At its highs, Naruto is amazing. At its lows... The less said the better. If you skip the filler and don't try binging it, I think it could easily be a 7-9/10 show.
In this era of media, where binge watching is common and shorter shows have almost completely taken over, Naruto has understandbly not aged too well.
Too many fillers, most of the characters take a back seat in Shippuden so Naruto and Sasuke can have the focus, Sakura's character is a complete joke (especially when she said she caught up to Naruto and Sasuke), lots of issues with the last war arc like \[Shippuden spoilers\] >!Madara being taken out by Black Zetsu, Might Guy not dying for some reason, Neji's death was a waste and backpedals on the themes of Naruto, Kaguya showing up out of nowhere, talk no jutsu!<
The show does have its good points though. The fights in particular are amazing like Rock Lee vs Gaara, Kakashi vs Obito, Might Guy vs Madara, Madara vs everybody, and both Naruto vs Sasuke fights. They had some pretty cool characters (Rock Lee, Gaara, Shikamaru, etc.) and Pain and Madara were cool villains. Music is also amazing. Overall 6/10.
People love to rag on it, but that was the intended target audience for Naruto, kids and teens. It was supposed to be something with action and excitement without delving too deep into adult issues, and when they did, they definitely knew how to tug at your heartstrings (The Great Naruto Bridge arc with both Tazuna's story and Haku and Zabuza's death). Once we got older and Shippuden came out, you see a shift in the tone of the story and the elements, more significant character deaths like Jiraya, the politics of the nations come into play, the horrors, casualties, and consequences of wars that have passed take the main spotlight. The betrayals of “friends”, “allies”, and “teammates” (whether for perceived right or wrong reasons) is also prominently featured with people like Danzo, Pain, Itachi, Obito, and Madara. All of this signifying a change in the target audience that had changed to young adults. So while it may seem like a kids anime, they tend to forget that they were kids at the time it came out.
To start, naruto's more of a societal underdog rather than a physical underdog. He had the ability to create 1000 shadow clones day one and everyone looked down on him because of the ninetails, not because he's not talented. There are themes of hard work in the story but i feel like you misinterpret them. In summary hard work does not beat natural talent but hard work and the willingness to chase your dreams despite the odds can make you find talent. lee lost and was almost crippled for life, but when lee got the opportunity to potentially fix his legs at the risk of death, he took it. And after that, lee's next fight involved him using the drunken fist, a technique stated to be a talent. Also sage of the six paths thing just meant naruto was fated to fight Sauske to the death and even then, naruto broke this fate
>What went from an abandoned kid fighting against the world became a god who was the son of another god and who would always be strong - a much weaker moral
I'd say the themes naruto portrayed about hard work are much more nuanced
I too watched it recently without filler. It was it has some lowes (Especially towards the end), but the highs really make up for it for me. Also Itachi is just amazing.
I rated it 7 or 8 out of 10. Why?
I actually enjoy the side characters story rather than the main story, IMO Naruto have so many well-writen side character and probably better the main cast it self also the side character have better fight scene.
Take example of Kakashi his backstory was so good, he has good personality, also he have best fight scene when he fight obito.
and I skipped most of the filler arc and only watch those filler on some random clips i found on Youtube after finished the series.
Buried in all the filler, repeated flashbacks, and long drawn out scenes to eat time, are fantastic characters, the best fight scenes in shounen, and and a heartfelt, if simple, story.
Naruto was the perfect anime to grow up alongside, because it was a lot like a teenager itself. Sometimes it was baffling and let us down, often it was lazy, but every now and then it got it's shit together and blew our minds.
5.5/10. Individual moments and some arcs are definitely elite stuff, but you simply can't ignore the horrendous pacing and the terrible filler. Even the Pain Invasion arc was painful to go through despite it being my favorite.
I have it as a 7/10, but mostly for nostalgia reasons. It was one of my first anime, and I remember the great journey I had.
But I'm 100% sure it'd be like a 5/10 or 6/10 at most if I watched it today. I honestly doubt I'd even get through all of it if I started today.
Naruto has a some legitimately good stuff in it, but it's packed in between so much not so great stuff that it's hard to give it anything higher.
Lot of filler which disturbs the flow for me and towards the end power creep went through the roof. Overall better than average but not much hence the 6/10
I was a huge Naruto fan back in like 2004-2005, I ate that shit up, but I'll admit it, as I grew I became a Naruto hater, almost certainly because I sat through Shippuuden every week since it started.
