An underdog is someone that's expected to lose. Naruto was the underdog until he wasn't until he proved himself. Lee was the underdog until he wasn't, he also proved himself. Saruka was an underdog until she wasn't. There's no story if the underdog remains the underdog. They need to grow beyond their underdog label.
You’re both forgetting or misremembering, Orochimaru put the 5 prong seal on kuramas seal, THAT disrupted Naruto’s ability to mold chakra. Once jiraiya removed the seal Naruto’s ability to mold and gather chakra goes back to normal aka pre Orochimaru forest of death
That doesn’t mean that the nine tails didn’t disrupt Naruto’s chakra. This just shows that Naruto has been able to at least partially overcome the handicaps the nine tails gave him. It is stated by Kakashi during the tree walking training that Naruto had poor chakra control which shows these issues predated the forest of death.
@washingtonfootballfan7974 it is literally never stated that 9 tails meses with his chakra control infact when he has 9 tails chakra is buffing him , he performs jutsus just fine
I think the confusion over Kurama interfering with Naruto's chakra control comes from the scene where he shows Jiraya his water walking technique and almost sinks. If I recall correctly, in that case it was because Orochimaru had put a second seal on top of the original seal for Kurama, and the two were incompatible somehow caused Kurama'a chakra to leak out in fits and starts. Jiraya unsealed Orochimaru's seal, which immediately cured the control issue. Jiraya was even astounded that Naruto could perform water walking at any level under those conditions.
Yes it was the odd number Five Prong Seal on top of the even number Eight Trigrams Seal that was messing up Eight Trigrams Seal's mixing of Kurama'a chakra into Naruto's chakra system, hence why after Jiraiya removed the Five Prong Seal Naruto was able to pull off the water walking technique flawlessly on his next try.
Yeah, he had trouble with walking up the tree in the Land of Water, but he gets it down relatively quickly. Slower than Sasuke, but Sasuke is a genius, and Sakura gets it so fast the Kakashi was astounded. So he was fine with chakra control at this point, but was just normal control for a genin just out of the academy. Kurama wasn't the reason Naruto was having trouble, being 12 was. Then Orochimaru put a five-part seal over the 8 trigram, disrupting the chakra flow. It wasn't until this point that Naruto started having 'chakra control issues'.
Idk man. I'm not really understanding how Minato being able to defeat the 9 tails inside Kushina gives Naruto a "genetic disposition" to also defeating the 9 tails. That makes 0 sense to me personally. That's like if because my dad shot a game winning half-court shot gives me the genetic disposition to do the same when no, it really doesn't. Maybe I'm missing something
Minato created Rasengan, which defeated tailed beast bombs, so his son, Naruto, can also do it. That's what he is saying. The whole of the Naruto universe-Jutsus, Chakra natures, chakra amounts, and so on-are genetically passed on. So, if someone's dad or mom can do X, then that child is extremely likely to be able to do X.
@@ShangoTheyeah but naruto still had to work towards this... he didnt pop out the womb knowing how to do it, and even after learning it he still needed a shortcut for it
@@godobb Genetic disposition doesn’t mean you’ll be born with it, it means you are more likely to get an ability if your parents also had it. Even shisui and Itachi weren’t born with mangekyo,(a Kekkei genkai) even tho they were both uchihas.
Hell, not jsut bonds. Unity, working together, communication, forgiveness, breaking of cycles, self improvement, Golden Path Buddhism, and several other concepts/topics people straight up ignore bc they apaprently cant read past "work > talent", something that was largely dropped by the 2nd half of the series
Guys you are both 100% correct in your assessment of the series, but way off on your assessment of this situation.. This isn't about any of that, this is about Nick feeling like Swagkage was trying to come for his often stated ideal that Naruto was a prodigy... Quite honestly, I think he was talking about Nick on the low for a lot of this video too lol.. Not taking shots but agreeing to disagree with the idea that Naruto was born to be Konoha's savior, as Nick 100% believes.. Which ended up being true in the end.. But making Naruto a Asura reincarnate, son of the greath 4th, perfect sage and jinchuriki was only done to set him apart from every other ninja that worked their ass off.. Because there obviously had to be other strong willed, highly dedicated Shinobi in the history of the Ninja era... So there had to be a reason his situation paid off more than the other's have.. But he also did have to work hard to get there so they're both right and I don't think Nick ever said that he didn't work hard at all.. He just made the point that you guys are making as well, but in a different way.. It was way deeper than hard work.. It was familial ties and bonds, a lack of those bonds, gaining those bonds elsewhere and then eventually gaining those famial bonds on top of the bonds he gained in lieu of having family.. Then bonding with the man who started it all on top of that! Then spreading the energy that brought all of that together, to others even if they happen to be a foe..
@@mr.aNdErsOn88 My issue with NC's arguement is that the prophecy states he'll unite the beasts and beat a great calamity (aka: kaguya). Thats it. Being an Uzumaki and a reincarnation and jinchuriki didnt stop him from nearly flunking out of the academy, lagging behind sakura for over half the series, struggling to even control his chakra, losing to Sasuke the first time, being orphaned, abused (physically and socially) by an entire village, having to fight in a war at 16, being nearly murdered multiple times, having to save the very village that abused him, and only being recognized by anyone as a person until after he saved them multiple times over...but hes not an underdog. Like being the chosen savior only leads him to uniting the biju and beating Kaguya. That doesnt require him to win any of his other fights, get stronger (since sealing Kaguya really only needed the 2 seals from Hagaromo), or anything. He didnt win fights or get strong bc he had Kurama, Uzumaki chakra, or bc he was a destined reincarnate. He won fights bc he either appealed to the themes of the series or simply out fought people or got help.
Yes and no. Naruto is about generational responsibility and the impacts that has throughout a nation's and its populus as a whole and the importance of role models who can foster the minds of a younger generation who can right those issues. The mentor trope is fundamental to the heroes journey sure. But it isn't just a trope in Naruto it's a feature of the narrative required to create a world where ninjas start by going to school and by the end punch god in the face. Think about the most most commonly refrenced impactful deaths of the series. Jiraya. Asuma. It's not just that they were mentors or characters you did and did not care about. One of the biggest reasons for this is it's not just those characters being killed. It's the idea they represented of fostering the younger generation against the malingering effects of the previous. And the both perspnal and shared responsibility of the current generation to aspire towards linear progression.Will of fire bro. Wouldn't be shocked if a teacher played a big role in kishimoto deciding to pursue manga. But that's just a game theory bro. You can see this in most of the deaths of Naruto but classic example is "Obito". And it is so nice they did it twice with one single sequence. Minato informing Obito about Kakashi's dad acting as a mentor and further the legacy of another. Thereby causing Tobi to do the same for Kakashi with the scum speech and saying the white fang was a great ninja. If fundamentally doesn't matter if Naruto was or wasn't an underdog. Because that isn't the question being answered. It doesn't matter if it's about destiny or hardwork because that isn't the question being answered. The question being answered is what does it take to impact the future in a meaningful way? Cooperation, unity, acceptance, and a hot gay boyfriend named Sasuke.
To be completely Fair to his Rock Lee point I think regardless of the amount of hard work he put in being able to open up to the 5th gate at 13 is still indicative of an utterly insane amount of talent and while it's fair to dismiss the Kakashi point I think it's also fair to conclude that Lee is also some caliber of Genius aside from just being a genius at hard work
Exactly but he's not a genius at hard work, hes a genius at Taijutsu through hard work. People are just confused about the story being about hard work beating talent when really it's one of many premises of the show. I think the main message is believing in yourself. Naruto literally says it "believe it" when facing every challenge 😂
Also, I find it hard to believe that Kakashi, the person who probably knew Might Gai the best, and therefore, knew exactly how hard Gai worked to gain the power that he had, wouldn't at least have a small idea of Lee's training routine. So when Kakashi calls Lee a genius, I don't think it's because he doesn't know how much Lee worked to get to that point.
It’s crazy how people like NCHammer are so quick and hell bent to undermine Naruto’s achievements with “well he had Kurama, or he had Uzumaki genes” Dragon Ball is a story about surpassing your own limits and being the better person you were than yesterday. Guess who the main character of that story is? A super powered alien from outer space. By using NC’s logic, Goku was hard carried by his Saiyan genes. Sure, it was impressive that he trained to defeat Frieza but his Saiyan genes which granted him S-Cells allowed Goku to achieve a transformation so that is the real reason he won. Sure it was impressive that Goku was able to fight an elite like Vegeta with the Kaio-Ken But his Saiyan genes only made it possible. Tien should have been the main character of Dragon Ball because he personifies the themes of the series better than Goku. It’s crazy how people don’t consider that both things can be true Despite Goku being a super powered alien, he worked extremely hard to get to where he was today overcoming impossible obstacles(hell he even entrusted one to his own son) no disputes that. Naruto may have Kurama, may be an Uzumaki, but it does not change the fact that he had no support system growing up, was hated by his own community, was the bottom of his class coming out of the academy, was constantly underestimated, was targeted because of the power he has, I can go on and list every single thing that was stacked against Naruto. If Goku can be acknowledged as someone like that why not Naruto, the character that Goku obviously inspired. This fanbase is hypocritical. Also Naruto IS NOT about Hard work. This theme was only explored in the Rock Lee fight. Watch every fight Naruto participated in and tell where the themes of Hard Work vs Talent come into play. The themes from the first chapter was always about overcoming hatred
Your naruto vs neji thematic breakdown at 3:00 is so wrong it's actually crazy. Neji does NOT want to "keep hinata down" to prove he should be able to accomplish more than her. Neji hates Hinata because to him, her fate is to be the leader of the clan because of the conditions of her birth. However he doesn't try and change that AT ALL because he accepts his fate as a branch family member. He takes out his anger on Hinata by trying to kill her, but he doesn't try to change his, or her fate for that matter. Neji's ENTIRE POINT is that Naruto's fate is to be a failure that accomplishes nothing, and there's nothing he can do to change that. He uses the example that his unchangeable fate is to be used as a sacrifice for the main family and again, that he didn't have a choice in the matter. And Naruto proves Neji wrong by overcoming the odds in their fight and winning, proving that no matter what fate someone might be born with, they can overcome the circumstances of their birth. To add to that, Neji's death brings this plot point full circle by CHOOSING to sacrifice himself for that same member of the main family that he once took his anger out on because he felt trapped in an unchangeable fate. You literally got the entire plot of the fight and its themes wrong, I find that kind of wild.
@@alex52043 narutos fate wasnt to be the child of prophecy, jiraiyas fate was to train a child of prophecy. vastly different if u introspect on just that single line
@@VelocityEzz The subject of the prophecy is the child of prophecy, not the mentor of prophecy. Jiraiya's fate was centred around Naruto even more than Naruto's fate was centred around Jiraiya.
@@alex52043 and thats just wrong. the story blatantly blurts out Jiraiya's prophecy that he will train a child who can change the world for the better or worse and HE has to make a critical selection when the time comes (P.S his final moments also emphasize that) It's HIS prophecy not naruto's. naruto proves himself that he is worthy to be the child of prophecy. hell jiraiya wouldnt have even stayed in the village or trained him if naruto didnt go out of his way to make him do so. all this is made much more clear when u see that naruto wasnt the only child of prophecy or the candidate to be it.
All ima say is it’s stated that Naruto’s training regime is due to his large chakra reserves not kuramas. It’s also stated that he would have even more chakra if so much of it wasnt being used to suppress the nine tails
I don't think that the fact Naruto isn't an underdog at the end of the series means he's not an underdog I general he had to work through hardships with no guarantees to capitalize on his talents without the hardwork in the og series he doesn't make it to the eventual endpoint.
Something that seems to be misunderstood is that Naruto's lineage isn't perceived in the same way to Japanese audiences. His mentors and parents are supposed to serve as evidence of his qualifications for the role as hokage, not to detract from his underdog status.
Honestly I think Minato being a prodigy ninja NOT from a notorious clan is more of an outlier than Naruto not inheriting any of his parents' techniques or skills.
The Naruto Chakra control thing that keeps getting mentioned in the first half of the video I believe is a "false memory" of episode 53 when Jiraiya removes the seal Orochimaru put on Naruto in the Forest of death which was making it hard but that was near the start of Forest of death to before Neji fight. Although I feel like their may be a mention of it being hard for Naruto to have good chakra control for low chakra things like clone jutsu because of his chakra pool size, something like hard to fill a tea cup with a fire hose, this may be head cannon not real cannon though but that is only for things that use a small amount of chakra not for things like rasengan that require significant amounts of chakra.
The theme of naruto was never" Hard work overcomes natural talent" The theme of Naruto is NEVER GIVING UP , NEVER HIVING UP. Naruto repeats almost every single chapter. Never hiving up on becoming hokage, never giving up on Sasuke, never giving up on humanity, never giving up to hate and pain. The Theme of naruto is never giving up
And the reason Naruto didn’t give up is because he had every advantage. Insane amounts of power he was born with/gifted. Wise and powerful Sensei and friends to lift him up. Plot armor. He didn’t overcome his obstacles through his will to never give up.
@ perfect example of someone who watched Naruto through reels. Last i checked, it was Naruto who mastered multi shadow clones along with the strategy on how to use them, not Kurama. It was Naruto who mastered the rasengan, not Kurama. It was Naruto who mastered sage mode, definitely not Kurama bc he didn’t even want Naruto using it. Naruto had to literally beat Kurama to master kcm and then later on befriend him and earn his trust completely. All his accomplishments and techniques were overcame through HIM. Naruto had to earn those bonds and respect from everyone who was by his side along his journey just like any other shonen mc. Especially since he was hated most of his life with no one.
@@jaybronx98 He was only able to utilize shadow clones to the extent he does because of the massive amount of Uzumaki chakra he was born with. Kakashi said it himself Naruto is the only one who can train with shadow clones like that. And Kakashi was literally the one who gave him the idea of how to utilize shadow clones in training. And he only learned multi shadow clones in the first place because he stole the scroll of sealing because it was a forbidden jutsu. Naruto was taught a step by step process on how to use the rasengan by one of the most famous and powerful shinobi ever. Not everyone had access to the knowledge of how to learn rasengan. How do you know that Sasuke or Sakura or Shikamaru or anyone else could’ve learned rasengan? They were never given the privilege of being taught it because they weren’t the child of Minato. Same with sage mode. Naruto was only given the opportunity to learn it. And only because he already had massive chakra reserves. And he also had a perfect jinchuriki to teach him how to become one himself. It’s not that hard to become a perfect jinchuriki, most of the jinchuriki we’be seen are. Yes he accomplished all those things. I’m not saying he didn’t. But he had every advantage and cheat code. More than anyone.
@11:10 Naruto's chakra control was brought up multiple times, w/ the most notable being how Orochimaru's 5 trigrams seal interacted with Minato's 8 trigrams seal. Even before then Kakashi had discussed the amount of chakra that Naruto had being 4x that of himself, and when training for the rasengan he noted that Naruto was having to dedicate a lot of his chakra to combating the nine tails for control. The reason why Naruto can make 1000 shadow clones, but not walk up the tree is he's losing fine chakra control during his struggle w/ the ninetails, but can operate just fine when he's turning the fire hydrant of chakra on the kagebushin tech.
As others have pointed out, the core messaging of Naruto is not "Hardwork Beats Talent." It is the bonds that are built and not giving up on those bonds that more strength is found. Naruto shows that from beginning to end of the series, and Boruto is showing that continuation. Hardwork can lead to knew power and strength, Rock Lee with the gates, Naruto with the mastering of Sage Mode, Sakura with her medical ninjutsu just to name a few. But at the end of the day, bonds can overcome anything and leads to a new power not seen before. Shikamaru in the 4th Great Ninja War has every ninja around use a simple earth release to help combat the 10 tails, and it works. The 10 tails, nature energy itself, is beaten by lots of ninjas and the bonds that combine. I just think this video and your reaction is on an incorrect conclusion due to a wrong basis.
