesn't help he gave these to old Naruto characters as well as changing their look. So it is even harder to recognize them as often the most recognizable thing about an anime character is their unique hairstyle. As its part of their iconic silhouette. I already mentioned Sakura but I remember very early on Nos could not recognize Konohamaru because he had changed his hairstyle from his spikes to a bunch of curls. Also doesn't help his female characters all have the same face; so they only way to recognize them is often their hairstyle. Its why I couldn't tell who Tree-Moegi (who is apparently his favorite Naruto character) was a clone of her until they said it, because her face looks like any random Ikemoto female, and the imitation of her hair through the belts made her look like a jester. 

 

The Backgrounds are one of the few things that feels like was it carried over from Naruto. Probably because the guy that did them is now the main artist. Of course, this still somehow backfires due to Ikemoto's other artistic choices. As by having the background remain the same while the characters be a different style leads to an uncanny valley effect. As they feel foreign, alien, invaders into something familiar. Also does not help that there are a limited types of backgrounds in this manga. Its either the leaf ninja village or barren wastelands for the battles.

 

Now the cover pages, as you have to see them at the start of every chapter. They are lazy, they are just one of the characters posing like they are on a cover of a fashion magazine with the most interesting thing, besides noticing they are off model, is that he swaps around their color palette. So the cover pages would be Boruto standing but this time his cloak is blue, and another cover his cloak is green, and a third his cloak is red. While other manga might start out with their characters just posing they would eventually branch out. Like showing their characters doing something like taking a nap, reading, spending time together. Sometimes they would be in outfits they haven't worn in the manga. Or Oda's Cover Stories in One Piece. If Ikemoto had a sporty combat outfit for his cast and then dressed them up in K-Pop idols on the cover page that would be fine as well. Anything instead of the most intended interesting aspect of the cover page being this time their jacket is yellow.

 

Now, I shall reiterate and make clear. A large part of the problem with the art is that it is inconsistent with clashing styles of varying quality that just make it worse. If he had copied Kishimoto like those two spin off manga had done. (Note one of the most universally praise parts for both was going back to that art style as it was seen as superior to Boruto.) Then most of the complaints about the art would be nitpicking trying to compare how he adapts Kishimoto's style. Also, as there was already an anime planned with a staff that had made the Naruto anime ready to go to adapt his. Going with this style would have made it easier for the anime to adapt. As they have been doing it for around 12 years by that point. If he had gone with his own style and made all the characters fit into it. Then people would have to get used to it, and the anime would struggle to adapt to the new style. Which...what is a nice way to phrase this. Is highly technically with excessive minute details. Instead the art is a mix between poorly drawn Kishimoto, and his own.

 

From what I recall. The anime never used his style when drawing characters he inherited. They always defaulted to Kishimoto's style instead. For example, they had a tame version of his Sarada outfit for the first anime arc before switching to Kishimoto's outfit in the second arc and then never switching back despite the fact, it should've been the opposite. This also made his own characters stand out more and put off anime viewers because the anime had no clue how to make them look like Naruto characters because they were so wildly different. So they just had to put them in as he drew them. This is also why I think in part two, he has characters outright talk about his design changes. So if/when the anime comes back they have to make the characters match his style. Despite the fact his art is harder to draw than Kishi's, who kept his style simple & streamlined for the benefit of the anime staff, and not that appealing to anime viewers.

 

Supporters constantly try to defend the art by saying it is improving. However, the core problems have always been there and they have never been improved upon. The art at the start of the manga was abysmally atrocious; that there are very few that still try to defend it. So people have taken it becoming mediocre and then settling there for years as the art is improving. As they now use the early art to lower the standards of others. So people can't critique the below average art the manga has had for years. Ikemoto was not an inexperience artist when he took over drawing for Boruto. He is a veteran in the industry with decades of experience. Even if he was an assistant and not a full mangaka.

 

The AI eventually said that apparently, in response to my criticisms about the art that, "Ikemoto doesn't want the story told through the art," as an excuse for why his characters show no emotion, "but through the dialogue." I just want to point out that Ikemoto is a manga artist not a writer. They had to hire and eventually fired Kodachi who was in charge of the writing. Though I suspect not the story. If the script is more important to Boruto than the art, why was the script writer replaced and not the artist?

Edited by Bail o' Lies, 21 August 2026 - 06:26 PM.

[Bail o' Lies]

2) Narrative.

 

Let's start off with, why I called Part One of Boruto The Never-Ending Prologue. Well for one, it was easier to say and sounded better than the actual title. Boruto: Naruto Next Generations(...wait it has an "s" at the end?) I kept changing it to either. Boruto: Naruto's Next Generation. Or. Boruto: The Next Generation of Naruto, in my head constantly. The second reason is, that the manga itself said that its prologue wasn't over till after chapter 15 of a monthly manga with a weekly anime waiting on it. So I wanted to make clear my opinion that the manga was wasting time it didn't really have. Finally, third, it just never seemed to get started, every chapter was just meandering refusing to truly start the story until it was force to by the executives by going to part two.

 

As for the story. If we go from the end of the Boruto Movie. The intended story should be, Sarada figuring out what she wants to do once she becomes Hokage, while Boruto strengthens his resolve to support her from the shadows by watching her growth. Instead its, for Part One, The Evil Organization Kara want to recapture Kawaki, Ikemoto's original character, so they can use the Karma Seal to transform him into their leader's Isshiki Otsutsuki new body, while he develops a father-son bond with Naruto. In Part Two, due to experimenting by a Kara member, Code, their Divine Tree has gain sentience through capturing some of the secondary cast. So, now they want to absorb Kawaki and a few other characters that were important to the cast they are based on, to gain true sentience and make their chakra fruit...Oh right Boruto is still the title character and supposedly the protagonist. It's easy to forget. Right, through both parts he has a "Bond of Bro" with Kawaki that is very similar to Sasuke's and Naruto's bond, he has to deal with his own Karma Seal trying to turn him into Momoshiki Otsutsuki, and is hunted in part two by Kawaki to stop him from turning into an Otsutsuki.

 

And really that is the entire manga's story. Minus a few plotlines like Amado wanting to revive his daughter, and Eida wanting a boyfriend.

 

The plot often has a yearly cyclical structure that allows it to be repetitive and constantly give the feeling that nothing is happening. In part one, at the start of the year it will often try to wrap up the fight from last year for about 3 chapters. Then 6 chapters in the village setting up the next fight and having character moments. Then, for the last 3 chapters of the year, the new villain arrives at the village to fight the cast. Now while editorial/executive pressure has changed this somewhat (mainly the timing) in part two. The problem still persist. It also doesn't help that they never really defeat the organization their foes are coming from. In Part One, Kara, who can just reveal more members and in Part Two, the Tree-People, can just make more of themselves if they run low on tree-people for the cast to fight for the year. So, it feels like they are largely doing nothing but sitting around and waiting to be attacked; while nothing is really ever resolved. Hell, this latest time, to fight against Mamushi (Tree-Bug,) is the first time they have honestly trained in preparation for the attack. Hell, even then its not even really training but set up the power ups that are going to be important for the up coming fight.

 

The manga also rarely leaves the village. The two main settings in the story are wherever the villains are so they can have their monologues, and the Leaf village. As for what the cast does mainly sit in a room/lab and listen to Amado speak, Eida on a couch providing battle commentary, sometimes the Hokage tower, or just some random spot in the village. Anytime the cast leave the village is for a very short amount of time and primarily for the fights. The fighting grounds are the standard barren wasteland that you see often in shounen. They are so there is an area the cast can fight use their big explosive attack while be assured no random civilian can get hurt. As well as so they mangaka doesn't have to factor in an tactical use of the environment into the fight. Once the fight is done they are sent straight back to the village. That means most of the story is just them sat in the village talking. Now one can set a story in one place while making it work, but there are requirements for it. The Story would need to make the setting come alive, that becomes a character in of itself. Worldbuilding focused on the village. Explore why it is so important that the character remain in the area. Despite being one the few areas the art has not issues he never does this. The only difference between the Leaf Village, barren wastelands, or just a white void, is the time it take for him to draw it.

 

There is also the problem of the manga chapters feel like they are just extended weekly chapters, and are also not worth waiting a month for. But also means that each month the manga was only giving their weekly anime enough material for at best one episode. More likely half an episode. 

 

I want you all to remember, that it took so long for the manga to do anything. That the anime didn't even introduce his True Main Character, Kawaki, until around episode 200 (188); well into the fourth year of the anime's run. By that point, so much filler has been done anime. The fans had already decided on which character they wanted Boruto to end up with. Sarada because either she is Sasuke's daughter or they understand the storyline. Sumire the anime made Hinata Clone which the anime supports as she is their own character and they want another Hinata-like character to be the heroine and love interest. Or Mitsuki for the fujoshi; which is the worse for Ikemoto as those are the ones who should be loving his Kawaki. So, as the anime ended around 300 (293) episodes, they didn't spend as much time on the "Bond of Bros." Despite the fact that Ikemoto clearly wants it to be the main story.

 

Think about it for a second. It took him so long to actually get his story deep enough into its plot, so that the anime adaptation could actually adapt the manga's story, they went through it in less than half the time the spent making filler waiting for it, and that is with calling all the episodes since Kawaki's incorporation into the cast canon. The anime still was making filler episodes during that time and it would not surprise me if it was still more than the episodes based on the manga. When in theory, the manga is suppose to be the main story and a skeleton for the anime to fill out with their own arcs. Or to expand on story ideas introduce in the manga but doesn't have time to cover.

 

The problem with that is, for one, there is barely anything in the story to expand. All the manga introduced was the bond of bros, karma taking over the two leads but that wasn't explain till late in part one of the manga where it was then quickly resolved, Amado being enigmatic, the two annoying invincible cyborg siblings, and the evil organization Kara which we barely know anything about. So, at best, the manga gave the anime a vague evil organization to make filler villains from. Which they were already required to make filler villains for their own anime original filler arcs. So all that changed is they have to add an, "oh right, this guy is connected to this mysterious organization Kara," somewhere in the arc.Which would just be six inner members waiting around to have their arc fight and two outer members without the anime. Two, its clear the anime staff like with Bleach were sick of making endless filler. So decided to just cancel it and then wait for the story to get done to adapt it. Which hurts the story because its very hollow and was designed for the anime to add depth through there original arcs. They didn't even finish the story of part one. They ended it after the arc where Kawaki "killed" Boruto, from what I recall. Which means his pacing helped to destroy the justification for the risky idea of a monthly manga with a weekly anime. The third problem is, that his arcs are very...sequential. Each one clearly leading to the next with very little logical time in between them. Often it feels when an arc ends, the new one starts that very day in story, at best a week later. When the story needs for the arc to feel like there is enough time between them to justify putting in several anime original arcs between each. To expand on the previous arcs ideas, to give focus on characters the manga isn't focusing on, and lead into the next one.

 

There were only two logical break points the manga ever gave the anime once Kawaki appeared. Which, again, Kawaki appearing starts 'the bond of bros' which is the primary emotional plot line of the manga and Kara attacking the village to retrieve him the primary conflict and justification battles in this battle manga. Those are the two main story elements of the manga and therefore, in theory, should have been expanded upon and given the most focus in the anime. One they used, when Kawaki was first adopted by Naruto there was implied weeks if not months where he bonded with everyone in the village or at least the cast. Then another one when Amado gave Boruto those magic pills to stop the karma seals advancement. Which was clearly internal story justification and an excuse for the anime to put more anime arcs before the next fight. Instead, the anime instantly went to the next fight to finish the arc. Then cancelled the anime.

 

There is also the problem that they fired the guy whose job was to work with the anime staff to keep the manga and the anime story aligned; Kodachi. There was also apparently a problem with the anime constantly going against the manga's story and making mistakes. Hell, even when he was there. They did that as the core of the first anime arc. The flash-forward had Boruto's right eye had a scar and byakugan. The implication being like Kakashi that something happened to that eye. Implanted or traumatic power awakening. When it turned out to be a side effect of the Karma seal integration or possession by that Otsutsuki. The anime wanted to give Hinata's son a special eye that was more powerful than a byakugan and tie the Last into the story. Then it was never used again, even in the anime after the first arc. So the anime staff had given the main character, Boruto, a powerful kekkei genkai that the audience is going to remember because it was the focus of the first arc of the anime, and constantly wonder "why isn't it being used?" Because its so powerful, but the anime can't use it because they made an non-canonical power that manga doesn't want to use as the focus of their first anime arc. Just showing how good the anime and manga staff were at cooperating and communicating from the beginning and was probably a major factor in why the anime ended early.

 

As in theory, what they should have done is asked Kodachi. "If Ikemoto had any plan for Boruto's right eye, and could they make a new eye power for Hinata's son?" So either, they didn't communicate and just did this on their own. Even though this would force the manga to include it making it clear all anime arcs are canon or ignore it and make it clear anime arcs are filler. Or they did and the manga staff didn't go through with it. I feel its the former and way they did it was a desire to make all their anime episodes canon. A large part of the reason nH became the end pairing of Naruto and Boruto even exist is because of all their filler arcs glorifying Hinata. However, all those arcs are filler. Naruto is infamously known for its endless filler arcs, even more than other anime. People refused to get into Naruto to avoid watching the anime's endless filler arcs. And people trying to introduce people to Naruto had to create spreadsheets and guides on which episodes to watch to avoid the endless filler. Part of the reason I suspect anime went from anime that airs new episodes weekly the entire year to seasonal anime is the downfall of Naruto and the success of My Hero Academia. But if they can first use the Boruto manga to say all their episodes are canon both for the Boruto and retroactively for Naruto. Then people have to watch them all. This didn't work out and clearly backfired damaging the story and image of Boruto.

 

Now people on this site, in the wider internet, and even the manga staff itself used Dragon Ball Super doing a similar idea of a monthly manga with a weekly anime; to justify why this setup wasn't a bad idea. The major difference and why it worked for Super was; Toriyama gave both the anime and the manga an outline for the arc for them to work on at their own pace. So there was no issue if the anime overtakes the manga, as they were both doing their own thing. As for which one is canon, Toriyama said "which ever the viewer wanted," though he worked more closely with the manga. This setup would likely still be ongoing if not for two deaths, the death of Bulma's Japanese Voice actress Hiromi Tsuru ended the anime, and Toriyama's death ended the manga. For Boruto, the anime is clearly subordinate to the manga and is largely filler to expand the story unless Ikemoto decides otherwise. Which he barely cared about and likely wasn't going to do until the anime staff made it clear. That they were unsatisfied with this arrangement. Forcing him to add their Hinata Clone, Sumire, to his cast but not the two others Denki and Iwabee despite them being Boruto's close friends.  Which also means their teammate, Metal Lee, rarely is in the manga as well. Also she was Hanabi's student in the anime as a clear, "your favorite aunt approves of her Boruto, get with her instead of Sarada" ploy. While she is an assistant/Watson to whichever of the two scientists is in charge of the exposition dumps at that point in the story, Katasuke Tōno from the movie at the start of the manga, and then Amado once he joins the village, in the manga. Likely another reason the anime staff ended the anime; despite it holding up the IP by that point. 

