Naruto (1999)

Chapter 694
Story & Art by Masashi Kishimoto
Chapters: 694-Ongoing

Summary: Naruto is a young ninja-in-training, having grown up in the Village Hidden in the Leaves, who is shunned and isolated from those around him because of the mysterious beast lurking inside of him. This causes Naruto great pain, but he decides to work past it in order to become the greatest ninja that ever lived. Along the way he makes many friends and enemies. Can Naruto do it?

[MAJOR Spoilers from this point on…]

Review: The talking is over, and the battle begins! Huzzah! But not before Sasuke finally reveals his version of “Hokage,” the driving force in his being for the last half-year.  And…. well, it’s at least a little different than some Naruto villain’s outlooks on the future. But it’s still the fundamental same as almost every single on of them.

Naruto villains are notorious for not looking at themselves as evil, but as heroes who feel they can end all hatred and darkness by not being defenders of justice but by being iron clad rulers of all. Problem with this is, after awhile, it gets pretty dull when a big bad just wants to end world hunger through starving every single person. At least for Sasuke though, he believes he can do this by becoming the one and only villain “hero” of the Earth. To unite all against him and well, that’s actually pretty unique way of going about it, I must say.

But it doesn’t fall under the term of “hokage” in the slightest and that’s what I think Sasuke can’t wrap his hand around. The Hokage is someone who does have to make dark, guilt-ridden decisions but that’s with any leader. The term Hokage is also exclusive to the Country of Fire where Naruto & Sasuke grew up, not the world at large. Sasuke also thinks he can “lead” the world through this manner of self-hatred, but like Naruto points out in the chapter no one is going to take this lying down.
Someone will take Sasuke down eventually.

But I give Kishimoto an E for effort. He’s trying. He’s winding down to the end, and this is all we got left to do. The battle between Naruto & Sasuke, and the aftermath. With this final revelation out of the way, I can safely forget about it and just enjoy the fight. And hope there aren’t too many flashbacks throughout the fight; Kishimoto is prone to doing that.
Sasuke is an interesting character, but I wouldn’t call him deep. He’s just confused, and I’m fully expecting Naruto to set him straight.

The art for this story was pretty half-&-half. There are a lot of flashback panels in this chapter, so it’s a lot of reused artwork. The last few pages though are gorgeous and I think this is shaping up to be a beautiful fight. Let’s go! Naruto vs. Sasuke!

Final Score: 2.5 Revelations of Evil-Doers out of 5

Derrick is a born and raised otaku with a love for comics, anime, manga and movies. The full list is pretty long, but that’s just the basics. Stories set in space are his bread and butter.

You can find more of his writing at IndieComix.net