Naruto is not about ''Hardwork over Natural Talent", that is more Rock Lee's forte, Naruto about "Defying your Predestined Fate" not being what People think You are, and overcoming it as such to become so much more than what's been decided for You, in other words as Naruto so blatantly put it, His Nindo, His Ninja Way is "I never give up and I never go back on my word!" which ties in perfectly as the other half of the theme of The entire Naruto Story
Naruto was never about underdogs triumphing over the gifted(especially by the Tsunade arc and onward). The whole, “hard work vs Natural talent”, debate was only a theme brought in the Chunin exams/Konoha crush arc, since the arc was so memorable by Rock Lee, Neji and Gaara. It was never the main theme but it’s one of the most compelling themes in the story because of Gaara, Naruto, Lee and Neji. Also Lee didn’t just open the gates through hard work it was how he discovered a way to open the gates early in a way no one else did before him.If we’re excluding Naruto’s power as a shinobi and talk about his status a shinobi before chapter 700 I’d say he was an underdog in that sense. He’s a kid who doesn’t understand nor agree with the ideology of the shinobi world and goes against the norm. He gets shut down for trying or being too idealistic but perseveres despite all odds(which is one of Naruto’s biggest themes).All the power ups he got by the end of the story only help amplify other Jutsus he already learned without Kuramas help(shadow clone, Rasengan, Sage Mode) and learned to incorporate it with most of his jutsus all in one. If Naruto just relied on Kurama like he’ did against Orochimaru he’d just be a feral animal. It’s the way he learned to evolve all his best jutsus which made the Kurama powerup seem absurd. The reason Naruto can’t do other jutus early in the story was because his chakra control was so bad. He couldn’t distribute it properly to where he couldn’t use other techniques such as genjutsu, etc. the shadow clone jutsu helped him expel the chakra in his body where it was a foundation for his control to get better. This is why Kakashi sent Ebisu to help Naruto fix this issue so he can expand his knowledge down the line. Another aspect as to what Naruto was so inept in the beginning was due to his home life. Naruto didn’t have a great upbringing and supportive figures witness him like parents to be with him all the time. It affected his motivation as a growing young man . The only thing he had was his desperate need to be acknowledged and dream to be Hokage because he thought it would give him what he wanted. He basically worked backwards trying do the most difficult things early to try to seem impressive. However this wasn’t effective since he has no basis on the foundations of the skills he needed to excel at. Which was him stunting his own progression without Kuramas supposed, manipulation. When Jiraiya was with him he gave Naruto what he desperately needed and it helped him become a more dedicated/adaptive individual when anything came his way in the future NCH is making it seem like Naruto accessing Kuramas chakra was easy when it really wasn’t. Once he got a better understanding of chakra control he was barely tapping into Kuramas powers. Also Naruto’s taijutsu was horrible in part 1 and 2. He doesn’t squabble with Sasuke he literally slams him in the ground and gets punk’d by seeing the conviction in Sasuke’s eyes. In most of his fights his taijutsu is so unrefined and gets no hits in and gets swatted away and dismantled(Sasuke, Kabuto, Rock Lee, Neji, Zabuza, Haku, Kakashi, Tsunade, etc). He only gets a hit in if it’s a strategic sneak attack. That’s why he always uses the shadow clones to compensate for his predictable unarmed combat. Whether it be combining the shadow clone jutsu with the rasengan to beat Kabuto, or using the reverse harem jutsu to land a blow against Kaguya to change the tide of the fight, the shadow shuriken in Zabuza, etc. In the end of the day Naruto pushed himself incredibly hard to be the man he set himself out to be all of his most important accomplishments outside of fights were him digging deep in himself to resolve issues. I didnt want to make this seem like a NCH smear campaign, I just had disagreements.
Exactly, idk how people still believe the core theme of the story was “hardwork beats talent” a subplot theme from the chunin exams mainly embodied by Lee. Naruto as a story has consistently been about never giving up despite your circumstances, overcoming hatred and being able to change your fate.
Haku didn't try to kill Sasuke either, it was a lot of Senbon but Haku was too kind hearted, that was a big point of the story, and before Haku died they were encouraging Naruto to kill them and then said "looks like you missed your chance". 100% Haku was never going to kill Naruto.
"Hard work beats talent" is ONE part of ONE of Narutos themes. Unity, working together, communication, forgiveness, breaking of cycles, self improvement, Golden Path Buddhism, and several other concepts/topics people straight up ignore bc they apaprently cant read past "work > talent", something that was largely dropped by the 2nd half of the series Also, the prophecy states he'll unite the beasts and beat a great calamity (aka: kaguya). Thats. It. Being an Uzumaki and a reincarnation and jinchuriki didnt stop him from nearly flunking out of the academy, lagging behind *sakura* for over half the series, struggling to even control his chakra, losing to Sasuke the first time, being orphaned, abused (physically and socially) by an *entire village*, having to fight in a war at 16, being nearly murdered multiple times, having to save the very village that abused him, and only being recognized by *anyone* as a person until after he saved them multiple times over. But sure, he was "never an underdog"
Morally Naruto was an underdog, sure but never in strength or anything else for that matter. In fact there is one ideology that Naruto didn't beat and that was Madara's, that in which being peace was only accessible through essentially being stronger than anyone with any other opinions. Let's not forget that his talk no jutsu would not have worked if it wasn't for him getting himself into a situation where he could talk to them in the first place and in 99% of those situations he needed that very strength to back his own ideology otherwise they wouldn't have even considered a conversation let alone to change their mind, with all that strength essentially being possible due to a single jutsu carrying him through all the training in which is being the multi-shadow clone jutsu that he couldn't have used in any meaningful way if it wasn't for the Uzumaki genetics and chakra pool. Naruto was morally speaking an underdog, but he was not the only character who would have wanted peace. Look at Konohamaru, he essentially held the same ideas in the series but in no way, shape or form would he have been able to achieve it. In fact there was only 3 characters in the entire series who could have achieved their morals and were guaranteed to, those being Kaguya, Madara and Naruto and the way they ALL had to achieve it was through force, its shounen fighting is a means to an end, the strongest has their ideology played out and it just so turns out that Naruto won and all that boils down to him being an Uzumaki with a tailed beast battery. Now that Naruto can't back that opinion up since he's "away" we see Shikamaru going against his ideology
All you have to say to prove naruto is a physical underdog too is compare him to hashima who has better biological gifts than naruto and still didnt break the cycle of hatred just like ashura couldnt naruto managed to do and save sasuke @@molyneuxproject
@MrA-dl6hh Hashirama has massive regeneration, wood release, large banks of chakra, a sage mode and high physical strength. Naruto also had almost every single one of those things too. Regeneration = Kuruma Wood release = he has it now (hashirama cells in his arm) but not in naruto Chakra = Kuruma and Uzumaki genes Sage mode = self explanatory High physical strength = Uzumaki and kuruma. They both also had the 5 releases plus yin and yang. Naruto was essentially a 10 tails jinchuriki giving him access to a few more types like magma too, shown in the whole rasenshuriken barrage scene. He also had sage of 6 patch chakra and abilities, including the orbs he had that could destroy chakra, he could essentially revive people from deaths door, the only ninjas faster than naruto were ninjas with instant teleportation like minato and most of these abilities only disappeared in the final fight against sasuke when he lost his arm. AFTER anybody who could pose a threat to him was gone. Hashirama was good, granted but the only people who could pose a threat to naruto series end before he lost his arm was Madara, Kaguya and Sasuke. Hashirama and Kakashi are close but ultimately would have to get very lucky to win
I think swagkage is more correct in this because in part 1 Naruto his natural talent couldn’t be shown because he hadn’t worked hard enough to be able to use the natures talents and gifts so neji is all talent, lee is pretty much all hardwork and Naruto is both
@@BreezyDylan no "natural talent" but has more chakra than he could ever hope to use in Kurama, a body that heals itself super fast and has it's own vast chakra reserves from both sides of his family, definitely no "natural talent" XD.
@@kandihustty5610I think you could argue that’s a bit different. He was 1000% physically gifted but he literally had to smash his head into a wall in order to progress where others didn’t necessarily need to work as diligently to get the same progress. 1 example is him learning wind release and needing all those shadow clones to grasp it vs Sasuke pretty much coming out with fire release and learning lightning release.
Definition: "An underdog is someone who isn't likely to win a competition or contest" How tf u gonna watch all 700 episodes and not think je was the underdog
So, Swag did not mention the fact that it was Kurama's chakra that allowed Naruto to both escape Haku's demonic mirroring ice crystal whatever, and land a critical punch against Haku.
You're missing swag's point. He's saying that it doesn't matter whether Naruto beat Haku or not because Haku refused to kill Naruto or Sasuke, and he would have sacrificed himself to save Zabuza no matter what course of actions Naruto decided to take.
@@keksis821 not exactly. Haku hesitated to deal a killing blow, but his attacks did intend to kill they were just not instant. He couldn’t bear to snuff out their lives by his own hands so he would bring his victims as close as possible, to assuage his guilt by leaving a possibility that they could be saved. But just because the possibility that emergency medical treatment could save them doesn’t mean that they’re not killing attacks especially since wiping out other allies would guarantee that would die so it was more of personal cowardice to not watch his victims die than an inability to kill them
21:00 right after he summons gamabunta he literally said “my hours of practice have finally paid off” and nothing in the moment shows any signs of the fox, no red eyes, no deep whiskers, not even a chakra outline so the idea the he can only summon him with the nine tails isn’t really back, the first time he summons him he did use the fox but we see him go up to the gate and little get the chakra from karamu and we don’t see that in the gara fight he bits his finger and summons him (slightly off screen cuz gara’s sand was coving him) but I if the implication was that he use karamu they would have shown something to indicate it; eyes, whiskers, chakra, or like they did the first show him go to the gate.
24:42 NC brings up that the reason haku left the fight to save zabuza and not because he didn’t want to fight Naruto I think is the point even if Naruto didn’t use the kurama’s chakra haku still would have left that fight to save zabuza even if he did used the chakra, also my comments are not hateful at all I enjoy NC’s videos but I agree with swag on this one 👍🏾
29:55 When Naruto was learning the rasenshuriken he 100%was not using karamu’s chakra that’s the whole reason Yamato was there to seal away any clones that started using it, so it’s fair to say his uzumaki chakra is way can do it but definitely not karamu’s. I personally believe that karamu is not why he can use the multi shadow clone but that’s my own thought but undeniably when he learn the rasenshuriken he was not using.
1:00:55 🤣🤣 we cannot all agree with that because I’ve watched NC’s breakdown of minato’s ons shot, and nothing Naruto did had anything to with how minato beat the nine tails, Naruto beats the him using sage mode, rasengan, and rasenshuriken all three of which he had no genetic or even skill advantages for I would even argue he had more disadvantages to use those abilities if minato wasn’t his father he would definitely be able to use these and nothing in the show even implies that’s minato had anything to with Naruto’s capability to use them.
Even though Naruto isn't always the underdog, he has a way of turning all his disadvantages to eventually benefit him. Whether it's utulising Kurama's power or even using talk no jutsu on a stronger opponent, these are things that mere genetics or being a reincarnation of Ashura cannot achieve without the characteristics of Naruto as an individual
It wouldn't make sense for Naruto to remain an underdog. His aim is to become the hokage. His story is him progressing from being an underdog and earning his way to being the best.
Pain literally asked everyone he came across "Where is Naruto?" He was there for Naruto and Naruto alone. He fought Kakashi and Tsunade because they ran up on Pain, even though he was in their village. Don't bring hypotheticals into it like "it was bound to happen with or without Naruto." You mention Naruto being the MC multiple times, so him being the MC is why Pain attacks Konoha. Just saying.
Well, Nagato has a hatred for Konoha because his parents were killed by Konoha Shinobi for no reason and he views the wars fought in his land as conflicts started by the leaf. I bet Pain destroying the leaf was just because he wanted to
Yeah i think alot of nitpicking is done by nchammer here swags points are pretty solid and perfectly supported by the series itself and its time the naruto community evovles because we're stuck fighting each other if rock lee is a better mc than naruto while other fanfoms laugh at us like we're a bunch of retards. Massive swag W
I have watched it this far (6:22) and i would like to say that, the main point is, that everyone is good at something. No one is an underdog. Even in real life.
A big thing I'd like to add to the "just because your parents are talented doesn't mean you will be." This can be true, however I feel like a more apt take-away would be that, it takes talent as well has hard work to be exceptional. I get the feeling that that is where Team Guy may have originated from. Neji is the poster child of exceptional talent, Lee is the definition of hard work. They are both very strong but incomplete, as it takes a combination of the two.
Can’t we just say he’s the child of prophecy BECAUSE of his hard work and dedication? Like every character has some talent about them that makes them unique expect Naruto. And because of the special way he was brought up (by having no one) he was able to fulfill the prophecy. He can still be the underdog and the chosen one at the same time
I have always felt that this was the case, even going so far as to _why_ he was a reincarnation of Asura. Being a reincarnate didn't just overwrite his failures and make him powerful regardless; if he didn't have his determination to never give up I think that Asura's chakra or spirit would have remained dormant or maybe even looked for someone else. It's similar to the discussion with Neji about fate; if Naruto was simply fated to become Hokage then it wouldn't really matter what he did, things would work out and he would become hokage regardless. Even if it was fate, it only worked out because Naruto acted as though it wasn't fate, which is much like the sentiment that Neji reaches after that fight, that we can't know whether or not fate is fixed and maybe the endpoint is the same regardless, but things seem to work out better if you act like you can choose your destiny.
Naruto’s clones are also so unique that he could also use Shadow Clones to gather nature chakra to instantly go into Sage mode mid fight with Pain. Kagebushin is a very versatile Jutsu.
Naruto is a underdog in the same way Deku is an underdog, Both are born into bad circumstances (Naruto as an orphan who is looked down upon and abused for supposedly being the Nine Tails and Deku being born quirkless and looked down upon and bullied for it) both theoretically have the most OP powers in their verse (Deku with OFA, Naruto with his insane Chakra Pool and the Nine Tails) but neither of them know how to control it, but over the series, they both learn and grow and eventually are able to use their powers to become the strongest characters in their world
17:50 I thought I heard him talking about just healing and besides you're missing the important point that most of the Naruto haters (I know you aren't one) try to say that Naruto is nothing without Kurama. But there's an important thing Kakashi mentioned while rasenshuriken training in Shippuden that Naruto has about 4 times more chakra than him and if he wasn't suppressing the leaking chakra of Kurama he would've had about 100 times more than his chakra. Kurama's chakra is been only fully useful to Naruto after the events of KCM1,prior to that though it helped him a few times but also it held him back massively. Like in the fight with pain and literally every other big fights, we remember that Kurama helped him but we tend to forget the hindrances it caused prior to helping. Only if it didn't cause any hindrance ,there might not have been a situation till the war arch where help would be needed. But that's the story how their relationship improved, about how Naruto and Kurama became friends.
