Naruto

I like that you don't even bother to begin to explain Kurama's Bullshit Mode.

Meanwhile, Sasuke is surprised he's getting stabbed in the eye that very specifically can predict movement, by a teenager who he can otherwise effortlessly beat.

Edited by devak on Jan 22nd 2022 at 3:45:45 PM

I mean, you still run into the same problems. Namely that Naruto and Sasuke were just too fucking powerful.

So it becomes a question of what could actually kill them. Nerfing them is somewhat more believable than straight up killing them.

I notice that's what any new generation show struggles with; either the new main characters are overshadowed by their predecessors (and completely ruining the point of it being a new generation) or said predecessors need to be pushed to the side to focus on the new mains...sometimes rather unceremoniously that stretches the disbelief of the viewers who watched the original.

I mean. It could be done if you went for a smaller scale conflict. Not as fun as giant nukes being thrown around, sure, but it might be more respectful to the old guard somewhat.

That's what Boruto started as and that's the part that people hated :V

Kind of hard to stay invested in a smaller conflict after the previous series ended with literal aliens and meteors being thrown around.

Edited by BlackYakuzu94 on Jan 22nd 2022 at 11:05:47 AM

Momoshiki taking over and the fact he can use Karma however he wants would have caught Sasuke by surprise. It’s not like they didn’t just have an intense battle or anything!

Seriously it’s easier for me to see that happening because Momoshiki explicitly makes sure to get the eye when Sasukes guard was dropped and exhausted, and he even makes a point he went after the eye so he wouldn’t have to worry about it when he’s incarnated in full. It was a pretty easy and simple explanation, especially previously what did Momoshiki in was an attack that he didn’t see coming from someone much, much weaker than him.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Jan 22nd 2022 at 8:46:56 AM

The funny thing about the smaller scale conflicts in the anime is that they actually balance the time with the new cast and the old. Boruto, Mitsuki and Shikadai were busy with the Nue incident while Kakashi and Sai were dealing with Danzo's Chimera project. Mist arc had Chojuro fight 3 ninjas at once while Boruto needed help from other ninja to beat one. Jugo arc had Taka helping out Team 7 & 15. Kara Actutation had the new Team 7 deal with Deepa while Orochimaru and Konohamaru fight Victor.

I mean Yakuzu, people still chose to watch, and the fandom overall can't tell what they want from Boruto. There's still debates about whether the series should be light hearted or darker, smaller scaled or larger scaled. I mean lets be real, they've been to the moon. If people think higher stakes equal good, then fine, so be it. Then when they start complaining about power escalation just like at the end of Shippuden, the cycle will repeat. Frankly I don't trust fans to write a good story: they'll just kill off all the new generation so the "real heroes" can take over the story and make the story needlessly edgy and dark.

I'm with Omega on this one. I still can't believe people don't get how Sasuke was easily blindsided. The man wasted so much of his Rinnegan powers trying to save 3 people all at once while fighting a god, extremely exhausted, and people think Momoshiki: the Otsutsuki smart enough to take advantage of any situation he had, wouldn't go after one of the major contributions to his defeat the first time.

Between this and Naruto holding back against Delta and being called nerfed for intentionally trying to gain intel out of her by hoping she spilled some info, I'm starting to wonder if people hate when characters are actually smart for a change in this series.

They do explain it but not in the anime (only in the manga) because it requires to Kurama to be an expert on nuclear physics.

Borushiki v Sasuke (at his best) would probably be a high dif fight for Sasuke.

But anyways, Sasuke was exhausted and near-dead form his injuries though. It doesn't matter if you can predict it if your body isn't fast enough to move to counter. Rock Lee already gave us a lesson on that. Not to mention that it wasn't a teenager. It's Momoshiki who going by feats is actually fast enough to dodge Kawaki/Isshiki's rods which Sasuke can't even do normally.

How Sasuke lost his Rinnegan is fine logically but it's anti-climatic when you compare it to how Naruto lost Kurama but Kurama is an actual character whereas Sasuke's Rinnegan is not.

Edited by MadSkillz on Jan 22nd 2022 at 12:12:20 PM

Did Naruto give Kurama a textbook on nuclear physics?

Kurama's many things, but never established to be stupid. He figured out how to get Kakashi to attack Obito in the Kaumi Dimension to stop the phasing of his attacks and lead the others to deal with the Ten-Tails when it first showed up.

Pretty cunning as a fox, Kurama is.

Kurama is also established to basically always be asleep during any meeting, but apparently was awake for the one nuclear physics lecture Naruto sat through (that we never saw). It... i cannot begin to explain the many ways in which it doesn't make sense.

>Between this and Naruto holding back against Delta and being called nerfed for intentionally trying to gain intel out of her by hoping she spilled some info, I'm starting to wonder if people hate when characters are actually smart for a change in this series.