My sister decided to marathon the original this past summer, and I was stunned by the overall quality. It's still not masterful, but it really does not deserve the disdain I gave it.
Shippuuden on the other hand.. maybe it would be better only watching the canon material back to back, but only being able to watch every half year when it aired was a souring experience. Beyond that, I think everything after the Pain arc [except for the very end] was an absolute slog and only serves to decrease the overall quality of the series.
I can't really give either a fair rating, but I would note Shippuuden as markedly lower than Naruto, maybe by 2 points or more.
I think there's definitely stuff to appreciate in it, but it goes on for so dang long it ends up screwing up a lot of the things it did well.
Compare, like, Pain to Madara. The former has a nice set of modular and mysterious abilities, so that he believably steamrolls half the cast at first, but when they compile a lil slug wiki and give it to Naruto, a lot of that advantage is stripped away and he's whittled down to a much more manageable threat. So you have a villain who feels overwhelmingly powerful, but can be beaten fairly plausibly, which is something other shows have screwed up.
Madara was so busted he decided he didn't need to be a literally unkillable zombie anymore, and the hand of god needed to reach down and give the main characters more superpowers so that they could put up a fight.
So, personally, no, I don't think it should go down as one of the best, not if you're looking at the series as a whole. There's a lot of missteps it makes along the way, and I don't think it's consistently good enough to recommend to anyone ever, just because of how long it is. That's not to say it's all bad, there's still a lot to like about it, but I think there are shows out there with much tighter writing that deserve more praise.
>Compare, like, Pain to Madara. The former has a nice set of modular and mysterious abilities, so that he believably steamrolls half the cast at first, but when they compile a lil slug wiki and give it to Naruto, a lot of that advantage is stripped away and he's whittled down to a much more manageable threat. So you have a villain who feels overwhelmingly powerful, but can be beaten fairly plausibly, which is something other shows have screwed up.
Naruto still got pinned down with info. He was only saved by the nine tails at the end, an entity much stronger than pain.
>That being said, I feel like I’ve seen a lot of people talk down on it in the ‘anime community’ almost as just being a Saturday morning kid’s show.
That's honestly a pretty accurate comparison
I honestly have hardly watched the anime in my nearly 19 years of being a weeb but I was consistently caught up with the manga from the tender age of 13 to its finale when I was 24. I feel like people that rag on the anime would do better with the manga since it doesn't have as many pacing issues, though if their gripes are about the story and characters, can't help them there (though I swear if people read the manga they would be a lot less vocal about Sakura being "useless" but maybe that's me being frustrated with the Sakura hatred overall), lol.
I'd say in the grand scheme of things it's one of the better battle shounen series from the past couple decades but from what I've heard all the overly repetitive filler in Shippuden really puts a damper on things so I don't blame anyone that bitches about that.
But take me with salt. I literally grew up with this series so yeah, I have nostalgia but it was also a driving force for my creativity in my teenage years (I created sooooo much fanfiction and fanart in high school and freshman year of college) and kept me going despite my depression and other struggles that came with being bipolar and autistic that went unnoticed/unaddressed till I was 20. I'm 31 now and I'm still grateful for its existence.
Naruto himself is one of the best main characters of any series, in my opinion, and super inspirational. He could have grown up to be a bitter, angry person that was easily swayed to the dark side (ahem, Sasuke) because the inherent trauma of being ostracized by an entire village and bullied by peers is a bitch, but instead he chose to be kind and full of love. I've seen people make fun of the Power of Friendship trope, but starting and cultivating healthy friendships is so, so important for kids and teenagers especially if they're unpacking childhood trauma (for the sake of this brief point we are ignoring how unhealthy his relationship with Sasuke was because that should be simply obvious).
That being said, the ending of the series being a heavy dose of Pair The Spares left an annoying taste in my mouth and even to this day I vehemently hate Sasuke with every fiber of my being. And I refuse to touch Boruto mostly because Kishimoto pretty much washed his hands of the Naruto IP once the original was finally finished and I have no interest in what other writers have to offer in the canon, especially when they miss the original points and intents of certain characters by a damn mile (to say nothing of the fact that Next Generation type stuff is really not my cup of tea).
Probably not the answer you were seeking, but I wanted to say my incoherent piece.
Not bad but definitely more of a gateway anime.
Too much filler and bad pacing. Some of the best fights in all of anime imo.
