Ulquiorra takes his hand out of his pocket.

[Ishamael]

No text.

[Zeus]

I still haven't seen it although I'm thinking of regulating Bleach to build-up status, kinda like Naruto now. I don't really see why everyone's loving this arc so much, I find it quite dull and REALLY slow moving. The fight sequences have some nice parts to them but overall, not much happens and barely anything new other than "oh, look at this cool new kick-ass weapon I just happened to have which just happens to be your weak-point".

I'm actually slowly turning towards Dragonbore for cryin' out loud (4 eps into the Z series now). There's no great anime that I've found since Death Note and Yakitate Japan

[Eric]

Ulquiorra rocks.

And I prefer Bleach's fights to Naruto's talk fest and slow ass pace.

[Ishamael]

Ulquiorra rocks.

And I prefer Bleach's fights to Naruto's talk fest and slow ass pace.

Ichigo made it interesting for a couple seconds at least.

Naruto is decidely second-tier when it comes to DBZ-Inuyasha-style animes (i.e., group of friends go out to beat up stuff together). As for DBZ, the best one is the one with Cell and Gohan going insane.

[Zeus]

Ulquiorra rocks.

And I prefer Bleach's fights to Naruto's talk fest and slow ass pace.

Ichigo made it interesting for a couple seconds at least.

Naruto is decidely second-tier when it comes to DBZ-Inuyasha-style animes (i.e., group of friends go out to beat up stuff together). As for DBZ, the best one is the one with Cell and Gohan going insane.

Eric, I agree that it's better than current Naruto but it's nowhere near the quality of the Chuunin exam stuff.

Ish, you think Dragonbore is better than Naruto? Now, i've only seen 4 eps but it's so much older and really feels like it. Naruto feels like an updated, far-faster paced anime than it (at least through the first 135 eps)

[Ishamael]

Ichigo made it interesting for a couple seconds at least.

Naruto is decidely second-tier when it comes to DBZ-Inuyasha-style animes (i.e., group of friends go out to beat up stuff together). As for DBZ, the best one is the one with Cell and Gohan going insane.

Ish, you think Dragonbore is better than Naruto? Now, i've only seen 4 eps but it's so much older and really feels like it. Naruto feels like an updated, far-faster paced anime than it (at least through the first 135 eps)

I'm mostly referring to the story arcs where they fight they androids and cell. When I think Dragon Ball Z, these are the ones that mostly come to mind. I actually don't remember too much of the other stuff.

[SineSwiper]

Yeah, I'm getting bored with both series as well. They are dragging on way too much, and I think it's because both are highly popular series, so they think that they can milk it for all it's got.

[Zeus]

Yeah, I'm getting bored with both series as well. They are dragging on way too much, and I think it's because both are highly popular series, so they think that they can milk it for all it's got.

Oh for sure. I mean in Naruto Shipp 48, hardly anything happened. It really felt like half a manga chapter that time, almost like they were sayin' "we've got a huge battle coming up so we're just gonna milk it a little now with this half chapter then do one chapter where they get to them then for big ep #50 we'll have some batting going on that's gonna take 12 episodes to do 5 chapters". It's stretching way too much

For Bleach 162, again nothing happened. You had the recap take up 5 minutes (I actually fast forwarded it through it, it was 5 minutes including opening creds), Ichigo fight take up 10 min with a very predictable ending, and the Renji fight take 3 minutes, about half being a recap of the last 2 eps, and the whole thing with Inoue take up the rest.

It's getting irritating. I might go back and just re-edit them down to what they fucking should be which is about 7 or 8 minutes per 21 minute ep.

[Eric]

Yeah, I'm getting bored with both series as well. They are dragging on way too much, and I think it's because both are highly popular series, so they think that they can milk it for all it's got.

Oh for sure. I mean in Naruto Shipp 48, hardly anything happened. It really felt like half a manga chapter that time, almost like they were sayin' "we've got a huge battle coming up so we're just gonna milk it a little now with this half chapter then do one chapter where they get to them then for big ep #50 we'll have some batting going on that's gonna take 12 episodes to do 5 chapters". It's stretching way too much

For Bleach 162, again nothing happened. You had the recap take up 5 minutes (I actually fast forwarded it through it, it was 5 minutes including opening creds), Ichigo fight take up 10 min with a very predictable ending, and the Renji fight take 3 minutes, about half being a recap of the last 2 eps, and the whole thing with Inoue take up the rest.

