The Salty Anime Challenge Day 10: What is something that you dislike about a show you love?

The Naruto series abandoning more sophisticated fighting style.

Naruto is one of my favorite series of all time. While the fillers in this series got annoying that’s actually not my biggest issue. At the beginning of the series Naruto and Sasuke were the main characters but other characters like Rock Lee, Gaara and Neji were prominent both in importance and in skill. Sure Sasuke with the Sharingan and Naruto with the Kyuubi Chakra had significant advantages over the competition, the skill level of many of the other fighters were actually superior.

I’m not suggesting that Naruto and Sasuke shouldn’t eventually have surpassed their peers but that by the end of the series they were the only ones that were really relevant. Most importantly, the series abandoned the more strategic and complex battle style that made me love it in the beginning. For example, the Chuunin exam showcased the analytical ability of the genin. The emphasis on logic in addition to strength made the series the most superior in terms of fighting.

There was also a sense of limits. With clans certain skills we limited to those clans and couldn’t be learned by anyone else or at least not easily. The Kekkei Genkai literally limited abilities to genetics, but at the end of the series the only clan that really mattered was the Uchiha. Eventually, the fighting went from strategy, analyzing and being cunning to pull meteorites from the skies or perform interstellar travel, control dimensions. I’m not opposed to large scale abilities but it no longer became about logic and reason when your opponent can travel through space and time.