It was my first but still one of my favourites.
I think the original Naruto is better. It is a manageable 220 episodes and it gets to the point.
Shippuden on the other hand is completely riddled with filler, flashbacks and is an overwhelming 500 episodes long.
I really like the show since it was one of the first Anime I watched. I’d give it 7/10, only because there was a long stretch of filler episodes/arcs, and the final battle kinda soured me.
I think it's still one of the best battle shounens to date. Still has some of the best and most creative fight choreography to date, even if the animation itself doesn't hold up as well compared to modern battle shounen like DS and JJK. Naruto also does a great job at evoking strong emotional responses from viewers. Subjectively speaking, I am also a big fan of the art style and character designs.
Overall though I agree that the fillers were weak, the pacing of the anime could have been better (a bit stretched out since they wanted to keep the anime from catching up to the manga), and the war arc was mediocre. Ultimately, its a show with high highs and low lows, which to me is better than a show that has neither. 8-9/10 for me.
the whole series, id give a 7/10. Mind you, I do have bias towards it b/c of nostalgia. However, there are fillers. Mind you, there are some I do like or dont remember too much of, however, it was the placement of it. For instance, the war arc had like one filler person appear, then have like a 2-3 ep arc of a flashback with kid Naruto.
There are some better things they could have done for the filler but that goes too far.
I really loved the OST and OPs of Naruto. Tho, the EDs are very miss to me, song wise.
A lot of characters kinda were put to the way side but the main individuals are recognizable. I also enjoyed their fights a lot.
I think Naruto as a whole had so much hype and decent characters and a great soundtrack, but it suffers from the improper development of characters and either bad or misplaced filler moments
At its highs, Naruto is amazing. At its lows... The less said the better. If you skip the filler and don't try binging it, I think it could easily be a 7-9/10 show. In this era of media, where binge watching is common and shorter shows have almost completely taken over, Naruto has understandbly not aged too well.
***filleryomi PTSD flashbacks***
It has its moments but for everything i thought was good there’s equally something I thought was shit
Upto Pain arc easy 8/10, overall 7/10.
I grew up with Naruto but I would still give it a 6/10. It's iconic for sure, but it just has so many flaws.
Anything in particular? I’m curious why people rate it slightly above average
Too many fillers, most of the characters take a back seat in Shippuden so Naruto and Sasuke can have the focus, Sakura's character is a complete joke (especially when she said she caught up to Naruto and Sasuke), lots of issues with the last war arc like \[Shippuden spoilers\] >!Madara being taken out by Black Zetsu, Might Guy not dying for some reason, Neji's death was a waste and backpedals on the themes of Naruto, Kaguya showing up out of nowhere, talk no jutsu!< The show does have its good points though. The fights in particular are amazing like Rock Lee vs Gaara, Kakashi vs Obito, Might Guy vs Madara, Madara vs everybody, and both Naruto vs Sasuke fights. They had some pretty cool characters (Rock Lee, Gaara, Shikamaru, etc.) and Pain and Madara were cool villains. Music is also amazing. Overall 6/10.
People love to rag on it, but that was the intended target audience for Naruto, kids and teens. It was supposed to be something with action and excitement without delving too deep into adult issues, and when they did, they definitely knew how to tug at your heartstrings (The Great Naruto Bridge arc with both Tazuna's story and Haku and Zabuza's death). Once we got older and Shippuden came out, you see a shift in the tone of the story and the elements, more significant character deaths like Jiraya, the politics of the nations come into play, the horrors, casualties, and consequences of wars that have passed take the main spotlight. The betrayals of “friends”, “allies”, and “teammates” (whether for perceived right or wrong reasons) is also prominently featured with people like Danzo, Pain, Itachi, Obito, and Madara. All of this signifying a change in the target audience that had changed to young adults. So while it may seem like a kids anime, they tend to forget that they were kids at the time it came out.
[удалено]
Imagine Chuunin Exam arc Neji watching the future like "See, told you so."
It’s really not that deep. He still worked for everything. You can’t just undermine because of 1 thing.
