Naruto: Shippuuden Volume 8
“One by one, the new generation will catch up to you, and in the end, they’ll surpass you,” says Kakashi to the defeated Akatsuki member Kakuzu.
Since Naruto tried out his new powerful jutsu “Rasen Shuriken” to defeat this powerful foe, he has injured himself by using it, leaving him with a broken arm. Still, with Kakashi finishing off Kakuzu, and Shikamaru’s great tactical ideas putting an end to Hidan, the team is successful and all return to the Leaf Village, thus concluding one of the best arcs of the Naruto anime series. So with the bar set high, will it continue with a much better arc? Sadly no, in matter of fact, it’s a lot worse.
One of the Anbu black ops ninja has successfully located Orochimaru’s hideout but with him being spotted, he sends a message to the Hidden Leaf Village on its location and dies. When Lady Tsunade finds out about this news, she assembles a search squad with Kakashi and Team 8 (Kiba, Shino and Hinata) who are the best suited for this search mission, and they leave to find Orochimaru’s lair.
Lady Tsunade decides to keep this mission a secret from Naruto since any mention of a possible location for either Orochimaru or Sasuke will most likely lead him to desperately join it, even when injured. During Naruto’s recovery, Jiraiya comes over for a visit, to offer some new training. Of course Naruto accepts and leaves the village with him.
Lastly we are introduced to Guren, an obsessed follower of Orochimaru, who has a unique and powerful crystal ninjitsu and wants to help him in any way. She is given the task of taking care of Yukimaru, a young boy with a strange personality and a mysterious power; she is also given some experimental prisoners by Kabuto to be used as henchmen.
So we have a filler arc on our hands and at first, I could understand why they would do this. Excluding Kakashi, Team 8 are not really mentioned in the later part of the Naruto manga and it does make sense to give this team a story that shows their true capabilities, and how much they have improved their ninjitsu skills; that is totally fine with me. The problem is that they’re boring to watch, nothing happens in their search mission for the most part, making it a chore to get through, and this shows in the early episodes.
“So how about Naruto’s new training with Jiraiya, surely this must be more interesting?” I said to myself. It was when I saw them arrive at a hot springs with the old teacher acting like his irritating, perverted self, that my hopes were dashed. This isn’t the worst of it, however. When we do begin the training, Jiraiya wants Naruto to practise the synchronizing jutsu with one of the summoning frogs called Gamariki who is overwhelmingly flamboyant, enough to make me cringe every time I see him; even Naruto can’t get along with him. Although we do see Naruto use his frog summon for the training, with Gamakichi and Gamatatsu; both are even worse, making me suffer through the awful singing and dancing of the “froggy song” that lasts two minutes with no laughter from me whatsoever. By this time my mood had changed from disappointment to anger.
The main antagonists aren’t that memorable as well, mainly because it feels too familiar to other Naruto arcs (Powerful leader introduced – around 4 to 5 become guards to follow the leader’s orders), to be fair though at least Guren is given a basic personality and Yukimaru’s mysterious presence can be interesting to follow when we get to the later episodes.
I just didn’t like most of these episodes in the end, while the last episodes of the box set showed some improvement; the lack of an exciting cliff-hanger has left a bad taste in my mouth.
The Opening “Inoue Joe – Closer” is still here and has definitely grown on me since, while the new ending “Dev Parade – Bacchikoi” offers a funkier theme with some strange dance moves performed by various Naruto characters, not my cup of tea.
Extras remain unchanged with production art and trailers.
In conclusion:
Unless you’re a massive fan of Naruto, then this review shouldn’t put you off. For everyone else, this is the most cringeworthy box-set I’ve ever watched and it rarely improves.