You're both right and wrong. Naruto was an underdog from both a power, societal and ideological aspect for most of the series. And he stops being an underdog of those things at certain points throughout the series. For me, Naruto was never meant to stay as the underdog because for the underdog trope to work, the hero needs to evolve past that and eventually achieve their goals. Naruto is an underdog in power due to his early life and his lazy ass teachers. He is an underdog in a societal sense because everyone hates him for having the Kyuubi inside him and because he didn't have parents or relatives around to help him, or even friends for that matter outside the ramen people. Naruto is an underdog in an ideological sense because Naruto's evolving beliefs and moral viewpoints are in direct opposition with how the shinobi world operates and he fights against that system all the time. Naruto stops being the underdog and starts becoming the fully realized hero the world needs him to be after the conclusion of the Pein fight. He stops being an underdog in a power sense when he learns Sage Mode and eventually controls Kurama's power. He stops being an underdog in an ideological sense when he "talk no jutsu's" Nagato and effectively inherits the mantle of responsibility as it were when Nagato gives his life in exchange for the people of the village he has killed and leaves the hope of the future in Naruto's hands. He stops being an underdog from a societal sense when he returns to his village a hero and all the people literally cheer for him and even throw him up in the air like he's a rockstar. The thing is that this was supposed to happen. Naruto cant stay the underdog forever otherwise he doesn't reach his goals because to achieve his goals he needs to ascend past that underdog role. This is how every underdog story plays out. Being the underdog is that long phase of trials and hardship the character needs to undergo in order to become the great hero the world needs to defeat the great evil and make the world all sunshine and sausages. So both Nick and Swag are right and wrong.
The point you're talking about at 16:04, about strong shinobi coming from strong parents is probably related to the fact that these strong parents trained their kids from a young age. I know both Kakashi's and Sasuke's parents died when they were really young, but they seemed to have been trained for more, and far better than the average shinobi of their age, when their parents were still alive. So saying Naruto is strong just because his parents were strong isn't that accurate. Sure, Naruto got the insane chakra pool of the Uzumakis, but no one ever trained him in the ways of the Uzumakis; he doesn't know any of the sealing jutsus that the Uzumakis are famous for. He was born with more chakra than others, but he had to train himself to actually make use of that chakra pool.
i think we’re all forgetting that naruto may have been destined to be the hero/savior but with his upbringing he had every reason to be the series’s main villain instead 😭 if the only consistent argument on this side is that he was predestined to be a hero because he has super god powers when literally his entire village hated him from the day he was born (largely because of Danzo) and he practically raised himself the first 12-13 years of his life since both his parents died (one of which was literally the HOKAGE) {which the village “didn’t know” he was Minato’s son by some impossible lapse in judgement} that exact same day + Hiruzen was just a terrible foster parent, then i think thats a bad argument. Naruto is literally famous for him telling/“talk-no-jutsu”-ing people who chose the villain path into seeing a better side of the world, and in a show with heavy emphasis on those exact emotions, i feel that is what makes someone an underdog in the context of Naruto’s overall story more than anything else, and characters like Naruto fit the description. He could’ve been evil, but he chose to prove the people around him wrong by achieving the highest position a leaf shinobi could attain that perfectly embodies the opposite of what the village believed him to be. him being a literal demigod certainly helped, but i wouldn’t say that made it any less of an uphill battle in a show about bonds, unity and working with the people around you to be better and achieve great things. Asura reincarnate or not, him and Sasuke are still both 2 sides of the same coin and their own separate people at that. Young Sasuke was no different to who Naruto grew up to be (kind, loving and hopeful) until his clan faced genocide, despite being the incarnation of Indra. So if that says anything about the Indra/Asura cycle, it’s that it clearly doesn’t completely determine who the incarnation becomes. that being said, i’m nowhere near as big of a Naruto nerd as Nick or Swag, these are just my two cents.
First Nick should make videos where he breaks down older anime into seasonal synopsis videos on the weebcommander channel. I would watch him explain the plot of like individual seasons of almost any anime just going through the major plot points of each episode per season Endless content there.
Yes kakashi didn’t train in opening the 8 gates but he was trying hard as hell when he accidentally opened one gate Nick. He was training his ass off as a prodigy. Any other characterization is disingenuous and you know it
I think the best summary of this whole thing is: Your lineage gives you your potential. You have to work hard and overcome challenges to draw out that potential. And even when you dont really have a potential for greatness, you can be the first person to break that barrier if you work even harder. Naruto exemplifies the first very well, but Lee exemplifies the second more, which in a psychological way overshadows the first. Naruto does break his own limitations at times, but those can be viewed through the lenses of it just being latent potential that was already there.
Reincarnation doesnt mean anything till he meets hagaromo it didn't impact anything in the story till then. Naruto wasn't shit and had to train till unconscious for years.
i think naruto best represents themes centered around the idea that you shouldn't let circumstances define you or your actions. Staying true to your moral code (even when breaking it would almost certainly be self beneficial in the moment,) active pursuit of being a positive impact on the people around you, friend or otherwise, and most importantly, no one is too far gone to be saved or irreconcilable. in all of those themes, naruto is constantly positioned as an underdog. from being an orphan that was hated his village, to the demon fox inside of him that BEGGED and clawed at Naruto to give in to his negative emotions. Naruto's chances of turning out okay were slim at best, let alone becoming someone who would positively impact the entire world in any meaningful way. His moral code was constantly tested by the many antagonists of the story. The ninetails was a massive disadvantage in this respect, because while it offered power it practically always came at the cost of compromising on his morals in part one. one exception being neji where the ninetails chakra is used directly to reward his unwavering morals, and it is a cool flip thematically, and of course in shippuden we would see this naturally develop more and more. Another way it was a disadvantage is in the way that power corrupts individuals. something that we overlook because Naruto is the protagonist, and the protagonist isn't susceptible to corruption blah blah. I won't get into the many examples of when Naruto could've abused the ninetails power to obtain a favorable result rather than work tirelessly to earn said result on his own merits, but there are plenty. I dont think i have to explain how hes an underdog when it comes to the theme of "no one is too far gone to be saved." he is forced to contend against some unimaginably heinous individuals that everyone else considers monsters, or simply "the enemy." Naruto was forced to confront these entities at their worst, and somehow cut through to their humanity with empathy. We're talking about mass murderers, war criminals, terrorists, assassins, etc. people who have long since discarded their humanity. Instead of doing the logical thing that everyone else does, and deem these people as evil irredeemable monsters, Naruto chooses the the impossible route of changing their entire outlook on the world to the point that they have no choice but to reconsider everything they've done up to that point in life. all as a kid / teenage orphan.
One thing most people often overlook about Naruto is the problem of a writer. Kishimoto didn't plan out the story and Naruto's growth from the start. Otherwise there was a large chance to make Naruto an underdog without giving him ridiculous benefits of being Nine Tails Jinchuriki, Hokage's child, and Asura's reincarnation. The whole thing about Nine Tails Jinchuriki could be ignored because Naruto earned this power. He had to bear the hatred and loneliness of being a Jinchuriki while still maintaining a positive attitude to change the world, change his village and change the mindset of the people. Naruto defeated Nine Tails and earned KCM1. He reconciled with a beast that destroyed his village and made go through so much suffering. He and Nine Tails were not brothers but comrades who needed each other to survive during Fourth Great Ninja War. So, KCM2 was well earned. Kishimoto didn't need to make him Hokage's son. There would be some changes he had to make in order to give Naruto a bigger Chakra Reserves but you could do it with the help of Eight Trigrams Seal. You don't need to be an Uzumaki to become a Jinchuriki. It will less stable but it will work. It will also give Naruto a real reason to suppress Nine Tails and continue to get stronger on his own. Finally, Hagoromo was able to come to the real world despite being dead. He can still give Naruto his powers to defeat Kaguya because of his Ironclad Will to never give up. Remember, Naruto is still the same Naruto who befriended Tailed Beasts, brought the Ninja Alliance together, and become the rival to Sasuke. The only difference was that Sasuke received Hagoromo's blessing because of his lineage while Naruto received it because of action. It would perfectly portray Naruto's character as an underdog while still having a legitimate reason to improve his strength. Naruto will have a slight disadvantage of not having Uzumaki bloodline but it can be covered up by focusing on Naruto's personal growth until he learns Sage Mode instead of focusing to control Nine Tails' Chakra.
Since the start of Naruto, Naruto never was the best at anything. Hence making him the underdog. It wasn't until he started focusing on his training and getting skills. This is the definition of an underdog, regardless of his underlying potential. Even when he reached certain levels of power upgrades, he still faced opponents stronger than him, this is what makes underdogs. When it comes to sports the underdog is the team that technically shouldn't win. Just like the story of Naruto and his opponents. Stop reaching Nick, this is like when you used to say you were the top 3 knowledgeable people in the world when it comes to Naruto, when you would just get information from quora and reddit like everybody else.
I feel like you are conflating "talent" with "potential" Naruto's massive chakra pool and Tailed Beast gives him the greatest potential of any character in the series but he had to work much harder than any other characters to realize that potential. Sasuke learned the Chidori within a month from learning his chakra nature to completing mastering the psuedo Rasengan while only having the chakra to use the Chidori thrice a day, Naruto took a relatively long time to learn both the Rasengan and the his chakra nature while cheating by not having to wait for chakra recovery and eventually the shadow clone cheat but still the only thing that Naruto has going for him power wise is his massive chakra pool. Which while being genetic Naruto's Chakra Pool is not what made him a strong Ninja, the thousands of hours using every bit of it did.
The manga panels and maybe the anime (I can't remember) show Sasuke was hit in vital spots, but I especially remember Kakashi saying that Haku specifically avoided hitting Sasuke in any critical way.
Naruto’s tutors totally gave him an advantage, specially Jiriya. If he wasn’t narutos teacher he never would have gone to train with the toads to learn sage mode, which is what let him take on Kuruma.
Generations before the events of Naruto happened Black Zetsu manipulated all of ninja history. And Naruto before birth was predestined to be the world’s greatest hero. Naruto (unknowingly) is the child of one of the most genius ninjas ever. The moment a child Naruto gets a scroll to properly teach him ninjutsu he perfects a Jonin level technique in 1 day while also having a disadvantage with chakra control thanks to the nine tails. Naruto was never an underdog. He was just presented as one in the beginning of the story.
If Naruto really had the predisposition you say, why did he struggle to learn all the other techniques he learned? Why didnt it take a single night for him to create a stable Rasengan? Why didnt it take a single night for him to create the Rasen-shuriken? is it possible youre talking out of your asshole?
Y’all need to stop talking about Naruto. It’s clear most people who watched Naruto don’t understand what the story is about. Naruto is about ending the Cycle of Hatred, and persevering despite of your circumstances. Actually watch Swag’s video, and pay attention then I hope people will stop pushing this nonsense. The hardwork vs natural talent theme is present mostly during the Chunin Exams. Even Hagoromo, Orochimaru, and Jiraiya support what Swag’s saying Naruto isn’t gifted nor does he have all these advantages like y’all would have people believing.
i believe the reason why naruto had trouble with chakra control earlier was because some of chakra was being used to suppress the nine tails hence it became a hindrance for easy chakra control
Kurama has been an issue in the teaching naruto with alot of ninjutsu. It wasn't until he somehow perfected the shadow clones after merely reading a scroll. Pervy sage even says how much kurama effected his Chakra control by leaking out nine tails energy. And kurama even says this. Why are you making arguments that are easily proven at least 2 times in the naruto series and plenty more in naruto shippuden. I think I need to switch to swakage and watch him instead lol
Nick showing once more that he hasn't watched the show/manga bc the core theme of Naruto is never giving up. All the others are sub themes that apply to specific arcs, or specific chunks of the Naruto franchise. He may not always been an under dog, but he has never given up, and its been a core idea of his character since chapter 1.
1. this plagueofgripes guy, really kicked off a never ending discusion... so for starters, it's a story with 700 chapters, just in its main continuity. in such a long story, goals change, same as motivations. naruto starts off as the underdog, probably to learn to not rely on gifts too much, and rely on things inside of his control. once he beat neji, the underdog plot is already over. he earned his gifted status by perseveering, even with the odds all stacked against him. he also had to go trough that phase, to become the best version of himself, or the most fitting one for the job. all following "states" up to the mary sue thing in the end, are accolades he gets from conquering his destiny. a destiny which menma in a movie showed, wasn't guaranteed. same as naruto says when he meets gara, and learned about his story. just one bad moment, could've set him up for becoming a tool for kurama back when he was just a giant ball of anger basiclly. to me, that whole underdog schtick was never the whole story. just alone the zabusa story, quickly turned into what the story is mostly about. allies and how to keep them. staying friends, cause friends are important, mmmmkay? learning the value of life, and how to protect it, would be a way better description of the real underlying message which ties way more arcs together, than that whole underdog yapping, that is kinda a big gripe for me. naruto earned all those accolades, cause he kept a mostly straight line, with his ninja way, something established super early, not much later than naruto having some issues, cause he literally had no guidance, which the 3rd probably did, cause he knew that he's the chosen one, and would need a ingrained moral compass. basiclly 4D chess. coddling him would've probably had the oposite effect. one of my friends liked naruto a lot when it kicked off, back when it seemed like it's just a gritty story, and he started to despise it, as soon as the friendship plot popped up. which is kinda hillarious cause he LOVES LOVES LOVES one piece. same way this plagueofgripes dude, talks about examples where other shows get a free pass, cause they speak to him more, and he suddenly becomes defensive about it. it's kinda tiresome to get sucked into a discusion which completly misses the mark of the show, which is positive growth, and solving conflict with the best outcome for as many ppl as possible. so as you can see, i kinda filtered out a few more story beats which were there from basiclly the start, which this gigantic story is about. and in a story which has some good amount of focus, on many characters, means that the story will carry many messages on its sleeve, some more vital, some less, and some which are there to be OVERCOME. naruto overcomes them all. the fact he's blond which is associated with delinquancy in japan, is probably a choice made not just cause of the inspiration of goku, but to show that even a delinquent, can overexceed all expectations. and this goes hand in hand with the part where all the adults hate naruto, cause they expected kurama to strike any day, cause naruto was living his deliquancy, and set expectations accordingly. the fact that he never outgrows his blond hair, shows that at heart, he stays that lil bubbele with a heart full of mischief, cause his mischief was never meant in bad spirit. i'm currently writing a story which focuses on the love of 2 ppl, which spans around 1400 pages, and almost as many words as the lord of the rings has. and even i have a tiebreaker in the middle, where everything changes, cause i want a certain outcome. i of course have the priviledge, that i don't need to draw anything in addition, and only draw with words. this means i have already conconted up the whole roadmap, where we have to go, like around chapter 3, cause it layed everything out, and gave me an idea, what i want to say with my story. mangas rarely work that way. a great example is guyver, which had multiple hiatuses, and some weird super success, combined with no success at all. the man could barely really plan out something, cause for some moments it seemed like he'll conquer the world, but then the manga had moderate success at best, but he had 2 hecking hollywood movies, before most of the world besides france and japan even knew what dragon ball or mangas/animes are, and had 2 short but amazingly animated anime shows, with a manga which for some reason, couldn't grab the audience as much, probably because outside of the animations and the films, ppl didn't have easy access to the whole show, in its drawn read format. continues in my own comments. letter limitations, gotta love social media. how dare you want to say soemthing longer.
