[Anime-only] Shippuden Episode 137 Discussion

[Albafica]

It wasn't a bad episode, but the music wasn't really good, too bad.

[Kafriel]

Originally Posted by AuroraFlash

I don't know what Jiraiya did, but he definitely did something wrong. I can't even remember what Naruto learned, but I didn't see much improvement considering he told us he had been training hard for two years. What had he learned? He failed at breaking Itachi's genjutsu, slightly improved the Rasengan and his use of Kage Bushin. That's not even worth a golf clap. It leaves me unimpressed. Another (dangerous and life-threating) version of the Rasengan doesn't make things better (and he learned it after the period of two years). Naruto needs some useful skills, elegant taijutsu skills and a proper training how to use his Kyuubi powers (since it burns his skin and he ends up like a deep-fried chicken). At least he keeps improving his tactics and keeps surprising his enemies.

Naruto learned how to properly use his KB, which gave him a huuuge advantage in chakra molding to get his rasengan to higher levels-if he had known it before he set out training, he would have become immensely more powerful during the timeskip (but since what ifs are not proper for arguments, let's just skip that part). At any rate , Naruto learned about affinities, teamwork, real-time combat strategy and managed to release up to 4 tails, something even Sasuke would have trouble dealing with.
Not to say that Sasuke didn't mature though, he certainly learned the same stuff Naruto did when it comes to nature/shape manipulation, and is currently fighting THE Itachi, combining all the techniques he knows too...plus he managed to break out of a Tsukuyomi that had caught even Kakashi off guard (although, to be fair, Sasuke had experienced it before, during the massacre).

P.S: -golf claps for both characters-

[Cub-Sama]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

Naruto learned how to properly use his KB, which gave him a huuuge advantage in chakra molding to get his rasengan to higher levels-if he had known it before he set out training, he would have become immensely more powerful during the timeskip (but since what ifs are not proper for arguments, let's just skip that part). At any rate , Naruto learned about affinities, teamwork, real-time combat strategy and managed to release up to 4 tails, something even Sasuke would have trouble dealing with.
Not to say that Sasuke didn't mature though, he certainly learned the same stuff Naruto did when it comes to nature/shape manipulation, and is currently fighting THE Itachi, combining all the techniques he knows too...plus he managed to break out of a Tsukuyomi that had caught even Kakashi off guard (although, to be fair, Sasuke had experienced it before, during the massacre).

P.S: -golf claps for both characters-

Sasuke learnt affinities when he was 7 and had a second one by the time he was 12 (something only Jonins usually have).

What he learnt timeskip wise though: he mastered the sharingan, learnt how to use the chidori for different situations and has adapted it, learnt better shape manipulation, mastered the CS2, got smarter, more skilled with seals, summoning, snake jutsu and new fire jutsu.

Naruto got bigger rasengan after the timeskip as well as better clone usage and better understandnig at genjutsu, can use the kyuubi more effectively (considering Sasuke was able to supress the kyuubi in their last encounter it probably means nothing to him and anyone with MS can control the kyuubi, I'm still wondering how Sasuke invaded Naruto's mind). Also he learnt how to use weapons more effectively and learnt better tactical stuff.

Naruto seems less impressive in what he learnt despite his mentor showing cool jutsu and impressive feats during the Pain fight and arguably being the strongest sannin.

Even after the time skip he only learnt wind affinities (no one decided to teach him wind jutsu though) and how to add it to rasengan, but now he is banned from using rasenshuriken.

What did Naruto and Jiraiya do during that 3 years? Pick out Naruto's latest jumpsuit, what they did seems comparable to when you are on summer vacation you spend the whole summer relaxing and you only do your homework at the end but you realize you dont have enough time to complete it.

Oh well the higher Sasuke goes is just leading up to his eventual defeat at the hands on Naruto at the end of this manga.

[Vorenus]

Originally Posted by Kafriel

and managed to release up to 4 tails, something even Sasuke would have trouble dealing with.

Well, considering that Sasuke managed to suppress the Kyuubi's power when Naruto met him again with Yamato, Sai and Sakura, I doubt Naruto could get up to 4 tails against him... Sasuke would stop the transformation way before that...

