With allies falling around him has Naruto finally reached a point the 16 year old isn’t prepared to cope with?
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Masashi Kishimoto
Translation/Adaptation: Mari Morimoto
What They Say
Naruto inches ever closer to discovering the true identity of his nemesis, Pain. But is it worth it as the frustrated ninja begins to morph at last into the dreaded Nine Tails? Plus, an unexpected confession reveals incredible secrets about his past as Naruto prepares for the ultimate battle with Pain. Can the chakra-challenged Naruto win when one misstep could spell disaster?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The battle left off in the previous volume with events seeming to lean heavily in Pain’s favor as Naruto had used up his Sage mode and because of the presence of Nine Tails in him he was unable to make use of the elder frogs as his mentor Jiraiya had done to gather the energy of nature to enable the ability. Fortunately though Naruto has become a master at adapting to his circumstances and has a surprise in store for Pain as he has planned for this contingency in advance.
Unfortunately for him though Pain wasn’t able to wipe out most of the village by chance and Naruto suddenly finds himself confronting a version of the enemy that he can least afford to at the moment he launches his attack and he again has to adapt to matters on the fly but his luck can’t hold forever. As the Pains start to weaken his defenses Naruto finds himself in a pinch- and that isn’t going to be the worst of it as one of his greatest allies is cut down before him as he is helpless to stop it.
While hope seems to be springing up in the village as the ninja begin to figure out Pain’s secret, Pain confronts Naruto with his twisted motivation for his actions where he attempts to explain to the youth that they aren’t nearly as dissimilar as Naruto would like to believe. As Naruto lies trapped before his enemy in the midst of the destruction of his beloved village there is one last surprise that awaits him as one of his allies can finally hold back no longer and rushes in to try to rescue Naruto in an act that is both brave and doomed as they can’t stand up to Pain. As Naruto is forced to question why that person would appear, a secret that the readers have known since the earliest books is finally revealed to Naruto just in time to make his suffering peak as is spirit breaks, unleashing the beast sealed within him. But this plan of Pain’s may have backfired as he may have bitten off more than he can chew and there maybe no one who can stop the rampage of the released beast…at least, no one living.
Throughout the volumes Naruto (both the manga and the character) have had their ups and downs as trials have been placed in the path of the lad as secrets were revealed and along the way there have been some powerful moments but it is possible this book has some of the finest examples to date of both action and emotion. On the action side the reader gets to see Naruto engage in a tremendous battle with the Pains as he displays both the skills he has learned along the way as well as his ability to improvise because of his rather clever nature as he faces off against a being that has justifiable been built up as an monster of enormous power. This alone isn’t unusual in a fighting manga as there always has to be a next, stronger enemy but this time events are different as Naruto thinks that he has isolated himself in such a way that he can minimize the loses that should come if he fails (along with keeping allies out of the way for him to use his most powerful abilities) and he is proven wrong.
That point is where the second part of the book really kicks in though as Naruto finds himself experiencing what appears to be losses anyway while also finding himself having to face what could have been a road he went down as he confronts a man who has seen a not dissimilar, and possibly even greater, torment than Naruto had. In the midst of this Naruto finds that his ability to fight physically is far superior to his ability to fight philosophically someone who believes in the path he treads as much as Naruto does. But it is in the (long time coming) revelation of a secret and his having to watch helplessly as Pain dispatches the new combatant that Naruto travels to a level of despair that really brings a new dimension to his character. Usually what the reader sees is the upbeat (sometimes somewhat ridiculously so) youth who fights everything before him even with the heaviest of hearts but this time the impossible may have happened and even his determination may fail him.
It is watching these events, both the seemingly lost Naruto and the enemy who has discovered that he may have underestimated his opponent that the volume fights its way to being one of the most emotionally powerful volumes of the manga to date but it still has one last surprise in store for the readers as in the worst depths of his despair Naruto will find a ray of hope that he never expected in the preparation of the man who loved Naruto more than anything and who has readied a lifeline for the youth- and possibly more importantly who has some answers Naruto and the readers have long sought. It is in this balancing of the incredible pain that that has just occurred and despair Kishimoto produces one of his finest works to date in a volume that build incredibly on what has come before, though the reader may wish to have had another chapter or two that allowed for a bit more delving into Naruto’s process of dealing with some of the volumes events.
In Summary
With his village destroyed and fighting with his back against the metaphorical wall Naruto is going to need every trick he learned and all his cleverness to fight a seemingly unstoppable enemy…and he’ll still find it won’t be enough as allies fall around him the one thing he never suspected may be the final straw that finally breaks the youth. With it seeming like a world of pain on his shoulders the youth may have finally found a burden he can’t lift…but it is possible that a miracle might still exist in the form of a long gone set of shoulders to help him carry his load.
Content Grade: A-
Art Grade: B+
Packaging Grade: Digital Review
Text/Translation Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: VizManga.com
Release Date: February 2nd, 2010 (Print)
MSRP: $9.99 (Print) / $3.99
