Anyone else feel their friendship wasn't as developed as

After the Land of the Waves arc there should have been one more arc that focused on forging their bond as a team. Ironically this was supposed to be the Chunin Exams arc but they were split up for most of that. That right there lies the root of the problem and why they feel like just people who only see each other at work: They spend most of the series split up from each other and only come together when shit needs to get done.

We at least should have been shown them hanging out just bullshitting with each other.

This is why you watch Naruto for the fight scenes and not the character development

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>>151821314
I agree with you on their "friendship" being kinda underdeveloped, imo Kakashi was heartbroken because team 7 reminded him of obito and rin.

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hidan and kakuzu best arc, prove me wrong faggots

>>151821418
But Naruto has no good fight scenes and the series is all about character development. Even the fights are more heavy on character than the actual fight.

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Well Sakura never fought Sauce in Part 1 - just fawned over him.

Compare to Boku no Hero Academia where the ramifications of Ochako vs Bakagou are pretty intense.

Basically you do the "Trio of Friends" shit you gotta have them all kick the shit out of each other.

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>Gets tasked with watching his dead mentor's orphaned son who has a demon Fox spirit inside of him
>Ignores him in favor of the edgelord

>Literally only teaches his students how to run up trees before he forces them to fight Chunin-level ninja against literally everyone else's wishes
>Keep in mind Kuruma has a chance of being released if Naruto takes too much abuse

>Pawns Naruto off on a shitty teacher like Ebisu while he takes Sauce away to show him literally all his cool tricks
>Does this KNOWING Naruto was going to fight Neji
>Couldn't even be bothered to show up for Naruto's match
>He literally never expected Naruto to win

>Completely forgets about Sakura at this point

>All three of his students fail the Chunin Exams because he forced them to take it when they clearly weren't ready for it

>His students leave him for better teachers that will actually mentor them

What a shitty teacher.

>>151821314
I think Naruto was actually pretty good for the first few arcs, but Kishimoto either is just not a very good writer (most likely), or he never figured out a really good direction after a while.

>>151821715
Yeah, Kakashi never wanted to teach them to begin with

>>151821471
>Thought Naruto was horse shit but loved Hidan and Kakuzu
>wasted
wew

>>151821715
I feel that everything starts to gradually just fall apart around the exams.

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>>151821715
>yfw you realize Orochimaru would score higher than Kakashi on a course eval

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>>151821518
This. Always do the Rock-Paper-Scissors if they're fighters or have each of one completely obliterates the rest in some certain aspect.
For instance, you have your fighter, you have your healer and you have your merchant/trickster/manager with an incredible amount of charisma

>>151821715
Still kakashi si the real MC of the series. It's funny how supporting characters are the real MVPs in most of shonen

>>151821518
>>151822222
Ochako could end up great - but Hori needs balls to make it work. He's realized something everyone inherently knows - losing in a battle manga sucks and dooms you to being a ragdoll.

He can at any point "tap out" - have Ochako learn she can just be a "support" hero, like Sakura becoming a Medical Ninja. A role that IS useful in-universe, but boring and pointless on a meta level. So far he's been pretty consistent with Ochako's shame over her weakness eating her up, so I'm hopeful. But I've been let down before.

>>151822324
Being a female is definitely a point against Ochako's favor - even Erza Scarlet jobs to big strong scary men. I'd say the biggest thing working against Ochako isn't her sex, but just how writing works.

A character who improves over time that IS NOT the MC - and lets be honest, even one that IS the MC - is very rare. Strong characters are usually strong from the start and grow even stronger. Weaklings usually can at best become a little less weak. Showing growth is hard, especially when juggling other story elements. But if you actually pull it off... oh man. That's the real shit right there. Someone who casts aside everything to become stronger - it's not a very Japanese thing, but it's fucking great.

>>151822324
Ochako hasn't been cool since the tournament arc. Hori made a mistake by thinking that he could push her back to love interest and barely anything more. Even if she "got over" Deku and got her license it doesn't mean shit unless she shows it.

>>151821314
When I read it the first time I was very surprised by Sasuke saying Naruto was his best friend. Kishi kept Sauce too edgy to show their "bond" so it came across as forced and strange. Too bad he made the manga essentially about them becoming friends again.

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>>151822324
>>151822324
>>151822600

This is a shonen. You know how it works. Women are either rude bitches or fucking doormats.

