She was a pretty obnoxious character for almost the entirety of Part 1. She's been largely alright since.

 

There's more to it than that. Her growing feelings towards Naruto are present even in part 1. Reread the part when Naruto shows up to save Team 7 from Orochimaru.

There were several snags along the way that really ruined her as a character:

1. The time skip happening when it did meant that Sakura's character development occurred largely off screen. Kishimoto's choice to make the first arc Post-TS focus heavily on her character somewhat helped with this problem, but it wasn't really enough. Leading to...

2. In the eyes of many fans she went from Sasuke fangirl to mini-Tsunade overnight, except that she could never measure up against the original.

3. Other than the Sasori fight she doesn't carry her weight in any battle until the shinobi alliance is formed. Kishimoto did not use her well. In particular, since Sasuke retrieval the second is the second Post-TS arc, it almost seems like she regresses as a character.

4. The "love confession" to Naruto in order to get him to stop thinking Sasuke. That was just... wow. Way to make her look like a complete bitch, Kishimoto.

If we had seen more of her journey as a character, if Kishi hadn't shoehorned her so hard into a Tsunade role (and instead made her more unique), if he had used her effectively and continued to demonstrate her as strong physically and mentally, and if Kishi hadn't done that one thing that completely put me off her character, then I think she would actually be quite a bit more popular.

Too bad.

There are far worse things that have happened in Post-TS. If Sasuke gets made Hokage, I swear my frustration levels might get so high that I literally explode.

 

When Tsunade was comatose, a bunch of jonin had to deliberate on their choices before they presented the daimyo with the candidates (it's been a while since I read that part, but I think this is the gist of it). I highly doubt any of them are gonna say Sasuke is a capable Hokage. He's powerful, yes, but I don't think he has the charisma and leadership qualities for the post.

Then again, he's all about changing the current system, so I wouldn't be surprised if he gets the position in a different way.

 

I've never heard anyone say that people hate Sakura because she chose Sasuke over Naruto. This is literally the first time I heard of this.

People hate Sakura because she was toxic for the entirety of Part 1. She was useless, only serving a role when Kishimoto needed a damnsel in distress, some random bit of trivia that he wanted the readers to know, or comic relief, largely at Naruto's expense.
When she's not doing that (and sometimes when she is) she is an obnoxious fangirl, and everybody hates those.
Part 2 is better, to a degree. You can tell and she never stopped being a fangirl, only that the object of her affection was away stopped her from exhibiting the same mannerisms.
The fact that she has nothing that she can call her own, basically being forced into a mini-Tsunade role, only much worse, did not help matters at all.

So no, we don't hate Sakura for choosing Sasuke. We hate Sakura because she is a terrible character with little to no redeeming qualities and a bunch of screentime that hurts our eyes, ears and brain.

 

Rainbow Rasengan anyone?

And yea Sakura as a character is just kind of bad. And when I first read Naruto as something like a 10 year old, the whole hitting Naruto for every single fucking thing he said just annoyed me so much.

Back on topic of this chapter, I'm really hoping that the past Hokages actually do something against FV-Obito, I wanna see more second hokage pwnage, his whole personality as a cold hearted ninja is just awesome. Also am I the only one who is annoyed that Sarutobi has basically said and done nothing since getting to the battlefield besides be a part of the barrier?

 

I haven't read the manga for a while, mainly lurking these forums to laugh at what's going on in canon, but this comment intrigued me.

The Nidaime never cane off as particularly charismatic. The opposite, one could say from what evidence we've seen.

As for Sakura, she's just a horrible character, but Kishi is generally hopeless at writing badass females anyway, so I'm not surprised.

 

I get the feeling he was just the obvious guy for the job, after Hashirama. Brother of the first Hokage, master of sution jutsu (like woah), creator of a space/time jutsu and a jutsu that can bring back the dead? Who else would they have chosen?

I think that in a scenario where two S-rank monsters are contending for the spot (Naruto and Sasuke), charisma and such is definitely a big factor. But when it's one S-rank monster and a bunch of jonin or whatever? Unless you're batshit insane and/or won't accept the job, you're the next Hokage, bud.

