i think i would place it below One Piece and Fullmetal Alchemist Manga/Anime though. i am aware of all the plotholes or inconsistency which may occur here and there but i don't think it gets in my way or ruins the story or anything. the Characters are the Best part of the Show and the World may not be the most well defined but it works well, the fights are pretty entertaining too as well as the character development and depth in characters is shown in a more simplistic way. the lore is very easy to follow and the characters are well characterized along with villains who are diverse enough and have good personalities. the set-up and ending of the arcs is really well done which makes them memorable because Toriyama was good at setting up tension inthe arcs and all the events leading upto a memorable final fight. Goku is that's why one of my favourite anime protagonist because of his development in manga and throughout Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z but not only that, his charm and innocence is another trait which makes him a great character. though, i have to say i am not much of a fan of Modern Dragon Ball and what they are doing to the franchise but either way i keep up with it due to it being Dragon Ball but Classic Dragon Ball is really good in my Eyes and holds up well.
among the Big 3 anime too, i think only One Piece surpassed it overall and there are shows like Hunter x Hunter and Fullmetal Alchemist or JoJo which feature better writing but I still think Dragon Ball holds up for its charm.
doesn't Majin Boo arc have similar problems as last war arc of Naruto Shippuden? like them carrying this theme of new generation in the whole arc only to goku coming back to save the say yet again? not wishing revived Gotenks and Gohan on Kaioshin Realm to fight kid boo and aid him but using genkidama. Goku not going ssj3 against Majin Vegeta and when he did go ssj3 against majin boo, him not finishing him and relying on two kids.MajinMan wrote:Shonen isn’t targeted at “Teen Boys,” it’s just boys in general. The main target demographic for these type of series is probably around 8-14.
Anyway, I’m a pretty big Naruto fan as well, and although it has a lot of great moments and characters, it will never top DB to me. The final arc of Naruto is a complete disaster and ruins a lot of the story. If you’re wondering what I’m talking about, think of it as a very, very long Dragon Ball Minus. One that takes up around 200 episodes and chapters.
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Gohan despite learning his lesson of not being cocky vs Cell , again not finishing Boo instantly and allowing him to do his stuff by being cocky. constant changing of the main villain as in, forms like Fat Boo retconned to have an evil side then becoming Super boo and then after the fat side was freed him turning into kid boo instead of the grey coloured evil Boo?
wasn't Madara a good villain who kept the war arc entertaining? or how Obito and kabuto saved Naruto and Sasuke in the end after they (in Sasuke's case his brother with the help of Izanami) helped him realize what they were doing was wrong and all the history and stories we got to know like Madara's past with Hashirama and Tobirama, Gaara's story, Itachi-Sasuke reuniting final time against Kabuto, Sai full story, Obito characterization and story, the themes of war and peace and human nature, Sasuke and Naruto fight and their clash of ideologies and same with every fight in war with different ideologies clashing? and many great moments? and the way they defined their World? i am not telling which should be better but the war arc in Naruto was setup up for very long and Hyped up Madara as a villain and was a part of a very overarching plot from episode one. different villages reuniting was the result of the war who used to be foes, Sasuke ending the curse of hatred of Uchihas and Naruto's relationship with Kurama getting stronger, so where do you think the problem lies? yea Kaguya thing could have been avoided but again, that clan was always there since Original Naruto when kimmimaru appeared and thus the whole Naruto story looks planned and overarching with the world and more Pre-established from the start. Boo Arc started just after a Time-Skip with new lore "being connected" to Kaioshin and Majin Boo retconned to be the strongest in the Universe, compared to Naruto last arc the Boo arc seemed made up, etc..