 

Also, again, to show how Dragon Ball Super did the "monthly manga with a weekly anime" idea better is how they adapted their movies. Dragon Ball Super always did a summary of the events, at best highlights of the movie, and what they added. As they knew their readers could just watch the movie. So they didn't want to waste the readers time on something they already watch. Boruto adapted the movie scene for scene and other than some design changes to suit Ikemoto's style and Momoshiki giving Boruto the Karma seal. It was one to one rehash. Scene for scene. Beat for beat. Nearly no changes for 10 months, the customers were reading a recap of something they probably have watched the year before in theaters. They had to spend nearly a year reading something they already watched. Besides something that could have just been a flashback to the movie at the start of chapter one of Boruto. The only noticeable thing about the entire arc was how utterly horrendous the art style was. The Dragon Ball Super manga adapted 4 movies during its run. Battle of the Gods took up the first four chapters, then both Resurrection of Freeza & Broly were a single page, and only Super Hero was fully adapted with 12 chapters. Which was because they were telling their own version of the story with extra content and context. Even then, if you were to average it out they would have 4 chapters per movie. Boruto only had one that ate up ten at the most critical point of a manga, the start.

 

While we are talking about adaptations lets talk about Video Games. At the moment Video Games are the most important media for getting the interest of Zoomers and younger generations. As that is their primary form of entertainment. If an IP doesn't have a popular video game out it might as well not exist to them. Naruto had many successful games during its run. It was once the crown jewel of Bandai Namco. I knew many people that hated and refused to watch Naruto, mainly due to the filler issue, but still played the video games. Boruto has barely produced any video games during it run. When they do, they have to lean on Naruto's name instead of letting Boruto stand on its own. Cyber Connect 2 that made the Ninja Storm games, that Kishimoto himself said he considered their adaption of his story better than his manga. Eventually, after working on the successful Dragon Ball: Kakarot game; they were asked to do a Boruto game. They looked at the story realize that there was not enough content to adapt, and would have to make their own. Which they have admitted in public. Theirs was a self deleting time travel story. As what would they have to work with, if they had adapted the manga? Boruto and Kawaki standing around the village calling each other bros, as no other character matters in the story, fill a gauge by having side characters talking about how amazing, deep, and tragic Kawaki is until one enemy invades the village, beat them back, and then repeat? Oh, with quick time events answering & responding to Amado's philosophizing? Well, I guess for DLC they could introduce Eida and Daemon, not as character to fight against of course as their powers are designed so no one can harm them, and then replace Kawaki's gauge with one that has characters gushing about how Eida is more beautiful than any Kishimoto's female characters until its time for Kawaki to turn evil. Ew, who would even give that to their worse enemies much less want to play it themselves? Part two is barely any better. 

 

Another issue is Lack of Object Permanence, Character Freezing, Literal Time Pacing and a lack of Diegetic Chronology. I am bad with terms. So I tried to explain it to an AI and those are what it spit out. To lay it out Ikemoto has a problem understanding that some events should happen off panel. Even as simple as travel time or the passage of time. I'm particularly thinking about that week time skip before that Tree-Bug fight that seemed to both happen and not happen for the second one. There seems to be a rule in this story that, if a character isn't doing anything on panel, they aren't doing anything. If the characters haven't talked about something on panel, then they have never talked about it, and the first time its brought up on panel is the first time the characters have had this conversation. Also, because of this need for everything to be on panel we are forced to read dialogue that most manga will skip. I am thinking of the chapter Shikamaru gave a recap of the manga up to that point, for an entire chapter. That so was unneeded, that it shook me out of my apathy for this manga and return me to burning hatred for its very existence for a while.

 

There is also a problem of poor retcon cycles through out the story. In short, Ikemoto does not think about the implication and consequences of the "concepts" he introduces to the story. But then an editor or Kishimoto either through fan complaints or on their own realizes there was a problem with the introduced idea and he needs to adjust/fix/clarify. Often his fixes are just as poorly thought out as his initial idea. Which creates a cycle of him introducing an idea and then anywhere from 3 to 5 monthly manga chapters later he is having to reexplain it, then having to reexplain again the next chapter, and this keeps going. Till you can tell the editor doesn't think its fixed, they just gave up. If you want examples...it is pretty much everything he has introduced into this story. For some examples, look at the next part of this line of posts.

Edited by Bail o' Lies, 29 September 2026 - 06:11 PM.

[Bail o' Lies]

3) Plot Devices.

 

Omnipotence was some cheap shock event at the end of part one to hopefully get the reader interested in part two. "Oh No! Boruto is now hated and chased by the village while Kawaki took his place!" But the mechanics and how it would be played out in the story was not thought up beyond that. "Boruto will slowly convince the cast that he is Naruto's son in their heart, slowly bring the village to his side, and after defeating Kawaki he will release his parents, who were unaffected by the spell, who will tell the rest of the cast he is their son. Breaking the spell completely." Of course, there is always the possibility of a "shock twist" that they are also affected and believe Kawaki is their son, but that would be cheap. However, they do not know how to reach that point in the story; while keeping the story thread going till they reached that point. So, they have to constantly reexplain why people can't break the spell. For example, it only rewrites memories it doesn't rewrite physical object such as: photo, documents like birth certificates, and video recordings. Which should make it easy to convince someone something has happened. But Ikemoto says it doesn't work, unless you are an Ikemoto character like Amado or Code, as you will just trust your memory. Even though things like genjutsu exist. Another excuse was even if they explain it to someone, they will just magically be overwritten again to believe the lie, except in certain cases for reasons where they discover the truth and the reset stops. Which is never explained. Which again just makes it clear they shouldn't have done this storyline.

 

Normally, in a story where a person conscious is overwritten such when either their personality is overwritten or they minds are overwritten to believe a lie. There is a flaw due to the human spirit, the heart resisting the change. That gives the characters a sense of unease, dissatisfaction, a sense of something is wrong. Or the character uses logic to see irregularities & inconsistencies that make them notice the artificiality. When they realize the truth, they are able to break the illusion and resist retempering. It can happen all at once to all characters or slowly overtime. Ikemoto made it absolute with no way to resist it for most of the cast...until it isn't because the plot requires them to work with Boruto now.  

 

Also, Sarada and Sumire are somehow immune despite the fact they are neither relatives of Eida nor an Otsutsuki; who are stated to have immunity to her ability. This was not explained for a long time and most had to guess it was due to the power of love that they have for Boruto. Their love for Boruto was so strong, they are able to resist both the swap that would force them to have feelings for Kawaki and the charm that is suppose them make them have a crush on Eida once they see her. When Eida's power was just a charm effect they were immune to. It was assumed that they were immune to her power because they loved Boruto. When it was revealed her power was Omnipotence. It was assumed that they were immune because it affected their feelings for Boruto again, but it was implied that if she used her power to affect something that would not tie back to their feelings for Boruto, they may be affected. This caused problems for the franchise, due to adult characters like Shikamaru, Sai, Naruto, and Konohamaru falling for her power. Therefore Implying they are not truly in love with their respective love interests. Obviously, because that would backfire. As it would piss off the shippers that support those pairings. So, they eventually had to explain the power is absolute with no exceptions. Everyone is affected by it save Sarada, Sumire, Daemon, Eida, Boruto, and Kawaki. So they don't have to deal with the shipping issue.

 

The reason those two are immune is because she subconsciously wanted friends and they were made immune to her powers out of that desire. How did that happen? Why were they excluded? Why did it choose two random girls she had never met that conveniently loved the same boy that was an Otsutsuki? Why not anyone else? Why can't she do that to anyone else? Since a big thing about her character is she regrets using her power to do that because the entire world loves her on sight, save Boruto & Kawaki, but she realizes that it is all fake. Wait. Doesn't that mean they are still under her powers, as they are her friends that are "supposedly" aren't under her charm to love her, and should still be affected by the swap? As that was a separate activation that shouldn't have the exception grant them immunity if it even exist? Or did she grant them an exception again because if they swapped they would have a crush on Kawaki the boy she wanted? If she did she didn't bring that up in explaining why they were immune. Again, if she did granted them complete immunity to all her power due to desiring it on a subconscious level, why can't she consciously grant this immunity to more people? Seriously just have her use her power again with, "the desire to make everyone immune to omnipotence," and the issue is solved. Yes, it means her power is useless but she didn't want it anyway. None of that is explain and they really don't want you to think about it. Also, to be honest, I do not want them to try to explain it again. As that just means, another 1 to 6 months of poorly thought out retcons filled with sophistic pontification that will makes the story even more of a contradictory mess to follow than it is already.

 

Also, it is the best explanation to explain how the end pairings of Naruto, nH/SS, came about. As this power is almost as big of a mess as that corporate decision. They are so poorly written, underdeveloped, toxic, and they are so out of left field. That having an Otsutsuki decided to rewrite reality to make Boruto born instead of a NS child like Shinachiku, As clearly Boruto as vessel its far easier to destroy humanity (like how the franchise has been destroyed with him as protagonist.) This at least makes more sense than them naturally coming together.

 

Prescience. Clone Jiraiya's power to see the future. Now future sight is always a difficult element for a story to have, and it is something Ikemoto should have avoided. CJ has visions of the future. He uses those to prepare to fight the Tree-People by training the main cast by giving them power ups and telling them the powers and weaknesses of the Tree-People. If CJ is required to tell the main cast the powers of the Tree-People to defeat them because there is no other way they can handle them. Then the story and the fights becomes predictable as they should know and been prepared before the fight even started. If they still fail they look incompetent. Also doesn't help that part of the drama for part two is that CJ is operating in adjusting events in narrow margins. So the course of events don't diverge wildly from his visions. While Boruto openly resents not being told everything. This gets old fast as it means either CJ refuses to tell Boruto his reasoning, or he does, constantly, and like the spoiled child he is Boruto refuses to listen. Its the latter.

 

Also not helped that Boruto constantly goes off on his own to enact his own plans without telling the guy that has future sight. For example, telling Kawaki about the limiters Amado put on him, and using Sarada as bait to draw out Code. Kawaki after learning of this used the fact the his Karma holds the memories of Amado's daughter, who he is trying to revive, as hostage to constantly give him upgrades to strengthen him. Which will make him more of a threat once he turns on Boruto after they defeat the tree people. When before he was just a nuisance. With Sarada, Code had fought Boruto several times, even in the manga, by this point. So already knew the mechanics of Boruto's teleportation technique. He coats a metal pin with his chakra to swap places with it. So Code was able to sense those, takes them off Sarada, and abduct her before he could appear. Also, because she had put her absolute faith in Boruto's plan, she had lowered her guard to make it easier for Code to capture her. So, by the time she realize the plan had failed, which was still almost immediately upon enacting the plan, and tried to fight back; it was too late. 

 

Karma Seal. That totally original unique cool power up and plot device that Kishimoto could never come up with. It looks exactly like Tsunade's & Sakura's Yin Seal; which they eventually justify by saying theirs is based off it. When activated it slowly spreads out and corrupt the person who has it, like Orochimaru's curse seal. And, it has a entity inside of it that is trying to take over the host body like the various Jinchuriki seals. Yes, totally original. It is an USB stick/seal containing the information of an Otsutsuki member that they download into a person to take them over after sacrificing themselves to the World tree so it produce its chakra fruit...don't look at me like that. This IS the explanation they give in the manga. It also powers up its host and give them millennia worth of combat experience. Which is part of the reason why Boruto and Kawaki are stronger than Naruto by the time the are twelve; this was also explained in the manga. Its suppose to be the ticking time bomb of the story especially in part one. Where we slowly, very slowly in long info dumps, learn about it. The thing is the first time we learn about its infection rate, we learn that its almost complete. Then in the next fight its resolved. There are hints that the Otsutsuki could still take over Boruto, at the end of part one, but nope, it is made clear in Part two he can't. Its rare to see a story flub one its primary elements so hard and so often. 

 

The reason the Karma seal doesn't work for drama, is because there was barely any tells it was taking its host over. Sure, there were some signs, like if Boruto used the seal and a fell unconscious or ran low on chakra Momoshiki could take control for a bit. But that was it for most of part one. Well, till Amado told them their percentages. Boruto's and Kawaki's Karma Seals were at around 80% when it was revealed and Momoshiki was forced to use up the remaining data of the Karma seal to save Boruto at around 87%. Yet, outside of the activation of the Karma seals. You could hardly tell that the download was nearly complete. Hell, Boruto didn't get Momoshiki's spirit talking to him till after he used up the data to save him. It honestly, feels like the takeover is like a computer download, where it can be a 99.99% and it won't turn the host, but the second that last .01% finishes. Boom. Turns completely into a Otsutsuki, no turning back, and no signs till it happens. That is too sudden for something that is quite literally suppose to be converting their mind and body into something else.

 

This type of story doesn't work unless the audience can see the signs of the gradual taking over. For example, let's use Cyberpunk 2077. A Mercenary V was saved from death by her employer, by a device called a relic that restarted their brain after being kill. Problem is the activation started installing the digital engram of Johnny Silverhand that was on the Relic. So the story is finding a way to take the Relic out before Johnny takes over. She can't just pull it out because it what is keeping her brain functioning. Early on, it is revealed that V doesn't smoke but Johnny does. Depending on how a player does the branches of the main quest. If a certain quest is done early on Silverhand will ask V to smoke where she will have a choice whether to do it or not. If the quest is done later on, she doesn't get a choice and describe it as feeling natural to smoke. As one of the signs that V's mind is fading and Johnny's is taking over. The start of the final quest always begins with the fact that V can no longer keep Johnny's dialogue in her head and will speak out his thoughts in his cadence. 

 

For a story like this, there needed to be signs of gradual change for the terror & horror to really hit. From what I recall, Boruto really like Burgers and other Western fast food in the anime. Ok. Early on in the manga show he doesn't like eating those anymore and he only eats traditional Japanese food. This uses the anime that is suppose to be working with the manga to tell the story, and help show the subtle signs of Boruto is changing. The people around him brush it off at first, maybe Sarada feels concerned, until the changes start to become increasingly noticeable especially once it start affecting him physicality. When Amado reveals the progression its not 80%. Its 30% or 40%. The cast is shocked by the changes have changed Boruto so much, yet there is still so much left to download. With the hints but not outright stated, that once it passes 50%. Boruto will start to loss himself and will becoming more and more like Momoshiki.

 

Terror comes from fear of the unknown. But real horror comes from fearing something will happen again. The best way to make the audience fear for a character, is that they understand what will happen to them as they have already seen it happen to someone else. So since Momoshiki was able to infect Boruto with his seal in the middle of a battle. Why couldn't Kaguya do the same to Sakura? Think about it the core of Boruto's creation was Sakura was too unpopular & hated to be Naruto's love interest. (Ignore that was likely false and data shows she is the most popular adult in Boruto.) So, what should please fans more than anything is that she has been dead for years by the time she appears in the Boruto manga. Erased in both mind and soul. Completely taken over. Her body must be killed as it is being used by the enemy. They don't know how long it has been since Kaguya had taken control; as they didn't see the signs. The reveal makes them question, how much they can trust Boruto and Kawaki? Its perfect; it creates buzz for the story, it makes the Karma Seal plotline more serious, it appease her haters that have been making Boruto just so..."successful" so far, and it allows Sarada a way into the Karam seal plotline.