 

The Hokages have been suitably boring since arriving on the battlefield, only Minato has really done anything, the first and second have just made clones and then gone, oh noes, can't do anything even though I have unlimited chakra. Third has done literally nothing. Atleast spam some crazy level jutsu for the heck of it and have Madara reintergrate, I'd like to see the four Hokage just spam for the hell of it against Madara and all get ripped to shreds and few times by Madara and vice versa, just to show that they can't do shit against him. Same with Obito, have him fuck up the Hokage a little just to show us how powerful he is, not by just telling us that they don't stand a chance.

Too much tell, not enough show.

Naruto seems to be getting quite angry at Sasuke for acting rashly, he needs to beat him down and make him think before acting, seems to be a bit of a role reversal, Sasuke acting rashly and Naruto knowing whats actually going on and not diving in head first. He seems to know more about whats going on than anyone else and they aren't listening to him.

Also, him and Minato standing next to each other in chakra cloak mode does look pretty damn badass. I want to see some double teaming between the two, combo moves between Hirashin and Naruto's Rasengan would make for some even more epic combos than Naruto had going with Kakashi.

 

Since charisma is being discussed, I first want to say that I highly, highly disagree about Sasuke. We don't like him because we don't identify with him. But does that mean the characters within universe don't find him charismatic?

Think about the reactions to his reappearance. There's a battle to save the entire fucking planet going on and suddenly everyone's focused on Sasuke's arrival. The very fact that his grand announcement is taken seriously is proof that he has charisma.

Naruto is the kind of guy who sneaks up on you. People underestimate him, but the more they get to know him the more they believe in him and follow him. Sasuke is the guy everyone else in the manga treats seriously the moment he walks in the room. We're supposed to acknowledge him as a character who is a natural born leader.

I have no idea if the Nidaime was considered a charismatic leader in his time and I have no inclination to guess. I don't think we've seen anything to push him one way or the other. The only thing we can say with certainty is that he was a super badass and the younger brother of the greatest shinobi of that era, the founder of the village.


My fear with Sasuke is that Kishimoto is building towards making Sasuke Hokage. Kishimoto seems to have a big thing for history repeating itself and his solution for breaking the cycle may be to make Sasuke what Madara wasn't. I hope I'm wrong, but given how many times Sasuke has been made an exception to one of the many other overarching themes in this story (true power is found when protecting something important, there are no shortcuts, etc), being the one to take away Naruto's dream that was the foundation of this story since Chapter 1 wouldn't be out of character for Kishimoto.

Kishi made Sasuke to be the "perfect rival" type, but either he forgot or never realized that the ultimate purpose of the perfect rival is to be surpassed by the main character. That's the defining moment in the Hero's Journey where we know he's arrived. I'm not saying it has to be like that every time, but it's not something you should stray from without a lot of thought.

As for Kishimoto with females, am I the only one who noticed that females ALWAYS have the supporting role within a squad? Tsunade was the medic of the Sannin just as Sakura is the medic of Team 7. Ino is a sensor/mind technique user. Tenten is the only member of Team Gai who primarily uses weapons. I guess Hinata is *technically* an exception, but not really since her only real fight was with Neji and she's pretty much only been useful for her eyes the rest of the time. All three Sand Sibs are also ranged users, but the role I'd consider most feminine of the three (fan user -- is there any example from books/anime/videogames of a male fan user? there are male puppeteers) goes to Temari. Even among the jounin, Shizune is a medic, Kurenai is a genjutsu type. And Kurenai is clearly the weakest jounin sensei. Blah.

 

Either that, or they are reacting because he is totally fucking insane. And any help against Juubi would be welcome at that point. That does not mean Sasuke is considered charismatic or is going to be made into hokage. Atleast I really really hope not, because it would indeed be fucking insane. Heck, Tsunade is still alive and well, so why would she be replaced anyway? She has repeatedly shown willingness to sacrifice her life for the village, and while she might not have super-magic-eyes, she is not helpless either, and most of the work of the hokage in times of peace (which things will lead do) will be one that Tsunade will be much better suited for than either Sasuke OR Naruto actually. Would make most sense if Naruto becomes the next Hokage after he is grown up, when Tsunade is old enough to retire.

So really, unless We get a double bluff, and Tsunade dies still, despite somehow surviving being sliced in two, why should the hokage change at all anytime soon?