It is probably going a bit off-topic as we are probably more supposed to talk about Sasuke now, but I tend to agree with AuroraFlash... compared to Sasuke's growth, I always found something was weird with the training Naruto went through with Jiraiya in the time skip as it produced little results after 2 years and half... a bigger rasengan, faster at making clones, and slightly enhanced taijutsu... come on, he still needs a clone to do a basic rasengan!

Then, most of the time seems to have been spent on mastering Kyuubi's power... with rather limited success seeing that it injured both Jiraiya and Sakura and that because of that, Naruto doesn't want to use it anymore... 2.5 years of training for more or less nothing...

I think that Jiraiya should have figured out what Kakashi figured out before: that Naruto could make a huge number of clones and that it was the fastest way of training and for Naruto to catch up on many things he didn't know like nature and shape manipulation... if he had figured this out... Naruto would be way above Kage level by now... since he would have had more than 700 days of training with a number of clones in the hundreds and with one of the best shinobi around to teach him crazy techniques... Now, Naruto goes on missions after missions since he mastered Rasen-Shuriken... and doesn't seem to have a lot of time to polish his skills further using the shadow clones trick...

We know that Naruto is not the quickest person at studying, compared to people considered ninja geniuses like Kakashi or Sasuke, that he has a poor chakra control, etc... however Jiraiya has trained a lot of great ninjas... Yondaime, the kids who are now in Akatsuki etc... it is not like he is a poor teacher so that he didn't figure out things that both Yamato (that relying so much on Kyuubi's power would only lead to disasters) and Kakashi (using clones for learning/training), who are both way inferior ninjas compared to him still seems surprising...

Of course, Naruto couldn't become overwhelmingly strong after the time-skip or it would have sort of ruined the show, but from the story point of view... it feels sometimes like a bit of a plot hole... or at least... not something very logical...

[Hunter]

We know what Jiraiya did wrong : he trained Naruto to make further use of the power of the Kyubi but it backfired after he messed up Yondaime's seal and Naruto went 4 tails and almost killed him. It was probably a huge setback and even if Jiraiya had figured out the KB training it wouldn't have been possible because they didn't have Yamato to control the Kyubi.

[DragoZERO]

Well, that was pretty good. Cleared up some confusion from when I read the manga since all of that action can get overwhelming if you don't know how to read it properly.

The best part was the end, after the ED with the manga fact book or whatever. That is funny stuff.

[Vorenus]

Originally Posted by Hunter

We know what Jiraiya did wrong : he trained Naruto to make further use of the power of the Kyubi but it backfired after he messed up Yondaime's seal and Naruto went 4 tails and almost killed him. It was probably a huge setback and even if Jiraiya had figured out the KB training it wouldn't have been possible because they didn't have Yamato to control the Kyubi.

Well, that's right... Yamato indeed is a required safety for the KB training... and Jiraiya wouldn't have had that control...
That said, Jiraiya's point was to trigger the power of the Kyuubi in Naruto and cause transformations to happen so that was definitely was he was trying to do anyway and was apprently confident he could manage the risks...
Also, Jiraiya has those "Kyuubi Suppress" papers that can stop the transformation unless it gets up to the 2nd tail if I remember well so he wouldn't have that much of a problem since getting above that usually takes some time...
Even if doing it with someone like Yamato is safer, I think that Jiraiya could have supervised the KB training under relative safety... since after all, it wasn't worse than what he was trying to do in the first place...

Another difference between Naruto's growth and Sasuke's is that everytime Naruto gets something powerful enough to make him an extraordinary ninja, he is prevented from using it... most noticeably, using Kyuubi power or using Rasen-Shuriken... and maybe even Futon: Rasengan which seems to actually be a smaller Rasen-Shuriken but with less power...
As a result, Naruto still is stuck with a handful of techniques that any moderatly skilled ninja can manage... like KB, Summons, Transforms...