 

I had forgotten that it did happen with Jigen and Isshiki. The problem is, besides apparently not being that memorable, is we see so little difference between the possessor and the possessed. Now granted, that can be due to how long Isshiki has been turning Jigen's body into his. Since, he install Karma onto him after he lost to Kaguya. Which always made me think of instead of how long is the history of the ninja world? As this manga makes it feels like that event could have happened at best a few decades ago. When anything else implies, it has at least been centuries since Kaguya ruled the world if not millennia. Which then makes me think, "so he been in his body for possibly a thousand years but he never tried to find a new host that entire time, till just a few years before the start of this manga?" He also seems to rely on Amado to help maintain his body, with Amado switching sides starting the true countdown for when he makes a mad dash to try to takeover Kawaki, but then how did he survive on his own for all those years? The contradictions just make the whole thing feel like a mess to justify an Otsutsuki that been on Earth for a while instead of just arriving on Earth like the Boruto movie duo. Which all leads to the question of why didn't he enact any plans till now? As its not like Kawaki is from some special bloodline. He just some random civilian kid with an abusive father. He could have easily in Jura's body gathered up all the tailed beast restored the Divine Tree, used eugenics to make the perfect host, and eaten the chakra fruit. Years before Naruto's was even born at the very least and most importantly without any serious effort because an Ikemoto character are just that much stronger than any Kishimoto character.

 

Then, there is also another problem is how little of a differences there is in looks and personality between Jigen, Isshiki, and Jura. There was so little difference between them, I didn't even change the nickname I used for the character in my summaries "Jenga" when Isshiki took over, and only added "Tree-" in front of it for Jura to show he was part of the Tree People. They all look the same for one; Isshiki is just Jigen with horns and wearing a long coat, while Jura has that made out of belt leather all the tree people have. Which does not help when apparently Jura is suppose to be a new charact not based on anyone and due to the art the reader just goes, "Oh ,its just Jigen again." They all fight largely the same apathic way as no one can beat them because they are just so powerful. They all act the same smug yet overly polite villain that is so above everyone else in power and intellect while they spend most their time philosophizing about random topics. Ikemoto clearly think this is the ultimate villain that will impress his reader, but by refusing to make them distinct as well as relying on the exact same mold. They come off as generic and uninteresting instead. 

 

Also, if the Karma Seal will download into the host's body and transform them into the being that's data is in the Karma Seal, why does Amado need a clone body of his daughter? What Kawaki doesn't want to give up the power that Karma seal gives him to revive her? OK. According to its established rules, it will eventually take him over and turn him into Amado's daughter, Akebi, on its own. That is what the seal does. That is what the seal is designed for. That is its sole purpose. The power boost it grants to the host, is just a side effect of the downloading process. It turns someone into an Otsutsuki who are all naturally stronger, lived far longer and have more chakra. So of course it seems like a power boost, but it isn't. It just adjusting the host to fit the data stored within it. With that in mind, the clone is more for Kawaki's benefit than Amado's. He doesn't want to give it up? Again, Ok. Just wait a few months and he will become Akebi. The reason it isn't, is because Kawaki is Ikemoto's true protagonist. So Amado used his magical science powers to alter the seal to not take over Kawaki...somehow!?! How is this altered Karma seal of a random non-ninja teenage girl able to power him up equal to Otsutsuki Gods? Do not ask questions.

 

Though to be honest, from what I have seen. No one really likes Kawaki even the most die-hard Boruto supporter barely tolerates him and hopes he either goes away or improves. So, if he turns into a girl. It honestly be the best for his character as it would make him far more interesting and appealing to certain groups. Ikemoto might actually be invested in a characters romantic relationship. Perverts can fantasize about him turning. Transgender rights advocates can claim "her." Yes, unironically, pretty much erasing him or heavily overwriting him is the best thing that could happen to him and this story. As at least Kawaki would finally have fans.

 

Shinjutsu. Divine Techniques. The new tier of power that apparently the Otsutsuki always had; that Amado is able to give to the cast through making people cyborgs or through the Karma seal. Making anyone that does not have one, powerless before the villains of the story. Leaving only the cast Ikemoto grants these powers to able to fight against his villains, anyone else is fodder. It does not matter if they are even Kage level ninja, without Shinjutsu they will lose fights to any of Ikemoto's mooks. Limiting the cast that can fight. But they often aren't that impressive as they are hyped up to be. Looking particularly at Boruto's signature Shinjutsu, the Uzuhiko, which was hyped up to be an ultimate attack, that when first shown just gives people vertigo. Which feels like a power that should have been one of the first genjutsu Sakura should have learned in part one before even entering the chunin exam; if Kishimoto had ever thought to have Kakashi actually train her in genjutsu. It was clear this was suppose to be what it does and seen as this impressive ability. Till people pointed out how unimpressive it was, as it was at best a low level genjutsu that couldn't be dispelled, and so they changed it to a rasengan-spirit bomb. 

 

The original Uzuhiko would have been fine, if it had played into that; a basic genjutsu that can't be dispelled. Instead the manga acted like it was the ultimate attack; cooler than anything in Naruto or any other shounen manga could come up with. Honestly, it wouldn't be that hard to make the original Uzuhiko work, given that his original signature move Kishimoto gave him was the Vanishing Rasengan. That was dropped the second Ikemoto took over. Let's say it was a rasengan that he turned invisible due to his own unique chakra nature; instead of trying to remember that nonsense they tried to explain it with in the movie. Which was, "by subconsciously and accidentally infusing the spinning ball of chakra with an elemental nature transformation (Lightning Release in the anime, Wind Release in the movie novelization...wait. Then shouldn't that happen to all of Naruto's wind releases: rasenshurikens?...Probably why the anime staff changed it to lightning.), the projectile turns completely invisible mid-flight before striking the target by surprise." Also, instead of invisibility being his intended unique power, he uses genjutsu to hide the attack, and he makes illusions real when his attacks are enhanced by Shinjutsu. Which would make him stand out instead of just being seen as a copy of Naruto. As he seemed to have no talent with genjutsu, if for nothing else he never used it. Of course, for that to truly work for the best impact story wise. For one, Sakura would have needed to use them in part one of Naruto, so we can see that the basis for Boruto's attacks are basic genjutsu they teach to genin, and those Illusions had to be dropped because everyone could dispel them by part two. Second, it would be best with him being Sakura's son. So he would use the power she started out with that his father wasn't good with, genjutsu, and making it his signature by making them real. When foes face him, they are hit by an attack that while has a debilitating power. It feels the same as the basic genjutsu most ninja can dispel in their sleep. Only to be shocked when they can't dispel it. 

 

So how this Boruto would fight, along with fitting in with Ikemoto wanting his battles to be seen as cool. Boruto starts off going invisible. His opponent cannot sense him with sight, sound, smell, or chakra sense. Then Boruto starts inflicting his opponent with various undispellable genjutsu. First they get hit with the Uzuhiko to give them vertigo, so they can't stand. Then they are hit with a move similar to what Tsunade did to Kabuto, where all the body's signals are messed up. Then he goes after the senses: tinnitus to remove acute hearing, a foul smell to remove scent tracking, they feel their nerves are on fire preventing touch, and they then have both hearing and speaking reverse; so they can't even use voice commands for any abilities. No real reason to go after taste unless its to be spiteful. The foe tries to use Chakra. They are hit with a spell that makes them constantly fluctuate between utter exhaustion and hyper energy. So they can't properly mold their chakra because they can't gauge how much stamina they have. Any attempt to dispel it makes it worse. So a foe initial dismissal turns slowly into horror as they can't stop it and can only lay there as more and more curses are inflicted upon them. Then, have someone watching the fight think, "this is not a fight between ninjas anymore...it is more like a tragedy of an unseen divine being punishing an arrogant mortal by inflicting various malaise until they beg the heavens for mercy." Then, have Boruto finish them off with either Rasen-Spirit Bomb or something to do with his sword; so they also shown to act as a back up if his foe is immune to his powers. 

 

It would at least be a better skill set than he has currently. Lets see: Shadow clone which by part two he rarely uses, standard rasengan no vanishing ones, his Uzuhiko, Sasuke's swordsmanship, wind & lighting release, his flying thunder god rip off that behaves very similar to Sasuke's swapping power, and oh the byakugan which he got from his Otsutuki instead of his mother. He honestly is just Sasuke that learned how to use the rasengan. Like how Sarada is just Sakura with the chidori and the sharingan.

 

Oh a quick fix for Sarada since I brought her up. Have her learn seals under Naruto as well as elemental rasengans instead of using the chidori. So her skill set would be her mother's strength and evasive ability enhanced by the sharingan, while she lays traps with seals, and finish off her foes with an elemental rasengan; instead of just a chidori.

 

Scientific Ninja Tools. Now I understand, this idea was thought up by Kishimoto. Granted it was to show off cool sci-fi gadgets but was also about how society advances technology and a question of hard work verse technological convenience. Ikemoto just inherited it and has to incorporate it into his manga. It doesn't mean I have to like it, that I am required to feel he has done a good job in using it, nor give him a pass because it wasn't his idea. For one, it breaks the feel of the world without really adding anything. For example, when he gave characters guns. In anime, guns are either instant kill weapons or utterly useless. His were useless. Two, often it is just an excuse to give a character a power up, most often than not Kawaki or one of Ikemoto's personal creations, and not need to explain it because, its Magical Science.

 

Please note what made me completely give up on this manga ever being good and going into apathy was The Scientific Ninja Tool: Scroll Memory. A Ninja Scroll that was an USB stick. Just looking at it, my first thought was, "Dear god. They are trying to make their tech feel like it fits the ninja theme of the world but it just looks ridiculous." Why have a two hand size scroll instead of a normal USB stick? That they could just stick on their belt or put in their pouch. Why have a scroll solely for data constantly on their person? It looks ridiculous. It is like when Disney Star Wars have character use their lightsabers as a light source instead of a flashlight/glow-rod in lore or lantern. It is as silly as it is impractical. What are there no portable light sources in Star Wars beyond lightsabers? Did no one think to shrink down their USB sticks so they are more convenient? Knowing Naruto's Schizo-Tech issues, I wouldn't be surprised if there were USB sticks in Naruto.

 

The Psychic Ninja Phone Company. Near the tail end of Naruto during the war arc, it was revealed that the Yamanaka clan had the power of telepathy and can use it to communicate and coordinate the massive Ninja Alliance's Army. Granted with some restrictions. They needed a special made device to do so and communicating with them all at once was dangerous for the user. In Boruto, they started using this after Eida's power was revealed to allow her to spy at anyone at anytime. So they started having the Sensor Division led by Ino set up mental links so important people can communicate important information between each other without the risk of her listening in; as she can't read minds. It quickly devolved into near every conversation was done by these mental links. To the point, it becomes hard to tell when people are actually talking instead of using these mental links. As well as to tell at time who is involved in these conversations. As sometimes it would seem like its a one on one conversation through these telepathic links then suddenly reveal that others were listing in the entire time. Others someone would give a grand statement to the entire cast then suddenly shift to a private conversation; with only the context of the conversation making that clear. They can seemly start these conversation with anyone at anytime. So one must ask, is it always active or not? Did the main cast learn telepathy or is still an Yamanaka only ability? The rules, limits, and the mechanics are never explained and one increasingly get sick of its overuse.

 

Amado's Constant Endless Exposition Dumps. In part one, after he switches sides from Kara and joins the village. Half if not more of any chapter is listening to him explain, theorize, and pontificate about the Karma seal, Kara, the Otsutsuki, or the ongoing battle. Sometimes it is important as he is explaining the villains' goals and powers. But, it quickly became tiresome and obnoxious because if he started talking he would take up at least half the chapter. So even if a battle could be interesting on its own, it loses it ability to grab a reader's interest and invest them in the battle because the fight would constantly be broken up with him opining about something. This eventually was reduce, could be editorial demand as readers complain about it, but because it started to fade once Kodachi left. I will say it was one of his contributions to the manga. Seeing as he was a light novelist, he probably wasn't used to relying on visuals to explain what is occurring in a chapter and felt their needed to be text to explain and give context. 

 

Kurama's Death & Revival. Now, one of the hooks/pulls/plot threads of this story since the first scene is the hint of The Death of Naruto. Which was implied to been either been done by Kawaki or why he turned evil. It was hinted that Naruto was gone and likely dead. They ended up going with sealed. However, I believe that Ikemoto did fully intend to kill off Naruto. For the same reason a lot of Western Media have killed off their old heroes. They don't want their new cast of characters constantly compared to the old cast, especially between the main characters. So they they hope if they are dead and disgraced it makes it easier for their cast to shine. Of course this always backfires because the audience is watching the media because they like the old characters. So when Ikemoto originally planned his death was his fight against Otsutsuki Isshinki in control of Jigen the leader of Kara. When he activates his baryon mode or as I call it the Suicide Nuke Mode. How it works is, that the tailed beast and their host burn through their chakra by combining it like nuclear fission to give their foes Chakra Cancer through Chakra Radiation. That is not the explanation they give but its simpler than what they say. Of course it was suppose to be an Ultimate Form at the cost of the user's life, but it barely did anything in the fight in the manga. As despite Jigen already being at death's door as an Ikemoto Character, he cannot lose under any circumstances to a Kishimoto character. So it was the most hilarious and pathetic Ultimate Super Mode upgrade you will ever see. The anime tried to fix this of course. Naruto was suppose to die once it was over. However, Boruto only got ratings or got any notice on the internet when Naruto was doing something in the story. So they order him at the last minute, especially once Kishimoto returned as a supervisor, to not kill Naruto. However, the story made it clear someone is going to die because of that mode. So who do they kill? Answer, Kurama. They tried to lazily retcon this by saying Kurama was hiding that the form will kill him. When he made it clear to Naruto as a warning that he (Naruto) would die if he used it. Now to make it dramatic they made it clear that it was a permadeath with no chance of revival what so ever. As Tailed beast can reform after their host dies, it just takes them time. Granted the manga went on about the tailed beast being extracted from their host, because Ikemoto is a moron. Also the fact he doesn't have Naruto emote at all during this made it one the most infamous and ridiculed scenes in the manga. Which again, the anime had to put in all the work to fix.  