The problem is mostly that the hand of the author is extremely heavily felt whenever some character decides to be smart. What exactly has established Momoshiki as smart? He was mostly fucking around spamming large-scale jutsu and repeating very similar moves. Nothing really establishes him as a brilliant fighter, he was simply very powerful. Hell, his straightforward moves are exactly how they beat him.

Naruto and Boruto switch between being tactical geniuses and idiots on a dime (the anime straight up makes Boruto smarter during the Amado interrogation) depending on what the plots needs.

>I mean, you still run into the same problems. Namely that Naruto and Sasuke were just too fucking powerful. So it becomes a question of what could actually kill them. Nerfing them is somewhat more believable than straight up killing them.

Well, Naruto could've been just killed by Isshiki. or Sasuke for that matter. Any of the times their enemy had them dead-to-rights and was one final blow away from killing them. This goes back as far as Momoshiki.

Like... i like Kawaki. I even like Boruto. But every time the series intersects with the old gen, the old gen just gets shafted hard.

Edited by devak on Jan 22nd 2022 at 10:44:04 AM

Momoshiki is clearly smarter than he appears considering he took invisible Rasengan to the next level and made a RasenGUN.

Due to the moral the movie and anime arc we’re going on about, Momoshiki was definitely meant to be someone who uses the easy way to victory despite having the skill to win if he worked at it as a foil to Boruto, since he also relied on his hand Rinnegan so heavily during said arc.

So him being smarter than he appears, especially when he doesn’t have access to all the power he previously had, means he has to think things through and act strategically.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Jan 22nd 2022 at 2:00:04 AM

You have to pick your poison at this point man, they're either going to be killed or sidelined. They're not the main characters anymore and that's something you're going to have reconcile.

I find this to be a huge problem with the greater Naruto fanbase in regards to Boruto; the absolute refusal to accept that the story simply isn't about them anymore and has moved on to someone else. And I don't even care that much about Boruto or Kawaki if I'm being honest with myself, but intellectually speaking at least, they're the main focus of this story now, not Naruto and Sasuke.

@Omega Yep. If you dig deeply, you can see that Momo and Boruto are foils to each other just like Isshiki and Kawaki are foils to each other.

This is why me and a friend of man don't really read the chapters or episodes anymore after talking about it recently.

Its all just very ehhhhhh. Helps that we don't really care much about the new gen to any degree.

Edited by slimcoder on Jan 22nd 2022 at 2:45:29 AM

I will say that as a team, the New Team 7 (the one that includes Kawaki and not Konohomaru) is much more likeable and interesting than the old Team 7 overall.

And I'd argue Boruto is a better protagonist than Shippuden's Sasuke-obsessed Ninja Jesus which is a low bar. This coming from someone that doesn't love Boruto but just thinks he's okay.

Edited by MadSkillz on Jan 22nd 2022 at 2:55:24 AM

Naruto has been the focus of this series for over 10 years. I was literally still in middle school when I was still following Naruto.

Like it or not, most of the older audiences are going to be more emotionally connected with him than any of the newer characters.

Yakuzu, I agree with you, but as an older fan...okay relatively since if we grew up on Naruto, that automatically makes us older fans, I can still keep my attachment to the old characters, while still giving the next generation a chance. And I did. Some are compelling than others, I agree, but half of the fans just being a b**chy boomer about everything Boruto does gets a wee bit tiresome after six years.

Almost like the manga has only focused on only 2.5 out of 7 (14 counting the anime) of the next generation while giving Naruto and Sasuke the focus for nearly two years at this point. Even people more critical of Boruto have pointed out people would care about them if they were A) in the manga more and B) played more role in the arcs.

Honestly, 7/10 times, that's complete bullshit.

• Who protected the Leaf from Nue: Kakashi and Sai, who beat Sumire in one strike. All Boruto did was Talk no Jutsu her, Kakashi was the one busting S-Rank jutsu and saving people.
• Who did most of the work against Shin Uchiha: Sasuke and Sakura. Sarada just killed him trying to escape.
• New Team 7's first mission: Konohamaru beats the Big Bad, Team 7 takes out The Dragon
• Shikadai's mini arc: Shikadai fails and Naruto comes to save the day.
• Who did the leg work against Momoshiki and Kinshiki: The Five Kage and Sasuke. Naruto just gave Boruto the energy to finish them off.
• Stone Arc? Mitsuki, Sarada, Team 10 all get a kill, Boruto loses against 3/4 members, and Onoki gives his life to solo the Big Bad on his own.
• Jugo Arc: Karin's the reason Sarada beats her opponent, Jugo takes down everyone on his own, and Suigetsu's the one that stops a viral infection
• Konohamaru Arc: Guess who took down Soma in the end: Konohamaru.
• Urashiki Arc: That's the only time the new generation carried it, and even then, PTS Naruto and Boruto would've died had it not been for Sasuke and Jiriya doing the leg work.
• Kara Arc: Naruto and Orochimaru defeated Inners on their own while the new generation couldn't defeat one without training from 3 of the old generation the first time and got saved by Momoshiki the second.
• Who did the leg work against Jigen: Naruto and Sasuke. Jiraiya's clone finished the job.
• Who did the leg work against Isshiki: Naruto. Kawaki just sealed the deal, and that was only thanks to Naruto teaching him.
• The genuine exceptions are the Mirai Arc, the second Chunin Exams, and Boruto vs Shojiji, and yet

Don't get me wrong, there are times they do, but so many people whine about this and then ignore all the feats the old generation have in Boruto. The older generation helps out the new generation more times than people complain about.