If Sasuke (a traitor) somehow gets Tsunade kicked out of her job which she has performed quite well at, and then takes over the position, then I will be utterly enraged.

 

I wouldn't really be surprised if Tsunade is replaced because she's an older woman, whereas Sasuke and Naruto are young men. Sounds like the sort of double standard that's been going on in this manga for years, where the men are leaders, and the women support them with their healing abilities and their vaginas.

 

In the manga, when they were basically introducing the ninja showing up for the new war, the Suna page had entire squads of ninja with huge fans on their backs, some of them male. The whole fan thing appears to be an actual thing in Suna, like puppeteers.

 

Not sure where the double standard comes into it. Hiruzen was an old man who got replaced by a younger one. Tsunade's an old woman with a body that's technically far older than it should be because of all the regeneration she's been doing.

Sasuke only got the attention of his classmates who all have personal history with him and have been under the impression that he's a psycho missing-nin. No-one else gave a crap, IIRC. But I'd agree that I think he has his own charismatic, it's just different to Naruto's. He automatically gets attention and he brought together a bunch of odd individuals under his command who still follow him around.

How are we defining a 'support role'?

 

Maybe I'm biased because I dislike any sort of discrimination in "equal opportunity" fiction, especially if it's sexism against women. Kishimoto has already admitted that he can't write female characters very well, and it's very obvious he's telling the truth. The men act and do all the hero stuff, and the women are on the sidelines assisting them without getting too involved. The only times this is different is when Temari stepped into take down Tayuya, and Chiyo and Sakura took down Sasori.

Look at how characters like Tsunade, Sakura, and Temari have contributed to the story compared to their teams (or in Temari's case, her younger brothers). All of them are overshadowed by their male peers, in terms of motivation, power, how they affect the plot, and so on. Hell, Sakura, Hinata, and Temari are pretty much defined by their relationship towards men (Sakura's motivation is... her love for Sasuke? Her desire to assist Naruto by not being useless? Hinata is completely useless without Naruto. Temari doesn't really do anything unless Shikamaru, Gaara, and sometimes Naruto are around to motivate her).

 

Tsunade is really the one meaningful exception to that rule and even she has been sidelined enough by Kishi.

As to the Sakura and Chiyo victory over Sasori, it should be mentioned that Sasori let himself be killed and at no point took the fight all that seriously which boils down to making Sakura's and Chiyo's achievement an assisted suicide.

And as to Temari, it was also a victory over another female, so... yeah. Her other win was also against a female (Tenten). After that, she pretty much stopped being significant and while she is a Jonin we don't really see all that much from her. Did she do something in the war? Probably but I can't remember.

The only time Sakura took anyone down that I remember that was not a huge mindless beast was when she sleep bombed her own team who, to be fair, didn't expect that since they were a fucking team. She failed spectacularly against Sasuke afterwards. Her "draw" against Ino was one of the biggest asspulls in the manga and even that was also against another girl. She cut her hair against that sound girl but outside of a gesture that didn't really amount to anything and she did have to be saved by Lee.

Can't remember more enemies or opponents that she took down except maybe a Zetsu but given that they are about as threatening and strong by now as the Droids in "The Phantom Menace" can't really say that that is worth much.

So yeah, her best contribution in battle in terms of actual combat was against Sasori, where she was coached through the fight by the one who knew most of Sasori's tricks while Sasori was just phoning it in. Otherwise, her best acts has been healing everyone know, which I would definitely file in under support.

Think one could argue that Hinato "won" her fights, in, that while she lost the physical battle (Neji, Pain) she won the spiritual one, fulfilling her goals, i.e. standing up to her cousin and saving Naruto but I guess that is looking a bit too deep into this manga. Don't think Naruto lends itself to close reading all that much. So, outside of motivating people and as a lookout, which is also more of a support role, would also say that she is in that category.

Ino was cheated out of her victory over Sakura with the "Inner Sakura" bullshit, was useless against Kakuzu and only recently did something cool and even then it was mostly support, albeit unique and cool support.

Tsunade, even if she was out of practice, couldn't do any real significant damage to a crippled Orochimaru, even if it looked pretty awesome, was not all that great against Kabuto (even if she did overcome her fear), and did pretty much nothing against Pain, outside of impressively healing everyone (again, a supporting role). In the war, she put on a good show against Madara, alongside the other Kage but it is clear that she is the weakest Hokage to date, not counting Danzo.

