#potentially boruto?

[hozukitofu]

idk what's weirder for iruka: konohamaru becoming a jounin sensei or shino becoming an academy teacher and both of them are his colleagues now instead of former students. one is a reformed prankster carbon copy of naruto and one spoke maybe four words to him during the entire time he knew the kid. imagine running into them in the staff room. i would need to leave immediately.

they also refuse to call him without honorifics or if this is a modern AU - mr umino/sir/sensei. iruka tries so hard to make them comfortable and feeling like they're his colleagues, to no avail. they got as far as 'iruka-sensei' and then promptly faltered.

all the little students look up to iruka as a superhero. their teacher's teacher. none of that silliness where they don't respect him - his disappointed face is lethal

[just-dreaming-for-now]

the utter, heartbreaking letdown that is kashin koji being in an abandoned orochimaru hideout instead of recalling some of jiraiya's memories and turning to orochimaru for help with boruto, thereby substantiating the orochimaru redemption arc and expanding on orochimaru & jiraiya's dynamic mirroring the recent chapter of mitsuki talking about himself & boruto

[sannin-three]

So you're telling me that Boruto introduced a Jiraiya clone, and we never see him interact with Tsunade or Orochimaru? No exploring how messed up that would be for them, suddenly seeing a copy of their dead friend brought to life? The uncanny valley sensation of him looking so much like Jiraiya but his personality being so very different? Or even taking it a fluffier route: the fact that Koji seems to retain some of Jiraiya's memories and could maybe tell the two how Jiraiya felt about them, how he cared about Tsunade, how he would have been happy to see how Orochimaru has changed...

None of that?

Okay then.

[wegog]

Himawari & Shikadai in Chapter 81

'Your moves were great. That's what Kawaki's little sister is supposed to be like.'

[chelbea-art]

Time skip Himawari just cuz. I don't really have expectations but I hope that in the time skip she's a well trained shinobi

[angstsasuke]

I’ve never watched an episode of Boruto ever so idek what’s happening really but I think after Sasuke finds and kills all those gods or kaguya progeny or whatever the reason he’s never home w his wife and kid is, he needs to reconnect with his 17 yr old self like take some ninja shrooms &immediately rededicate himself to revolution. he’s 33 now, he’s had plenty of time to learn ninja dialectics and read ninja Marx and he needs to start organizing orochimaru’s victims and other victims of the ninja military industrial complex. &naruto is obsessed with him. if you’re a communist and you fail to radicalize someone who’d chase you to the ends of the earth, thinks abt u ceaselessly, and holds onto every word you say what are you doing… but that doesn’t mean give up that means work on your agitprop skills and be principled and dedicate yourself and Sasuke can be very dedicated and principled. Sasuke could literally start a party in Konoha idk what he’s doing

[watermelonsloth]

Here’s something that would’ve been interesting for Boruto to be about: intergenerational conflict and resentment.

I’m sure the majority of people reading this at least know what I’m talking about, that being when older generations insult, degrade, and infantilize the younger generations. Boomers calling people snowflakes, people constantly mentioning the “tide pod challenge” to insult Gen Z, etc. It’s when older generations are resentful of children growing up in better times than them or when the different generations just don’t understand each other. This is already touched on a little in the Boruto series, but I’m talking about it being a major theme, so all of that conflict would be amped up to ten.

Granted, this wouldn’t work unless characters from Naruto that were already emotionally attached to are less than perfect parents (this is perfectly fine writing wise, even realistic, but I know a lot of people had problems with it). In fact, the Naruto characters, although not outright villains, would probably be similar to antagonists. Boruto’s generation would want to be taken seriously and be seen as ninja while the older generations would look at them like “kid, you haven’t been to war once and you’ve barely experienced conflict. you don’t know what the word ninja means.” Ideally, this would have a healthy mix of both sides of the conflict (like Naruto looking at Boruto’s screw-ups and becoming doubtful about leaving problems in his hands while Boruto feels like Naruto is magnifying minor mistakes).

I think this would work because:

It continues the theme of breaking the cycle of hatred through understanding because intergenerational resentment is a kind of cycle of hatred

The series would acknowledge that the Naruto characters went through a lot of trauma and screwed up things at a young age

The characters get to acknowledge all the crap they went through and get the chance to work through some of it on screen

It wouldn't be too far off from Boruto and Sarada’s desires to be treated as their own people rather than the son of Naruto and daughter of Sasuke

It would immediately give the next gen a shared relatable and sympathetic motivation

Naruto’s gen (or at least the most prevalent characters from it) could go through an arc about progressing the world without resentment and learning to accept that even without intense pain or trauma children can grow mature, competent adults. This could also play off of the idea of the will of fire.

