And now, out of left field… fighting! And marriage!
What They Say:
Naruto meets two kunoichi ninja named Shizuka and Tokiwa from the Nadeshiko village who are seeking the student of Jiraiya.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
After the previous episode that gave us a new generation of little shinobi in the Hidden Leaf village, I was actually looking forward to get back to Naruto’s time killing journey to see what’s up there. Now that the group is no longer on the sea and Guy can actually walk and talk without puking, they’ve been moving along and potentially meeting new and interesting people that we’ll never see again or have any deep meaning with. The episode actually opens abruptly as Naruto is hanging around in some little town and comes across a woman named Shizuka who is causing some damage while dealing with something. He’s interested but doesn’t get involved, which is good, though she ends up coming to him in the end.
As it turns out, she has a history with his master, Jiraiya, and wants to catch up with Naruto since she realizes what village he’s from and wants to know if Jiraiya ever had a student. It turns out that the two had quite the past together at one point that should have potentially lead to a marriage, as Shizuka’s village is one that is women only and they only marry and bear children of those that defeat them, though it seems the men don’t have to stay. Because of Jiraiya’s actions back then, the task to finish things out with a new fight, this time with a kunoichi named Tokiwa, becomes the focus as he’s hounded a bit to fulfill what his master was unable to do. While the idea in general is straightforward, the whole thing is basically a bunch of nonsense with no tension or meaning. While it could have been an interesting little addition to Jiraiya’s past, it’s just a token mention at best that turns to things falling on Naruto’s shoulders that comes off as overly forced.
In Summary:
Thirteen weeks of filler, thirteen weeks of pain. While there have been bright spots here and there, by and large and again with this episode it’s just a bunch of pointless tomfoolery that leaves you feeling like you wasted your time. When you realize that it’s more than a seasons worth of episodes and that we’re likely to go four months before getting back into the main storyline overall, you realize again just how insulting the series can be at times when it comes to adapting the original work. I’m still a fan of the Naruto storyline, but these filler arcs just get to be too big and feel too regular at times. This episode even offers up some very awkward introspection by Naruto at the end about the “triangle” that he exists in and it’s just so surreal when you really think about the characters that you just have to laugh, write it off and move on.
Grade: D+
Readers Rating: [ratings]
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment:
Sony KDS-R70XBR2 70″ LCoS 1080P HDTV, Dell 10.1 Netbook via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