2. i even already have prequel and sequel plans for my story, cause just suddenly stumbling over my idea, with an untapped well, which kinda mesk it super original, took me just like 3 sleepless nights of thinking about it. once i was halfway done with writing it down which takes the most time for me, i already had multiple i can't sleep moments in bed where i was thinking about the back story, and the future, and how to expand it. if i also had to draw it, and write in hecking kanji, i would've never had the time to be so, nonchalant about going above and beyond. i just have to write, and then jiraya showed naruto a spinning ball of chakra, and told him that he will one day, make this tecnique his own, not knowing he tought it to iraya in the first place. i guess as a mangaka with a serialized story, especially in that era where it was expected to be weekly, they just didn't have the time to just ponder a whole night instead of sleeping. also, for soem reason, i was born with ADHD and OCD, and somehow, conconcting up stories comes super natural to me, it's just the executing which takes a lot out of me. i already have like 15 pending ideas for my future books, and luckily, only one other one of the ideas, is gonna end up in a trilogy. and i also have an end of life plan for a further trilogy, all other can be oneshot novels. and funnily enough, learning that i actually had a talent for writing, didn't really come easily to me. it was a real udnerdog situation as my life was shit, my parents were old when they got me, and i was kinda all by myself, cause love is not easily shown among my peers. i wrote paragraphs with ex girlfriends in positive and negative situations, same as with flings. before that, back when pencil were the norm for writing, i sucked at it, because i have a saukralle, which is german for, a pigclaw. basiclly my hand writing could be mixed up with physician handwriting. that held me back, and made most teachers ignore that i already at a young age, excelled especially in creative writing. first teacher that aknowledged it, only aknowledged it cause i was literally fronting him for his boring way of teaching. the set goal was write a short 2 page story in 45 minutes. i wrote a 5 page, horror epic, set up like a nightmare, which ended with me, throwing myself out of the window, cause i was stuck in a, basiclly genjutsu before genjutsus existed, in which the teacher bored me to tears for multiple days. so basiclly being stuck in a boring version of itachis mangekyo ability. i wrote the ending so hillariously, that a teacher which openly told me he hated me, and that i will never become someone, gave me kudos. but it still took 13 additional years of writing short messages with chicks that i wanted to bonk or love, until i realized, i don't like writing with them, i actually just enjoy writing, aslong as i'm not held back by paper, pencils or writing machines, which all lack the backspace option, cause the way i write, is so unorderly, if i lack a backspace, my OCD goes haywire if i have to look at my own handwriting. so, basiclly i live in the naruto story. i have talents, things which hold me back, i actually am moreso an underdog cause of the circumstances, and it takes me forever to catch up with the time i lost, cause the circumstances often made me doubt myself, often with malicious intent. society i my kurama. and just in that lil explanation, i have proven that other ppl are essential to life, having good relations are important, the part where you're an underdog, will pass if you do your do dilligence, and back your talent up with effort, and that i don't feel like and underdog anymore, it's moreso that i have baggage which i need to get rid of, to get myself back into the way i can write most profciently, which is currently not possible if my apartment, cause i hate it here, and i've been basiclly stuck living in places which i hate, for 10 years now, cause the city i live in has a never ending sshortage of living space problem, cause it's a big pharma city, and i don't have the balls to move away from here, and all my friends live here, and i'm 40, disabled, and still in a state of beating my traumas into submission, on my mission to become the next j.k rowling, but with a lot more grit XD once i have success and dosh, i will move away from here in a blink, but for now, safest bet is to find a place here. and this part of my story, is basiclly my madara/obito in my story. that's the thing in long running shows like life. it's only so interesting, cause the states and goals change over time. that is also why bleach kinda, can't really keep up with naruto or dragon ball. the evolution is moreso surface level. the character is seemingly stuck in the same conundrum for almost 3 quarters of the beginning, till the end with weizen (also, i bingewatched the whole show up to the point were ichigo beats the big bad and looses his powers, maybe the manga handles the tpics better, but the show really didn't make me want to read the manga, so i don't know, if the planned ending, actually lead to betterment, but point still stands, ichigo takes forever to really change his mindset and goals). i guess what i'm trying to say is, stories which span a whole life time, can't be discused in such a boxed up format. the goal with naruto having kurama in him, was probably always that he becomes a shinobi deity, kishi just wanted to show us, that even if your road is made of gold, that it takes effort to walk a very long road, cause that road ent trough multiple rosegardens, and every rose, has it's torns. and naruto had to walk trough those, and keep his spirit up. not giving him gifts as rewards for fighting trough the torns, would defeat the purpose, of him learning to use those gifts for good. and there was only one person which naruto didn't even try to talk no jutsu at all, and that was kaguya, cause he probably had some underlying anger, to see madara become a mere chessfigure, in someone elses long game, which never showed its cards, until it was too late. so we trully just had one iredeemable person in the whole show, which was a deity herself. ho boi, got a bit carried away with this one. eh, good training excercise, and a way to show myself, that i can get back into the writing spirit, as soon as i got trough my rose bush, cause i may get an apatment, which i actually could love, which could finally remove the last roadblock i need, to sore to the skies. so yeah, reducing this giant story, just on naruto being an underdog, is kinda cheap. the story is so much more, just laone the fact that every gift can be a curse, kurama, the sharingan being born out of ppl which love way too hard, so hard that it messes with their physiological truth, even more anchors of what the story is really about. maybe that's why asuke is so reserved, cause he's affraid of it, since he knows the truth about the uchia powers now. his daughter feels so hard for boruto and her own dad, that she awakens a perfect mangekyio, without having to lightbuld a siblings eyes into her own sockets. the gist of that could very well be that she's not affraid to feel this intense for someone, something which she's the first uchia to be able to do, and this then in turn, ties into sakuras road, cause she was always a hopeless romantic, that wasn't affraid to love sasuke with every ounce of her being. maaaaaaaaaaaaan, the subtext in this story. i feel like this is one of the real anchors of naruto, it's an insanely, expansive analysis of the human experience, with flashy superpowers on top. which is hillarious when you think about what inspired it, a show about the pursuit of power with dragon ball. akira defintly was a god when it came to selling you an actual pretty basic concept, with so much style, that there is no escaping it. eh, if you made it this far, thank you for coming to my TED talk (no jutsu)
He had so manny disatvantages. And the only atvantage he had, that was also a downside, is his amount of chakra. And evan that made him incapable of using most jutsus in the begining of the series. Naruto cant use a bunch of jutsus, because his large amounts of chakra, make it way harder for him to mold it correctly. The only jutsu this doesnt happen with though is, the shadow clone jutsu. Thats why he spams it so much. And its the thing, that he uses to get past his disatvantages slowly. He isnt able to do the rasengan because of his chakra controlability. So he uses a clone to get close to the utility of a normal rasengan although his need for the clone does make it worce than the normal one. Then he does the same thing with the shadow clones to control the big ball rasengan. He also ,thanks to kurama, cant use ma and pa for endless sage mode, which is the reason he uses the inferior clone charges system. which leaves him open when he needs a new charge and can also run out. He also used the clones to learn his chakra natur, which isnt as hard for others as it is for him. Here he also uses it to make the rasenshuriken. This is finaly when his hardwork and talent in one single thing, pays of and gets him an atvantage over others. Now he has to use all the abilities he had aquired to defeat kurama and lose him as a hindurance and gain him as an advantage. He got all his abilities threw hard work and using the one thing he is good at, to surpass others. As swag said.
(the kid naruto point is also just utra disingenous, do u expect him to never grow? stay a disabled lump of meat with a heartbeat? and a lot of the issues he had carried over as he grew while many of them he actively had to work to beat) The Kakashi point is just disingenous. Saying that he didn't train on it and that Lee only hardworked his way through it is just mostly wrong, nor is it made out that anyone can open the 8 gates. Even the suicide corps is a small bunch of people who recieved the knowledge on the gates as the 4th generation and by people who had already mastered them and were considered genius in that area. Naruto isnt a genjutsu type, thats just it, chakra control doesnt fully equate to genjutsu especially when his chakra was being messed up until he befriended kurama. the only naruto you could see performing genjutsu is at 19 years old by the time his chakra has the retraints removed and he has had time and experience to have that ability, other wise he CAN use genjutsu but through summonings. as for kurama, yes it does hamper his chakra, kakashi even reiterated that point during his rasenshuriken time, just like how throughout the series we saw that was the case, and how much stronger he was able to get when his pools got the restraint removed or even when kurama decided to not mess with him when he was fighting madara... by the time guy approached lee, which is basically when he was a young academy kid, he basically didnt have to train on other aspects and brute force on taijutsu by THE BEST TAIJUTSU master SWAG's point wasnt that naruto killing haku didnt mean that kurama didnt help, his point was that kurama coming out didnt change the outcome at all, naruto would have lived, sasuke would have *probably* lived, haku would have died yada yada. the cutting up and pausing was also kinda of manipulating a bit of what swag was trying to convey
Yeah no, the point of Kurama messing with Naruto's early chakra control has been brought up, I can't remember by who either Kakashi or jiraiya, and maybe an anime throw away line, but swag has that correct. And like, it is correct, for a child he has such a large chakra pool that trying to control fine input/outputs of it is really difficult due to kurama's chakra leaking out adding to his probably already impressive base pool of chakra. Like trying to move 1kg a mm Vs 50kg a mm, it'll be easier to move the 1kg without overcompensating. Hence when Naruto first did the multishadowclone jutsu he made tons cause he just couldn't hold back/be chakra efficient.
11:07 i think the idea of Kurama messing with Naruto's Chakra comes from Jiraiya saying something to the effect that Naruto isn't using his Chakra correctly, he has more than he realizes, and even more when you factor in the Nail Tails, and essentially he can kind of just blunt force justu to work if he pours his massive energy into it. But I also don't have a massively successful Naruto RUclips, so I might be wrong
I'll preface this with saying I directly disagree with your idea of Naruto being Hard Work v Talent. Naruto is shown working just as hard as the "more talented" Sasuke yet they both grow basically the same amount (succeeding in tree walking) as early as the Land of Waves. It also has the distinct showing that no matter how hard someone works they won't always achieve their goals. It straight up showed this in Gaara v Lee I feel like making a manga where the main character is perfectly and underdog is impossible. They're the main character which means that for the story to be satisfying they're certain to attain their goals. The only time Talent vs. Hard work is a story driving plot point is Chunin exams which happens after this and focuses mainly on Lee. I'll probably edit this over the course of my reaction Kakashi 100% knows how hard Lee has worked. He's best friends with Gai and given Gai has been teaching Lee how to open the gates then Kakashi certainly made an accurate assumption on how hard he's training. The thing though? He said "no amount of mere hard work would be able to accomplish that" as in if Lee truly had zero talent he could work 10 times as hard and still not achieve that. Also for your point on the sui cide corps, finding people who have a talent allowing them to learn the gates doesn't mean anyone putting in effort can do it, just that Lee knew how to find people with the talent to do it (especially given how it's likely a majority of people couldn't learn it and dropped out for more reasons than just being unable to put the effort in). On how Kurama negatively affecting INaruto's control l'd assume swag used facts to make inferences. Naruto in Shippuden is blatantly still unable to use the clone justu in spite of all his training which gives the implication that something is preventing him from properly using his chakra that way. The other thing is how when he befriends Kurama a lot of his control based problems vanish, most specifically his ability to create the rasengan with one hand For swag's comment on Kurama's power getting him closer to being Hokage that's more in Naruto's mind. In his eyes the Hokage is the strongest person around who everyone respects. He doesn't get the view of respect first, Hokage second until quite a bit later. So as far as Naruto would think Kurama's power would tangibly get him closer to the power needed to be Hokage His whole reason for talking about Kurama and how Naruto's use of it is wrong is just a rebuttal to the idea that Kurama was an advantage to Naruto when it not only wasn't an advantage but was a disadvantage until Naruto earned the power through hard work It is indeed the yang half of Kurama but his point is that Yang is by virtue more agressive than the Yin half especially given Minato was able to befriend Yin. I feel you're just distinctly wrong on powerful ninjas come from powerful ninjas. Yes, genetics do exist in Naruto to pass on talent but you neither need a powerful parent to become powerful, 2 of 3 Sannin don't have parents who were ever suggested to be super strong, and then there's Sakura who's parents are straight up civilians I'm pretty sure, nor are you destined to become ultra powerful with powerful parents, Asuma is and A-level jonin born to the strongest of all living Kage. Just because it is extremely common doesn't make it a rule The point that a select few don't singlehandedly shape history is completely true. Swag goes into this but without the help of countless other people there would've been no way for things to get to that fight. While Team 7 and Kaguya's fight may have decided how the world would go so did countless other things with other people. Saying that only those people shaped history because of them being the ones in that fight is dumb. It's like saying only Madara and Hashirama matter in all of the history of Shinobi villages because they are the first two to make one Being child of prophecy I'm pretty sure is just "bring about a great change" not bring peace. His goal for the great change just happened to be peace. In fact "great change" is a very weak fate in comparison to what Naruto wants to do because things like creating Ninjutsu from Ninshu or the creation of the Hidden Villages were both "great change" For the expecting a lot of himself it's less that he has an ego believing that he will become that and more he feels he needs to do that. Swag is saying he has way more determination than anyone would be expected to. For the forbidden scroll he learns it almost immediately and can do it effectively because of genes and Kurama. That's an immediate showing of talent directly opposing the fact that you think he was meant to be a showing of pure hard work 1:37:48 this specifically is the thing that I agree with the most. Naruto's story was about how anyone can change the world if they try hard enough. It's an underdog story of someone who wants to flip the world on its head because he disagrees with the way the world works. Anyone regardless of level of talent or amount of hardwork will be an underdog in that story because that takes way more than power. While you point out that power is required to be able to Talk No Justu you're only half right. People can be born good speakers but 99% of the time Naruto Talk No Jutsu's someone is because of how he was born. He was hated so he developed empathy for those who are suffering. Empathy isn't a skill that can be developed by training or hard work. The talk about what people Talk No Jutsu'd did was meant to be an example of how many crazy things happened as a result of Naruto and how those trying to accomplish even one of those things would make you a massive underdog yet Naruto did them all. Also showing how many of Naruto's success required much more than power that came as a result of his privilege and natural talent. By Hashirama having significantly better gifts he probably means the extremely busted Wood Release. End of video: I disagree with you on your particular belief on the main message of naruto but I did enjoy your video and the counterpoints that you brought up because a lot of them were true. I just personally feel Hard Work beats Talent as a message is just impossible to argue for because it would only ever be true if Talent doesn't work hard which would cause the characters to less entertaining because it requires the mc to be the only hard worker.
gotta love the "Orochimaru was unable to use his arms vs naruto" followed immediately by the clip of him using his arms to summon the three Rashōmon Gates.
I think you can look at it either way. I think that he was conceived as an underdog character and certainly was presented that way early in the story. But once he started to unlock 9 Tails powers, sage powers, and then it was revealed that he was the son of the Fourth Hokage, and also a reincarnation of the heir to the Sage of Six Paths, he could never be an underdog.
I mean naruto was never really about hard work overcoming things. Hell naruto himself in the first few chapters yeah I slept through any of the hard classes in the academy but also mastered a B rank(also A rank) in the shadow clone Justu in a day despite straight up having slept through the classes on what is chakra which would probably have helped him with learning stuff Honestly the Chunin exams is the best example of this with both Rock Lee Vs Garra and Naruto Vs Neji. Rock Lee the poster child of hard work works(even if he was the only one of the three of him, Neji and Tenten who succeeded in the first gate training that Guy made them all do) Vs Garra the person with basically the sand control power he was given and forced to master by having assassin try to kill him but does have an Auto defense. Garra wins that Fight so Talent Beats Hard work. Neji the one who spends a month training with Tenten to become a better fighter and prepare to fight naruto and the rest vs the person who basically learned how to summon(which he doesn’t use), a bit of chakra control and how to access nine tail power at will(aka going hey nine tails lend me power). So once again Talent beats hard work. Well more tailed beasts laugh at hard work.
This whole discussion is akin to real life. A lot of people arguee that meritocracy isn't real because there are rich kids and all, while others arguee that it's not like that because even if a parent pay for a better school, the kid still has to try very hard to achieve things. And both sides are kinda right. Yeah, having privileges don't garantee your future and you still have to try hard, but at the same time, the more privileges someone has, more he can achieve with less work, while someone with no privileges, sometimes won't achieve anything for lack of opportunity.