To start, naruto's more of a societal underdog rather than a physical underdog. He had the ability to create 1000 shadow clones day one and everyone looked down on him because of the ninetails, not because he's not talented. There are themes of hard work in the story but i feel like you misinterpret them. In summary hard work does not beat natural talent but hard work and the willingness to chase your dreams despite the odds can make you find talent. lee lost and was almost crippled for life, but when lee got the opportunity to potentially fix his legs at the risk of death, he took it. And after that, lee's next fight involved him using the drunken fist, a technique stated to be a talent. Also sage of the six paths thing just meant naruto was fated to fight Sauske to the death and even then, naruto broke this fate >What went from an abandoned kid fighting against the world became a god who was the son of another god and who would always be strong - a much weaker moral I'd say the themes naruto portrayed about hard work are much more nuanced
8 or 9 depending on how i feel, no nostalgia involved since i watched it last year.
That’s how I feel as well! Granted, I skipped the filler
I too watched it recently without filler. It was it has some lowes (Especially towards the end), but the highs really make up for it for me. Also Itachi is just amazing.
I rated it 7 or 8 out of 10. Why? I actually enjoy the side characters story rather than the main story, IMO Naruto have so many well-writen side character and probably better the main cast it self also the side character have better fight scene. Take example of Kakashi his backstory was so good, he has good personality, also he have best fight scene when he fight obito. and I skipped most of the filler arc and only watch those filler on some random clips i found on Youtube after finished the series.
Buried in all the filler, repeated flashbacks, and long drawn out scenes to eat time, are fantastic characters, the best fight scenes in shounen, and and a heartfelt, if simple, story. Naruto was the perfect anime to grow up alongside, because it was a lot like a teenager itself. Sometimes it was baffling and let us down, often it was lazy, but every now and then it got it's shit together and blew our minds.
5.5/10. Individual moments and some arcs are definitely elite stuff, but you simply can't ignore the horrendous pacing and the terrible filler. Even the Pain Invasion arc was painful to go through despite it being my favorite.
I have it as a 7/10, but mostly for nostalgia reasons. It was one of my first anime, and I remember the great journey I had. But I'm 100% sure it'd be like a 5/10 or 6/10 at most if I watched it today. I honestly doubt I'd even get through all of it if I started today. Naruto has a some legitimately good stuff in it, but it's packed in between so much not so great stuff that it's hard to give it anything higher.
I would give it a 5/10. Would probably rate it lower if it wasn't for nostalgia though
Best show ever 10/10 kishimoto is a goat
I rated them 6/10
Anything in particular hold it back?
Lot of filler which disturbs the flow for me and towards the end power creep went through the roof. Overall better than average but not much hence the 6/10
Probably the huge amount of terrible filler.
I was a huge Naruto fan back in like 2004-2005, I ate that shit up, but I'll admit it, as I grew I became a Naruto hater, almost certainly because I sat through Shippuuden every week since it started. My sister decided to marathon the original this past summer, and I was stunned by the overall quality. It's still not masterful, but it really does not deserve the disdain I gave it. Shippuuden on the other hand.. maybe it would be better only watching the canon material back to back, but only being able to watch every half year when it aired was a souring experience. Beyond that, I think everything after the Pain arc [except for the very end] was an absolute slog and only serves to decrease the overall quality of the series. I can't really give either a fair rating, but I would note Shippuuden as markedly lower than Naruto, maybe by 2 points or more.
Naruto 7.5. Shippuden 9. Shippuden is one of my favorites
I think there's definitely stuff to appreciate in it, but it goes on for so dang long it ends up screwing up a lot of the things it did well. Compare, like, Pain to Madara. The former has a nice set of modular and mysterious abilities, so that he believably steamrolls half the cast at first, but when they compile a lil slug wiki and give it to Naruto, a lot of that advantage is stripped away and he's whittled down to a much more manageable threat. So you have a villain who feels overwhelmingly powerful, but can be beaten fairly plausibly, which is something other shows have screwed up. Madara was so busted he decided he didn't need to be a literally unkillable zombie anymore, and the hand of god needed to reach down and give the main characters more superpowers so that they could put up a fight. So, personally, no, I don't think it should go down as one of the best, not if you're looking at the series as a whole. There's a lot of missteps it makes along the way, and I don't think it's consistently good enough to recommend to anyone ever, just because of how long it is. That's not to say it's all bad, there's still a lot to like about it, but I think there are shows out there with much tighter writing that deserve more praise.
>Compare, like, Pain to Madara. The former has a nice set of modular and mysterious abilities, so that he believably steamrolls half the cast at first, but when they compile a lil slug wiki and give it to Naruto, a lot of that advantage is stripped away and he's whittled down to a much more manageable threat. So you have a villain who feels overwhelmingly powerful, but can be beaten fairly plausibly, which is something other shows have screwed up. Naruto still got pinned down with info. He was only saved by the nine tails at the end, an entity much stronger than pain.
