Is Naruto hated or something?

[Zacharious-khan]

Personally i hate it now because the plot has gone six ways crazy since shippuden and all logic and rationality has been thrown out the window. the only way the series can make sense at this point is if the entire series is an hallucination Itatchi is forcing on Naruto from after the Chuunin exam.

 

[Kaimax]

It's so depressing that mediocre manga can continue for what seems like forever, but incredibly awesome high-quality manga like Berserk, can take 1+ years for a single issue to come out...

That's because Kentaro Miura has other issues that stalls him (Mostly Idolmaster lol /jk) and besides that Berserk is in a Biweekly Magazine. There's no one else to blame but Miura himself for stalling, and then there's that other side project manga that he's going to do before continuing Berserk.

OT: Naruto just simply overstayed it's welcome, like most of the flagship series from Jump. It's the dilemma of not knowing where to stop. And this is why Bakuman is still the best example.

 

[Julius Terrell]

Ok, I've watched this show from the first season, and I was in my early 20s when this show started airing in japan. I was simply hooked. The show felt very childish at the beginning, but has matured into an adult show. I'm only stating this because there are some fans like me who stuck with the show. I didn't like the filler so I skipped it. I hate seeing the same flashbacks for a millionth time, but the main story is what keeps me watching.

For all those that are saying that this show has no depth. I think you people don't know what you're talking about. You actually have to have watched the show before you can make a statement like that. I'm not saying Naruto is perfect by any means, but this show has excellent writing compared to bleach! That was show that made NO sense whatsoever. So for everyone that doesn't know, this show has evolved into a really interesting show, but you'll never appreciate that unless you stuck it out.

For the record I can appreciate a good shounen show, but shounen is only but one of the many genres I watch.

 

[Torkuda]

Really I forced myself to watch to the end of the first saga, don't remember the name of it and can't be bothered to look it up. At the end Saskue finally embraces the dark side after fighting Naruto. I got into the show because of all the AMVs that featured it, thinking I was gonna see an action packed thrill ride and... yea no.

I'll admit to liking some of the designs and characters for a while... many compare Naruto and Bleach, but from what I saw, there is no comparison. The writers of Naruto were good at getting you interested in something happening and building suspense, but the pay off was always terrible as it took FOREVER! Bleach drew things out a little, but dear lord it was nothing compared to Naruto. Even when Bleach devoted a whole season to a flashback, at least the Vizard flash back was interesting.

Also, another thing that always got on my nerves, as everyone else I'm sure, Saskue. Seriously, no one else in the show was that much of a downer and everyone else had been through just and much shit as him if not more. Hell Naruto was treated like a mutant for how long and he was bright and cheery all the time, so what was Saskue's excuse? Seriously, pay a hit man to kill your brother and get over it. You're in a world filled with ninjas, I'm sure you can find an assassin on the cheap.

Finally, Sakura. I don't know what she was like in the manga, but yes, she was useless in the show. No, I don't want to go into anything about her relationships with the boys, she was a preteen for heavens sake so why should I care? But even when they tried to advertise that she was going to fight, she ended up just biting someone and being knocked out in record time. I seriously wanted to see the skill everyone talked about her having, but again, that's what the series did. Build up and never pay off.

 

[mlow44]

It's just an already tired formula that's been used in every other major shounen anime that's shamelessly repeated over and over for maximum profit. Same with Bleach and One Piece, and any other anime that doesn't somehow distinguish itself with any actual substance, people just realize that they've already seen the same situation play out over and over again, just with slight variations in characters or settings. They outgrow it, and in retrospect realize that it was never actually as good as they thought.

At least, that's my experience with shounen anime. DBZ, One Piece, Bleach, Naruto, and the list goes on... Their appeal only lasts for so many episodes before the formula starts wearing on you, and they all rely on tedious, unnecessary dialogue and panoramic shots to draw out their run time. Every 100 episodes of anime like this could be condensed down into 20 or so episodes without losing any substance, and it's for reasons like this that a series like Naruto is viewed as a total joke by anyone with half a brain.

 

[Erttheking]

If it's popular, there's going to be a dedicated group of people that hate it. Seems to be the way of the world. To be honest, some people go way too far with it and it stretches into fan hating territory. Some people really need to chill.