 

Now why he was revived? Well because of the failure of ikemoto's chosen cast to actually appeal to the general audience in part one. In part two, He was ordered to add in the characters Kishimoto made for the sequel that were focused on in the anime as the fans actually liked them. One of them being Hinata's daughter who was younger than the rest of the cast. Now in the anime she was in the academy like all children her age were, but for some strange reason in the manga she wasn't. But needed to be added to the manga's story in part two. Now Ikemoto had set up three tiers of power for his cast. Boruto and Kawaki who have the Karma seals are basically gods, The Demigod-Cyborgs Amado makes that gain Shinjutsu Edia and Daemon, and then the rest that can't do anything. Now to make those characters be involved in part two he made Clone Jiraya gain future sight so he can teach the cast abilities they would have gain in the future that make them situationally useful for a fight. Now again, Ikemoto decided that apparently no one had ever trained the daughter at all before the end of part one. Despite the fact that she was old enough to be in the academy and in the anime was. Again making any anime original arc noncanon because Ikemoto can't be bother to work with the anime staff or watch the anime. As far as I can tell she also is not a genin as where is her Jonin-Sensei and teammates? She just seems to train with Neo-Team Ten. So, she has no powers to get involved with the story nor any natural way to gain any power. So she needs to be given something. So they gave her Kurama; who they had said was perma-dead. Well they couldn't think of a justification so they gave a whole list of possibilities so the reader can just pick one. But then you must ask, Naruto had to basically kill himself to barely inconvenience Jigen who is a hundred times weaker than the Tree-Person Jura (Tree-Jenga.) How is she even suppose survive fighting them much less hold her ground? When her Kurama is barely a fraction of the original that was in Naruto? Well the answer is, she is apparently the most perfect Jinchuriki host to ever to been born. Even though she doesn't have a 1/100th the chakra or battle experience she is a 1000 times stronger than Naruto ever was with a fraction of Kurama's power. Also she was made the world's greatest healer. No matter what the injures are, she just has to pour chakra over the wound for a second to instantly heal them. She first showed this restoring by Inojin who was at death's door and it implied he could have been up and walking in a second afterwards. If he just got over not having a torso for a minute. The cast cannot die now as long as she is there to heal them.

 

Try-Hard Edginess and Coolness. Often times if one were to read the manga they would come across a panel where a character is standing or saying something. That if one thinks about it for a moment was an attempt at being cool or deep that fell flat. Ikemoto wants his manga to be this cool deep dark edgy manga that is better than Kishimoto's Naruto. Among the many problem with that is he lacks the aesthetic tastes to pull it off. For one, because his artwork is inconsistent and doesn't have a define style. It is trapped between wanna-be seinen and a poor copy of Kishimoto's art style. The manga lacks a define style the reader to attach themselves to. If he had done his own, it might have worked. If he had kept Kishimoto's but refined it to be a bit darker, it could have worked. But because he didn't, the readers will often be left confused by the art or notice the inconsistency making near impossible for an image to impress a sense of coolness onto them. The story often tries to have cool moments or be serious but does things to constantly undermine any attempt. As he doesn't know what is cool and just copies something that is considered cool, which risks losing the context of what made it cool in the first place. Also the anime decided early on that it was going to be a lighter and softer take on the Ninja World compared to Naruto. So that leads to clashing tones, when either the scene must be adapted or an anime watcher reads the manga or vice versa.

 

Lack of Iconic/Signature Moments. Talked about this not in the summaries, but in general discussions. In theory and ideally, a writer or artist wants their work to stick in their audiences' minds. So that even years later, they would remember it. Ideally, the writer would want so their entire story can be recalled by someone that read the story because it was just so amazing, engaging, and engrossing. Even years later. For example, you could probably find someone that can quote the entirety of the Original Trilogy of Star Wars verbatim. That obviously difficult to do for most stories. So most settle on the important moments to remain with the reader even if they can only vaguely recall or even forgotten the rest. The same is true for mangaka. They generally want you to remember: the first chapter, any major introduction to important characters, character deaths, reveal of signature techniques, reveal of power ups, important battles, and generally important scenes that happen in the story like backstory flashbacks.

 

Some examples:

 

Dragon Ball: First meeting of Goku and Bulma, first meeting of the Turtle Hermit, first Kamehame wave, first summoning of Shenron, Goku turning into the Great Ape, meeting Krillin & his deaths, Demon King Piccolo killing Shenron, Goku's fight with both Piccolo, Goku's two sacrificial deaths, Gohan's rage, Goku and Vegeta stances before they fight, first Super Saiyan transformations, transformations in general, fusion, Gohan's fight with Cell, "when did the Super Saiyan get put on a bargain sale," Majin Vegeta blowing up the tournament ground, Vegeta's sacrificial death, Videl fight with Spopovich...if for nothing else people never stop complaining about this one, Mr Satan become friends with Majin Buu, and the final spirit bomb.

 

Bleach: The Intro to Ichigo and Rukia, when he first transforms into a shinigami, anytime a shikai & bankai are first shown and their power revealed, the battle in the rain with Grand Fisher, the first appearance of a menos, Rukia returning to the Soul Society, Ichigo's battle with Kenpachi, her execution, Ichigo's battle with Byakuya, Aizen reveal, Ikkaku battle with Edrad, Ichigo fighting Zangetsu & Zangetsu instinct speech, Orihmie's farewell, Ichigo's final fight with Grimmjow, Mayuri's speech on Perfection, Ichigo going Vasto Lorde against Ulquiorra, Barragan's death, Gin's betrayal of Aizen, Aizen's defeat, the death of Yamamoto, the reveal bankai can't be restored, the truth about Zangetsu, Ichigo getting his true Zanpakuto, Zaraki and Unohana duel to the death, Renji revealing his treu bankai, Yoruicih using Shunko and probably more as the anime improve the last arc.

 

MHA: "Fear Not Citizen! Hope Has Arrived! For I AM HERE!" "Young Man, You too can become a hero." "Eat This." "I just couldn't stand by and watch you die." Izuku's first smash, Izuku's and Bakugo's first and second fight. izuku's fight with Shouto especially once he activate his flames, the fight with Stain, Bakugo's abduction and rescue, All Might's fight with All For One, "Your next," Sir Nighteye's final prediction, Mirio's fight with Overhaul, "Watch me" & Endeavor's fight with the high end, Dabi's reveal, Shigaraki using the full power of his decay quirk, Mirko's fight with the high end nomus, Class 1-A capture of Deku and the chastisement of the civilians taking refuge at the school, and Bakugo's death.

 

Akane-Banashi: Akane's introduction, Tohru's final performance and expulsion, Tohru deciding Akane's name, Akane's rendition of Jugemu, "you realize you don't belong in this competition," "if applause comes before art then what is its value," and Kaisei second performance, Tohru's returning to the story, Maikeru promotion, Shiguma's collapse, Issho declaring Akane is now his student, the origins of the Arakawa school, and the duel between Akane & Kaisei using The God of Death story, and any master showing off their art like Zensho showing why he is the King of Comedy.

 

Jujutsu Kaisen: Itadori eating the first finger, Gojo's deal with Yuji, Any domain expansion, Jogo setting a restaurant on fire, Gojo using his curse technique, Yuji and Nanami fight with Mahito, Yuji and Todo fight with Hanami, Yuji and Nobara fight with the curse womb brothers, "You got it from here," Sukuna's destruction of Shibuya, Yuji calm & cold speech to Mahito about how he is going to kill him, Maki slaughter of her clan, "have you no heart," Ryomen Sukuna enacting his plans, and Yuji whenever he uses a Black Flash.

 

The various problems of Boruto prevent the story from sticking to your mind in a positive way. Because of the cyclical nature of how the story is told, it all starts to blend together after awhile. As the current monthly chapter might be talking about the exact same subject as one released 3 years ago. Because of how inconsistent the art is, its hard for the art to stand out. As it is either poorly drawn or so well drawn you are more impressed/surprised that Ikemoto put in any effort into the art. Because he doesn't have good ascetic taste; he doesn't really know how to make an image or event impressive. That doesn't fell like he is just copying someone else. Because he can't scale his powers properly their reveals are as lame and they are broken most of the time. Also does not help that his chatacers do not train and are handed their upgrades, which makes them feel unearned. Because he uses so little of the cast you either gets sick of their overuse or more surprised they are getting a screentime at all. Because they rarely leave the village, the story has the feeling of it is all the same and unchanging after awhile. Because it is a sequel, Ikemoto doesn't have to establish his own world's lore as much a lean on what Kishimoto already establish in the original. Even then it feels underused, and when he does add something new it often feels contradictory to already established lore.

 

I was honestly having difficulty thinking of any Iconic moments the manga may have had and then pick them apart to show why they don't work. So I asked the AI what were considered iconic moments of Boruto? Ignoring stuff from the anime and anything Kishimoto had done. It gave me 6...for a manga that has been going on for at least 10 years. That's not even an iconic moment every year/arc. So let's go through them and I'll add any I can think off.

 

Boruto's death. This the arc the anime ended on by the way. During his fight with Code, Momoshiki was about to take him over. So he asked Kawaki to kill him. He trusted him because they were Bros. Why I remember it was Shikamaru asking, "what they should do," to Naruto over his son's corpse, Naruto claims he will forgive Kawaki instantly like his sophist ideology demands, and when Shikamaru ask if he can truly do that with his son's Killer? Naruto yelled at him to shut up. Then the entire conflict was resolved because Boruto was revived by Momoshiki using the uncompleted data of the karma seal to revive him.

 

Eida using Omnipotence at the end of part one. Yes, this is one I was thinking of and can't argue against. But that does not make it a good thing. Seeing how much of a mess it made for the story. I have covered the issues above.

 

At the start of Part Two where Boruto return is to stomps on Code's face. I think that was when I was laughing at the entire chapter because everything looked lame and trying too hard. But that is apparently one of Boruto's very few peaks. Something that mid in most other manga. This is also the start of when Code became a complete joke of a villain and a non-threat.

 

The first use of the Uzuhiko...again above. Too much hype for basically vertigo.  

 

The reveal of Sasuke stuck in a tree...ok can't argue with it because I honestly forgot about the scene. Ah right it was when Boruto sat down to talk to him and then we see the reveal of him stuck in the Tree and that is how the Tree-People were made.

 

The daughter gaining the power of the nine tails...again above. It is kind of awkward I already complained about/laid out my issues with most of these iconic moments already.

 

So I'll add the ones I thought of:

 

The AI probably excluded this because of the restrictions (no movie scenes because those were from Kishimoto, granted even this scene was his idea, and it was in the first 10 chapters so it didn't counted it; when it was one of the two things Ikemoto added....besides bad art) opening scene of Kawaki and Boruto on top the of Hokage Monument with the village destroyed beneath them activating their karma seals. This moment is what most of the people I have talk to remember about the story and why they were interested in it. Until they got bored of the slow pace and nothing happening for years. Not helped that they didn't really build up to it and what they have built up did not interest people. Is Naruto dead? No sealed. Is Kawaki likely to destroy the village? No, it just their final battle where Boruto just going to say over and over, "Just Trust me Bro." Is Boruto a cold cool stoic ninja? Well Ikemoto would hope you think that but, no.

 

That fight with Isshiki. Mainly for pounding Sasuke with his expanded Black Rod. Also Naruto Baryon mode, though that form look stupid in the manga. Kawaki using Shadow Clones to trick Isshiki which was about as intelligent as the main cast was allowed to act. Though that require more arcs to restore Kawaki's Karma seal as he is required to have it. The Death of Kurama though that also fell flat.

 

Sarada using the mangekyo and using her gravity balls, Ohirume. That was probably the closest the manga actually got to an iconic scene. It was very standard millstone for most shounen manga. But still leagues above the rest of the manga.

 

Sakura's speech to Sarada about how she trust her after warning her of the risk of overusing the mangekyo. It was probably the best scene in the manga and was only slightly undermined by the art.

 

Granted, when I truly think about the manga. The first image I always get in my head is an image of Amado sitting in a room rambling about something for chapters at a time. If someone were to do an abridge series of Boruto. It cannot truly capture the essence of Boruto without every scene cutting to Amado sitting in a room pontificating about something.

 

Claw Marks. The villain Code has the power to create belt markings when he swipes his hand. Note he does not have to touch anything for his powers to work. He just has to wave his hand in a general direction and it will create these markings on a surface in that direction. He has the power to travel though this markings. So if he stick his hand through one belt mark it will come out another. This allows him to teleport to anywhere he has left his markings. He is in complete control of where and which marking he will come out of. An obvious use of his power, which he does use often, is to swipe his hand in the general direction of his foe, have the marking appear on them, and then stick his clawed hands through a belt on his person. So he can threaten his opponent by having his clawed hands at their throat. Granted outside of mooks he has never killed anyone with this.

 

He used this power to mold the Tentails into his minions the Claw Grimes, or as I call them the nudist. They were given the innate power to use his marking. So when they became Tree-People. They could in theory can just overwhelm any battlefield with minions the second a fight starts between them and the cast. They could also teleport themselves to overwhelm them as well. They don't because the story would be over if they fought that smart .A big thing in part two is that cast can't fight Jura because his is too strong. So they have to fight the lesser Tree-People. Of course any fight against them; Jura should just instantly appear to save his men and kill who they are fighting. If not feed them to another nudist to create another of their kind. Making any fight against them impossible. So the manga has to make constant contrivances to justify why he doesn't do that.

 

Tree-People. I forget what they are called in the manga or if they have even been given a name. At the end of part one Code after being dumped by Eida decided to mess around with Kara's Ten-Tails/Divine-Tree to create an army of minions through his belt power. He created the Nudist (Claw Grimes) they have Freeza's lower body (feet and tail,) upper body of a human male with a soul patch, and covered in patches of belt leather. Over the time skip, they slowly gained sentience by attacking people and sticking them in trees made from a Nudist. They used the trapped people to give themselves sentience. They are that trope of plant creatures absorbing people, putting them into pods, and making an army of clones. Their goal is to eat other characters important to the people they are based off of to gain true free will or something like that. On paper it isn't a bad idea for villains. The problems come from the implementation.

 

Part of the trope is the importance of recognizing who has been taken and is being used to create plant copies. In Boruto, this has two layers to the problem. First, is Ikemoto's art style, makes it hard to recognize who is the basis for his tree-people. This is due to a mixture of a lot of his characters looking the same and the modifications of their new forms make it hard to tell who it is. Second, his pick characters that are too obscure for the audience to recognize on first glance, to really care about them, and haven't got focus in his story as he has been solely focus on Boruto and Kawaki. So your suppose to look at a character and go for example, "Gasps. Sakura has been captured and transformed! Oh No!" Instead you go, "Oh No...wait. Who are they?" Then once you learn who they are based on you go, "Wait, who is that again? *After looking them up*...oh its that character. Wow, haven't seen them in years." Which obviously kind of lessens the impact it suppose to have. Also, is that how much they know about the person they are a copy of is vague and because most of the people that have been copied are obscure. So most of the audience does not have much familiarity with their personality. So you don't really have much of the cruel mockery of the person they are a copy of besides appearance and maybe power. Finally, is how to defeat them. Often times that's where the real drama of this type of situation comes from. How do you free the person that has been captured and put into a pod? What are the risks? How much time do you have to free them? Is there a risk if the cast takes too long the character can be completely absorb and be gone forever? Is there a risk that harming the clone can harm the original? In Boruto, that is explain almost out of the gate. Each Tree-Person has a soul bulb. If you defeat them then place the respective bulb on the tree holding the person they will be release. No side effects. No time limit. How dull.