Everyone thinks the Ninetails messes with Narutos Chakra because when Jiraya is looking at the seal he notices there's a second seal, placed by Orochimaru. Orochimarus seal is what was messing with Narutos chakra, Minato made the 8 trigram seal to where Kurumas chakra slowly leaks out to help Naruto. The seal was designed to help Naruto control Kurumas chakra, why would it allow Kuruma to mess up Naruto?
It seems like swagkage is trying to say that Naruto is always an underdog because Kurama doesn't help Naruto on his goal to becoming Hokage (his stated want). Being an underdog in his ultimate goal does not mean he is an underdog in the overall story though. He slowly stops being the underdog throughout the series.
11:13 I remember it being said that Naruto's chakra control was bad because he had too much chakra. It could just be his Uzumaki lineage, but you can also interpret as the kyuubi being a problem there. Still, in Shippuden he pretty much had gotten over it completely.
17:34 also, even if wasn't literally regeneration, Kurama is a big reason why Naruto is so resistant, in every fight, he takes a lot of damage, and if he hadn't any healing factor, he would be knocked out way faster.
sigh... hard work beats talent is a basic level of understanding of the series and it is correct. HOWEVER. the more correct understanding is that not only hard work, but the ability to create connectinos and have strong enough bonds with more people helps solve more problems than it creates. Naruto never killed anyone. Naruto always tried his best to befriend the pepole he encountered minus kakuzu. From start to finish he did this. That is not something an ordinary person who works hard can accomplish. Naruto may not have had to put the hours in to being strong that lee did, but lee also never put anything into person to person interactions.The dude was always punching or kicking a tree/rock. The dude never communicated with someone outside his team. He didnt understand the delicate balance between peace and war. Not how naruto did. Please stop giving him AND SAKURA for those few of you.... so much credit for the MC position.
Lee was a ln example of a great underdog. Could do nothing with ninjursu or genjutsu and was only barely okay with taijutsu. Then he met Guy who helped him learn to become a taijutsu master. It was his extreme dedication and hard work that allowed him to become such an extreme powerhouse. All Guy did was direct that dedication and tenacity toward a goal worthy of someone who works so hard
An underdog is someone that's expected to lose. Naruto was the underdog until he wasn't until he proved himself. Lee was the underdog until he wasn't, he also proved himself. Saruka was an underdog until she wasn't.
There's no story if the underdog remains the underdog. They need to grow beyond their underdog label.
@@tiffanyedwards5722 facts 😮💨
Bro not letting this one slide
Agreed......U think kuz it's swag?
I don't really blame him :D it's a fun topic
@@AaronJustice better learn who swag is quick. lol. bros the goat of Naruto content.
Nick was coping hard this whole time😂
Yeah. Nick was coping this entire stream, and is wrong completely when it came towards his opposition.
You’re both forgetting or misremembering, Orochimaru put the 5 prong seal on kuramas seal, THAT disrupted Naruto’s ability to mold chakra. Once jiraiya removed the seal Naruto’s ability to mold and gather chakra goes back to normal aka pre Orochimaru forest of death
That doesn’t mean that the nine tails didn’t disrupt Naruto’s chakra. This just shows that Naruto has been able to at least partially overcome the handicaps the nine tails gave him. It is stated by Kakashi during the tree walking training that Naruto had poor chakra control which shows these issues predated the forest of death.
The nine tails ALSO did.
@washingtonfootballfan7974 it is literally never stated that 9 tails meses with his chakra control infact when he has 9 tails chakra is buffing him , he performs jutsus just fine
@@na5567it was never stated in the series that kurama caused Naruto poor chakra control
@@washingtonfootballfan7974nah Naruto lack of chakra control was all Naruto doing, it had nothing to do with kurama
I think the confusion over Kurama interfering with Naruto's chakra control comes from the scene where he shows Jiraya his water walking technique and almost sinks. If I recall correctly, in that case it was because Orochimaru had put a second seal on top of the original seal for Kurama, and the two were incompatible somehow caused Kurama'a chakra to leak out in fits and starts. Jiraya unsealed Orochimaru's seal, which immediately cured the control issue. Jiraya was even astounded that Naruto could perform water walking at any level under those conditions.
Yes it was the odd number Five Prong Seal on top of the even number Eight Trigrams Seal that was messing up Eight Trigrams Seal's mixing of Kurama'a chakra into Naruto's chakra system, hence why after Jiraiya removed the Five Prong Seal Naruto was able to pull off the water walking technique flawlessly on his next try.
No the five element seal dud was cut Naruto off from Kurama Chakra that's all
Yeah, he had trouble with walking up the tree in the Land of Water, but he gets it down relatively quickly. Slower than Sasuke, but Sasuke is a genius, and Sakura gets it so fast the Kakashi was astounded.
So he was fine with chakra control at this point, but was just normal control for a genin just out of the academy. Kurama wasn't the reason Naruto was having trouble, being 12 was.
Then Orochimaru put a five-part seal over the 8 trigram, disrupting the chakra flow. It wasn't until this point that Naruto started having 'chakra control issues'.
@@godofwind200nope I am pretty sure it was orochimaru seal that was messing with Naruto chakra control
@@Pannedcakes-90also just the raw amount of Chakra Naruto has makes it very easy to overflow
I’d pay money to see NCHammer23 and Swagkage have a Naruto debate.
Not even close nc hammer would get cooked.
I love them both sm them doing a collab of any kind would be sick man
I’d pay even more to see him debate DygoKnight. Part one should be Boruto and part two, Naruto.
To watch Swag annihilate him? 🤭
Swagkage will cook his ass. I can cook this mf and prove that he is wrong
Idk man. I'm not really understanding how Minato being able to defeat the 9 tails inside Kushina gives Naruto a "genetic disposition" to also defeating the 9 tails. That makes 0 sense to me personally. That's like if because my dad shot a game winning half-court shot gives me the genetic disposition to do the same when no, it really doesn't. Maybe I'm missing something
He's just nitpicking at this point at every word swag said
This statement makes absolutely no sense
Minato created Rasengan, which defeated tailed beast bombs, so his son, Naruto, can also do it. That's what he is saying.
The whole of the Naruto universe-Jutsus, Chakra natures, chakra amounts, and so on-are genetically passed on. So, if someone's dad or mom can do X, then that child is extremely likely to be able to do X.
@@ShangoTheyeah but naruto still had to work towards this... he didnt pop out the womb knowing how to do it, and even after learning it he still needed a shortcut for it
@@godobb Genetic disposition doesn’t mean you’ll be born with it, it means you are more likely to get an ability if your parents also had it.
Even shisui and Itachi weren’t born with mangekyo,(a Kekkei genkai) even tho they were both uchihas.
the core messaging of naruto has never been "HARDWORK BEATS TALENT". Nick you have said this yourself. Naruto is about bonds
Hell, not jsut bonds. Unity, working together, communication, forgiveness, breaking of cycles, self improvement, Golden Path Buddhism, and several other concepts/topics people straight up ignore bc they apaprently cant read past "work > talent", something that was largely dropped by the 2nd half of the series
Guys you are both 100% correct in your assessment of the series, but way off on your assessment of this situation.. This isn't about any of that, this is about Nick feeling like Swagkage was trying to come for his often stated ideal that Naruto was a prodigy... Quite honestly, I think he was talking about Nick on the low for a lot of this video too lol.. Not taking shots but agreeing to disagree with the idea that Naruto was born to be Konoha's savior, as Nick 100% believes.. Which ended up being true in the end.. But making Naruto a Asura reincarnate, son of the greath 4th, perfect sage and jinchuriki was only done to set him apart from every other ninja that worked their ass off.. Because there obviously had to be other strong willed, highly dedicated Shinobi in the history of the Ninja era... So there had to be a reason his situation paid off more than the other's have.. But he also did have to work hard to get there so they're both right and I don't think Nick ever said that he didn't work hard at all.. He just made the point that you guys are making as well, but in a different way.. It was way deeper than hard work.. It was familial ties and bonds, a lack of those bonds, gaining those bonds elsewhere and then eventually gaining those famial bonds on top of the bonds he gained in lieu of having family.. Then bonding with the man who started it all on top of that! Then spreading the energy that brought all of that together, to others even if they happen to be a foe..
@@mr.aNdErsOn88 My issue with NC's arguement is that the prophecy states he'll unite the beasts and beat a great calamity (aka: kaguya). Thats it. Being an Uzumaki and a reincarnation and jinchuriki didnt stop him from nearly flunking out of the academy, lagging behind sakura for over half the series, struggling to even control his chakra, losing to Sasuke the first time, being orphaned, abused (physically and socially) by an entire village, having to fight in a war at 16, being nearly murdered multiple times, having to save the very village that abused him, and only being recognized by anyone as a person until after he saved them multiple times over...but hes not an underdog. Like being the chosen savior only leads him to uniting the biju and beating Kaguya. That doesnt require him to win any of his other fights, get stronger (since sealing Kaguya really only needed the 2 seals from Hagaromo), or anything. He didnt win fights or get strong bc he had Kurama, Uzumaki chakra, or bc he was a destined reincarnate. He won fights bc he either appealed to the themes of the series or simply out fought people or got help.
Yes and no. Naruto is about generational responsibility and the impacts that has throughout a nation's and its populus as a whole and the importance of role models who can foster the minds of a younger generation who can right those issues. The mentor trope is fundamental to the heroes journey sure. But it isn't just a trope in Naruto it's a feature of the narrative required to create a world where ninjas start by going to school and by the end punch god in the face. Think about the most most commonly refrenced impactful deaths of the series. Jiraya. Asuma. It's not just that they were mentors or characters you did and did not care about. One of the biggest reasons for this is it's not just those characters being killed. It's the idea they represented of fostering the younger generation against the malingering effects of the previous. And the both perspnal and shared responsibility of the current generation to aspire towards linear progression.Will of fire bro.
Wouldn't be shocked if a teacher played a big role in kishimoto deciding to pursue manga. But that's just a game theory bro.
You can see this in most of the deaths of Naruto but classic example is "Obito". And it is so nice they did it twice with one single sequence. Minato informing Obito about Kakashi's dad acting as a mentor and further the legacy of another. Thereby causing Tobi to do the same for Kakashi with the scum speech and saying the white fang was a great ninja. If fundamentally doesn't matter if Naruto was or wasn't an underdog. Because that isn't the question being answered. It doesn't matter if it's about destiny or hardwork because that isn't the question being answered. The question being answered is what does it take to impact the future in a meaningful way? Cooperation, unity, acceptance, and a hot gay boyfriend named Sasuke.
Mostly about never giving up and no shortcuts.
To be completely Fair to his Rock Lee point I think regardless of the amount of hard work he put in being able to open up to the 5th gate at 13 is still indicative of an utterly insane amount of talent and while it's fair to dismiss the Kakashi point I think it's also fair to conclude that Lee is also some caliber of Genius aside from just being a genius at hard work
Yeah I'm pretty sure rock lees whole thing was hard work can reveal your true talents or sm like that
@@itsyaboyjay9862 not really because Kakashi's generation was brutal training and most people can't do it when they put in more hours than lee did
@@-Datboijj- exactly, that's what I said
Exactly but he's not a genius at hard work, hes a genius at Taijutsu through hard work. People are just confused about the story being about hard work beating talent when really it's one of many premises of the show. I think the main message is believing in yourself. Naruto literally says it "believe it" when facing every challenge 😂
Also, I find it hard to believe that Kakashi, the person who probably knew Might Gai the best, and therefore, knew exactly how hard Gai worked to gain the power that he had, wouldn't at least have a small idea of Lee's training routine. So when Kakashi calls Lee a genius, I don't think it's because he doesn't know how much Lee worked to get to that point.
I thought the whole point of an underdog is to overcome the odds an rise to the top. An Naruto did just that
Yes, regardless if you have natural talent and gifts you still have to overcome come odds just like Neji did in the Sasuke retrieval arc and Choji.
Absolutely 💯
the argument is that the odds are not in fact stacked against Naruto... which they aren't after og Naruto.
The odds aren’t against you when you’re ninja Jesus with hacks to get you out of tough spots. 😂
@@Dave3ohgood thing he wasn’t ninja Jesus.
It’s crazy how people like NCHammer are so quick and hell bent to undermine Naruto’s achievements with “well he had Kurama, or he had Uzumaki genes”
Dragon Ball is a story about surpassing your own limits and being the better person you were than yesterday. Guess who the main character of that story is? A super powered alien from outer space. By using NC’s logic, Goku was hard carried by his Saiyan genes. Sure, it was impressive that he trained to defeat Frieza but his Saiyan genes which granted him S-Cells allowed Goku to achieve a transformation so that is the real reason he won. Sure it was impressive that Goku was able to fight an elite like Vegeta with the Kaio-Ken But his Saiyan genes only made it possible. Tien should have been the main character of Dragon Ball because he personifies the themes of the series better than Goku.
It’s crazy how people don’t consider that both things can be true
Despite Goku being a super powered alien, he worked extremely hard to get to where he was today overcoming impossible obstacles(hell he even entrusted one to his own son) no disputes that.
Naruto may have Kurama, may be an Uzumaki, but it does not change the fact that he had no support system growing up, was hated by his own community, was the bottom of his class coming out of the academy, was constantly underestimated, was targeted because of the power he has, I can go on and list every single thing that was stacked against Naruto.
If Goku can be acknowledged as someone like that why not Naruto, the character that Goku obviously inspired. This fanbase is hypocritical.
Also Naruto IS NOT about Hard work. This theme was only explored in the Rock Lee fight. Watch every fight Naruto participated in and tell where the themes of Hard Work vs Talent come into play. The themes from the first chapter was always about overcoming hatred
Your naruto vs neji thematic breakdown at 3:00 is so wrong it's actually crazy. Neji does NOT want to "keep hinata down" to prove he should be able to accomplish more than her. Neji hates Hinata because to him, her fate is to be the leader of the clan because of the conditions of her birth. However he doesn't try and change that AT ALL because he accepts his fate as a branch family member. He takes out his anger on Hinata by trying to kill her, but he doesn't try to change his, or her fate for that matter. Neji's ENTIRE POINT is that Naruto's fate is to be a failure that accomplishes nothing, and there's nothing he can do to change that. He uses the example that his unchangeable fate is to be used as a sacrifice for the main family and again, that he didn't have a choice in the matter. And Naruto proves Neji wrong by overcoming the odds in their fight and winning, proving that no matter what fate someone might be born with, they can overcome the circumstances of their birth. To add to that, Neji's death brings this plot point full circle by CHOOSING to sacrifice himself for that same member of the main family that he once took his anger out on because he felt trapped in an unchangeable fate.
You literally got the entire plot of the fight and its themes wrong, I find that kind of wild.
Naruto's fate was to be the child of prophecy. He was always going to be great and Neji just couldn't see it.
@@alex52043 narutos fate wasnt to be the child of prophecy, jiraiyas fate was to train a child of prophecy. vastly different if u introspect on just that single line
@@VelocityEzz same outcome
@@VelocityEzz The subject of the prophecy is the child of prophecy, not the mentor of prophecy. Jiraiya's fate was centred around Naruto even more than Naruto's fate was centred around Jiraiya.
@@alex52043 and thats just wrong. the story blatantly blurts out Jiraiya's prophecy that he will train a child who can change the world for the better or worse and HE has to make a critical selection when the time comes (P.S his final moments also emphasize that)
It's HIS prophecy not naruto's. naruto proves himself that he is worthy to be the child of prophecy.
hell jiraiya wouldnt have even stayed in the village or trained him if naruto didnt go out of his way to make him do so.
all this is made much more clear when u see that naruto wasnt the only child of prophecy or the candidate to be it.