 

[Tiamattt]

Eh, the series just totally wore me down. It has it's great moments sure, but it took a ton of episodes to get to them. I'm not even talking about the filler episodes either,(that just made things worse) I'm talking about all those episodes that felt like it spent it's first 10 minutes recapping what happened in the previous episode, which for a guy that likes to watch episodes back to back is maddening. And after they're done recapping a few things happen and then "tune in next week!" It also didn't help that I've always found Naruto really annoying, which only got worse once he got his shiny blue ball of solves everything.

I've actually hung around for a lot longer then I thought I would, right up until like 1/3 into the filler episodes before the time jump? And by the time that was over and the gang grew up, I just stopped caring. I'm sure that it has plenty of other great moments that happened since the time jump but I've used up all patience for the series. IMO they should've ended the current story when they were still kids, (like add in 1 or 2 more seasons instead of the fillers to the time jump) and if they wanted to do something when they grew up they can start a new series with a new story where they can get a fresh start. Like a story can only get dragged out for so long, and for me they dragged out that story long past the point of interest. Especially in the case of Naruto where the end was nowhere even close in sight, and it's been how many years since that time jump? And the series still isn't over? Yeah I'm sorry I can't stick around for that kind of story-telling.

 

[KOMega]

Naruto is tiring.

Really anything that has like 100+ episodes are tiring.

And if I for any reason fall out of it once, I will probably not get back into it. I forget where I was anyways and I am not going to get past however number of episodes or whatever to find where I am again.

That plus anything going that long I suspect will have either a lot of filler or may suffer from some form of spectacle creep and everything will eventually look the same.

So unless it is actually finished and I haven't really started yet or I have somehow kept myself on the line I will probably not watch it.

That being Naruto which almost tires me now with it's very mention.
I don't hate it, but it's just tiring to think about.

The best I have for any of the big three actually is that I've sorta kept up to date with the One Piece manga.
Sorry.

 

[tthor]

The thing about the escapist community, they hate everything. Why I've stopped coming here, I'm cynical enough as is

 

[Pixelspeech]

I don't even read Naruto anymore. Take a look under my username. See how many manga books I've read?

Wow...

This is what young anime fans like me aspire to achieve.

 

[Rad Party God]

I started watching it on my early 20's, so no nostalgia googles for me, I thought it was pretty solid, nothing groundbreaking, but entertaining enough, the exams arc, Gaara's fight afterwards and the part where they chase Sasuke were all pretty solid arcs and after an incredibly epic fight... filler, upon filler, upon filler... I gave up, I even decided I couldn't be arsed to watch Shippudden if they kept with that same bullshit, so I simply gave up on it entirely.

 

[Yopaz]

I have a friend who's a big fan of Naruto and she told me to watch it, but she said I should skip 2 or 3 seasons because they were mostly fillers. That's reason enough for me to not want to watch it.

However Naruto is incredibly popular and that's why it is hated. Almost anything very popular also generates a whole lot of hate along the way. It has to do with the fact that the bigger the audience is the more people know about the thing and that gives a bigger potential of hate.

It's like this with everything and it's natural. Also if something is very popular it's likely that people who aren't interested get a whole lot of recommendations to watch it and end up hating it simply because of the recommendations rather than actual quality.

 

[Guffe]

I started following Naruto at a pretty young age, maybe 13? and as someone who liked DBZ I found it pretty cool.
I still read the manga but the boring thing about series like DBZ, Bleach and Naruto is that they are so predictable. You have the overly good and pure guy (main char) who loses at first, comes back with new found power, wins enemy. Make x-amount of archs and follow patter.
Surely there'll be one or two twists and a small amount of interesting characters but the main idea always stays the same and often the series just gets too drawn out. Especially the animes with a lot of fillers.

 

[Raioken18]

Most Anime/Manga fans, when they hear me say I love Naruto let out a sigh and tell me about how it's crap and homogenized. Then after a little inquiry I find out they've watched it up-to-date even though there's a ton of episodes and they just feel like they should hate any anime/manga that becomes mainstream.

Now about my feelings towards the actual show. I got into this around the same time I got into Bleach, both have quite large amounts of filler and at the time were very popular. I feel like in the big picture Bleach has fallen off whilst Naruto still holds out quite well. Yes Naruto is one dimensional, it's what makes him endearing, he has a purpose he's trying to achieve. A long term goal. The world of Naruto feels alive. Bleach always felt like it was always reactive, like if the badguys didn't attack them first the whole of soul society would just sit on it's hands.