 

Oh they did a patchwork on the Tree-People to add some drama. The Soul Bulb only last a few minutes...which doesn't make sense because the first two they got from Tree-Shinki and Tree-Moegi were in the middle of nowhere days away from either of their bodies. But this was a patch to add some danger or suspense to it. Still doesn't work and another one of Ikemoto's poorly thought out retcons.

 

For what Its worth. When the chapter came out I thought of my own fix. "To explain why this time limit wasn't an issue for Shinki and Moegi but is for Bug and likely Sasuke. The answer is obvious, time. Moegi and Shinki were only stuck in a tree for a few days at most while Bug was stuck for years. The Souls in the Soul Bulbs are slowly absorb by the Tree-People but they cannot fully absorb them as long as there is a person in their heart that gives them the strength to resist. Which is why they are after the people dear to the original, to remove that strength, and allow them to fully absorb the original's soul. There is no saving either the original or the person they care most about once the second is eaten, as they are both consumed. However, the original is able to resist somewhat at the start, thought they weaken over time. So, people freshly captured have about a week before their bulb rots, that slowly ticks down till you got a few minutes or even a few seconds."

Edited by Bail o' Lies, Today, 09:07 AM.

[Bail o' Lies]

4) Power Levels and Fighting in General.

 

The fights are not interesting because they can be boiled down to, the villain is invincible till a mid-fight power up, often Boruto using his karma seal again, after that, they die in one attack. This upcoming fight against Tree-Bug is the first one hinted to be different, as they have already laid out the power up the main cast have gotten and the villain's power and tactics beforehand. However it so basic that its unimpressive, and feels like someone else has come in and ordered a change to the story. Instead of something naturally develop by Ikemoto.

 

If you were ask anyone, 'what is the primary moral message of Naruto was,' they would say: hard work. It isn't, but is still an important aspect of Naruto and a major part of its identity in the general public. Every character in the story has to train to learn and develop new powers, even people born with special powers have to train to grow stronger. If Naruto wasn't fighting in the manga he was more likely than not training. Even though most of the cast is from powerful clans, they slowly have to learn their clans powers over time. In Boruto, everyone is a gifted prodigy apparently. Most of the cast starts off with all the powers their parents had by the end of Naruto before Boruto even starts. They seem to rarely train either through implication or in the manga but seeing as its a monthly manga not showing it can be given a pass. Even when they are shown training its them learning their future powers from Clone Jiraiya. So it doesn't even feel like they have earned their growth as much as they have been given to the character to justify them being allowed to join in the battles again.

 

Power level being broken in this manga is something I talk about frequently in the summaries. In a Shonen battle manga, it is important for the readers to have an understanding of roughly how strong a character is at any given time and how they would match up with another given character. Strength, combat abilities, growth capabilities, intelligence, adaptability, fighting style, powers, endurance, and so on should be guessable at any point of time within logical reasoning. In Shonen manga, the story should go through a gradual escalation to show of the growth of the cast and the foes that are able to match them. Of course a mangaka should try to be creative with their approach. In Naruto, his strength level went from genin to low-chunin by the end of part one. To high-Chunin to Jonin to Kage Level through part two to Demigod by the end with foes to match him. At the start of the series, Naruto could not fight the big bad of an arc because they were too high level. so he fought a powerful minion while an adult fought the big bad. He fought Haku while Kakashi fought Zabuza. He fought Gaara while the Third Hokage fought Orochimaru. He fought Kabuto while Tsunade and Jiraiya fought Orochimaru. In part two, he fought alongside Kakashi against the Kage Level Akatsuki till he was eventually fighting them on his own. In Boruto, Naruto and Sasuke are in theory the two strongest ninja in the world with vary few able to match them. Boruto constantly fights side by side with them with no issue at age 12 and very quickly surpasses them, or at least Naruto. Especially after they were powered down by killing Kurama, and stabbing Sasuke's rinnegan. Able to handle the demigod level foes on his own when he was at best 13 years of age.

 

The justification for this is the Karma Seal. But this makes his growth unnatural, artificial, and uninteresting to read about. Almost no one in the cast is able to do anything. Unless they have either gotten cybernetic upgrade from Amado that allow them to use Shinjutsu, or some training from Clone Jiraya to learn moves they would have developed naturally later. Spreading the issue to the entire cast. As any character is either useless or they have just been given a upgrade that allows them to be useful now.

 

Fighting in Konoha. Nearly every fight has been in the village. Beside getting sick of this story almost never leaving the blasted village. The other problem is power scale and other ninjas. In Naruto, battles rarely happened in the village. For the leaf village is a main base and home to one of if not the strongest military power in the world, filled with thousands of ninja. This was how they were able to turn around the Invasion of the Sand and the Sound, with few losses, despite it being a surprise attack. As well as shown when the Teams Sensei battled Itachi & Kisame. Long battles tend to run the risk of other ninja sensing the battle happening and coming over to help their fellows. It also implied to have happened when Naruto and Sasuke fought on top of the hospital, Jiraiya and Kakashi both sensed it and rushed over. So, any fight needs to either be quick so the intruder isn't swarmed or you need someone so strong that it doesn't matter a la Pein. Yes, the village was invaded more often in the anime by random people, but those are in filler arcs. They don't count, as they are non-canon.

 

So, by constantly having the battles in the village, this in theory runs the risk that the old cast would and should sense what's happening and get involved. And they should still be, in theory, stronger than the current cast. As the new generation is 12 and Naruto's generation are around 30 years old. They had their children young. So any fight they get involved with would and should be quickly resolved. As the old generation cast that make up their parents are the strongest ninjas in the world at the moment. However, Ikemoto doesn't want their involvement. As he wants to focus on his own cast. So, it leads to two questions of are where are the adults and why are they so useless when they rarely get involved? 

 

Problems with the sequel child being involved in combat. Typically when a shounen manga ends that it has the main protagonist have a child with their love interest that has their combine power. Implying they will eventually become stronger than their parent; even in a more peaceful time. Now Boruto like Naruto was inspired by Dragon Ball. Granted Kishimoto clearly likes the Red Ribbon and King Piccolo arcs, its likely why he wants all his mentor characters to be talking animals and would have been if Yahago did say, "no," while Ikemoto liked Z. So Ikemoto on some level is using Gohan to justify Boruto's involvement in battles with Naruto and Sasuke. Problem is how Boruto goes about it.

 

            Dragon Ball. Goku was a super strong child with a tail, but he was not the strongest. So he kept fighting stronger foes and training in marital arts till he became the strongest on Earth. Gohan was naturally born with a higher power level than his father. Its implied & constantly stated that if he trained; he would become stronger than his father. However, he doesn't like fighting and training as he does for studying. When he was involved in battles especially when he was young. He was forced into combat because he was one of the strongest warriors despite being 5 years old. As he was so young and untrained he mostly just stood around frightened till his rage hit his limits; where he would then temporally overwhelm the foe till the rage ran out. So he was more a distraction than an asset. When he got older any training would make him stronger than the foe the cast was facing but due to inexperience, a lack of a fighter's mindset, and arrogance. He would fail to secure the kill, leaving it to Goku. He is however smarter than his father, and according to the lore his research will eventually lead to him scientifically explaining the concept of Ki to humanity allowing it to spread among the population. So they can defend themselves instead of relying on Goku to be their eternal defender. 

 

Honestly, a lot of the problem with Super, for Gohan, was it was just doing random studying an kissing up to professors instead of training. If he had been working on his KI research instead I don't think many would have been as many constantly complaining about him.

 

              Bleach. Ichigo was born a Fullbringer/Human-quincy-hollow-shinigami hybrid this makes him a transcendent being, like the Soul King. So by default one of the most powerful being in the universe. Which is how he is able to go up against spirits with centuries of combat experience despite being 15. However, due to the circumstances of his birth most of his power was suppressed and he was unaware of his full power. Also because he could see spirit since he was young. He thought he already knew everything and was largely uninquisitive about spiritual matters. Unless there was a strange occurrence that happened right in front of him. So that means he largely didn't train until a new threat arise and he needed to unlock more of his potential. It wasn't till the final arc that he finally learned about his past and awaken his full power. Kazui is a natural transcendent being like his father and has never his powers suppressed. He is also by nature a more curious person. So that means he is more willing to use his power and has more of an understanding of them than his dad ever did. However, its heavily implied despite his cheery nature and happy childhood, there is some wrong with him, as he lack the moral & mortal grounding his father had. He will likely join in the Hell arc and he will very likely unsettle his allies with how casually he can use dangerous powers.

 

For the Hell Arc, I hope it starts out with Kazui and Ichika in high school. With Ichika both acting as his minder and being horrified at what he was casually doing with his powers. Sending souls to hell instead of the soul society, going between realms on a whim, and granting powers to people if they ask. Like turning his classmates spiritually aware and into either fullbringers or qunicies. As well as ripping off mask of hollows and turning them into arrancars. He was never stopped or corrected because Ichigo was ignorant of his actions. Eventually, when he joins in the battle the power of his Zanpakuto is to alter reality. During this were are also informed that the Soul King was very much like Kazui a pure innocent soul that just didn't realize how terrifying he was. And, The Original Sin was his friends turning on him out of fear because they did not trust him to be the linchpin while remaining sentient. So Ichigo needs to control his son before the same thing happens to him.

 

                Naruto. Naruto while the son of the Genius Fourth Hokage and from a clan of legendary seal masters. He never learned anything when he was young, unlike his peers, because he was an uneducated orphan from the day he was born. He barely knew how to read and write if even that. He was a dead last with the only advantage was being able to take more hits and last longer in a fight. So, he had to train to learn what he wasn't taught before. He had to constantly train to get stronger and catch up; till he became the strongest. Now since he married Hinata their child should be a combination of the Uzumaki and Hyuuga clan. Seals, Shadow Clones, Rasengan, Byukugan, and Gentle Fist. Now that is a decent & versatile range of abilities but those would not make one all powerful. At least without training. Instead Boruto was the most gifted prodigy genius who has ever been born. Now, some of this could be Naruto trained him, so his children wouldn't be disadvantage like he was growing up, but the anime ignores that option. He also incredibly lazy and its stated he never bothers to train. So how is he able to go up against foes that defeated his father and win? The Karma seal. It instantly downloads millennia of power & combat experience into him. By the end of part one, it is very likely  at age 12, he has utterly surpassed his father and that before his perfect training with Clone Jiraiya. Oh and his sister is the most perfect Jinchuriki ever born, almost instantly stronger than her father ever was the second her powers activated, and the world greatest healer all without any training. Again, this is so they can fight against foes that were at least once a match to their father, but they completely surpassed him because of the scaling issues Ikemoto has. When the Naruto had a solution to deal with this. In part one, have the genin team fight another ninja around their age, while the adults fight each other. Then in part two you have them fight side by side with their mentor. Then, slowly surpass them as the new generation slowly grows stronger.

 

Explaining the powers. Normally, a manga would hint at what gimmick abilities someone uses. So their opponent can show how smart they are for figuring out the gimmick mid fight and find a way to counter it. Both the hero and the villain can do it and in Naruto, especially in part one, both sides did. However, Ikemoto is terrible at anything that is standard for those fights. He does not know how to set up or limit powers. So they become broken (until they are fixed later on.) For example, Daemon's counter power was invincible when first introduced. Whether thought or an attack all damage is reflected back, if you even have the though of killing him you will die, and he is physically stronger than Sakura and Tsunade put together. Imagine putting a character like that into a fighting game. Later on Ikemoto was ordered to add the requirement of contact for it to work. Which he often ignores anyways. Second, is that normally the main character spends half the fight slowly trying to figure out the gimmick. You know in increments. "Ok, they are doing x. I see they can only do X with in a certain range. Oh they have a recharge rate of y many seconds. Oh they can't affect something or it has some sort of limit." Sometimes it will be, "wait I got it their power isn't X its Z." In Boruto, anytime someone reveals a foe's powers it all at once and is accurate to the letter. It doesn't feel like they figured out their opponents power as much as they been given the script. So they don't come off as smart. Then in a normal well written story, once they figure out the power and its limitations; they have to come up with a way to counter it to defeat their foes. Which shows off the character's creativity, ingenuity, and adaptability. In Boruto, they just keep fighting till they win, at best they get a power up. I swear most fights end in part one with..."and Boruto activates his karma seal and it one-shots the enemy."

 

So, this revealing of a power early is normally done because the opponents power is so strong or tricky; that the main character needs time to think of a way to beat it. Here, its so Ikemoto understands what the power is, so he doesn't overhype it or make Tree-Bug unbeatable, because normally he gives the arc's antagonist some powers that makes them dominate the first half of the fight till the contrivance happens (normally the karma seal activates and becomes an instant win.) Now, he as at least laid out how the fight will go. They have to wait till Tree-Bug spams copies till their about 25 of them. Inojin will use his mind powers to screw with them. Boruto will combine his new super cool sword with Uzuhiko to one shot them or something.

 

Well, since the battle with Mamushi (Tree-Bug) is over, lets go over the fight. Again, Clone Jiraya has informed everyone of Tree-Bugs power. He makes copies that are exact equal of the original in power that are part of a hive mind, the more he makes the dumber overall he gets, somehow. So informs them that they needed to keep Tree-Bug's copies under 40 so they don't overwhelmed the cast and above 20 because he will be stupid enough to beat him, as he won't think to retreat or keep one of himself away from the trap. The prep was Boruto getting a new sword, and CJ teaching Inojin a new Yamanaka mind/sensing jutsu that allows him to make a map grid out of chakra (think one of those holographic sci-fi maps in a futuristic military setting story to help understand what it looks like and what it does.)

 

Both the sword and map was unneeded despite Tree-Bug making a thousand copies of himself. They try to justify that the map was important to keep an eye on him. But they just lure him to his target Eida and all his copies go to that place. So was it really needed? He is a hive mind. So by using the basic mind transfer jutsu. He can possess the Tree-People and enter Tree-Bug's hive mind to destroy his eyes by sending killing intent toward Daemon. All the Tree-People's power is apparently from their eyes. So they were able to wipe out the thousand clones with no issue afterward to the point it was done off-panel something Ikemoto rarely does.

 

This of course creates a massive issue. I had assumed because the Tree-People are just the divine tree/Ten-Tails just given human-like form and sentience. It has the same powers and abilities as the divine tree. Namely if you get in contact with them they will start draining a Ninja's chakra. Therefore, logically, if a Yamanaka tried even the mind transfer jutsu on them, which all of them learn at a young age; their soul would be absorbed. But nope, they could just hop into one of the Tree-People destroy their eyes' and have the daughter heal them with no downside, and the threat of the Tree-People is completely neutralize.