[cherryhrat]

Im ashamed to say im back on my naruto shit

Hes my son your honor, hes just a little guy

Id die for him

[stickyricewithmangosauce]

Years go by and not a single day passes that I don't wish Naruto had been written by a competent author

[morningbyrd]

Eida/Ada but make her actually look like the damaged lonely teenager she is.

[narutosidebitch]

Imma need mitsuki's character to get serious now

[alteredphoenix]

I'm honestly not sure why Kishimoto Masashi hasn't done any other stories that isn't Naruto (well, there's Samurai 8, but that ended up cancelled, and Boruto is...well. It's Boruto But Let's Disassemble Boruto's Dad's Canon Until Not Even The Atoms Are Left).

Compared to the high fantasy ninja-cum-borderline-modern-day-cyberpunk aesthetic, Mario was such a breath of fresh air. Maybe not as lived in as Naruto (because it's a forty-four page one-shot, and you can't really afford to waste time on making New York feel "lived in" in that many pages), but it's so grounded in reality that the environment and the foundations of the story are already set in place. It doesn't have to worry about playing with the Magic System or keeping its chronology from getting tangled up in retcons and deus ex machina. It's short, it's simple, and gets right to the point while leaving many of its other elements inferred and in the background.

[wegog]

Damn! Boruto's using Flying Thunder God Technique... So, it means he's taken almost all techniques from his relatives/ancestors.

They have given Hima only the Byakugan... Not surprised at all.

[eclipsedsun1989]

spoilers for boruto i guess

also i am so fucking pissed about the boruto manga not showing hinata fight like she went there to protect naruto and we see NONE OF IT? Like none, just her being injured afterwards? I am not suprised a lot of people see her as a "housewife" (which btw is not wrong! you can be a housewife, do whatever the fuck you want!) and weak wet towel? Naruto/Boruto women are written so badly it makes me angry honestly because fucking ALL OF THEM are fucking badass but we never see even a glimpse of it?

[descendant-of-truth]

Alright guys, cast your votes: how do you think Boruto's gonna get that scar on his right eye? My bet is that he does it himself in an attempt to prevent/break out of a Momoshiki possession

[oh-no-its-bird]

There's an interesting note to be made on how Orochimaru is noticeably more stable and sane (and less "I will now gleefully crimes against humanity") when he has positive, stable relationships to ground him (Tsunade and Jiriyah, potential Sakumo + Mitsuki, Log, the rest of team Taka who are inexplicably around him in Boruto)

And how Sakumo's death would line up very neatly with the time Danzo was pressuring him into joining ROOT.

I've seen some really fun takes before about how Sakumo was being looked at as a very strong contender for 4th Hokage, and that his mission gone wrong was just weeks before Sarutobi was going to make a concrete decision naming him for it.

And that Danzo did not like the idea of Sakumo as Hokage— for many reasons but some of them being that he was a strong willed man who was very resistant to potential manipulations and with a very different political agenda than Danzo.

(A few things that later down the line, the much younger and more flexible Minato was not, which made him a much more attractive candidate for Danzo to attempt to continue his Hokage puppetiering on)

And so Sakumo's mission was sabotaged, and he was set up to fail no matter what choice he made on it. Rumors were carefully spread, hate was skillfully cultivated, and in the end Danzo had only sit back and watch the man who may have been the Hokage to get in his way take himself out of the equation.

(Also, notably: conveniently leaving his equally as prodigious son to later fall into Danzo's hands)

So anyways, rolling with that, if you subscribe to the Orochimaru and Sakumo friendship (or ship tbh, I think they're cute) then I am welcoming u aboard my hc of "hmmm it sure is oddly convenient that Orochimaru, who was so isolated and had already lost Tsunade and Jiriyah, also lost Sakumo and was only then approached by Danzo for ROOT experiments."

Am I saying Danzo killed Sakumo to more easily get to Orochimaru? No. But I am saying it could have totally contributed to his motivations to orchestrate it, just along with everything else. It'd be neat, so