It's getting irritating. I might go back and just re-edit them down to what they fucking should be which is about 7 or 8 minutes per 21 minute ep.

LOL, "huge battle coming up".

There's no huge battle coming up fyi. You just had your huge battle with Naruto and Orochimaru.

I'd say your next thing resembling a huge battle might be in, oh, say 10 episodes, and then it doesn't even involve the current cast you're watching. In fact it's not even a major battle, more like an action sequence.

[Flip]

I finally saw an ep of Naruto tonight on CN and it looks to me like a morph of DBZ (obviously) and one called Basilisk. The characters all have some weird magic they call jitsu's? Same thing in Basilisk, which was a decent anime. So, it might be interesting, but i'm not a huge fan of someone popping in and exclaiming, 'Hey, i learned a new jitsu!' (magical hands grow to person size and grab bad guys)... lame.

[SineSwiper]

Hey, don't knock Choji. The guy is badass if you provoke him.

Anyway, I would recommend that you start from the beginning. The first arc gives you a good idea of what to expect from the rest of the series. The original Naruto series is awesome, and unlike the new one, actually keeps a good pace.

The jitsu's actually have a lot of detail with how they are done, the power required to pull one off, etc. A lot of that is explained as they are trained in them. It's not like some kid can just learn a hand sign and do anything they want. I think the combat systems more comparable to Rurouni Kenshin in their strategy.

Plus, the Chuunin exam arc is full of win.

[Eric]

Jutsu, the word is Jutsu, fucking Sineswipers and Flips, I swear to god.

There is Ninjitsu, and Jujitsu

But in Naruto the abilities are called Jutsu. JUTSU DAMN YOU ALL.

*breaths heavily*

[SineSwiper]

I was just copying what he typed. I could give a shit how it's spelled.

[Zeus]

I finally saw an ep of Naruto tonight on CN and it looks to me like a morph of DBZ (obviously) and one called Basilisk. The characters all have some weird magic they call jitsu's? Same thing in Basilisk, which was a decent anime. So, it might be interesting, but i'm not a huge fan of someone popping in and exclaiming, 'Hey, i learned a new jitsu!' (magical hands grow to person size and grab bad guys)... lame.

If you're talking about watching an anime 140 eps in you really can't develop an opinion on it, you don't even know what's going on. Watch the first 15 eps, that's enough for you to get an idea of what's actually going on.

You need to give all long-running series' at least that long. I'm giving Dragonbore 25 eps before I give my final judgement on it (just finished ep 5 last night). Most of my making fun of that show was teasing Eric :-)

[RentCavalier]

Naruto is great for about the first, oh, I'd say eighty episodes. The exact moment where it begins to suck is the same exact moment the fight with Gaara ends, because that's the last time we get to see any real coolness out of the supporting characters.

Seriously! My favorite part of Naruto were all of the little different ninjas--the other classmates. Instead of creating some cliche end of the world plotline that has been built up, there should have been MUCH more focus on these Ninjas and their unique abilities.

Naruto's major flaw comes from its change in focus. Isn't it supposed to be a coming of age story? I mean, that's what I was getting from it. There should've been more lessons, and less unrealistic "OMG this class E Ninja must fight Twelve Class A ninjas but its cool because he has a MAGIC DEMON FOX IN HIS ASSHOLE".

[SineSwiper]

Naruto is great for about the first, oh, I'd say eighty episodes. The exact moment where it begins to suck is the same exact moment the fight with Gaara ends, because that's the last time we get to see any real coolness out of the supporting characters.

Not true at all. In fact, I think many of the supporting characters shined in the Sasuke saga. Except for the filler episodes, the entire first series was damn good. I'm hoping that they will eventually pick up the pace on the 2nd series to recapture the magic that it used to be.

[Zeus]

Naruto is great for about the first, oh, I'd say eighty episodes. The exact moment where it begins to suck is the same exact moment the fight with Gaara ends, because that's the last time we get to see any real coolness out of the supporting characters.

