We will now discuss Naruto is a spoilery manner.

[Lithp]

The Uzumaki Clan in general was the world's biggest asspull.

The most horrifying thing, to me, is that he still hasn't defined what he means by "special chakra."

[greed]

Originally Posted by Lithp

The Uzumaki Clan in general was the world's biggest asspull.

The most horrifying thing, to me, is that he still hasn't defined what he means by "special chakra."

Honestly I'm kinda happy with this as like 99% of shonen series, the hero's dad is like some super badass from an long line of ancient powers who gives his son a dark but powerful heritage and the mum is just like, some random housewife who either stays at home and has no real part in the story outside of maybe a flashback arc were she's the dad's love interest. Or she's as above, but dead.

Here though the mum's a badass from a long line of ancient and mysterious powers who gave her son a dark but powerful heritage.... and the dad's just some random guy with no special powers who just happens to be ridiculously cool and strong cause he trained and shit. I just thought it was a nice play on the usual thing. I mean think about it, if Naruto's dad was never mentioned or talked about for 400 chapters, other than dropping his name like 200 chapters ago, you'd expect some kind of crazy revelation like this when he finally showed up.

[Lithp]

I tend to think that Kushina is false progressiveness. By which I mean, okay, she's mentioned as being really strong & having superpowered chakra or whatever.

Now let's consider what she provides the story, in terms of practicality:

1. She's the 4th Hokage's wife.
2. She's the mother of Naruto.

And...that's basically it. In spite of her Informed Abilities, she's either being saved by Minato or mothering Naruto in every instance we see her.

And I don't even care that she's a flashback character. So is Minato. And he's still always been known as the most powerful Hokage, the guy who bitchslapped the Nine Tails, & most recently, 1 of 2 characters who's ever fucked up Madara, in addition to being Naruto's father.

It also isn't really much a revelation, because you expect a revelation to be somehow important. This is just more of the focus shifting from "Naruto works hard" to "Naruto is a destined hero." The only practical use for this plot device I can possibly see is to allow Madara to reach full power & Naruto to still be around to stop him. And even that could have been handled in a number of ways.

Frankly, the only female character Kishimoto is remotely competent with writing for is Tsunade.

[Arcanum]

Originally Posted by Lithp

In spite of her Informed Abilities, she's either being saved by Minato or mothering Naruto in every instance we see her.

Just pointing out that when she was saved, she was kidnapped when she was like 6 years old by a bunch of Jounin ninjas who probably organized the kidnapping so as to do it in a way that wouldn't allow Kushina to fight back in any way whatsoever (especially considering she was a jinchuriki and if they fucked up they would be screwed).

And when she's mothering Naruto and being useless, it's because she just had a freaken kid and had the nine-tails fox ripped out of her, which she survived. (something that no other character has been able to do).

Actually, that fact alone just shows how strong Kushina really is. She survived having the Nine-tails ripped from her body, and still had enough strength to help seal half of the nine-tails chakra into Naruto.

And as for this:

This is just more of the focus shifting from "Naruto works hard" to "Naruto is a destined hero."

I mean... you do realize this is a Shonen manga, with Naruto as the main character... right? Naruto was destined to be the hero ever since the manga's title was his name. But that still doesn't change the fact that Naruto worked his ass off to get to the level he is at now.

[Kim]

This is just more of the focus shifting from "Naruto works hard" to "Naruto is a destined hero."

So what you're saying is it's turning into Bleach.

[Fifthfiend]

In fairness it is less annoying for a comic to just be about its dumb destined hero of heroic dumb destiny than it is to set itself up like it's going to be about a guy working really hard to defy destiny and THEN be like naw ya'llz homes be destined like a motherfucker.

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by Lithp

I tend to think that Kushina is false progressiveness. By which I mean, okay, she's mentioned as being really strong & having superpowered chakra or whatever.

Now let's consider what she provides the story, in terms of practicality:

1. She's the 4th Hokage's wife.
2. She's the mother of Naruto.

And...that's basically it. In spite of her Informed Abilities, she's either being saved by Minato or mothering Naruto in every instance we see her.

To be fair by Japanese culture not doing this would be degridation not progression. In Japan a good wife and mother supports her husband and child. If she wasn't that then to them she would be a bad mother. If rolls were reversed Minato would be seen as a poor father for not being the head of the house and setting a poor example of responsibilities of a man.

Now I do agree with what you are saying. I am just pointing out, expecting anything else from a Japanese shonen series is expecting too much

[edit]

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

In fairness it is less annoying for a comic to just be about its dumb destined hero of heroic dumb destiny than it is to set itself up like it's going to be about a guy working really hard to defy destiny and THEN be like naw ya'llz homes be destined like a motherfucker.

if you really want a shonen series that screws conventions go with Kenichi. Whose main character is repeatedly told, "you have absolutely no talent" and unlike Naruto, it to be true

[greed]

Originally Posted by Aerozord

To be fair by Japanese culture not doing this would be degridation not progression. In Japan a good wife and mother supports her husband and child. If she wasn't that then to them she would be a bad mother. If rolls were reversed Minato would be seen as a poor father for not being the head of the house and setting a poor example of responsibilities of a man.

Now I do agree with what you are saying. I am just pointing out, expecting anything else from a Japanese shonen series is expecting too much

Well Kekkaishi did it. But it's pretty goddamn atypical for shonen.

[Sithdarth]

if you really want a shonen series that screws conventions go with Kenichi. Whose main character is repeatedly told, "you have absolutely no talent" and unlike Naruto, it to be true

That is somewhat debatable while he wasn't particularly physically talented, until his training nearly killing him everyday toughened him up, he was always talented at absorbing and perfecting what he was taught. At least in the Anime I'm going to have to take a look at the manga. I'm just saying that even if someone works hard they still aren't going to be able to master several different and somewhat conflicting martial arts at the same time. Kenichi's talent was his lack of talent in all martial arts allowing him to progress equally in all the styles he was learning at the same time and preventing habits learned from one style from interfering with the techniques of another style.

But has been stated Japanese Archetypes accounted for what little we see of Naruto's Mom was pretty badass. She was essentially dead when Minato did the sealing and she managed to stick around longer and hold down the Ninetails as nothing but I assume chakra (what else would a spirit be made of?) and there couldn't have been much left in here at the time of the sealing.

[Bard The 5th LW]

But that still doesn't change the fact that Naruto worked his ass off to get to the level he is at now.

When you say 'worked his ass off' you mean 'genetically inherited or asked a demon for power' right?

Because seriously, the hard work idea was put on the shelf during the first fight with Neji.