Samurai 8: Masashi Kishimoto's next Serialized Manga

Page 30 on Jaminisbox. Bottom right panel. That sure looks like a curve to me but it could just be the weird way the art in this manga is. Everything is really smooth and curve with weird shadowing.

Well, either Nameless's trans, or it's more of a joke about personality or something.

And considering this is from Japan, it could easily be both.

-The first character we see is a black woman who is the defender of the galaxy -Our main character is a (formerly) disabled kid -We have a single father instead of a single mother or badass missing dad -Now our newest party member is a transgender hikikomori (this guy seems really cool, hopefully he becomes a travelling companion)

What am I to make of all this Kishimoto? Minorities everywhere i turn. You are the one mangaka I know of who gave black people real love and representation with a lot of awesome and important black characters in Naruto. I know you said that you learned from the past and have some your research....please dont mess this up!

2 chapters in and the story is bursting with tropes. Nanashi alone carries a dozen. Gonna start page pimping when I get some free time.

Edited by Nymeros on May 19th 2019 at 7:29:47 AM

I could see the character's gender (or possibly being trans) going either way.

Question: in the Japanese, is "Nameless" saying they're "Nanashi"? If they are, I expect they'll just make that their name (even if they aren't I expect it) because that's just a common samurai convention. This also assumes they'll become a samurai.

The official release gave the name as Nanashi but keeps the "body of a man, heart of a lady" line. I'll stick with Nanashi until the name changes. Pretty sure it's being saved for a big plot moment.

Although some complained that the first black character in Naruto was a rapper… But yeah, the Cloud Ninjas were cool.

Regarding Nanashi (let's call 'em that for now), the raw and official translation make it clearer that the left hand is "male" and the right hand is "female", which reinforces the gender questioning issue. And rereading the chap it does seem like they're talking to themself… huh.

Never forget Bee & A's total ownage of Sasuke, never forget......

I have to say Nanashi is certainly a creative character. The apparent unknown gender mixed with robotic talking male/female hands to further symbolize the dynamic is certainly interesting.

Hopefully its a sign that Kishi is going out there with the characters here & it makes me curious how the further samurai will be & how they mix their quirks with cybernetics.

I complained about Bee being a rapper as well. Then I stopped complaining when he started trying to learn Japanese folk music and we spent more time with him. The guy just loves music and it became clear he was much more than just the "rapping black guy." he was one of the most talented(Kishi even allowed him to go toe to with Itachi!), successful, kind hearted characters in the series. Also, getting Naruto to rap and teaching him the power of fist bumps? What a boss.

What makes people think that Nanashi's hands are robotic? I thought Hachimaru made it clear that Nanashi was the one doing the talking and changing his voice to fit each "character."

I went back and looked at the chapter, from what it looks like maybe people are thinking the gaming console/device for the samurai fighter is part of Nanashi's hands? Which is clearly not the case as seen on the 30th page where they're outside. I can see why it could be confusing though.

Speaking of which, what should we do about the character page? Should we use the name "Nanashi" there too? And should we use "they" or a neutral "he"?

Probably best to use the official name, yeah.

Yeah, and "they" seems to fit the gender confusion thing best.

Edited by rikalous on May 21st 2019 at 11:23:21 AM

Aight. I added pictures in the character page. Couldn't find a good one for Nanashi yet, though.

Chap 3 is out. A little badass moment and a Love Epiphany? for Nanashi and some questions about Hachidad's identity.

Seems like Nanashi won't become a travelling companion quite yet though. A pity, but I guess they need some training first. =[

And we still don't know his/her gender either.

I do not trust him on this. When you screw up your previous heroine and then blame her for being a bad character, you deserve the stink eye.

Kishimoto never wanted to make Sakura in the first place. He was forced to make her after originally making Hinata a civilian at the time. I don't blame him at all.

Well, it was the same with Sasuke too wasn't it? He was forced to put both of them in if I recall, but he clearly made an effort with Sasuke, whereas he never even let Sakura's parents appear in canon, and we same the parents or family of nearly every character but Ten-Ten. He didn't even give her any kind of specialty pre-timeskip, and everyone had one (including the family-less Ten-Ten). If he was gonna keep her as a main character, he could have at least tried.

That doesn't really matter for a new manga. Judge it by its own standards, not by an older manga's. Simple as that.

Nanashi really looks like Nagito Komaeda in this chapter with their hair down in length without a VR headset on. Its cool.

Hey, Sakura was a Genjutsu expert! Yeah, that never went anywhere but it was mentionned. It would have been so cool honestly…

Anyway, I have a feeling we'll need a few more chapters to wait before the story goes anywhere… So far Hachimaru doesn't really have any clear goal, that could be a problem.

Aaaaaaannnd, end volume 1. Good chapter.

What does Sakura have to do with anything?

Edited by Nymeros on May 24th 2019 at 11:12:11 AM

That's not the end of volume 1… There's 3 or 4 more chapters for that.

Word? I'll give it 1 or 2. These first 3 chapters have been extra large.

I miss Nanashi already....really dope character, hope he comes back very soon.

I really thought Kishi had blew his load with Naruto but the samurai were cool and unique and Nanashi stepping in was pure awesome. Very simple but cool concept to force the two to grab the sword together. I'm ready for Hachimaru's backstory. Gotta be a good reason he was missing half his damn body.

Edited by Nymeros on May 24th 2019 at 1:47:58 AM

Well his dad sold his body parts to demons to that he could rule the… wait.

Hmm, chapter 1 was 70 pages, chapter 2 was 30 pages and chapter 3 20 pages… That still leaves a good 60 pages to complete the volume.

Edited by Lyendith on May 24th 2019 at 11:01:28 AM

My best guess is that his dad is a samurai himself and the former owner of the vampire blade.

So not only is Nanashi gender ambiguous, but they might have a crush on Hachimaru (or be mistaking a feeling of strong friendship for a crush.)