 

Power of the Gods is nothing compared to just getting some five year old Yamanaka to just hop into them to destroy their eyes. 

Edited by Bail o' Lies, Today, 01:22 PM.

[Bail o' Lies]

5) Characters.

 

Characters of Boruto can be broken up into three groups/caste:

 

Old Naruto Characters. Who are often visually unrecognizable due to the art and design changes in the manga. They are often treated as worthless, useless, and incapable of doing anything.

 

Boruto cast that Kishimoto made before giving it over to Ikemoto. Since, they were created for this manga and were barely in Naruto you get used to their designs in the manga, but because they were made by Kishimoto they have the Ikemoto's redesign issues where they always look poorly drawn. Unless forced to they are rarely used.

 

Ikemoto's original characters. The only characters he can bother to drawn properly. Constantly treated in story as superior to the rest of the cast being smarter, stronger, and cooler than the rest of the cast, especially the old Naruto characters.

 

When I am mocking the original cast in my summaries. I am mocking the underuse of the original cast and how Ikemoto treats them. Ikemoto does not want to use most of Kishimoto's characters unless he is forced to, he wants to focus on his own original characters(, like Kawaki, Daemon, Amado, & Eida,) and there are only a handful he clearly likes Jiraiya, Moegi, and Ino. While loathing using the rest. The worse and most consistent example of this is Shikamaru, the smartest of Kishimoto's characters, is constantly treated like an absolute moron and is constantly dismissed and disrespected by any Ikemoto character he interacts with. This would be less of a problem if his cast left the village on missions so they can be focused on, like Kishimoto did in Naruto, but Ikemoto refuses to leave the village for his fights. So you constantly have to ask two question about both the old and new characters. Where are they!? When they are not around while half the village is destroyed. Why are they so useless?! When they are involved in the story.

 

It also doesn't help he doesn't care about his inherited cast of Boruto's generation either. I am convinced that if Boruto's name wasn't in the title, he likely would have been left in the dust as well. So, Ikemoto could focus solely on his original characters. Who are uninteresting and most readers do not care about. So, he had to start including more of his inherited cast in part two.

 

Now, I don't want focus on every single character at there is in Naruto-Boruto. That cast is too large for realistically any medium to handle. Want I want is to know is, who are the main characters, and what is their story? In One Piece, its the Straw-Hat Pirates. Sure Luffy is the main character and the rest of the crews importance varies depending on the arc. But you know who the main characters of the arc are and who are there just for the arc. In Naruto, it was, in theory, team 7 that was the main cast. Of course, Kakashi had less focus because he was the mentor. But, Sakura rarely got any focus. Kishimoto, got bored of Naruto and eventually just turned him into the ninja Messiah. And Sasuke nearly consumed the plot. But in Boruto, who are the main characters? Is it Neo-Team 7? Going by part one they are certainly not. Konohamaru got no focus in part one. Mitsuki and Sarada were pretty much background characters to show Boruto was on a team in the manga. Is it Ikemoto's original characters? Kawaki, Eida, Amando, and Daemon. Well, fans didn't care for them. So, now in part two, the cast has been expanded to add the next generation characters that Ikemoto didn't care about in part one. For example, it was hinted in Part One that Daemon had feelings for Hinata's daughter and they were going to be a pairing. In Part Two, she is in a pairing with Inojin who was constantly one of the most popular characters of the new generation in the anime.

 

Which is why I want the main cast to leave the village on missions more. So we can focus on the main cast. Instead of wondering, where is everyone? When half the village is being destroyed again in another battle.

 

Now I have gone on about Ikemoto's tier system and how his refusal to leave the village causes frustration as the village can be destroyed but only like 2-4 characters are fighting the one causing the damage. But seeing how only about a quarter to at best half a year's chapter will have combat. That means, most of a year's chapters must be focused on character dialogue, interactions, and growth. So how are they? In a word, repetitive. Pretty much any character in this story, with rare exceptions, has one topic that is brought up if they are involved in the plot and that's it. Naruto instantly trusts any Ikemoto's character. Shikamaru he doubt Ikemoto's characters but he is dumber than them all. Mitsuki worships Boruto as his sun. Sarada has feeling for Boruto. Sumire has a crush on Boruto/is friends with Sarada. Boruto his bonds of bro's with Kawaki, his daddy issues, the Karma seal, and him not liking Clone Jiraiya's plotting. Kawaki his bonds of bros with Boruto, his troubled past, and him wanting to eliminate Kara/Otsutsuki. Clone Jiraiya talks about his future sight and his plans. About four years of the manga were focus on Amado being enigmatic and the cast couldn't tell if he was on their side or not. Not that any issues are ever really resolved, they are just repeated. When in theory for a story like this, a conflict introduced in the downtime would be resolved by the cast fighting together. If they are even brought up. Mitsuki seeing Boruto as his Sun was never even discussed/mention by Boruto until part two. So most of part one all they talk about is, "we can't trust Kawaki & Amado." In part two its, "we have to work together with Boruto, but we hate him due to the perspective flip." So it gets very dull.

 

Oh, let's talk about one of the few rare problems in Boruto that isn't Ikemoto's fault, but he still does nothing to fix. The likability of his main character, Boruto. First, let's look at why his father worked. Naruto was a loud, stupid, and obnoxious brat that got on the nerves of both the characters around him and the audience. Yet, he was able to impress both through his hard work ethic. He would challenge notions he disagreed with and if he couldn't get through the person by beating them up. He would go off to train to get stronger. He was constantly training, therefore, working towards his goal of either becoming Hokage or returning Sasuke to the village. His backstory of being a lonely dead last at school orphan that no one cared about made Western fans feel empathy towards him. That gave him a pass on a lot of his antics. And if he got really annoying Sakura would often hit him when he was acting really rude or obnoxious act as a stress release before Naruto really got on anyone's nerves. Maybe too well, as while she had no problem with the Japanese fanbase. The Western part of the fandom grew to hate her for constantly hitting him.

 

Boruto was born the privileged son of Naruto. Savior of the World and as Hokage, leader of his home village. Going off the movie, therefore Kishimoto's original intentions for the character. Naruto while busy, clearly made sure his children didn't suffer through the same issues he suffered when he was a child. Naruto was considered a moron well into his adulthood, due to being dead-last in his graduating class. To make sure his son wasn't considered the same, he clearly personally tutored him while he was in the academy. For example, teaching him the Shadow Clone jutsu. So, he wouldn't fail a test due to being unable to form a standard clone like he did. (Oh wait. In the anime, in Episode 36 Boruto said to Kakashi. That Naruto never taught Boruto anything and he just somehow learned the Shadow Clone on his own. Because he is just that gifted of a prodigy...Right. We are ignoring that stupidity for this part because it isn't in the movie.) So, Boruto was the top of his class through out his time in the academy and considered a gifted genius prodigy. Naruto understood Boruto's skill level to such an extent. That he was the only one to realize Boruto was cheating during the chunin exam because he, Konohamaru, and Hinata never taught him any of the moves he was pulling off. He also wanted to make sure his son was never friendless, so he asked his friends to set up playdates with their kids. The thing is, because the kids could feel their parents forcing him on them. So while they couldn't reject him, they didn't like hanging out with him. For example, during the movie, the boys were playing a new RPG fighting game. Boruto was given a hacked maxed out character by someone trying to gain favor with his father. The boys were annoyed by this and it is clear that this was a constant occurrence. Also, Boruto already knew the character was hacked before he met up with his "friends" to play against each other, with them boasting about how much they grinded and built up their character. He didn't delete the character and start over; so to not ruin it for his supposed friends. He just expected them to accept, that he had a max out character theirs had no chance of beating and accept losing to him. He was only upset about it once they complained about him having a maxed out character which he clearly got through cheating and left him alone after making their frustration clear. Sarada, who clearly grew up constantly spending time with him, due to their parents being teammates, so was likely the one that spent the most time with Boruto of their age group, saw him as a spoiled arrogant lazy brat. Her opinion and her feelings on him did not changed till after the Chunin Exam. Of course, he feels frustration that he never truly struggled and any success is already assumed because of who his father is. The only real issue in his life is the fact that his father is busy and not through out his entire life but only recently. Even in Chapter 700 when he vandalized the Hokage Monument. It is made clear Naruto was only recently appointed to the position of Hokage. Which is why he attaches himself to Sasuke so quickly as he is the first person who clearly doesn't bend over backwards for him, gives him standards that he can fail, and doesn't constantly praise Naruto. 

 

That said, he has issues that are faults of his actions and behavior alone and not anything caused by Naruto. It is made pretty clear, he doesn't really care about anyone outside himself, his mother, and his sister. It is them being upset and mistreated that makes Boruto have issues with his father. He doesn't bother to even try to bond with his teammates at all. Despite one being a big brother mentor figure all his life who had a very similar life to his growing up, one who has been his "friend" since before they could walk who also has an absentee father as well, and the newest addition is probably the only person in the world genuinely interested in him. He is also lazy despite how gifted he is. When he asks Konohamaru to teach him the rasengan. Konohamaru is overjoyed because this is the first time Boruto has ever asked for training. He thinks he is finally taking being a ninja seriously and wants Konohamaru to train him like Naruto taught him. He was able to learn it in a day. Which even with the short cuts Naruto discovered that would make the training easier, that is still impressive. Of course, that was only so he can get training with Sasuke. This is why whenever he calls Konohamaru, "sensei," in part two, it always comes off as absurd to me. As he never treated him with any respect when he was studying under him. He clearly coast through life barely bothering to do anything, passively accepting the handouts he is given because of his father instead of refusing them, clearly never refusing the privileges no matter how much he may claim to dislike them, and would have failed the Chunin Exam in the earlier parts on his own. When he would have easily passed if he had put any effort into his training. If not for his teammates carrying him or him cheating when he couldn't just rely on them doing all the work. He still uses the illegal equipment the Kote/Shinobi Gauntlet (a Scientific Ninja Tool that uses miniaturized scrolls to store and instantly cast powerful ninjutsu regardless of training) despite knowing its wrong, because he doesn't like looking bad by losing, also Naruto was praising him because he thought he was winning his matches fairly, and just blames Naruto when he is caught.

 

Now the movie is suppose to be his lowest point before he changes for the better. This is both what Kishimoto wrote and clearly intended when he handed the story off to Ikemoto and the anime.

 

Of course, it was a bad idea to make daddy issues the core of Boruto. A large amount of the appeal of Naruto-Boruto is the likability of Naruto. Boruto acts out the exact same way Naruto used to when he was the pariah of the village. So that implies Naruto is neglecting him on the level of how the village used to treat him. Either this is false and it makes Boruto look like even more of a spoiled brat. Or its true and it destroys Naruto. 

 

Now granted there was a way to make this situation fine for both sides that anime could have done but didn't think off. Have the anime start off with Naruto being the perfect father and the perfect Hokage, despite just starting the job. Early on in the anime like the first episode, he sends a genin team on a mission that weren't ready for because he was reminded of himself by one of the genin. So he thought of the growth he got by going to the land of waves on a mission when he was young, and thought they would be fine like he was. By the end of the first anime arc the entire team is dead. The anime does not have to state it just imply it. Naruto is horrified that his lax attitude caused this and so doubles down on focusing on being the best Hokage to atone. So something like that will never happen again. Everyone knows his focus on his job is because he can't forgive himself and even them saying it wasn't his fault just make him beats himself up even more. As he feels they are just trying to let him off, or worse trivializing it. Hinata understand that Naruto needs to come through this on his own, so endures the neglect, and raises their kids own her own. But as time goes on it becomes accepted as the norm no one tries to fix. So the division and neglect of the family get worse without it ever becoming abusive. No one tells the children as they feel they are too young to understand. So Boruto is frustrated at a situation he doesn't understand and wants to fix. Also if he knew and still acted like he did it would just confirm he doesn't care about anyone else that isn't his mother, his sister, or himself. Making it clear he is completely spoiled rotten as a result.

 

Instead the anime because it starts earlier when he was in the academy overplayed those traits and turned them into his defining characteristics in the show. They also make it clear that he is the most gifted prodigy ever. To the point that it is utterly confusing that he ever needs to cheat to win. He knew 3 elemental releases before even leaving the academy, wind, water and lightning, something that would make someone Jonin level in Naruto's days. Also, he somehow instinctively learned the shadow clone jutsu in the anime and was never taught it. He is very arrogant and obnoxious, constantly acting like he is better than Naruto in most episodes. Well, until the anime needs to do something to get the kids to laugh; then he acts wackier than Naruto ever behaved. Also, the more time before the chunin exam means extending the daddy issues plotline dragging it out to the point of apathy. 

 

For the manga, because the story is so cyclical, it never seems like Boruto improves. Despite making supporting Sarada's dream of becoming Hokage his life goal. He still doesn't show much care of his teammates. Instead it is just him adding Kawaki into the handful of characters he actually cares about. He never works towards his goal even after he supposedly changes. He never tries to change anything, just constantly complains to the adults that are both required and used to listening to him whine. He doesn't train and it's not like he needs to because the Karma Seal makes him stronger than Naruto over time. He is an obnoxious smug selfish arrogant lazy brat that constantly thinks he is better than anyone. His privileged background means he is not given a pass for his behavior like Naruto was by the audience. It would be better if Sarada hits him like her mother used to. In order to release some of the frustration the audience felt for him, before it reached the apathy stage, but they fear her being hated like her mother. So no one really criticizes or complains about his behavior. I am 95% convinced that Inojin's popularity, as he was considered at times the most popular character of the new generation by anime fans especially in Japan, is because he is one of the few that does. Which is likely why he was made the love interest of the daughter in part two over Daemon. The one Ikemoto clearly wanted for her to be in a pairing with instead.

 

Part one of the manga should have been several arcs of him admiring Sarada's dream of becoming hokage and what she would do that would make it so worth it to be her shadow. Have him addressing Mitsuki seeing him as his sun. As well as learning something from Konohamaru and treating him as his teacher just like Naruto does for Kakashi; as Sasuke should be his Jiraiya. That's way how he behaves in part two, suddenly caring about them which he never did before, doesn't come out of left field.

 

In part two, Ikemoto made him more like one of his characters. Arrogant yet selfless edgy cool stoic silent lone wolf that the manga clearly wants you to think is cool, but just comes off as fake. He seems like a completely different person. Well, until he starts having hissy fits again. Also even here when clone Jiraiya trains him CJ makes it clear he is going to train Boruto in the most optimized way to make him the strongest he can possibly be, and it all but stated he is the strongest in the world with no one being close to his level; besides the Tree-People.

 

So (anime) before he left the academy he was the greatest genius ever to be born just able to learn advance techniques on a whim instinctively with no training, (movie) he is a lazy brat that doesn't train and had to cheat to win, (part one) even when he supposedly turns himself around he is given a seal that instantly makes him one of the most powerful ninja in the world, and (part two) he then undergoes training with someone who uses future sight to optimize his training to make him the most perfect version of himself. Where is the hard work?

Edited by Bail o' Lies, Today, 10:33 AM.