I Disagree on Naruto characters being better. most of the characters lost their uniqueness or charm towards the end of the show as the show itself stopped caring about side characters and started focusing only on Naruto and Sasuke unlike the Original Naruto series. also, they don't really need Shikamaru anymore, he himself was a big disappointment at the war but more than that, Rock Lee was the biggest disappointment in Shippuden since he was teased to be this ultimate character in the coming arcs in Original Naruto with his fights against Kimmimaru but he was ruined in Part 2. that's like DBZ hinting at Gohan's potential in the start and never doing anything with him. i don't even remember what characters like Kiba, Tenten or Shino did because they started feeling like Filler characters in the show. but, can remember Yamcha's fights in Tenka'ichi Budokai, his Soukidan, Tenshinhan's amazing development and fights in Tenka'ichi Budokai, his Shin-Kikoho, Chaozu's Sacrifice against Nappa, his little fight against Kuririn or even Yajirobe proving himself to be useful when he cuts Oozaru Vegeta's. they unnecessarily ruined Neji by making him die like a cupid but making him survive when he should have died in Sasuke Retrieval Arc which would have impacted his character more since from that point to war he too faded into background.sintzu wrote: What I love most about Naruto which makes or breaks a story is its characters. Each character is completely different from the other and thanks to those differences each one is able to bring something to the table even if they're not the strongest in the group. Naruto and Sasuke are by far the strongest characters but they still need Shikamaru's mind to help put plans together or Kiba's sense of smell to find clues if need be. Sasuke is an actual 2nd main character, he doesn't just follow in Naruto's footsteps or is always trying to catch up to him. Instead, he goes on his own adventures, fights his own villains, has his own team and when he did eventually cross paths with Naruto during the war he was Naruto's equal. Sasuke is always what I've wanted to see Vegeta eventually become but he's yet to become that. I like how the villains aren't black and white but each one has a complicated backstory that makes us not only understand why they do what they do but also justify it like Pain trying to bring peace to the world. I like how it takes Naruto so long to be the actual hero (all the way up to pain) as the vast majority of the time it's his elders who deal with the main threat while he gets the side dish, something that made his eventual victory against pain very satisfying as it was built up to from the very start. In terms of Naruto's world, it has history behind it as at the very start we find out there were THREE major wars, 4 hokages and all kinds of complicated history between characters and villages that make the world alive in its own right, not something that was just created to revolve around one character.
as for Sasuke-Naruto thing, the biggest problem with Naruto, even bigger than the war arc stuff, is that Kishimoto fucking forgot to have Naruto and Sasuke bond at all after the Zabuza Arc. And there's no time skip between that and Sasuke leaving, we know for a fact that the two only bonded once ever.
If you played any Breath of Fire videogame, the plot is pretty much the same but there is a contex and a backstory for each character that supports this (they where friends, they grew up together, they where trained by the same master, and so on)... However, this doesn't happen in Naruto. They weren't best friends and they didn't have any common ground, so why the heck didn't Naruto just beat Sasuke up and be done with it? Why was he set on "bring him back"? This was a false storyline created for Shojo Yuri Yaoi nich markets, and yes it worked for a while but overall it's forced and cringy as hell. Naruto became too earnest in trying to save Sasuke in a series that was trying to impose a political and realistic taste in a story. also, Sasuke wanting to destroy Konoha after getting to know that Itachi's lifelong wish was to protect it, is a dumb character motivation and makes zero sense no matter how much his mind was fucked from inside. Sasuke unnecessarily wanting to take revenge on konoha including those little children who at one point idolized him is downright stupid and childish and him letting himself get manipulated by Obito is dumb imo. Atleast Vegeta is honest to himself and never allowed any magician like Babidi to motivate him and has his sense of dignity and Pride and even after knowing that his soul recarnition was still wanting to sacrifice himself is more brave and noble than anything Sasuke did in the Franchise. Vegeta dealing with his inferiority complex and facing the truth that Goku will forever be better than him was the point of his development, it meant he humbled down from his cocky self in Saiyan Arc and had the balls to admit the truth. also, i don't think a villain not being complex is better than one who is bad. look at Dio Brando, Aizen, Joker, all these Anime/Comic villains were not about bringing peace and what matters is their execution and personality. in Naruto, the villains in early part are diverse but in Shippuden its same structure where they all lost their loved ones and want to change the world by causing chaos, for me atleast it becomes repetitive and Madara and Obito look like poor Man's Pain with similar peace motive besides the Talk-no-Jutsu is another issue.
i agree with lore being more sophisticated and well defined in Naruto and all the mythos and systems too but i think the execution left us with so much more to desire and Kishimoto didn't do much justice to it. with Dragon Ball, the Setting is similar to Yuu Yuu Hakusho or JoJo where it's a small cast and the show is about that cast overcoming the challenges. it's just Naruto is much more like new shonen which are about more characters and bigger cast and focusing on their backstory, but i think Shippuden it became kinda dragged when they needed the backstories and flashbacks to move the plot forward instead of the main plot, like most of the war arc was filled with lots of backstory and flashbacks than actual plot progression.
those are just my opinions, feel free to disagree.