Maybe the Mizukage but given her minimal screentime don't think she breaks that mould. Not when all primary and secondary character get sidelined like that.

So yeah, I do agree that this manga is quite unfair towards its female characters, who are all inferior to their male counterparts among their teams/peers unless they to the supporting. Which is quite a shame. It has great concepts for female characters and I do like most of them, I just wish they weren't sidelined so often.

 

Kiba earned MASSIVE points from me for calling out Sasuke, but the overall reaction isn't "Sasuke's insane" it's more like "Sasuke's back." I fucking hated that chapter.

When has anybody not taken Sasuke seriously? Zabuza in their first fight? Okay, that's a jounin against a rookie genin, and even he calls Sasuke a rival for Haku in their second battle (despite being sure Haku would win). The reality is that there are plenty of times even Post-TS where Naruto is dismissed without a second thought even by characters who should know better. Even Temari's reaction to first seeing him was "that runt?" Compare to Sasuke who commands the respect of people who have no business respecting him.



On Kishimoto and women, I disagree about Naruverse being truly equal opportunity since ninjutsu is NOT like western RPG magic (specifically because chakra is a combination of physical and spiritual energies -- compare male athletes to female athletes; I'd expect a higher concentration of men than women at the top).

However, that fact remains that there are top female athletes out there who are competitive even with male pro athletes and the physical is only one half of the picture to begin with.

It's a frustrating missed opportunity.

 

It's a shonen, so no one really expected more competent and fully realized female characters as there are male ones, or even an equal amount.

But at least a few, dude. Right now, we have maybe one if we are really, really generous with the definitions of competent and fully realized.


As to Sasuke, as I once said earlier, Sasuke could only become Hokage if Naruto were to become the Overlord of the Elemental Nations of some kind, thus ending the cycle of hatred, which has been his goal for some time now. True, he wanted to be Hokage, but only for two reasons:

1. He wanted to be acknowledged by everyone and surpass all the Hokage before him.
2. He wanted to protect his loved ones.

Well, he has done the first and did the second one repeatedly and is doing it right now as we speak. He might as well skip being Hokage right now, since it has dropped in significance by now anyway. Now that we know the other villages and now that they have all banded together and forgotten all old feuds, the truly important prize is to keep everyone safe and protected.

That can't be done as only a Hokage. We had this one shot from someone here where Naruto had become a benevolent tyrant of sort, and really, that is actually the only way this can end if Naruto lives, whether Naruto himself realizes that or not. Everyone else who can stand up to him are Edo Tensei. This thing were Sakura and Sasuke ride to battle alongside him, together with the summons? Yeah, mostly a joke since he "ran out of chakra". (first time for everything)

In fact, I would say that Naruto would make for a terrible Hokage. I rather see him as someone like Robert Baratheon from Game of Thrones. Someone who was a tremendous warrior, a good strategist with a peculiar charisma that enabled him to even win over his defeated enemies and make them join his cause. He made for an excellent warrior and leader of war but a terrible King since he had no talent or interest in governing. I can't see Naruto dealing with taxes, education, security, health care and whatnot. Nor can I see him deal with this with clones. Clones are exact copies of him, after all. Not like they would be any better at this than he is.

Being Hokage is not really about fighting a lot and that and training are really the only things he is interested in. Sure, he would remember a few of his promises, like the Hyuuga clan issue (maybe, he sure as hell forgot about the whole Hinata thing) and they would cave (I mean, how could they not) but as a whole, Naruto would be terrible at that job.

He is basically Dr. Manhatten now, albeit a Dr. Manhatten that is loyal to Konoha with ample motivation to do something.

Maybe they will never officially say anything in the manga about it but once the Edo Tensei are gone, what Naruto says, goes. His clones can take down S-rank shinobi and we have seen what two S-rank shinobi can do to a single village. Naruto can make as many of them as he wants. He may never voice that threat, realize it even but the others would.

Really, the more I think about it, the more it would make sense if Naruto were to die, which could pave the way for Sasuke to become Hokage in a more "now it makes a bit of sense" manner. Tsunade, and probably the other Kages other than Gaara and maybe the Mizukage, would probably take a step back and resign as well, becoming advisor's more than anything to let the new generation with not as many grudges and memories take over.