And that's the thing, barely anyone shows up in the manga as it is: old generation or new generation but Naruto, Sasuke, Sai, Shikamaru, New Team 7, the SNT, and Kara. Yet so many people act like all Boruto is doing is killing off all the old characters for the new ones to shine or pushing everyone else in the background when:

• 1: Only three, four characters if you count Boruto from Naruto are dead. No one cared about Ao all that much until he came back, Kurama's death was criticized to death until the anime came out and handled it better, and Onoki at least went out in a blaze of glory.
• 2: If Kishimoto finished everyone's arcs back when he had 70 volumes to, people wouldn't be complaining about the older generation getting shafted. We never saw Lee surpass Guy on screen, Anko never got justice for what happened to her, Sakura and Kurenai's genjutsu talents were underused, Team 9 and 8 needed more screentime and got overshadowed by Might Guy, almost all the new designs people hate in Boruto are what Kishimoto did, skipped over many possible war encounters for Chiyo and Kimimaro, and y'all expect a sequel series with a monthly schedule to fix all of the problems people have with Kishimoto's writing and give all the older generation powerups and focus when Boruto can barely focus on more than 4 characters at a time?

Kishimoto gave the shaft to more people in his own series then most people get at a nightclub. It's not Boruto's fault Anko's the worst Special Jonin: when Ebisu, Hayate, Raido, and Gemma all get more to do than someone tied to a Big Bad, I think people need to start aiming for the right target.

Honestly at this point I just don't jive with anything about this.

I don't like the character designs, I don't like the characters, I don't like the general storyline, even now nothing about this really impresses me because I can't go beyond the framework of everything.

Boruto just exists to me and thats about it.

And yet, you still follow it?

I don't I haven't read a chapter in over a year.

I only stay somewhat aware due to secondhand knowledge like the updates on this thread.

I’ve read Naruto since I was a kid and I can say the complaints about Boruto do tend to get obnoxious at points.

Boruto isn’t perfect and while it doesn’t tend to reach the highs Naruto did, it never reaches the lows it has either, and this is despite passing the original show in episodes when it devolved into Filler Hell. Boruto has had some some pretty good arcs, and has even been willing to end anime only arcs on a tragic note a lot more too without the villain overstaying it’s welcome by being overpowered for an eternity.

Thus I can easily understand why things went down as they did with Momoshiki doing something like stabbing Sasuke in the eye cause we’ve gotten enough about Momoshiki and him being a Foil to Boruto, while Naruto baryon mode is “Ehhhh….” because Kurama knowing about nuclear physics is never implied before.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Jan 22nd 2022 at 6:52:07 AM

>You have to pick your poison at this point man, they're either going to be killed or sidelined. They're not the main characters anymore and that's something you're going to have reconcile

See, i wouldn't actually mind that. As i explained earlier, the series is utterly unwilling to decide what it wants to be. It's either a story about the successors or a continuation of Naruto. It would be better if Naruto and Sasuke were either just dead or completely ignored. And not, well, what we have now.

You can't ignore them because this is meant to be a world-ending threat and you can't have them die because it would invalidate the old Naruto series.

Imagine if you had the old Naruto without the old gen and it just focused almost exclusively on the Konoha 11 + Sasuke & Sai?

Also new Boruto episode came out and it's a promising start. This might turn out to be another big mega arc like the Mitsuki Arc but better.

Lots of interesting elements here between New Team 7's first mission, the pirates, terrorists, super-criminal Funato in prison, an escaped Shizuma, a trio of the fake Ninja Swordsman as prisoners that they're implying redemption and working together with, Kagura, Denki around as potential back up on an island of robots, the feudal lord's son of the Land of Water being murdered in front of everyone along with the leaders of economic powers, the new power plant etc.

Honestly? Putting aside character designs/physical appearances (Personally I think Sakura was the more attractive of the two in Part 1 but Hinata's the more attractive of the two from Part 2 onwards.) I'd definitely rather go out with the girl I've had a crush on since childhood even if she didn't like me at first. Like, this is someone I have prior feelings for who's arguably become one of the most important people to me. Yeah the other girl might be nicer but I don't have preestablished feelings for her and she's not as important to me as the one who didn't like me at first but came around to considering me her friend.