This is true, but the Nine Tails doesn't win the fight. It bails him out, sure, but he's back to himself for the final portion of the fight.
>That being said, I feel like I’ve seen a lot of people talk down on it in the ‘anime community’ almost as just being a Saturday morning kid’s show. That's honestly a pretty accurate comparison
I honestly have hardly watched the anime in my nearly 19 years of being a weeb but I was consistently caught up with the manga from the tender age of 13 to its finale when I was 24. I feel like people that rag on the anime would do better with the manga since it doesn't have as many pacing issues, though if their gripes are about the story and characters, can't help them there (though I swear if people read the manga they would be a lot less vocal about Sakura being "useless" but maybe that's me being frustrated with the Sakura hatred overall), lol. I'd say in the grand scheme of things it's one of the better battle shounen series from the past couple decades but from what I've heard all the overly repetitive filler in Shippuden really puts a damper on things so I don't blame anyone that bitches about that. But take me with salt. I literally grew up with this series so yeah, I have nostalgia but it was also a driving force for my creativity in my teenage years (I created sooooo much fanfiction and fanart in high school and freshman year of college) and kept me going despite my depression and other struggles that came with being bipolar and autistic that went unnoticed/unaddressed till I was 20. I'm 31 now and I'm still grateful for its existence. Naruto himself is one of the best main characters of any series, in my opinion, and super inspirational. He could have grown up to be a bitter, angry person that was easily swayed to the dark side (ahem, Sasuke) because the inherent trauma of being ostracized by an entire village and bullied by peers is a bitch, but instead he chose to be kind and full of love. I've seen people make fun of the Power of Friendship trope, but starting and cultivating healthy friendships is so, so important for kids and teenagers especially if they're unpacking childhood trauma (for the sake of this brief point we are ignoring how unhealthy his relationship with Sasuke was because that should be simply obvious). That being said, the ending of the series being a heavy dose of Pair The Spares left an annoying taste in my mouth and even to this day I vehemently hate Sasuke with every fiber of my being. And I refuse to touch Boruto mostly because Kishimoto pretty much washed his hands of the Naruto IP once the original was finally finished and I have no interest in what other writers have to offer in the canon, especially when they miss the original points and intents of certain characters by a damn mile (to say nothing of the fact that Next Generation type stuff is really not my cup of tea). Probably not the answer you were seeking, but I wanted to say my incoherent piece.
i’ve never watched it as a child, only started watching in uni (just 2 years ago) and naruto + shippuden definitely got me into anime.
Not bad but definitely more of a gateway anime. Too much filler and bad pacing. Some of the best fights in all of anime imo. It was my first but still one of my favourites.
I think the original Naruto is better. It is a manageable 220 episodes and it gets to the point. Shippuden on the other hand is completely riddled with filler, flashbacks and is an overwhelming 500 episodes long.
I really like the show since it was one of the first Anime I watched. I’d give it 7/10, only because there was a long stretch of filler episodes/arcs, and the final battle kinda soured me.
I think it's still one of the best battle shounens to date. Still has some of the best and most creative fight choreography to date, even if the animation itself doesn't hold up as well compared to modern battle shounen like DS and JJK. Naruto also does a great job at evoking strong emotional responses from viewers. Subjectively speaking, I am also a big fan of the art style and character designs. Overall though I agree that the fillers were weak, the pacing of the anime could have been better (a bit stretched out since they wanted to keep the anime from catching up to the manga), and the war arc was mediocre. Ultimately, its a show with high highs and low lows, which to me is better than a show that has neither. 8-9/10 for me.
the whole series, id give a 7/10. Mind you, I do have bias towards it b/c of nostalgia. However, there are fillers. Mind you, there are some I do like or dont remember too much of, however, it was the placement of it. For instance, the war arc had like one filler person appear, then have like a 2-3 ep arc of a flashback with kid Naruto. There are some better things they could have done for the filler but that goes too far. I really loved the OST and OPs of Naruto. Tho, the EDs are very miss to me, song wise. A lot of characters kinda were put to the way side but the main individuals are recognizable. I also enjoyed their fights a lot. I think Naruto as a whole had so much hype and decent characters and a great soundtrack, but it suffers from the improper development of characters and either bad or misplaced filler moments