>A character who improves over time that IS NOT the MC - and lets be honest, even one that IS the MC - is very rare.

We've discussed this A LOT in the BnHA threads. Hori really fucked up the manga with the size of the supporting cast.

Also we have the situation of when a tertiary character gets promoted to secondary and vice versa. The criteria for doing that has been pretty lackluster if you ask me.

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>>151822600
Ochako's plot thread still hasn't had her say "Oh I'm weak but thats ok." As long as she has shame, she has a chance. An ever diminishing chance.
>>151822878
>This is a shonen. You know how it works. Women are either rude bitches or fucking doormats.

It didn't have to be like that though. By all accounts the fanbase loved Ochako actually trying. The decision to just abandon focus on her is baffling, and her tumbling from 4th to 10th in the polls is pretty much what you'd expect.

>>151821480
naruto is shit

>>151821471
But I can't. It's litterly the only part I enjoyed watching.

>>151821715
Yeah I never got why Ebisu

>>151821715
>Does this KNOWING Naruto was going to fight Neji
I'd say it wasn't so bad if it wasn't for the fact Neji legit tried to kill Hinata in the previous round and had to be held back.

The more you focus on Kakashi the shittier he becomes.

>>151821314
I don't think he ever really exchanged more than a few words with Pink Shit

>>151821715
At least he's not a dad.

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>>151823026
Yup it doesn't have to be like that.

Mt. Lady, Midnight and Wild Wild Pussycats are nice pro heroines but still they're render useless/not as OP as their male fellow pro heroes.

Hori can do better. The girls from Omagadoki zoo and Sensei no nulge are quite enjoyable. Moreover IIRC in Zoo's case SHE was the real MC.

>>151821314
I think you want to not make the mistake of thinking that just because people aren't buddy-buddy that they can't care about one another or be close.

It's not a small thing facing life or death situations with someone, having your life saved by someone, having someone declare undying love/commitment for you (even if you don't feel the same), growing up with someone, etc.

Team 7s whole point is that they are, in a lot of ways, incompatible personalities that undergo powerful bonding experiences in spite of it. It's better to think of it as "they became as close as a group of people who would otherwise never give each other the time of day can become."

>>151821314
>It felt like Sakura only tolerated Naruto, just saw Kakashi as a teacher, and never saw Sasuke as more than a middle school crush
>never saw Sasuke as more than a middle school crush

What? She has always been irrationally, uncontrollably in love with him. Say what you will about her, but her love for Sasuke is as pure as it gets.

>>151824029
The weird thing is that Ochako doesn't even get moments of comic relief anymore - she makes no wacky faces or has any gags - she feels shelved entirely.

If Hori's building up to something he'll need to hurry up. Else it'll be a cycle of "Ochako isn't popular so I shouldn't give her too much focus -> Wow Ochako fell in the rankings! -> Ochako isn't popular so I shouldn't give her too much focus -> Wow Ochako fell in the rankings!"

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>>151824315
>irrationally, uncontrollably in love
>pure

>>151824614
How does that not make sense?

>>151823823
He's clever enough to realize that would be bad for him.

>>151824315
There is a fine difference between love and a crush. Sakura' affection for Sasuke never grew past being a crush. She was saying she loved him from day one and we are never told why.

>>151826901
I think calling it a crush was valid in the early days of the series when we didn't yet know the depths of her devotion to him, but it's pretty reductive to say 'she's just crushing on him' when she'd proven multiple times that she'd die for him by the end of the series.

And as such, I think you have to reexamine her feelings for him from the very beginning. It's easy to dismiss her as being a silly middle school girl in the beginning because that's all we've seen and that's what it looks like at that point. But it becomes very clear that it wasn't some fleeting infatuation. She should have gone "Sasuke?! That nigga's crazy. Fuck him. I'm over that dude," a million times, but never did.

I agree that we can't say she loves him in the way that two people who have a relationship built on an established history of mutual trust and understanding do, but I think it would be unfair to say her feelings for him don't count as anything more than a superficial attachment just because they are unrequited.

And as to the "why," that's exactly what I mean when I say it was pure. It's hard to understand if you've never seen it or had the experience yourself, but sometimes we're just drawn to people. No real explaining why, there's just something about that specific person that stirs something in you on a visceral, cosmic level that you can't really control. That was Sasuke to Sakura.