All ima say is it’s stated that Naruto’s training regime is due to his large chakra reserves not kuramas. It’s also stated that he would have even more chakra if so much of it wasnt being used to suppress the nine tails
I don't think that the fact Naruto isn't an underdog at the end of the series means he's not an underdog I general he had to work through hardships with no guarantees to capitalize on his talents without the hardwork in the og series he doesn't make it to the eventual endpoint.
Something that seems to be misunderstood is that Naruto's lineage isn't perceived in the same way to Japanese audiences. His mentors and parents are supposed to serve as evidence of his qualifications for the role as hokage, not to detract from his underdog status.
Honestly I think Minato being a prodigy ninja NOT from a notorious clan is more of an outlier than Naruto not inheriting any of his parents' techniques or skills.
The Naruto Chakra control thing that keeps getting mentioned in the first half of the video I believe is a "false memory" of episode 53 when Jiraiya removes the seal Orochimaru put on Naruto in the Forest of death which was making it hard but that was near the start of Forest of death to before Neji fight. Although I feel like their may be a mention of it being hard for Naruto to have good chakra control for low chakra things like clone jutsu because of his chakra pool size, something like hard to fill a tea cup with a fire hose, this may be head cannon not real cannon though but that is only for things that use a small amount of chakra not for things like rasengan that require significant amounts of chakra.
In the Jiraiya training, it is said that he has trouble molding Chakra because of the nine tails inside him.
The theme of naruto was never" Hard work overcomes natural talent" The theme of Naruto is NEVER GIVING UP , NEVER HIVING UP. Naruto repeats almost every single chapter. Never hiving up on becoming hokage, never giving up on Sasuke, never giving up on humanity, never giving up to hate and pain.
The Theme of naruto is never giving up
Thank you, exactly. It’s crazy that this guys channel is dedicated to Naruto and missed the whole point of the story. Swag broke it down perfectly.
@@jaybronx98he's always looking for a reason to push the Sakura is the true mc agenda
And the reason Naruto didn’t give up is because he had every advantage. Insane amounts of power he was born with/gifted. Wise and powerful Sensei and friends to lift him up. Plot armor. He didn’t overcome his obstacles through his will to never give up.
@ perfect example of someone who watched Naruto through reels. Last i checked, it was Naruto who mastered multi shadow clones along with the strategy on how to use them, not Kurama. It was Naruto who mastered the rasengan, not Kurama. It was Naruto who mastered sage mode, definitely not Kurama bc he didn’t even want Naruto using it. Naruto had to literally beat Kurama to master kcm and then later on befriend him and earn his trust completely.
All his accomplishments and techniques were overcame through HIM. Naruto had to earn those bonds and respect from everyone who was by his side along his journey just like any other shonen mc. Especially since he was hated most of his life with no one.
@@jaybronx98 He was only able to utilize shadow clones to the extent he does because of the massive amount of Uzumaki chakra he was born with. Kakashi said it himself Naruto is the only one who can train with shadow clones like that. And Kakashi was literally the one who gave him the idea of how to utilize shadow clones in training. And he only learned multi shadow clones in the first place because he stole the scroll of sealing because it was a forbidden jutsu.
Naruto was taught a step by step process on how to use the rasengan by one of the most famous and powerful shinobi ever. Not everyone had access to the knowledge of how to learn rasengan. How do you know that Sasuke or Sakura or Shikamaru or anyone else could’ve learned rasengan? They were never given the privilege of being taught it because they weren’t the child of Minato.
Same with sage mode. Naruto was only given the opportunity to learn it. And only because he already had massive chakra reserves.
And he also had a perfect jinchuriki to teach him how to become one himself. It’s not that hard to become a perfect jinchuriki, most of the jinchuriki we’be seen are.
Yes he accomplished all those things. I’m not saying he didn’t. But he had every advantage and cheat code. More than anyone.
@11:10 Naruto's chakra control was brought up multiple times, w/ the most notable being how Orochimaru's 5 trigrams seal interacted with Minato's 8 trigrams seal. Even before then Kakashi had discussed the amount of chakra that Naruto had being 4x that of himself, and when training for the rasengan he noted that Naruto was having to dedicate a lot of his chakra to combating the nine tails for control. The reason why Naruto can make 1000 shadow clones, but not walk up the tree is he's losing fine chakra control during his struggle w/ the ninetails, but can operate just fine when he's turning the fire hydrant of chakra on the kagebushin tech.
As others have pointed out, the core messaging of Naruto is not "Hardwork Beats Talent." It is the bonds that are built and not giving up on those bonds that more strength is found. Naruto shows that from beginning to end of the series, and Boruto is showing that continuation. Hardwork can lead to knew power and strength, Rock Lee with the gates, Naruto with the mastering of Sage Mode, Sakura with her medical ninjutsu just to name a few. But at the end of the day, bonds can overcome anything and leads to a new power not seen before. Shikamaru in the 4th Great Ninja War has every ninja around use a simple earth release to help combat the 10 tails, and it works. The 10 tails, nature energy itself, is beaten by lots of ninjas and the bonds that combine. I just think this video and your reaction is on an incorrect conclusion due to a wrong basis.
I love the arguments you made here nick. I love that you respect swags knowledge, but pick spots to respectfully disagree.
100 percent agree
Naruto is not about ''Hardwork over Natural Talent", that is more Rock Lee's forte, Naruto about "Defying your Predestined Fate" not being what People think You are, and overcoming it as such to become so much more than what's been decided for You, in other words as Naruto so blatantly put it, His Nindo, His Ninja Way is "I never give up and I never go back on my word!" which ties in perfectly as the other half of the theme of The entire Naruto Story
Naruto was never about underdogs triumphing over the gifted(especially by the Tsunade arc and onward). The whole, “hard work vs Natural talent”, debate was only a theme brought in the Chunin exams/Konoha crush arc, since the arc was so memorable by Rock Lee, Neji and Gaara. It was never the main theme but it’s one of the most compelling themes in the story because of Gaara, Naruto, Lee and Neji. Also Lee didn’t just open the gates through hard work it was how he discovered a way to open the gates early in a way no one else did before him.If we’re excluding Naruto’s power as a shinobi and talk about his status a shinobi before chapter 700 I’d say he was an underdog in that sense. He’s a kid who doesn’t understand nor agree with the ideology of the shinobi world and goes against the norm. He gets shut down for trying or being too idealistic but perseveres despite all odds(which is one of Naruto’s biggest themes).All the power ups he got by the end of the story only help amplify other Jutsus he already learned without Kuramas help(shadow clone, Rasengan, Sage Mode) and learned to incorporate it with most of his jutsus all in one. If Naruto just relied on Kurama like he’ did against Orochimaru he’d just be a feral animal. It’s the way he learned to evolve all his best jutsus which made the Kurama powerup seem absurd. The reason Naruto can’t do other jutus early in the story was because his chakra control was so bad. He couldn’t distribute it properly to where he couldn’t use other techniques such as genjutsu, etc. the shadow clone jutsu helped him expel the chakra in his body where it was a foundation for his control to get better. This is why Kakashi sent Ebisu to help Naruto fix this issue so he can expand his knowledge down the line. Another aspect as to what Naruto was so inept in the beginning was due to his home life. Naruto didn’t have a great upbringing and supportive figures witness him like parents to be with him all the time. It affected his motivation as a growing young man . The only thing he had was his desperate need to be acknowledged and dream to be Hokage because he thought it would give him what he wanted. He basically worked backwards trying do the most difficult things early to try to seem impressive. However this wasn’t effective since he has no basis on the foundations of the skills he needed to excel at. Which was him stunting his own progression without Kuramas supposed, manipulation. When Jiraiya was with him he gave Naruto what he desperately needed and it helped him become a more dedicated/adaptive individual when anything came his way in the future NCH is making it seem like Naruto accessing Kuramas chakra was easy when it really wasn’t. Once he got a better understanding of chakra control he was barely tapping into Kuramas powers. Also Naruto’s taijutsu was horrible in part 1 and 2. He doesn’t squabble with Sasuke he literally slams him in the ground and gets punk’d by seeing the conviction in Sasuke’s eyes. In most of his fights his taijutsu is so unrefined and gets no hits in and gets swatted away and dismantled(Sasuke, Kabuto, Rock Lee, Neji, Zabuza, Haku, Kakashi, Tsunade, etc). He only gets a hit in if it’s a strategic sneak attack. That’s why he always uses the shadow clones to compensate for his predictable unarmed combat. Whether it be combining the shadow clone jutsu with the rasengan to beat Kabuto, or using the reverse harem jutsu to land a blow against Kaguya to change the tide of the fight, the shadow shuriken in Zabuza, etc. In the end of the day Naruto pushed himself incredibly hard to be the man he set himself out to be all of his most important accomplishments outside of fights were him digging deep in himself to resolve issues. I didnt want to make this seem like a NCH smear campaign, I just had disagreements.
Exactly, idk how people still believe the core theme of the story was “hardwork beats talent” a subplot theme from the chunin exams mainly embodied by Lee. Naruto as a story has consistently been about never giving up despite your circumstances, overcoming hatred and being able to change your fate.
Yes THANK YOU
Also the basic training to open the first gate was something Neji and tenten also went through but the two of them failed at doing so unlike Lee,
your right these big creators change the narrative on everything
@ It also doesn’t help how polarizing the war saga was, which just increased the hatred and frustration by a lot.
Happy Birthday, Hinata 🤗
Happy birthday 🎂
Happy Birthday Hinata!
Happy birthday OG
Haku didn't try to kill Sasuke either, it was a lot of Senbon but Haku was too kind hearted, that was a big point of the story, and before Haku died they were encouraging Naruto to kill them and then said "looks like you missed your chance". 100% Haku was never going to kill Naruto.
"Hard work beats talent" is ONE part of ONE of Narutos themes. Unity, working together, communication, forgiveness, breaking of cycles, self improvement, Golden Path Buddhism, and several other concepts/topics people straight up ignore bc they apaprently cant read past "work > talent", something that was largely dropped by the 2nd half of the series
Also, the prophecy states he'll unite the beasts and beat a great calamity (aka: kaguya). Thats. It. Being an Uzumaki and a reincarnation and jinchuriki didnt stop him from nearly flunking out of the academy, lagging behind *sakura* for over half the series, struggling to even control his chakra, losing to Sasuke the first time, being orphaned, abused (physically and socially) by an *entire village*, having to fight in a war at 16, being nearly murdered multiple times, having to save the very village that abused him, and only being recognized by *anyone* as a person until after he saved them multiple times over.
But sure, he was "never an underdog"
Morally Naruto was an underdog, sure but never in strength or anything else for that matter. In fact there is one ideology that Naruto didn't beat and that was Madara's, that in which being peace was only accessible through essentially being stronger than anyone with any other opinions. Let's not forget that his talk no jutsu would not have worked if it wasn't for him getting himself into a situation where he could talk to them in the first place and in 99% of those situations he needed that very strength to back his own ideology otherwise they wouldn't have even considered a conversation let alone to change their mind, with all that strength essentially being possible due to a single jutsu carrying him through all the training in which is being the multi-shadow clone jutsu that he couldn't have used in any meaningful way if it wasn't for the Uzumaki genetics and chakra pool.
Naruto was morally speaking an underdog, but he was not the only character who would have wanted peace. Look at Konohamaru, he essentially held the same ideas in the series but in no way, shape or form would he have been able to achieve it. In fact there was only 3 characters in the entire series who could have achieved their morals and were guaranteed to, those being Kaguya, Madara and Naruto and the way they ALL had to achieve it was through force, its shounen fighting is a means to an end, the strongest has their ideology played out and it just so turns out that Naruto won and all that boils down to him being an Uzumaki with a tailed beast battery. Now that Naruto can't back that opinion up since he's "away" we see Shikamaru going against his ideology
You can't be more right@@molyneuxproject
Naruto was never an underdog in terms of his physical and natural strength.
All you have to say to prove naruto is a physical underdog too is compare him to hashima who has better biological gifts than naruto and still didnt break the cycle of hatred just like ashura couldnt naruto managed to do and save sasuke @@molyneuxproject
@MrA-dl6hh Hashirama has massive regeneration, wood release, large banks of chakra, a sage mode and high physical strength. Naruto also had almost every single one of those things too.
Regeneration = Kuruma
Wood release = he has it now (hashirama cells in his arm) but not in naruto
Chakra = Kuruma and Uzumaki genes
Sage mode = self explanatory
High physical strength = Uzumaki and kuruma.
They both also had the 5 releases plus yin and yang.
Naruto was essentially a 10 tails jinchuriki giving him access to a few more types like magma too, shown in the whole rasenshuriken barrage scene. He also had sage of 6 patch chakra and abilities, including the orbs he had that could destroy chakra, he could essentially revive people from deaths door, the only ninjas faster than naruto were ninjas with instant teleportation like minato and most of these abilities only disappeared in the final fight against sasuke when he lost his arm. AFTER anybody who could pose a threat to him was gone.
Hashirama was good, granted but the only people who could pose a threat to naruto series end before he lost his arm was Madara, Kaguya and Sasuke.
Hashirama and Kakashi are close but ultimately would have to get very lucky to win
I think swagkage is more correct in this because in part 1 Naruto his natural talent couldn’t be shown because he hadn’t worked hard enough to be able to use the natures talents and gifts so neji is all talent, lee is pretty much all hardwork and Naruto is both
Agreed 💯
@@flummy1692 facts
Naruto had no natural talent. The sage of Six paths literally confirms this in chapter 671.
@@BreezyDylan no "natural talent" but has more chakra than he could ever hope to use in Kurama, a body that heals itself super fast and has it's own vast chakra reserves from both sides of his family, definitely no "natural talent" XD.
@@kandihustty5610I think you could argue that’s a bit different. He was 1000% physically gifted but he literally had to smash his head into a wall in order to progress where others didn’t necessarily need to work as diligently to get the same progress. 1 example is him learning wind release and needing all those shadow clones to grasp it vs Sasuke pretty much coming out with fire release and learning lightning release.
Definition:
"An underdog is someone who isn't likely to win a competition or contest"
How tf u gonna watch all 700 episodes and not think je was the underdog
So, Swag did not mention the fact that it was Kurama's chakra that allowed Naruto to both escape Haku's demonic mirroring ice crystal whatever, and land a critical punch against Haku.
i mean he mentions how it helped him beat haku, i js assumed he also meant it being used for breaking thru the ice mirrors
You're missing swag's point. He's saying that it doesn't matter whether Naruto beat Haku or not because Haku refused to kill Naruto or Sasuke, and he would have sacrificed himself to save Zabuza no matter what course of actions Naruto decided to take.
@@keksis821 not exactly. Haku hesitated to deal a killing blow, but his attacks did intend to kill they were just not instant. He couldn’t bear to snuff out their lives by his own hands so he would bring his victims as close as possible, to assuage his guilt by leaving a possibility that they could be saved. But just because the possibility that emergency medical treatment could save them doesn’t mean that they’re not killing attacks especially since wiping out other allies would guarantee that would die so it was more of personal cowardice to not watch his victims die than an inability to kill them
@@keksis821 Unless Sasuke knew how to get out of the ice he was going to slowly die from the wounds and lost of blood
Jiraiya said it himself that the nine chakra was making it hard for him to control his own chakra which is why it took him so long to learn jutsu
21:00 right after he summons gamabunta he literally said “my hours of practice have finally paid off” and nothing in the moment shows any signs of the fox, no red eyes, no deep whiskers, not even a chakra outline so the idea the he can only summon him with the nine tails isn’t really back, the first time he summons him he did use the fox but we see him go up to the gate and little get the chakra from karamu and we don’t see that in the gara fight he bits his finger and summons him (slightly off screen cuz gara’s sand was coving him) but I if the implication was that he use karamu they would have shown something to indicate it; eyes, whiskers, chakra, or like they did the first show him go to the gate.