On the other hand, Sasuke can use a lot of dangerous things without any problem... he seems to have full control over the cursed seal now which was said to be something extremely dangerous... especially the 2nd form but it doesn't seem to hurt him at all... and unlike Naruto, he can use his special trait, the Sharingan, without any limitation or risk at all...
Part of it is because Sasuke relies on advanced ninjutsu but which isn't extreme like Rasen-Shuriken... which Naruto currently lacks the knowledge to do given that he only has control over a single element while most ninjas use at least two and sometimes 3, without even counting Kakashi who used them all so far except Futon...

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by Cub-Sama

I dont think the prediction thing happens when he is in MS mode because I have never seen Itachi predict movements when he has his MS on, only when he has the normal sharingan.

Nope, The prediction also happens when MS is activated.

Originally Posted by monir

I agree with you that he is indeed going straight for the nukes instead of working his opponent which seems to tell us something is amiss about him. Something is lacking. Question is, what?

And we turn the clock a year back to see what Hunter said on those very same chapters:

Originally Posted by Hunter

......[...]Something is amiss.

I guess Mods have a similar way of thinking...

Either way, the Poll sentences were kick ass, "Utterly Amazing, like Hunter's spoon" LMAO

[Cub-Sama]

Originally Posted by Rurik

Nope, The prediction also happens when MS is activated.

We have never seen Itachi predict things when he has his MS on same with Kakashi but then again they only have it on long enough to do a technique. However there is no evidence that shows it happens during the MS state

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by Cub-Sama

We have never seen Itachi predict things when he has his MS on same with Kakashi but then again they only have it on long enough to do a technique. However there is no evidence that shows it happens during the MS state

We have no evidence it can't predict when it is in MS state, why would a more advance state have to loose some abilities of the base state? as I Don't think the MS looses the Sharigan ability to see Chakra. This and That Itachi could follow and catch the pat of Sasuke when he made the Amaterasu, To be bale to catch Sasuke like that you need a good prediction tool.

There is really no reason or evidence to believe the same eye looses ability when entering an advanced state.

[wingdarkness]

(Forgive me couldn't think about naruto until my Saints killed the Pats monday)

Watching this episode stoned was amazing, lol..But I sobered up and watched it again and it was good, but not as amazing...Well after watching this ep i guess it's clear...Naruto is stronger than both these mofos^^...Spare me the manga or in-anime debate dejour...Based on the context of this episode, skin of a hellhound, galaxy-ball spitting Naruto would be a problem for these guys...LMAO, i waited like 6 years just to see the coolest villain brother in shonen get owned by a metal shirukin chard to the a$$? Atamusara wasn't even that cool, although it does explain how Itachi got outta Jiraya's frog belly way back when...

I mean the ep was cool..I enjoyed it, but I can probably rattle off ten fights in naruto history that were just so much more epic with super-enjoyability (an maybe next week will shut me up on that--hopefully the music placement won't fail as much as this ep too)...It kinda makes it look like Itachi didn't train for $hit the day after he killed his family and was just living off his Bingo-Book mugshot all these years...All this ep really proved was that Monkeygold Sharingan by itself is pretty damn rad, but 3-dot sharingan, plus curse seal, plus Vegeta-like training for 6 years, plus supped-up chidori, plus Oro Jackson's corpse in your body, and it ain't all that scary nomore...Rather dissapointed in Itachi's resolve..He looked like a sick kid near the end of the ep( As I think about changing my avy as I type this)...Too cool to summon a monster or something Itachi? Cuz your ninjitsu sucks man...

LMAO @ mantis-head spy dude saying he didn't know Sasuke devoured Oro...this guy knows what kind of jam I have in my fridge, but he doesn't know the biggest non-secret in the show that multiple Akatsuki members openly talk about?

1 ep left i hope it's epic and, wow, I'm praying Itachi will do something supreme before the shonen gods (I suspect) off his a$$...And it wouldn't hurt if we actually got some awesome hateful dialogue from Sasuke that makes him killing Itachi feel more like a culmination of passion and less like a checklist...Despite the commentary I did pretty much like the ep, just wanted so much more...Like alot more...