But really, I like the idea that Sasuke refuses to come back to Konoha and settles somewhere in anonymity or something. Really don't see him wanting to come back to Konoha as satisfactory.

Sorry for the two long posts in a row.

 

Did Naruto ever say he wanted to become Hokage to protect people? He learns that the greatest strength comes from protecting the things important to him but I don't recall him ever mentioning it in relation to his dream.

And those different aspects of governing...is the village all that concerned about it? Both times having a new Hokage came up, they were just focused on the candidate being powerful and recognizable rather than their knowledge in handling the entire village's logistics. Then I have to wonder how much the actual Hokages knew about those things when they were anointed. But I suppose Naruto would definitely be the worst in that area since he spent 2 and a half years out of the village (unless Jiraiya taught him related info) and never advanced beyond genin.

Oh yeah, the one-shot was Inert's Uzumaki Peace. And I could also see Sasuke become some sort of wanderer after everything ends.

 

Well, he basically wanted it at first because he wanted everyone to like and respect him. Then Haku made him think, and that and other things caused him to grow up a bit and realise the importance of protecting people, however I think at that point atleast his primary goal in becoming Hokage was to get everyone to like him.

In truth, everyone already does respect and like him. The did it at the end of the Pain-arc, and now that he has kept the alliance alive again and again, he is probably liked well enough by near every shinobi still alive.

So in that sense, if he still wants to be a hokage, it would be because he realises that he can protect people better in that position than anything else. Which does make it interesting, that after Sasukes declaration, Naruto first flashes to Itachis comments about what would make a good Hokage, sees Sasuke blatantly ignore them all, and then declares that he will become the Hokage instead (which he did not do all that commonly anymore), almost implying that he believed that Sasuke as a hokage would result to disaster.

As for story reasons, I dunno. I mean Naruto did want to be the hokage, but his goal was again respect and being liked. Everyone likes him now that he saved/protected them, and he even already dealt emotionally with the hypocrisy of the villagers only liking him now after he has done things for them. I think I would be ok with Naruto not reaching his goal, or reaching some greater goal. So I would be ok if Kakashi becomes the next hokage instead. Or if Sasuke becomes the hokage, but Naruto gets the job one tier higher and is basically Sasukes new boss.

But there would be a sort of implied insult and a rather bad message too, if its Sasuke who gets the job. Kishi would basically be saying, its ok to abandon everyone and become a traitor, then go mad and think about killing them all for a while, and then just decide to return and become the leader despite not caring about the people one bit. You will still beat the guy who remained loyal all along. Maybe thats how it actually happens in some nastier politics, but it would certainly put a really bad taste in my mouth.

Yeah. Look at Raikage for example. Its quite probable that the Hokage is not a traditional leader, and there are lots of hidden systems running things in the background, while the Hokage is more of the "face" of village in times of peace, and a threat/protection in times of war. Sure, he is not a complete figurehead and has to know somethings about the job and he does make important decisions, but I don't think the shock is as big as say making Naruto the US president would be. He can probably learn and adapt to the rules and requirements of being a hokage a lot easier.

Yeah, though the same would be true of Sasuke really. Actually, it WAS true of Hashirama even more than it is true of Naruto.

 

On Sasuke: It's not so much that I think Sasuke is a lock for Hokage as I fear that Kishimoto might do that. I don't think that chance is zero, nor do I think it's arbitrarily close to zero. And no, there's nothing in Kishimoto's contract that says Naruto has to become an overlord if Sasuke is made Hokage.

And... I have no clue how you read out of the manga that Itachi thinks Sasuke would be a disaster as Hokage. Itachi somehow believed that Sasuke was the key to peace between Konoha and the Uchiha clan even though Sasuke was just an academy brat.

On Naruto: It's never explicitly stated that Naruto's reasons for desiring to be Hokage have changed, but I think it's obvious when you view his character.

On the meaning of Kage: I think one of the main roles of a Kage is to be a symbol. The Suna council expressed that making Gaara Kazekage was a means for controlling him (see Gaara retrieval arc) and we know that even after a Hokage is appointed by the daimyo and elders, he/she still has to be voted on by the jounin. Every village seems to be run a bit differently, but the Kage's powers aren't without limit.