Seriously! My favorite part of Naruto were all of the little different ninjas--the other classmates. Instead of creating some cliche end of the world plotline that has been built up, there should have been MUCH more focus on these Ninjas and their unique abilities.

Naruto's major flaw comes from its change in focus. Isn't it supposed to be a coming of age story? I mean, that's what I was getting from it. There should've been more lessons, and less unrealistic "OMG this class E Ninja must fight Twelve Class A ninjas but its cool because he has a MAGIC DEMON FOX IN HIS ASSHOLE".

You didn't like the Tsunade arc (3 Saanin fight) or the Sasuke fight arc? Those were excellent. I do think the Naruto-Gaara fight was the best of the bunch but the entire first 135 eps were excellent (not including the 5 or so filler eps after the Chuunin exam - Aoi and Kakashi's face one-off).

There has been WAAAAY more "minor" character development in the original Naruto series that in basically any series I've ever heard of. There was tons on characters like Rock, Neji, Kiba, and Choji and they quite a bit for a bunch of other characters too. I mean, look at when they were chasing Sasuke down, the characters that were in that arc got a SHITLOAD of screentime. And the Saanin's are well developed too. Then you have how many "main" characters? Kakashi, Sasuke, Naruto, Sakura, Orichimaru, Gaara for a large chunk....and that's not even including his siblings, Kabuto, some of the other Konoha team leaders, Shikimaru.....

You can speak a lot of your subjective feelings towards plot, direction, etc., but complaining about the development of secondary characters? There has been TONS of screentime devoted not only to their actions but their backstory as well.

Coming of age story? WTF? It simply followed the cursed boy and his path to becoming a Hokage. So yes, it would start out as coming of age but naturally you would expect it to change as the boy got older. The complaint I have is more of the severe stretching out of the anime, the filler, and maybe some minor plotlines as opposed to the direction.

[RentCavalier]

Yes, you have points, but the Tsunade arc bored me. It was interesting to see all these grown-up characters, but the fight against Orochimaru was both awesome and crappy because it exhibits the most annoying thing about Orochimaru--he's FUCKING CHEAP.

It's like, he's not a villain who earns victories based upon superior strategy or strength, he's a villain who either picks fights with kids and old men or else is just physically INCAPABLE OF DYING. Plus, he stops being interesting after he becomes a pedophile for Sasuke. As an arch villain, he works only so well.

The Sasuke arc was pretty good--ok, it was really good, even with the somewhat stretched out fights, because it had all my favorite supporting characters (except for the insect guy, who is my all-time favorite Naruto character and should have more screen time.) kicking ass in interesting ways.

BUT it's bogged down by having the stupidest fight between Naruto and Sasuke. It's twelve episodes of flashback after flashback after flashback and they REPEAT THEMSELVES over and over again and tell us VERY little and then for some reason everyone can turn into super-saiyan monster ninjas and...ugh.

The fight between Sasuke and Naruto really ticked me off, and it looks like the new series is offering just more of that. I'd read the mangas, but I honestly prefer to watch the fights in actual motion, because Naruto does them really well--WHEN it does them really well.

I dunno. I just want there to be some true FINALITY to things. One of the supporting ninjas should die--the guy with the white eyes (Hinata's brother ) should've died in the Sasuke arc, to free up room for new characters. Also, Tenten either needs to do something important or else get killed, because she's really quite pointless in the storyline.

[Zeus]

There is some annoying stuff in Naruto, no doubt. The flashbacks did get a little carried away in the Sasuke-Naruto fight, I agree. But it was still awesome what went on, unlike what I'm finding now with Bleach. That show's hanging on for me right now.

This is why I want to re-edit some of it. I really do think that there's an amazing base of stuff in the Shippuuden series (even a bit of the original series could used editing with the 5 minute recaps and a little excessive flashbacks in some parts) but it's just bogged down right now. Chop each ep down to 7-9 minute - which is about what it takes to do a chapter properly - and you would have some kick-ass stuff happening. The 4-tailed fox vs Orichimaru was pretty fucking cool, just bogged down.

They're so milking it now it's insane. Even towards the end of the non-filler original series too.