24:42 NC brings up that the reason haku left the fight to save zabuza and not because he didn’t want to fight Naruto I think is the point even if Naruto didn’t use the kurama’s chakra haku still would have left that fight to save zabuza even if he did used the chakra, also my comments are not hateful at all I enjoy NC’s videos but I agree with swag on this one 👍🏾
29:55 When Naruto was learning the rasenshuriken he 100%was not using karamu’s chakra that’s the whole reason Yamato was there to seal away any clones that started using it, so it’s fair to say his uzumaki chakra is way can do it but definitely not karamu’s. I personally believe that karamu is not why he can use the multi shadow clone but that’s my own thought but undeniably when he learn the rasenshuriken he was not using.
1:00:55 🤣🤣 we cannot all agree with that because I’ve watched NC’s breakdown of minato’s ons shot, and nothing Naruto did had anything to with how minato beat the nine tails, Naruto beats the him using sage mode, rasengan, and rasenshuriken all three of which he had no genetic or even skill advantages for I would even argue he had more disadvantages to use those abilities if minato wasn’t his father he would definitely be able to use these and nothing in the show even implies that’s minato had anything to with Naruto’s capability to use them.
**Kurama
@ sorry I don’t speak Japanese and forget I how to spell there names all the time
Even though Naruto isn't always the underdog, he has a way of turning all his disadvantages to eventually benefit him.
Whether it's utulising Kurama's power or even using talk no jutsu on a stronger opponent, these are things that mere genetics or being a reincarnation of Ashura cannot achieve without the characteristics of Naruto as an individual
Gotta get the popcorn for this one🍿
It wouldn't make sense for Naruto to remain an underdog. His aim is to become the hokage. His story is him progressing from being an underdog and earning his way to being the best.
Pain literally asked everyone he came across "Where is Naruto?" He was there for Naruto and Naruto alone. He fought Kakashi and Tsunade because they ran up on Pain, even though he was in their village. Don't bring hypotheticals into it like "it was bound to happen with or without Naruto." You mention Naruto being the MC multiple times, so him being the MC is why Pain attacks Konoha. Just saying.
Well, Nagato has a hatred for Konoha because his parents were killed by Konoha Shinobi for no reason and he views the wars fought in his land as conflicts started by the leaf. I bet Pain destroying the leaf was just because he wanted to
Yeah i think alot of nitpicking is done by nchammer here swags points are pretty solid and perfectly supported by the series itself and its time the naruto community evovles because we're stuck fighting each other if rock lee is a better mc than naruto while other fanfoms laugh at us like we're a bunch of retards.
Massive swag W
I have watched it this far (6:22) and i would like to say that, the main point is, that everyone is good at something. No one is an underdog. Even in real life.
Tell that to a person thats a vegetable.😅
Swag cooked, you guys just aren’t listening since you found nick first
A big thing I'd like to add to the "just because your parents are talented doesn't mean you will be." This can be true, however I feel like a more apt take-away would be that, it takes talent as well has hard work to be exceptional. I get the feeling that that is where Team Guy may have originated from. Neji is the poster child of exceptional talent, Lee is the definition of hard work. They are both very strong but incomplete, as it takes a combination of the two.
Can’t we just say he’s the child of prophecy BECAUSE of his hard work and dedication? Like every character has some talent about them that makes them unique expect Naruto. And because of the special way he was brought up (by having no one) he was able to fulfill the prophecy. He can still be the underdog and the chosen one at the same time
I have always felt that this was the case, even going so far as to _why_ he was a reincarnation of Asura. Being a reincarnate didn't just overwrite his failures and make him powerful regardless; if he didn't have his determination to never give up I think that Asura's chakra or spirit would have remained dormant or maybe even looked for someone else.
It's similar to the discussion with Neji about fate; if Naruto was simply fated to become Hokage then it wouldn't really matter what he did, things would work out and he would become hokage regardless. Even if it was fate, it only worked out because Naruto acted as though it wasn't fate, which is much like the sentiment that Neji reaches after that fight, that we can't know whether or not fate is fixed and maybe the endpoint is the same regardless, but things seem to work out better if you act like you can choose your destiny.
You're right it's just people not remembering because they watched naruto at a young age or people trying to push the rock lee agenda
Naruto’s clones are also so unique that he could also use Shadow Clones to gather nature chakra to instantly go into Sage mode mid fight with Pain. Kagebushin is a very versatile Jutsu.
If he didnt have kurama he wouldnt need the clones. He could have just stayed in sage Mode permenently with ma and pa
Naruto is a underdog in the same way Deku is an underdog, Both are born into bad circumstances (Naruto as an orphan who is looked down upon and abused for supposedly being the Nine Tails and Deku being born quirkless and looked down upon and bullied for it) both theoretically have the most OP powers in their verse (Deku with OFA, Naruto with his insane Chakra Pool and the Nine Tails) but neither of them know how to control it, but over the series, they both learn and grow and eventually are able to use their powers to become the strongest characters in their world
17:50 I thought I heard him talking about just healing and besides you're missing the important point that most of the Naruto haters (I know you aren't one) try to say that Naruto is nothing without Kurama. But there's an important thing Kakashi mentioned while rasenshuriken training in Shippuden that Naruto has about 4 times more chakra than him and if he wasn't suppressing the leaking chakra of Kurama he would've had about 100 times more than his chakra. Kurama's chakra is been only fully useful to Naruto after the events of KCM1,prior to that though it helped him a few times but also it held him back massively. Like in the fight with pain and literally every other big fights, we remember that Kurama helped him but we tend to forget the hindrances it caused prior to helping. Only if it didn't cause any hindrance ,there might not have been a situation till the war arch where help would be needed. But that's the story how their relationship improved, about how Naruto and Kurama became friends.
Yeah the predecessor was right on this one. We still love ya Nic. OG Swagkage got this
You're both right and wrong. Naruto was an underdog from both a power, societal and ideological aspect for most of the series. And he stops being an underdog of those things at certain points throughout the series. For me, Naruto was never meant to stay as the underdog because for the underdog trope to work, the hero needs to evolve past that and eventually achieve their goals. Naruto is an underdog in power due to his early life and his lazy ass teachers. He is an underdog in a societal sense because everyone hates him for having the Kyuubi inside him and because he didn't have parents or relatives around to help him, or even friends for that matter outside the ramen people. Naruto is an underdog in an ideological sense because Naruto's evolving beliefs and moral viewpoints are in direct opposition with how the shinobi world operates and he fights against that system all the time.
Naruto stops being the underdog and starts becoming the fully realized hero the world needs him to be after the conclusion of the Pein fight. He stops being an underdog in a power sense when he learns Sage Mode and eventually controls Kurama's power. He stops being an underdog in an ideological sense when he "talk no jutsu's" Nagato and effectively inherits the mantle of responsibility as it were when Nagato gives his life in exchange for the people of the village he has killed and leaves the hope of the future in Naruto's hands. He stops being an underdog from a societal sense when he returns to his village a hero and all the people literally cheer for him and even throw him up in the air like he's a rockstar.
The thing is that this was supposed to happen. Naruto cant stay the underdog forever otherwise he doesn't reach his goals because to achieve his goals he needs to ascend past that underdog role. This is how every underdog story plays out. Being the underdog is that long phase of trials and hardship the character needs to undergo in order to become the great hero the world needs to defeat the great evil and make the world all sunshine and sausages. So both Nick and Swag are right and wrong.
The point you're talking about at 16:04, about strong shinobi coming from strong parents is probably related to the fact that these strong parents trained their kids from a young age. I know both Kakashi's and Sasuke's parents died when they were really young, but they seemed to have been trained for more, and far better than the average shinobi of their age, when their parents were still alive. So saying Naruto is strong just because his parents were strong isn't that accurate. Sure, Naruto got the insane chakra pool of the Uzumakis, but no one ever trained him in the ways of the Uzumakis; he doesn't know any of the sealing jutsus that the Uzumakis are famous for. He was born with more chakra than others, but he had to train himself to actually make use of that chakra pool.
i think we’re all forgetting that naruto may have been destined to be the hero/savior but with his upbringing he had every reason to be the series’s main villain instead 😭 if the only consistent argument on this side is that he was predestined to be a hero because he has super god powers when literally his entire village hated him from the day he was born (largely because of Danzo) and he practically raised himself the first 12-13 years of his life since both his parents died (one of which was literally the HOKAGE) {which the village “didn’t know” he was Minato’s son by some impossible lapse in judgement} that exact same day + Hiruzen was just a terrible foster parent, then i think thats a bad argument. Naruto is literally famous for him telling/“talk-no-jutsu”-ing people who chose the villain path into seeing a better side of the world, and in a show with heavy emphasis on those exact emotions, i feel that is what makes someone an underdog in the context of Naruto’s overall story more than anything else, and characters like Naruto fit the description. He could’ve been evil, but he chose to prove the people around him wrong by achieving the highest position a leaf shinobi could attain that perfectly embodies the opposite of what the village believed him to be. him being a literal demigod certainly helped, but i wouldn’t say that made it any less of an uphill battle in a show about bonds, unity and working with the people around you to be better and achieve great things. Asura reincarnate or not, him and Sasuke are still both 2 sides of the same coin and their own separate people at that. Young Sasuke was no different to who Naruto grew up to be (kind, loving and hopeful) until his clan faced genocide, despite being the incarnation of Indra. So if that says anything about the Indra/Asura cycle, it’s that it clearly doesn’t completely determine who the incarnation becomes. that being said, i’m nowhere near as big of a Naruto nerd as Nick or Swag, these are just my two cents.
First
Nick should make videos where he breaks down older anime into seasonal synopsis videos on the weebcommander channel. I would watch him explain the plot of like individual seasons of almost any anime just going through the major plot points of each episode per season Endless content there.
You were not. It's clear to see the first comment was by hitting the newest tap in the comments. 😂🎉
Bro finally dropped the live reaction
Yes kakashi didn’t train in opening the 8 gates but he was trying hard as hell when he accidentally opened one gate Nick. He was training his ass off as a prodigy. Any other characterization is disingenuous and you know it
I think the best summary of this whole thing is:
Your lineage gives you your potential. You have to work hard and overcome challenges to draw out that potential. And even when you dont really have a potential for greatness, you can be the first person to break that barrier if you work even harder.
Naruto exemplifies the first very well, but Lee exemplifies the second more, which in a psychological way overshadows the first. Naruto does break his own limitations at times, but those can be viewed through the lenses of it just being latent potential that was already there.
Reincarnation doesnt mean anything till he meets hagaromo it didn't impact anything in the story till then. Naruto wasn't shit and had to train till unconscious for years.
i think naruto best represents themes centered around the idea that you shouldn't let circumstances define you or your actions. Staying true to your moral code (even when breaking it would almost certainly be self beneficial in the moment,) active pursuit of being a positive impact on the people around you, friend or otherwise, and most importantly, no one is too far gone to be saved or irreconcilable.
in all of those themes, naruto is constantly positioned as an underdog. from being an orphan that was hated his village, to the demon fox inside of him that BEGGED and clawed at Naruto to give in to his negative emotions. Naruto's chances of turning out okay were slim at best, let alone becoming someone who would positively impact the entire world in any meaningful way.
His moral code was constantly tested by the many antagonists of the story. The ninetails was a massive disadvantage in this respect, because while it offered power it practically always came at the cost of compromising on his morals in part one. one exception being neji where the ninetails chakra is used directly to reward his unwavering morals, and it is a cool flip thematically, and of course in shippuden we would see this naturally develop more and more. Another way it was a disadvantage is in the way that power corrupts individuals. something that we overlook because Naruto is the protagonist, and the protagonist isn't susceptible to corruption blah blah. I won't get into the many examples of when Naruto could've abused the ninetails power to obtain a favorable result rather than work tirelessly to earn said result on his own merits, but there are plenty.
I dont think i have to explain how hes an underdog when it comes to the theme of "no one is too far gone to be saved." he is forced to contend against some unimaginably heinous individuals that everyone else considers monsters, or simply "the enemy." Naruto was forced to confront these entities at their worst, and somehow cut through to their humanity with empathy. We're talking about mass murderers, war criminals, terrorists, assassins, etc. people who have long since discarded their humanity. Instead of doing the logical thing that everyone else does, and deem these people as evil irredeemable monsters, Naruto chooses the the impossible route of changing their entire outlook on the world to the point that they have no choice but to reconsider everything they've done up to that point in life. all as a kid / teenage orphan.
naruto was the underdog because he was meant to fail due to the reincarnation curse however he succeeded in the end where everyone else failed
One thing most people often overlook about Naruto is the problem of a writer. Kishimoto didn't plan out the story and Naruto's growth from the start. Otherwise there was a large chance to make Naruto an underdog without giving him ridiculous benefits of being Nine Tails Jinchuriki, Hokage's child, and Asura's reincarnation. The whole thing about Nine Tails Jinchuriki could be ignored because Naruto earned this power. He had to bear the hatred and loneliness of being a Jinchuriki while still maintaining a positive attitude to change the world, change his village and change the mindset of the people. Naruto defeated Nine Tails and earned KCM1. He reconciled with a beast that destroyed his village and made go through so much suffering. He and Nine Tails were not brothers but comrades who needed each other to survive during Fourth Great Ninja War. So, KCM2 was well earned. Kishimoto didn't need to make him Hokage's son. There would be some changes he had to make in order to give Naruto a bigger Chakra Reserves but you could do it with the help of Eight Trigrams Seal. You don't need to be an Uzumaki to become a Jinchuriki. It will less stable but it will work. It will also give Naruto a real reason to suppress Nine Tails and continue to get stronger on his own. Finally, Hagoromo was able to come to the real world despite being dead. He can still give Naruto his powers to defeat Kaguya because of his Ironclad Will to never give up. Remember, Naruto is still the same Naruto who befriended Tailed Beasts, brought the Ninja Alliance together, and become the rival to Sasuke. The only difference was that Sasuke received Hagoromo's blessing because of his lineage while Naruto received it because of action. It would perfectly portray Naruto's character as an underdog while still having a legitimate reason to improve his strength. Naruto will have a slight disadvantage of not having Uzumaki bloodline but it can be covered up by focusing on Naruto's personal growth until he learns Sage Mode instead of focusing to control Nine Tails' Chakra.
29:56 if Naruto made 100 clones but had 50 of them sleep for him and then undo those clones would be feel more rested?
Maybe 25% more rested cause each shadow clones halves from the original pool of chakra
Since the start of Naruto, Naruto never was the best at anything. Hence making him the underdog. It wasn't until he started focusing on his training and getting skills. This is the definition of an underdog, regardless of his underlying potential. Even when he reached certain levels of power upgrades, he still faced opponents stronger than him, this is what makes underdogs. When it comes to sports the underdog is the team that technically shouldn't win. Just like the story of Naruto and his opponents. Stop reaching Nick, this is like when you used to say you were the top 3 knowledgeable people in the world when it comes to Naruto, when you would just get information from quora and reddit like everybody else.
I feel like you are conflating "talent" with "potential" Naruto's massive chakra pool and Tailed Beast gives him the greatest potential of any character in the series but he had to work much harder than any other characters to realize that potential. Sasuke learned the Chidori within a month from learning his chakra nature to completing mastering the psuedo Rasengan while only having the chakra to use the Chidori thrice a day, Naruto took a relatively long time to learn both the Rasengan and the his chakra nature while cheating by not having to wait for chakra recovery and eventually the shadow clone cheat but still the only thing that Naruto has going for him power wise is his massive chakra pool. Which while being genetic Naruto's Chakra Pool is not what made him a strong Ninja, the thousands of hours using every bit of it did.