[Bail o' Lies]

6) Shipping & Character Relationships.

 

I have gone over why the Shipping in the story is pointless before, in other topics, but let's go over it again. But. To make it clear, because of how little is focus on most of the cast. Whether that be Naruto character or Boruto. There are only two relationships that matter beyond Boruto's relationships with his father (Naruto) and mentor (Sasuke.) To even bother to bring up, much less discuss. Boruto's relationship with Sarada, as they are supposedly in love as well as his dream is to support her dream; which should make this relationship the focus of the story logically. And, his bond of bros with Kawaki, which the manga focuses on instead.

 

The goal of the character Boruto at the start of the manga is the be the Shadow Hokage/Hokage's Shadow for Sarada; like Sasuke is for Naruto, and Danzo was for Hiruzen when he was Hokage. So logically, what matters and what the story should be focused on is; why does he want to be her shadow enforcer when she becomes Hokage? Does he agree with her policies? Does he agree with her moral views? Does he agree with her philosophy? Does he support any reforms she wants to enact? Does he think she has good economic policies? Does he think she would be good at governing the village? Why does he support her? Whether he ends up with her romantically or not doesn't matter, because his dream job is still to be her shadow enforcer. Whether he ends up with Sarada, Mitsuki, Kawaki, Eida, or Sumire does not matter. As working for Sarada is still his goal regardless to who he ends up with; if he ends up with anyone. Neither the anime nor manga, as far as I know, have even attempted to cover this in the slightest. The only answer that might have been given is that, he is in love with her. If that is the case, if that is the only reason he has to support her when she becomes hokage. Then, he must end up with her and all other pairings considerations are a distraction. As he has no other reason for his stated end goal, besides his feelings for her.

 

This also brings up another problem of Sarada's constant underutilization in the story. Her becoming Hokage is the end goal for both her and the Protagonist, Boruto. But it is rarely mentioned, never addressed, never explored, never examined in the story. The only thing she has is her feelings for Boruto, which she is unwilling to admit she has but everyone can see. Why should the audience care about her becoming Hokage at the end, when the story itself won't till the ending?

 

The Sarada Gaiden was well received by the fans. One of the main appeals of the miniseries was the growing bond between Naruto and Sarada that eventually inspired her goal to become Hokage. Which Boruto despised and resented in equal measure. Now, if this had led to a mentorship role similar to what Sasuke has with Boruto, it would have fixed a major issue both in Boruto and Naruto. As its never made clear what Naruto even accomplished once he became Hokage? Why should readers even care about his goal of being Hokage  when he seems miserable in the role and doesn't seemed to accomplish anything? Him mentoring Sarada and showing what he has accomplish as Hokage would solve the issue, as its would demonstrate how important it was for him to become Hokage, what he had accomplished, and why its important for Sarada to follow after him.

 

This mentorship didn't happen, beyond them not thinking about it, for two reasons. For one, Ikemoto wanted to focus on Naruto being a father-figure for his character Kawaki. The other? The main message of that Gaiden was blood isn't important, bonds are. It doesn't matter if Karin is Sarada's mother or Sakura. As Sakura is the one who raised her, so she is her mother. The problem is that message leads into a logical question of, who is her father-figure then? Sasuke is her biological father, no one denies that, but because she wants to be Hokage due to spending time with Naruto. Doesn't that mean that she sees Naruto as her father-figure? This line of thought isn't allowed as it would mean the daughter of SasuSaku really wishes she was a NaruSaku daughter instead. So she isn't allowed to have more of a bond or interactions beyond what she had in the Gaiden with Naruto, despite this restriction harming the story.

 

Let me make this clear: the damage of not going with NaruSaku as the end pairing for Naruto is minor compared to them not going with BoroSara for Boruto. Granted, the difference is like be comparing the iceberg hitting the Titanic and a nuke going off. Not going with NS negatively affected Naruto as what was the point of the promise of a lifetime, why did Sakura confess to Naruto and try to kill Sasuke to atone for how she burdened Naruto, why did Naruto forgive Obito, and the bench scene meaning a purpose being erased made Sakura have a flat to not even having a character arc as she loved Sasuke at the start and she got him by doing nothing. But it didn't destroy the story entirely by not going through with it. That was the Last that did so, by making it why NS didn't happen worse. As instead of just Naruto moving on, so his two friends could be happy together. They made it, he never had feelings for her, and was only pretending to for over a decade to spite Sasuke, like an utter scumbag. While in Boruto, the only reason for the purported end goal of the story is their feelings for each other. They have never given another reason. They have never explored another reason. This story has been running for nearly ten years now. As even if they started next chapter, it feels too late to do something that should have been a part of the story all along.

 

And what did the story focus on instead of developing the end goal of the story? An attempt to make an improved Naruto-Sasuke conflict with Boruto and Kawaki. Their "Bond of Bros" is the primary if not the sole story focused in the manga and its not interesting. While one of the major weakness of the chase after Sasuke, is we didn't spend enough time with team 7 together. So fans got tired of why Naruto focused so much on a character they barely spent time with and didn't want to return to the village. In Boruto, most of the actual story in part one is building and bashing you over the head that Boruto and Kawaki are total Bros. They are the ultimate bros that totally care for each other like brothers. Please ignore that Kawaki constantly acts like an ass and Boruto is a spoiled brat. They are totally bros with a deep bond. Has the story mentioned that they are real bros enough yet, no? Don't worry they just have every chapter just constantly go on about how much they are bros. Of course that's till the end of part one, with the "tragedy" of Kawaki deciding to kill Boruto, his bro who he totally cares about bro, to destroy the Otsutsuki within him in order to protect Naruto his father figure. The problem is he tells no one of this, so the entire cast has to guess his motivation, and when Naruto and Hinata refused to kill their son just because Kawaki wants to. He seals them away, pretends they are dead, with the plans to release them after he kills their son, and anyone else that gets in his way. However, the first time we see Momoshiki in Boruto's head in part two, he makes it clear he has no power over Boruto, he can't take over his body, he can't influence him in the slightest, he is just a voice in the back of Boruto's head. Waiting for him to die so they can both end it. Unless Boruto gives him control. Which he had even given up on that by the time we saw him again. So, the reason for the conflict between them is moot.

 

Now, you can argue that the story can say, "well, Kawaki doesn't know that and can't believe Boruto even if he tells him." Sure, but the problem is the audience knows Momoshiki is no threat. Beyond maybe a fake out there is no risk or danger of Boruto being taken over by Momoshiki. So there is no suspense and its just an excuse for the conflict to continue as there is no other reason, conflict, or the story to continue the manga without it.

 

Sasuke's reasons made sense in character for why he left the village. He wanted power to avenge his family and felt the village was making him too soft to accomplish this goal. Of course the story needed a reason to keep the chase going. So he didn't just return to the village after he killed his brother. Therefore, making the chase after him unnecessary. As Naruto should've just trusted Sasuke would have returned after he killed Itachi and all he had to do is give him a heads up on why Orochimaru wants his body. But the way Kishimoto went about to try to keeping the chase going, the village ordered his clan to be purged by his brother, made so Sasuke was justified in never returning to the village and in fact making him an enemy of the village. While Naruto's reason for obsessively chasing was under developed because of the limited time they were on a team together, and not coming up for a reason Sasuke should return to the village beyond "bonds."

 

What is going to happen at the end of Boruto is obvious. After defeating all the tree people. They will have a fight where Boruto just keeps going over and over, "Just trust me, Bro." Until he wins/convinces Kawaki to release his parents. Then he gets instantly forgiven by them despite entrapping them for years while he brainwashed the world to chase down and kill their son.

Edited by Bail o' Lies, 15 August 2026 - 03:18 PM.

[Bail o' Lies]

Well now that the site is back. I fed this to an AI and here is what it made a thesis statement and a summary.
 
Thesis Statement: The structural collapse of Boruto stems from an fundamental mismatch between its corporate ambition and its creative execution. The franchise attempts to build a high-stakes, sci-fi-infused battle shonen while relying on a monthly artist who uses visual shortcuts to mask anatomical and emotional drafting weaknesses. By abandoning organic ninja world-building, clear tactical combat logic, and cohesive character development in favor of unearned power-ups, mechanical retcons, and hollow emotional stakes, the series transforms a legendary legacy into a sterile, hyper-focused sandbox that fails to justify its own narrative existence.
 
1.) The Visual Identity Crisis: Mikio Ikemoto’s background as a background rendering assistant leaves him fundamentally unequipped for dynamic human anatomy and organic facial expressions. To compensate, he relies on overly baggy K-Pop aesthetic choices to mask skeletal combat movements, isolates characters with off-putting visual anchors like literal nostril holes, and strips legacy cast members of their defining silhouettes. This structural limitation results in an emotionally flat world where characters lack facial nuance, and the visual storytelling fails to convey genuine human grief or kinetic momentum.
 
2.) The Structural Failure of the "Never-Ending Prologue: "The series operates on a broken mathematical reality: a monthly manga attempting to feed a weekly anime. This creates a sluggish, highly repetitive annual plot loop that stalls progression for years. Because the manga cannot generate enough source material, the narrative becomes a hollow skeleton designed for the anime to fill with filler. When the anime staff ultimately halted production, it exposed the structural failure of the series' pacing—leaving a story with zero organic downtime, rapid-fire sequential arcs, and deep bonds that exist entirely on paper rather than through sustained canonical buildup.
 
3.) The Illusion of Innovation Through Recycled Plot Devices: The central narrative engines of Boruto—the Karma Seal, Omnipotence, and Shinjutsu—are marketed as revolutionary expansions but function as lazy shortcuts. The Karma seal strips away the horror of parasitic takeover by becoming a glorified, consequence-free stat multiplier that drops millennia of combat data into a child’s muscle memory. Meanwhile, the Omnipotence memory warp locks characters in an artificial cognitive loop, forcing the story to repeatedly re-explain the spell's mechanics because the writers cannot allow logical deduction to break the predetermined endgame early.
 
4.) The Erasure of Strategic Shinobi Warfare: Combat has degraded from a game of high-stakes tactical chess into a highly scripted, binary sequence. Ikemoto establishes antagonists with absolute, flawless invulnerability, only to introduce a sudden mid-fight narrative contrivance or immediate power-up to end the fight in a single blow. Furthermore, by locking nearly every battle inside the borders of Konoha while completely ignoring the organic deployment of the village’s military and sensor divisions, the manga creates a geographical paradox that makes the world feel utterly empty, sterile, and devoid of stakes.
 
5.) Corporate Favoritism and Character Erasure: The cast is explicitly fractured by authorial preference. While Ikemoto’s original cyborg creations dominate screen time with un-counterable abilities and intellectual superiority, legendary strategists like Shikamaru are deliberately written as short-tempered morons to artificially elevate the new cast. When editorial pressure finally forced the inclusion of popular next-gen characters in Part Two, they were dropped into the frontline without prior organic development, proving that if the protagonist's name wasn't in the title, the entire inherited generation would have been completely abandoned.
 
6.) The Death of Narrative Purpose: The ultimate failure of the series manifests in its emotional core. By completely ignoring the political, philosophical, and structural governance of Sarada’s dream to become Hokage, Boruto’s foundational life goal of becoming her "Shadow Enforcer" is stripped of all ideological weight. The story backs itself into a corner where romantic love is the only remaining justification for the plot. To fill this void, the manga hyper-focuses on an artificial "Bond of Bros" between Boruto and Kawaki, which collapses in Part Two once the internal threat of Momoshiki is revealed to be completely contained.
 
Ultimately, Boruto functions as an artificial corporate enterprise rather than an organic continuation of Masashi Kishimoto's masterpiece. It is a story where the characters do not solve puzzles through ingenuity, but because they have read the writer's script. It is a world where conflicts do not conclude through thematic resolution, but through raw genetic privilege and immediate power-ups. By substituting systemic depth with superficial flash, the series validates "Bail o' Lies" critique: a narrative built entirely on broken promises, hollow stakes, and the systematic dismantling of the legacy that birthed it.

Note that this is before I started editing it once the site came back up.

Edited by Bail o' Lies, 20 June 2026 - 06:27 AM.

[Bail o' Lies]

Did the intro found interesting info for it.

 

7) The Villains.

 

Decided to make this its own sperate issue as narrative was a bit too big with this. The story has made it very clear that Tree-Jenga (Jura) is so strong that he could kill the entire cast if not the entire world in a second with barely any effort if he wanted to. He doesn't because of mere whim and the story would be over if he did. So the main villain is doing nothing because if he did literally anything, he would win. The story requires that he has to let his kind be killed off and eventually the protagonist find a way to beat him. While he largely does nothing, because if he doesn't, he'd beat them all in a panel.

 

Dragon Ball: Since Boruto takes a lot of "inspiration" from Dragon Ball, and their villains can also be described as able to kill the Heroes in one shot but don't. So, lets compared them:

 

Pilaf trapped the cast before trying to make his wish, and even when they foiled him. He just put them in the death trap because it would kill them come morning. How was he suppose to know Goku could transform into a giant monster that could destroy his castle?

 

Master Roshi entered the tournament as Jackie Chun as he wanted his students to taste defeat so they would avoid becoming too arrogant and learn the lesson that there can always be another stronger martial artist out there. He put on a wig to hide his baldness, perfume so Goku couldn't recognize him through his scent, and even got someone to be a doppelganger so Yamcha would stopped pestering him. He played fair during the match but still used his advantages of experience, more techniques, and a larger body to win.

 

The Red Ribbon Army could not believe that a little boy with a tail was annihilating their forces and finding the Dragon Balls faster than they were. Due to his smaller Dragon Radar. Once they realize it was true, they hired Mercenary Tao to take him out and get the radar for them, So they could find the balls faster. Of course, this made them an enemy to Goku, instead of a nuisance he saw them before that, so he wiped them out.

 

Master Shen had his two students take part in the World Martial Arts Tournament. So they could beat his Rival's, Master Roshi's, students. Then, he learned that Goku had killed his Brother Mercenary Tao; so he desired revenge against Goku. He tried to do this by having one of his students Chiaotzu use telekinesis to hold him down while his other student Tien killed him. This would have worked if not for their pride as martial artist being the only virtue they hold higher than their loyalty to him.

 

King Piccolo once he was released assigned one of his sons to kill all martial artists. So he could not be sealed again by the Mafuba (Evil Containment Wave.) When two of his sons were killed he immediately went to where they died to kill the one responsible. He confirmed he killed Goku before continuing on with his plot. Killed anyone else that got in the way of his wish. Killed the Eternal Dragon Shenron so no one could make a wish against him. Then went to the King's Palace to take over the world. It wasn't his fault Goku somehow lived and got a power up.

 

Piccolo knew he needed to defeat Goku before he could plot to take over the world. He knew Goku was training with Kami and would come down for the World Martial Arts Tournament. So he trained till then, and made a counter to the Mafuba. Goku was just stronger then him.