[james0246]

^Well, he was going blind (or already is mostly blind), and the defeat of Tsukuyomi certainly took a hell of a lot out of him, but yeah, this isn't quite the hyped fight we all imagined...

[xellos2099]

Also, didn't Sasuke also used only a handful of ninjitsu before he is fully drained? All he did was , shit lord of metal shiruken, then gaint one then a whole lot a koton technuque then he is out of chakra. Also we recall, Sasuke growth was unnatural and probably involved plenty of banned medicine and training.

[zaxthezax]

Originally Posted by xellos2099

Also, didn't Sasuke also used only a handful of ninjitsu before he is fully drained? All he did was , shit lord of metal shiruken, then gaint one then a whole lot a koton technuque then he is out of chakra. Also we recall, Sasuke growth was unnatural and probably involved plenty of banned medicine and training.

I think breaking the Tsukuyomi took him alot. Plus he used several chidori variations, genjutsus and the Orochimaru substitution thing, that is said to use up shitloads of chakra. And may I recall that it is still the same day he fought Deidara and almost died?

[james0246]

Originally Posted by xellos2099

Also, didn't Sasuke also used only a handful of ninjitsu before he is fully drained? All he did was , shit lord of metal shiruken, then gaint one then a whole lot a koton technuque then he is out of chakra. Also we recall, Sasuke growth was unnatural and probably involved plenty of banned medicine and training.

Illegal/unethical training regiments? Probably (then again, what isn't unethical for a Shounen main character ?). Steroids/Drugs? Probably not. The curse seal already acts as a steroid of sorts, and with the powers gained from Orochimaru, Sasuke is in no needs of any specific medication to enhance his powers any further (and just with the CS, there is still no need for any specific medicinal method to improve himself).

Originally Posted by zaxthezax

I think breaking the Tsukuyomi took him alot. Plus he used several chidori variations, genjutsus and the Orochimaru substitution thing, that is said to use up shitloads of chakra. And may I recall that it is still the same day he fought Deidara and almost died?

Added to that, there was the brief skirmish with the Itachi clone before Sasuke arrived at the old Uchiha Clan building. So yeah, Sasuke has been using quite a bit of chakra throughout the day.

[monir]

Originally Posted by Rurik

And we turn the clock a year back to see what Hunter said on those very same chapters:

I guess Mods have a similar way of thinking...

That's uncanny! Hunter obviously have time travel capability to copy me word for word.

Originally Posted by xellos2099

Also, didn't Sasuke also used only a handful of ninjitsu before he is fully drained? All he did was , shit lord of metal shiruken, then gaint one then a whole lot a koton technuque then he is out of chakra. Also we recall, Sasuke growth was unnatural and probably involved plenty of banned medicine and training.

He also did that disgusting skin-shedding Oro-sama was so fond of to escape the katon by Itachi.

The biggest difference between Naruto and Sasuke is that Sasuke has a very practical mind which makes him far more ruthless. His ability to disseminate information is also far superior than those of Naruto's. As a result, he is brilliant from a tactical stand point. Sasuke's resume speaks for it. He only defeated Orochimaru, Deidara, and in the verge of defeating Itachi. That's 3 powerhouse. He makes Naruto look like a London Silly Nannies. If you don't recognize the reference, you aren't watching enough Family Guy.

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by wingdarkness

Well after watching this ep i guess it's clear...Naruto is stronger than both these mofos^^.....

Well, Naruto havent show any improvement against Genjutsu, so basically Naruto would had just lasted until the Genjutsu portion of this fight.

[Haak]

Originally Posted by Rurik

Well, Naruto havent show any improvement against Genjutsu, so basically Naruto would had just lasted until the Genjutsu portion of this fight.

That was right at the start wasn't it?

[Rurik]

Originally Posted by Haak

That was right at the start wasn't it?

You mean in this fight? yes, he would had lasted until the moment Sasuke stabed the Itachi Genjutsu that was sitting on the throne (and this is giving Naruto an edge).

[Abyssinian]

Meybe the best episode of Shippuuden. Animation, soundtrack, everything awesome.