Naruto's filler, MOST of it is actually alright, they are other ninja missions and because of that mission structure and time lapses you know from the manga that Naruto went out on lots of other missions. Some are pointless yes but I did like all the expansion around Sai and a few of the other secondary characters and other teams. It didn't take itself as seriously, and showed minor progressions for some of those other characters.

Bleach... I like Bleach, but the filler didn't really feel like it fit in with the main storyline. Like this thing happened once in the same city and new villains popped up and were defeated but never mentioned again even though they were from the souls of their swords but the same thing happens again later only this time it's revealed to be a fake but didn't take advantage of the situation previously for no reason what so ever... At least have Ichigo go on a trip out of town or something. The filler was always about Ichigo never progressing...

 

[Torkuda]

and it's for reasons like this that a series like Naruto is viewed as a total joke by anyone with half a brain.

Dude, it's a show. If we try to judge folks based on what shows they like... we're all gonna end up looking like idiots.

Just looking at myself:

Star Trek- where do I even begin with the stupidity? Science is now the American version of Deus ex mancina
Star Gate- just because you realize how dumb you're being, doesn't mean you're not being dumb
Farscape- human goes to a far off galaxy where the inhabitants are under tyrannical and barbaric systems of rule, then proceeds to lecture humans in the finalie about how much better than us they are because their civilizations are united... in tyranny and mass murder... no the writers didn't seem to intend irony.
The Dead Zone- the brain doesn't work like that, case closed
The Nostalgia Critic- judges other people for doing things he himself does and then pretends he's just being ironic. It's not ironic.
Ah hell
Zero Punctuation- the guy plays through each successive game and then bashes the heck out of it though he must of enjoyed something else, likely as not, he would have quit gaming a while ago.

And I love all of them, flaws and all!

(And I hope I don't get a warning for saying something bad about an Escapist show. Honest, I'm not trying to attack it.)

 

[Lieju]

Naruto started out great, but the concepts of a harsh ninja-world and kids forced to make difficult decisions were abandoned in favour of FRIENDSHIP and magic eyeballs.

Also the fillers in the anime are horrid.

 

[gandhi the peacemake]

For my part, I'm actually quite enamored with the characters that populate the series. The story itself is extremely tedious, and the world is both overly elaborate and extremely shallow... and inconsistent as butt. But the characters, especially the core Konoha cast, are almost all interesting in one way or another. They all fit into typical shounen manga archetypes...

- the hotheaded dumb hero (Naruto)
- the rival prodigy (Sasuke)
- the token female (Sakura)
- the cool older guy (Kakashi)
- the token female's token admirer (Lee)
- the token female's token rival (Ino)
- the shy girl (Hinata)
- etc. etc. etc.

...but their designs and personalities are strong enough that they can exist outside of those molds if need be. Lee recast as the hero of the tale could work. Hinata can play the determinator just as much as the stuttering waif. Sakura could be turned into a fairly good role model were the series less stringently shounen-oriented.

One of the greatest missteps for the series was not capitalizing on this freedom of character movement and maturing the series in tune with its audience (a la Rurouni Kenshin, for instance). The best of Naruto fanfiction do this, and they make for infinitely better and more enjoyable stories.

But it's fine, I suppose. Naruto is still the biggest cash cow Shonen Jump has ever gotten their hands on, so they're happy; anime critics get a continual and easy target to bash, so they're happy; and the fandom gets more material to improve upon, so they're happy. Everybody wins, except those who don't.

 

[porous_shield]

I problem I have with Naruto is the same problem I have with many anime/manga in that genre and that's power creep. They start weak and then get exponentially more powerful as the series goes on so that means any threats they face have to be exponentially more powerful and that creates all kinds of problems with the story. Adult characters like Kakashi fight guys like Zabuza pretty early on and look about equal than later in the series fight much more powerful guys and they still look equal. It makes it look like they were pulling their punches and that takes all urgency or danger out of the story because I know in a chapter or two there's going to be an even more powerful dude and it's going to be the same thing all over again.

I thought Naruto was interesting first when I started reading it. I wish they had kept it short and sweet but obviously that doesn't generate stacks of cash like hundreds and hundreds of chapters of anime does.

 

[Queen Michael]

I don't even read Naruto anymore. Take a look under my username. See how many manga books I've read?

Wow...

This is what young anime fans like me aspire to achieve.

Thanks, comrade! (To be fair, it took me about 15 years.)