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Funny that you end on the note you did, because this is the beginning of the part of the manga that made me quit in disgust over some of the plot decisions Kishimoto made. Once he started killing off the best characters and spoiler[retconning Itachi into a hero], I basically said, "Screw this, I have better things to read." Which stinks, because I'd liked part 2 so much more than part 1 until this point.

And yet, in the checklist of things to appeal to 'everyone' in the review summary, I agree with none of them, and the series remains a gigantic borefest to me. :/ Funny, that.
(Something for everyone? Oh no! I am no one! D Smile

championferret wrote:

And yet, in the checklist of things to appeal to 'everyone' in the review summary, I agree with none of them, and the series remains a gigantic borefest to me. :/ Funny, that.
(Something for everyone? Oh no! I am no one! D Smile

Well, I don't begrudge people who do like the series - I used to like it, after all. I just really don't like some of the stuff that's been going on lately... and it doesn't help that at this point Naruto is my least favorite character, I like everyone else more (including the characters who got killed off). Confused

Oh dont worry, me too...I read quite a few volumes before deciding that the characters were all so shallow and boring and that I really didn't care about any of them. The only one I really cared about was Rock Lee, and he never really got to do that much anyway. I found Sasuke to be one of the worst characters in manga history, and considering the series seemed to be more about him than the character it's named after (seriously, Kishimoto should have just called the series 'Sasuke'), that pretty much dashed any possible enjoyment I had. There are some interesting things in Naruto; some of the battle techniques for example, I just feel like it was executed terribly. It has the same major problem that Bleach has, Too Many Damn Characters Syndrome, and it dumps all these characters on you at once so that it takes you ages to remember who is who and who is doing what. Worse, it wastes chapters, nay, volumes on battles between these other side characters who I couldnt care less about since I dont even know who they are, instead of showing me what the main characters, who I am supposed to care about more, are doing. Granted, Bleach's over 9000 cast was at least interesting to me, if not extremely overpopulated.
Frankly the series popularity is baffling to me; mostly considering that the far superior One Piece is nowhere near as popular in the west as it is in Japan. (In fact, I heard a bunch of 2channers have found the New York Times bestselling manga list, which is comprised of about 98% Naruto, and were baffled themselves. "I bet its just because he has blond hair and blue eyes!" "Where's One Piece?!")
But that's just my opinion... :/ I try not to hate a series for its fandom, but I swear, if a Naruto fan says to me "WHAT? You dont like NARUTO? But you're an ANIME FAN!" one more time...

Regarding One-Piece's relative lack of popularity in the US, I think a couple things may have hurt it.

One, it's artstyle definitely takes some getting used to. It turned me off of the series initially, even though now I love it.

Two, I imagine a successful anime run can help fuel the popularity of a series. The run dubbed Naruto had on CN may have had some issues, especially in the early episodes, but it was still a competent production that I enjoyed, and that helped fuel my interest in anime in general. One Piece's run in the 4kids days... well, I can't imagine that being very popular.

Back on topic, this is definitely an interesting series of chapters for Naruto. Some people hate it, and I have to admit that I didn't like some parts of it: I wasn't a big fan of the Jiraiya/Pain fight, for whatever reason. But I love Madara Uchiha as a villian now after his more complete reveal and his talk with Sasuke.

Yep, for sure, Naruto is my favorite manga, and one of the best stories I've ever experienced.

Kishimoto is a true genius.

Josh7289 wrote:

Yep, for sure, Naruto is my favorite manga, and one of the best stories I've ever experienced.

Kishimoto is a true genius.

Are you serious?

No, I am not mocking you are anything, it's just that from my experience on most sites on the internet, it is very rare to find anyone who is more than mildly appreciative of the series as a whole. So your comments, with their extreme praise, caught me off guard.

Woot some praise for the naruto manga! (better than the anime in my opinion) As long as you skip some parts in the first part its good and the second part of Naruto is even better. Yeah some characters died off but the story gets really interesting and I (as a fan) am happy that something good was said about this series. Haha and I used to hate Naruto before, who knew I'd like it XP

I really liked the first part of Naruto, but I thought the beginning of the second part was mediocre. From GN 38-current chapters its been one hell of a ride. I love it more than I ever have before.

Mad_Scientist wrote:

Josh7289 wrote:

Yep, for sure, Naruto is my favorite manga, and one of the best stories I've ever experienced.

Kishimoto is a true genius.

Are you serious?

No, I am not mocking you are anything, it's just that from my experience on most sites on the internet, it is very rare to find anyone who is more than mildly appreciative of the series as a whole. So your comments, with their extreme praise, caught me off guard.

You're putting too much stock into the small (but vocal) online minority that doesn't like Naruto.

Agreed. I've really been enjoying this "second arc" of Naruto alot more. The revelations of Kohona's past and the Uchiha clan have really made it all the worth while. While I understand some of the earlier story arc's were to give some of the supporting character's time to shine, the Chunin exams weren't exactly my favorite. Kohona's destruction arc and onward have been good to great reads with current chapters.

One Piece has little chance for success if it had any. It was a really bad decision on Toei's part to hand it over to 4Kids for US broadcasting. Now they cancel off any negotiations with Cartoon Network to continue airing the rest of the FUNi dubbed Skypiea? Yeah, really smart move.

Josh7289 wrote:

Mad_Scientist wrote:

Josh7289 wrote:

Yep, for sure, Naruto is my favorite manga, and one of the best stories I've ever experienced.

Kishimoto is a true genius.

Are you serious?

No, I am not mocking you are anything, it's just that from my experience on most sites on the internet, it is very rare to find anyone who is more than mildly appreciative of the series as a whole. So your comments, with their extreme praise, caught me off guard.

You're putting too much stock into the small (but vocal) online minority that doesn't like Naruto.

But even then, calling Kishimoto a "true genius" is a little much. I mean, sure, Naruto is (or was, if you're unhappy about where it's ended up like me) a fun story with a lot of excitement, but it's still pretty typical shounen-fight-series fare. When I hear the word "genius" I think of storytellers like Urasawa Naoki or Osamu Tezuka, or artists like Takehiko Inoue and Hiroaki Samura.

Son-kun wrote:

The revelations of Kohona's past and the Uchiha clan have really made it all the worth while.

...except that he clearly just made that up out of nowhere. The whole retconning on Itachi was the first of many things in this that made me decide this story had lost its direction (if ever it had any).

vashfanatic wrote:

[...except that he clearly just made that up out of nowhere. The whole retconning on Itachi was the first of many things in this that made me decide this story had lost its direction (if ever it had any).

Well, I thought it was very well done. I always had a feeling that there were bigger things going on beyond the whole Itachi/Sasuke relations and the fact that it all ties in with Konoha's foundings was very interesting. I certainly didn't expect Madara to still be alive and while Itachi's development his totally been reversed. I'm completely fine with that. I never cared much for the character and if that ruins the story for you, there's not much I can say.

This reads like a press release, not a review.

Also: http://www.colonydrop.com/index.php/2009/04/25/operation-british-casey-brienza?blog=1

I like reading Naruto. I don't know why, I just like reading it. It's lightweight, easy to digest, very readable and incredibly addictive.
I always end up comparing it to Harry Potter.
Somethings are just popular. I had Naruto recommended to me by a friend who studies English. He says the same things as me. It's not Dickens, nor does it ever claim to be. Just something fun to pass the time.

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REVIEW: Naruto GN 42-44