 

Raditz was stronger than Goku and Piccolo combine, but he didn't originally want to kill them. Well, at least Goku. He wanted his brother Kakarot to join his squad. By the time he got serious the trio of Goku, Gohan, and Piccolo were able to stun him long enough to kill him.

 

Vegeta wanted to punish Goku for defying him and get the Dragon Balls to wish for immortality. So he had his goon Nappa play around with them while ordering him to avoid killing Piccolo because he realized, he must be connected to the Dragon Balls. But once he realized Goku was actually a threat. He increasingly stopped playing around and tried to go for the kill.  

 

Freeza could not find them for most of the arc because he can't sense energy. Also, he had minions to do the searching and fighting for him. When Vegeta started killing them; he orders in his elite squad, The Ginyu Force. When he finally finds them. He wants to slowly torture them as punishment for denying him his wish. Which backfires as his screwing around drained his stamina.

 

Cell was actually weaker than the cast, or at least Piccolo, till he could start absorbing the androids to achieve his perfect form. So he hid while slowly absorbing energy till he could find the androids. Once he did that, he was stronger than the entire cast, but was curious how they can get stronger in a day's time. So he organized the Cell Games to play around with them as none of them were stronger than him. Once Gohan showed that he was, he twice tried to blow up the planet. 

 

The Majin Buu arc is more the heroes refusing to take him seriously despite numerous warnings till he blows up the planet.

 

Beerus is the God of Destruction and could defeat the entire cast and destroy the Earth in a second without any effort. Yet, he doesn't because he has no desire to do so. He wanted to face the Super Saiyan God from his vision. He only became hostile when he was slighted. After he got the fight he wanted he became an ally to the cast, though they have to constantly appease him as he is still far stronger than them.

 

Zamasu/Goku Black wants to kill all Mortals and Gods to create his utopian existence. To do this he takes over the strongest mortal body he could find using the Super Dragon Balls. Then finds a Universe without a God of Destruction due to the death of the Supreme Kai. Then he beats up Future Trunks as a sort of sparring partner to increase his strength. So he can combine the strongest mortal body with an alternant Future Version of Himself to become the Ultimate God. He fails due to not fully knowing how the Potara fusion works, Trunks going back in time to get help, them trying to use the Mafuba on him though failing due to not having the seal, and Goku being able to summon Zeno. 

 

Zeno can destroy all of reality if he wished, but he is a child at heart. So the Tournament of Power is set up to entertain him. The High Priest set it up to test the lower ranked Universes. If they lose, they are erased, and if they win, they get to use the Super Dragon Balls. In the anime, it was always the plan for the winner to use the Super Dragon Balls to bring everyone back so it could be a lesson/test. In the manga it was a surprise and Universe 7 was reward by having their ranking improved.

 

Moro the Planet Eater's powers were sealed away by the Grand Supreme Kai ages ago. So he needed the Namekian Dragon Balls to undo it, he also wanted to release the Universe greatest criminals to gain an army. He has the power to passively absorb life force from his surroundings. Once he realized Goku and Vegeta didn't die after he defeated them. He spent time eating other planets to strengthen both himself and his army before heading to Earth to devour them again. He lost because he couldn't handle the power of an angel. 

 

Broly and Paragus were just pawns of Freeza. Granted, no one could comprehend how strong Broly was once he was enraged. Once he calmed down as he was peaceful man a heart. So, he became friends with the main cast.

 

Granolah and the Heeters. Granolah was a survivor of a planet purge by the Saiyans so wanted revenge. He used his Namekian friend's Dragon Balls to make him the strongest moral in the universe at the cost of his lifespan to make himself strong enough to face them. He fought them. Once he was betrayed by his employers and learned the truth of what happened, they killed his mother, he allied with Goku and Vegeta. Heeter are the salesmen of Freeza's business, they wanted to overthrow him so they could rule the universe, and once they learn what their merc had done they wanted to copy it to make one of their own, Gas, The Universe Strongest Mortal. Their plan failed because the main cast keep growing stronger as they faced him till he aged into dust. They also underestimated Freeza.

 

Neo-Red Ribbon and Dr. Hedo. NRR reformed themselves over the years after Goku destroyed them under the cover of a pharmaceutical company. They knew how strong the main cast were so they wanted to hire Doctor Hedo, Gero's grandson, to create new cyborgs. And he did create cyborgs stronger than anything his grandfather created. But they were out of their league against the cast. So Piccolo used them as a lesson for Gohan. Hedo wasn't a bad guy so once the NRR was defeated he joined the cast at CC.

 

Naruto: Might as well talk about how they compare to Naruto's arc villains with the same rules.

 

Mizuki was a teacher at the academy that put on a false friendly mask. He decided to use Naruto a student desperate for recognition who failed to graduate as a patsy. He tricked him to stealing an important scroll filled with the village's forbidden jutsu. Planned to pin its disappearance on Naruto and keep it for himself. He failed because Iruka found Naruto first, was able to connect with Naruto, and Naruto was able to learn a forbidden jutsu from the scroll. The false test he told Naruto about.

 

Kakashi during the bell test, was testing them to see if they are ready to be a genin team under him. He made it as hard as possible to make sure the lesson of "the importance of teamwork" would sink in. So he made sure they felt they were competing against each other; so they wouldn't work together in the first part. So, he could show that none of them were a match for him on their own, again for the lesson they need to work together to win can sink in. They lost. Then, after giving them the lecture. He set up another trial to see if the lesson sticked of "will they feed their teammate Naruto when he order them not to." They do, so they pass.

 

Gato was a wealthy famous shipping magnate that was one of the richest men in the world. He wanted to use the Land of Waves as a base for his drug operations. He was able to suppress and oppress the villagers with his sword wielding goons. But when Tazuna planned to build a bridge to connect to the mainland -therefore removing his monopoly control over the land- and hired Leaf Ninjas to protect him. As a single genin could handle an army of Gato's goons on their own. Gato hired his own rouge ninja, in response. His lost due to the main cast being stronger and also his hired ninja Zabuza switched sides because Naruto connecting with Zabuza & Haku emotionally. After Haku's death of course.     

 

Orochimaru, the over arcing villain of Part one of Naruto, attacked the village because he wanted to disrupt its status quo as he saw it was stagnating. He also wanted to find a new host for himself in the Last Uchiha. So he formed his own Hidden Ninja Village as a cover so he could send three infiltration teams (a Sound genin team, Kabuto's, and himself) during the chunin exam to fulfill his goals. He waited to launch his attack until he got to see the performance of "his new body" Sasuke during the third part of the exam. He lost his arms because he underestimated The Third Hokage willingness to sacrifice himself to stop him to save the village. As his arms were sealed by the Third, so he went to the only healer the could possibly fix them. Tsunade, by offering what she desired most; the revival of her loved ones. Only failing because she was unwilling to cross that line at the last moment. Then, he sent out his guard to retrieve his new body Sasuke. But the retrieval team was able to delay the guards bringing Sasuke to him long enough that he could no longer withstand the pain and went into a temporary new body. Where he then had to agree to train Sasuke for three years to keep him around. While he waiting to use his jutsu to posses him. But, he underestimated how strong Sasuke had gotten in those three years. So he was suppressed and eventually sealed by Itachi

 

The Akatsuki were the villainous organization that were the antagonist throughout the entirety of part two. The organization consisted of Kage level rouge ninja in fact some of the strongest ninja their respective village ever produced, with their Figurehead leader Pain being able to solo the Leaf Village. Their goal was to hunt down the 9 jinchuriki to feed their tailed beast inside them to a statue. They all had their own personal reasons for joining the organization. They were gradually picked off by the main cast. The reasons they didn't just go after Naruto, who was the container of the ninth tailed beast was: it needed to be fed into the statue last, the one assigned to hunt him Itachi was an undercover agent for the village, and I think Jiraiya's power somewhat kept them at bay as well. Once Itachi was dead and he killed Jiraiya Pain pretty much just strolled into the village and almost won.

 

Obito, the man behind Pain, was Kakashi's former teammate turned evil, and all for a time took control of the Hidden Mist village. He hide himself because the mystery allowed him to pretend to be the dangerous legendary ninja Madara, while hiding who he really is. His main power is his intangibility. For a large part of the manga, no one could touch him, and most of the fights with him were trying to figure out the mechanics of his powers, so they could get around them to beat him. Once they realized who he was. That he had given part of his power to Kakashi that allowed them to cancel his power out. He was around Kakashi's level of strength. Eventually, they were able to defeat him even after he turned himself into the Tenth's Jinchuriki as well as a sage and got him to switch sides. By Naruto, Kakashi, and Minato connecting to him, and Madara revealing he was the one who orchestrated Rin's death. 

 

Madara, the man behind Obito. He was dead for most of the manga, so he had to plot to revive himself so he could become the Ten Tal's Jinchuriki. In order to make him as powerful as he was hyped up to be; he was given all the powers Kishimoto had been building up throughout the manga: Sharingan, Wood Release, and Jinchuriki. This made him so strong Kishimoto openly admitted he could not think of a way for the cast to beat him. He was the start of the Dragon Ball-ifcation of Naruto. So he was stabbed in the back to get rid of him. Granted, I think this was because Naruto's and Sakura's powers were underdeveloped. If Naruto had learned seals, and Sakura wood release this wouldn't have been an issue. 

 

Zetsu, the black blob behind Madara, and Kaguya. Zetsu was some black blob Kaguya made before/while she was sealed. He was the one the engineered the entire cycle of conflict between the Sage's sons that continued to Naruto and Sasuke. Also, he was apparently the causes of all conflicts and hatred in the world. He had no real power, so he had to manipulated others. Kaguya was a goddess, but it was implied she was inexperience in battle. (Then the sequels said she was a inter-galactic warrior with millions of years of combat experience.) So, she lost to the more experience team 7 working together to take her down. The first time all three (Naruto, Sasuke, & Sakura) worked together in a fight in a manga that made one of its main themes about teamwork. Then, Naruto threw Zetsu into the second moon after Kaguya was sealed while lecturing him about how no one should listen to their mothers, or something like that. Not sure why someone who was, an orphan from the day he was born, had to give this lesson. Beyond the fact that the manga had to say they were ignoring Kushina's list of advice that she had given him the one time they met. That, if followed would have led to the NaruSaku ending. 

 

Sasuke was the final foe of the story and as the primary rival throughout the story. Always at least slight stronger than Naruto regardless of the circumstances. So, should be Naruto's counterpart that went through a similar journey but came to a different conclusion of how to end the problems with the ninja system. Which required a final fight to see which journey led to the right answer as far as the story was concern. In theory at least, the problem on Naruto's side is that the reforms and changes he wanted to enact once he became Hokage that should have been a major part of his story were dropped early in the manga and all but abandon for chase after Sasuke. Even things like, ending the cycle of hatred, was original just another issues about the corruption in the ninja system that Naruto needed to reform. Quickly became just another excuse to justify the eternal chase after Sasuke. Sasuke only cared about revenge for most of the story. Until, one last conversation with Itachi.  Afterwards, (along with a history lesson from the first four hokages) he decided he needed to become hokage in order to lead a revolution to overthrow the ninja system. So he concocted an insane plan to kill all the current kages, take the tailed beasts to power himself, and become some great threat in the shadows that will keep everyone in line eternally out of fear...well until he dies, but I don't think he thought that far. Think Batman from DC, or Konrad Curze from Warhammer 40K. Of course this is a stupid and insane plan that wasn't much different from Pain's plan that Naruto had already proven wrong. So it should have been easy to defeat. The problem was, especially among readers is, Naruto had no plan only vague platitudes. The only thing that can lose to an insane & evil plan doomed to fail, is no plan at all. This is because the topic of, "what Naruto would do once he became Hokage," hasn't been brought up for at least 250 chapter by that point in the manga and hasn't been important to the plot for nearly 600 chapters. Also, he seemed to hold back during the war and have Naruto do most of the heavy lifting. So Naruto would wear himself out making it easier to beat him when he enacted his obvious betrayal. That the feeling I get but isn't stated in the story. He lost because the manga needed to end to get to the already in development sequel.

 

Boruto:

 

Shojoji the Molding Cannibal. The intro villain of Boruto; its Mizuki. He is an S Class missing ninja. As an Ikemoto character by default he is strong enough to defeat Naruto or Sasuke if they fought. He has the power to transform into people by eating their brain. In a desperate attempt to make a cool/horrifying power. He ate the Butler of the Fire Daimyo's son Tento in order to kidnap him to hold him for Ransome. His combat power was to create a wind barrier that are unblockable from the front. So Tento stabbed him in the back with a kunai. He knew about the karma seal and Kara when he saw the seal so he was our intro into to this dangerous powerful totally original organization.

 

Kara. Ikemoto's attempt of making his own Akatuski. Wants Kawaki as a new host for their boss and create a new Divine Tree to produce a chakra fruit to help Isshiki Otsutsuki ascend to godhood or something. When Kawaki escapes they attack the village to retrieve him. As they are all Ikemoto character each one could wipe out the village filled with Kishimoto characters without any major effort. As their group is split into their inner circle and their outer agent. One of the few outer agent we met was Cyborg Ao of the Minigun. He was the bodyguard for the Mizukage during the summit and seeing what happened to the rest cast that went to that summit. Beside the Sand and the Leaf, (though technically if you count Kakashi's 3 as the true delegates instead of Danzo's due to his hypnotizing of the Fire Daimyo) one of the bodyguards became the next kage of their respective village. He was clearly implied to be a kage level ninja or near enough that the difference would hardly matter. If he was just a lowly grunt agent to introduce us to this organization. As the first arc's foe for the main cast to face, outside of the prologue, to set the baseline for the threat level of their enemies. Then their inner circle members must be logically far stronger. So if they attack all at once they would easily retrieve him in about 3 chapters. But they don't because they are the bosses' of the yearly fight in this manga. So they go one at a time to die to the only ones that can defeat them Kawaki and Boruto. Who both possess the karma seal which they know the powers and importance of.

 

Tree People. They want to eat certain people to attain true individuality or something. Their ring leader is Jura they listen and follow his commands. Jura sits around reading books, talking to Tree Sasuke, eating ice cream all the while going on about love while his kind are being killed. When he could travel through the belt network to be at the battle in an instant to defeat anybody. Never really helping his comrades eat their desired people for the goal to evolve/complete themselves/what ever they go on about.

 

Jura knows that the cast can beat the tree-people, knows that they know how to free the people stuck in a tree, and knows there is someone helping them that can see the future. Therefore, is setting up a plan to beat them. Yet, he barely bothers to try to achieve his goals of devouring certain people despite every opportunity and barely set up any counter measures. Beyond sending Code to go look for Boruto's ally. It also doesn't help that Dragon Ball villains are arc villains. So they are gone once their arc is over...unless they turn good. Jura is the over arcing Penultimate story villain. Once he is defeat it is likely all that will be left is to convince Kawaki to release Boruto's parents. Yet, he does nothing except show up every once and awhile to show how deep, cool, dangerous, intelligent, and powerful he is. When he is none of those.

Edited by Bail o' Lies, Today, 01:25 PM.