The manga panels and maybe the anime (I can't remember) show Sasuke was hit in vital spots, but I especially remember Kakashi saying that Haku specifically avoided hitting Sasuke in any critical way.
Swagkage sure does like to use headcanon in his arguments a lot
Naruto’s tutors totally gave him an advantage, specially Jiriya. If he wasn’t narutos teacher he never would have gone to train with the toads to learn sage mode, which is what let him take on Kuruma.
Generations before the events of Naruto happened Black Zetsu manipulated all of ninja history. And Naruto before birth was predestined to be the world’s greatest hero. Naruto (unknowingly) is the child of one of the most genius ninjas ever. The moment a child Naruto gets a scroll to properly teach him ninjutsu he perfects a Jonin level technique in 1 day while also having a disadvantage with chakra control thanks to the nine tails. Naruto was never an underdog. He was just presented as one in the beginning of the story.
Why would Zetsu make the one who was going defeat him into what he is now?
@Asteriarimia read his comment again he didn't say that
Agreed!! But I do think Boruto is the real child of prophecy sadly
If Naruto really had the predisposition you say, why did he struggle to learn all the other techniques he learned? Why didnt it take a single night for him to create a stable Rasengan? Why didnt it take a single night for him to create the Rasen-shuriken? is it possible youre talking out of your asshole?
Y’all need to stop talking about Naruto. It’s clear most people who watched Naruto don’t understand what the story is about. Naruto is about ending the Cycle of Hatred, and persevering despite of your circumstances. Actually watch Swag’s video, and pay attention then I hope people will stop pushing this nonsense. The hardwork vs natural talent theme is present mostly during the Chunin Exams. Even Hagoromo, Orochimaru, and Jiraiya support what Swag’s saying Naruto isn’t gifted nor does he have all these advantages like y’all would have people believing.
i believe the reason why naruto had trouble with chakra control earlier was because some of chakra was being used to suppress the nine tails hence it became a hindrance for easy chakra control
Kurama has been an issue in the teaching naruto with alot of ninjutsu. It wasn't until he somehow perfected the shadow clones after merely reading a scroll. Pervy sage even says how much kurama effected his Chakra control by leaking out nine tails energy. And kurama even says this. Why are you making arguments that are easily proven at least 2 times in the naruto series and plenty more in naruto shippuden. I think I need to switch to swakage and watch him instead lol
Boruto debunk that fate exist in Naruto, stay mad Rock Lee glazer
Kurama should TOTALLY have a badass Genjutsu to pull from. He is literally Chakra, his control should be unparalleled.
Nick showing once more that he hasn't watched the show/manga bc the core theme of Naruto is never giving up.
All the others are sub themes that apply to specific arcs, or specific chunks of the Naruto franchise.
He may not always been an under dog, but he has never given up, and its been a core idea of his character since chapter 1.
Swag prolly put weeks of effort into research for this video and Nick ripped it straight from the dome in a stream. That’s actually wild
i mean that would be wild if nick was right, but he isnt
@@AiLearning-oh7mp but he is right
1. this plagueofgripes guy, really kicked off a never ending discusion...
so for starters, it's a story with 700 chapters, just in its main continuity.
in such a long story, goals change, same as motivations.
naruto starts off as the underdog, probably to learn to not rely on gifts too much, and rely on things inside of his control.
once he beat neji, the underdog plot is already over. he earned his gifted status by perseveering, even with the odds all stacked against him.
he also had to go trough that phase, to become the best version of himself, or the most fitting one for the job.
all following "states" up to the mary sue thing in the end, are accolades he gets from conquering his destiny.
a destiny which menma in a movie showed, wasn't guaranteed. same as naruto says when he meets gara, and learned about his story. just one bad moment, could've set him up for becoming a tool for kurama back when he was just a giant ball of anger basiclly.
to me, that whole underdog schtick was never the whole story. just alone the zabusa story, quickly turned into what the story is mostly about.
allies and how to keep them. staying friends, cause friends are important, mmmmkay?
learning the value of life, and how to protect it, would be a way better description of the real underlying message which ties way more arcs together, than that whole underdog yapping, that is kinda a big gripe for me.
naruto earned all those accolades, cause he kept a mostly straight line, with his ninja way, something established super early, not much later than naruto having some issues, cause he literally had no guidance, which the 3rd probably did, cause he knew that he's the chosen one, and would need a ingrained moral compass. basiclly 4D chess. coddling him would've probably had the oposite effect.
one of my friends liked naruto a lot when it kicked off, back when it seemed like it's just a gritty story, and he started to despise it, as soon as the friendship plot popped up. which is kinda hillarious cause he LOVES LOVES LOVES one piece.
same way this plagueofgripes dude, talks about examples where other shows get a free pass, cause they speak to him more, and he suddenly becomes defensive about it.
it's kinda tiresome to get sucked into a discusion which completly misses the mark of the show, which is positive growth, and solving conflict with the best outcome for as many ppl as possible.
so as you can see, i kinda filtered out a few more story beats which were there from basiclly the start, which this gigantic story is about.
and in a story which has some good amount of focus, on many characters, means that the story will carry many messages on its sleeve, some more vital, some less, and some which are there to be OVERCOME.
naruto overcomes them all. the fact he's blond which is associated with delinquancy in japan, is probably a choice made not just cause of the inspiration of goku, but to show that even a delinquent, can overexceed all expectations.
and this goes hand in hand with the part where all the adults hate naruto, cause they expected kurama to strike any day, cause naruto was living his deliquancy, and set expectations accordingly. the fact that he never outgrows his blond hair, shows that at heart, he stays that lil bubbele with a heart full of mischief, cause his mischief was never meant in bad spirit.
i'm currently writing a story which focuses on the love of 2 ppl, which spans around 1400 pages, and almost as many words as the lord of the rings has. and even i have a tiebreaker in the middle, where everything changes, cause i want a certain outcome.
i of course have the priviledge, that i don't need to draw anything in addition, and only draw with words. this means i have already conconted up the whole roadmap, where we have to go, like around chapter 3, cause it layed everything out, and gave me an idea, what i want to say with my story.
mangas rarely work that way. a great example is guyver, which had multiple hiatuses, and some weird super success, combined with no success at all. the man could barely really plan out something, cause for some moments it seemed like he'll conquer the world, but then the manga had moderate success at best, but he had 2 hecking hollywood movies, before most of the world besides france and japan even knew what dragon ball or mangas/animes are, and had 2 short but amazingly animated anime shows, with a manga which for some reason, couldn't grab the audience as much, probably because outside of the animations and the films, ppl didn't have easy access to the whole show, in its drawn read format.
continues in my own comments. letter limitations, gotta love social media. how dare you want to say soemthing longer.
2. i even already have prequel and sequel plans for my story, cause just suddenly stumbling over my idea, with an untapped well, which kinda mesk it super original, took me just like 3 sleepless nights of thinking about it. once i was halfway done with writing it down which takes the most time for me, i already had multiple i can't sleep moments in bed where i was thinking about the back story, and the future, and how to expand it.
if i also had to draw it, and write in hecking kanji, i would've never had the time to be so, nonchalant about going above and beyond.
i just have to write, and then jiraya showed naruto a spinning ball of chakra, and told him that he will one day, make this tecnique his own, not knowing he tought it to iraya in the first place.
i guess as a mangaka with a serialized story, especially in that era where it was expected to be weekly, they just didn't have the time to just ponder a whole night instead of sleeping. also, for soem reason, i was born with ADHD and OCD, and somehow, conconcting up stories comes super natural to me, it's just the executing which takes a lot out of me. i already have like 15 pending ideas for my future books, and luckily, only one other one of the ideas, is gonna end up in a trilogy. and i also have an end of life plan for a further trilogy, all other can be oneshot novels.
and funnily enough, learning that i actually had a talent for writing, didn't really come easily to me. it was a real udnerdog situation as my life was shit, my parents were old when they got me, and i was kinda all by myself, cause love is not easily shown among my peers.
i wrote paragraphs with ex girlfriends in positive and negative situations, same as with flings.
before that, back when pencil were the norm for writing, i sucked at it, because i have a saukralle, which is german for, a pigclaw. basiclly my hand writing could be mixed up with physician handwriting. that held me back, and made most teachers ignore that i already at a young age, excelled especially in creative writing.
first teacher that aknowledged it, only aknowledged it cause i was literally fronting him for his boring way of teaching. the set goal was write a short 2 page story in 45 minutes. i wrote a 5 page, horror epic, set up like a nightmare, which ended with me, throwing myself out of the window, cause i was stuck in a, basiclly genjutsu before genjutsus existed, in which the teacher bored me to tears for multiple days.
so basiclly being stuck in a boring version of itachis mangekyo ability.
i wrote the ending so hillariously, that a teacher which openly told me he hated me, and that i will never become someone, gave me kudos.
but it still took 13 additional years of writing short messages with chicks that i wanted to bonk or love, until i realized, i don't like writing with them, i actually just enjoy writing, aslong as i'm not held back by paper, pencils or writing machines, which all lack the backspace option, cause the way i write, is so unorderly, if i lack a backspace, my OCD goes haywire if i have to look at my own handwriting.
so, basiclly i live in the naruto story. i have talents, things which hold me back, i actually am moreso an underdog cause of the circumstances, and it takes me forever to catch up with the time i lost, cause the circumstances often made me doubt myself, often with malicious intent. society i my kurama.
and just in that lil explanation, i have proven that other ppl are essential to life, having good relations are important, the part where you're an underdog, will pass if you do your do dilligence, and back your talent up with effort, and that i don't feel like and underdog anymore, it's moreso that i have baggage which i need to get rid of, to get myself back into the way i can write most profciently, which is currently not possible if my apartment, cause i hate it here, and i've been basiclly stuck living in places which i hate, for 10 years now, cause the city i live in has a never ending sshortage of living space problem, cause it's a big pharma city, and i don't have the balls to move away from here, and all my friends live here, and i'm 40, disabled, and still in a state of beating my traumas into submission, on my mission to become the next j.k rowling, but with a lot more grit XD
once i have success and dosh, i will move away from here in a blink, but for now, safest bet is to find a place here.
and this part of my story, is basiclly my madara/obito in my story.
that's the thing in long running shows like life. it's only so interesting, cause the states and goals change over time.
that is also why bleach kinda, can't really keep up with naruto or dragon ball. the evolution is moreso surface level. the character is seemingly stuck in the same conundrum for almost 3 quarters of the beginning, till the end with weizen (also, i bingewatched the whole show up to the point were ichigo beats the big bad and looses his powers, maybe the manga handles the tpics better, but the show really didn't make me want to read the manga, so i don't know, if the planned ending, actually lead to betterment, but point still stands, ichigo takes forever to really change his mindset and goals).
i guess what i'm trying to say is, stories which span a whole life time, can't be discused in such a boxed up format.
the goal with naruto having kurama in him, was probably always that he becomes a shinobi deity, kishi just wanted to show us, that even if your road is made of gold, that it takes effort to walk a very long road, cause that road ent trough multiple rosegardens, and every rose, has it's torns. and naruto had to walk trough those, and keep his spirit up. not giving him gifts as rewards for fighting trough the torns, would defeat the purpose, of him learning to use those gifts for good.
and there was only one person which naruto didn't even try to talk no jutsu at all, and that was kaguya, cause he probably had some underlying anger, to see madara become a mere chessfigure, in someone elses long game, which never showed its cards, until it was too late.
so we trully just had one iredeemable person in the whole show, which was a deity herself.
ho boi, got a bit carried away with this one. eh, good training excercise, and a way to show myself, that i can get back into the writing spirit, as soon as i got trough my rose bush, cause i may get an apatment, which i actually could love, which could finally remove the last roadblock i need, to sore to the skies.
so yeah, reducing this giant story, just on naruto being an underdog, is kinda cheap. the story is so much more, just laone the fact that every gift can be a curse, kurama, the sharingan being born out of ppl which love way too hard, so hard that it messes with their physiological truth, even more anchors of what the story is really about.
maybe that's why asuke is so reserved, cause he's affraid of it, since he knows the truth about the uchia powers now. his daughter feels so hard for boruto and her own dad, that she awakens a perfect mangekyio, without having to lightbuld a siblings eyes into her own sockets.
the gist of that could very well be that she's not affraid to feel this intense for someone, something which she's the first uchia to be able to do, and this then in turn, ties into sakuras road, cause she was always a hopeless romantic, that wasn't affraid to love sasuke with every ounce of her being.
maaaaaaaaaaaaan, the subtext in this story. i feel like this is one of the real anchors of naruto, it's an insanely, expansive analysis of the human experience, with flashy superpowers on top.
which is hillarious when you think about what inspired it, a show about the pursuit of power with dragon ball.
akira defintly was a god when it came to selling you an actual pretty basic concept, with so much style, that there is no escaping it.
eh, if you made it this far, thank you for coming to my TED talk (no jutsu)
He had so manny disatvantages. And the only atvantage he had, that was also a downside, is his amount of chakra. And evan that made him incapable of using most jutsus in the begining of the series. Naruto cant use a bunch of jutsus, because his large amounts of chakra, make it way harder for him to mold it correctly. The only jutsu this doesnt happen with though is, the shadow clone jutsu. Thats why he spams it so much. And its the thing, that he uses to get past his disatvantages slowly. He isnt able to do the rasengan because of his chakra controlability. So he uses a clone to get close to the utility of a normal rasengan although his need for the clone does make it worce than the normal one. Then he does the same thing with the shadow clones to control the big ball rasengan. He also ,thanks to kurama, cant use ma and pa for endless sage mode, which is the reason he uses the inferior clone charges system. which leaves him open when he needs a new charge and can also run out. He also used the clones to learn his chakra natur, which isnt as hard for others as it is for him. Here he also uses it to make the rasenshuriken. This is finaly when his hardwork and talent in one single thing, pays of and gets him an atvantage over others. Now he has to use all the abilities he had aquired to defeat kurama and lose him as a hindurance and gain him as an advantage. He got all his abilities threw hard work and using the one thing he is good at, to surpass others. As swag said.
karama effected his chakra control . he was constantly having to use his chakra to keep karama at bay. without knowing of course
-never happened
(the kid naruto point is also just utra disingenous, do u expect him to never grow? stay a disabled lump of meat with a heartbeat? and a lot of the issues he had carried over as he grew while many of them he actively had to work to beat)
The Kakashi point is just disingenous. Saying that he didn't train on it and that Lee only hardworked his way through it is just mostly wrong, nor is it made out that anyone can open the 8 gates. Even the suicide corps is a small bunch of people who recieved the knowledge on the gates as the 4th generation and by people who had already mastered them and were considered genius in that area.
Naruto isnt a genjutsu type, thats just it, chakra control doesnt fully equate to genjutsu especially when his chakra was being messed up until he befriended kurama. the only naruto you could see performing genjutsu is at 19 years old by the time his chakra has the retraints removed and he has had time and experience to have that ability, other wise he CAN use genjutsu but through summonings.
as for kurama, yes it does hamper his chakra, kakashi even reiterated that point during his rasenshuriken time, just like how throughout the series we saw that was the case, and how much stronger he was able to get when his pools got the restraint removed or even when kurama decided to not mess with him when he was fighting madara...
by the time guy approached lee, which is basically when he was a young academy kid, he basically didnt have to train on other aspects and brute force on taijutsu by THE BEST TAIJUTSU master
SWAG's point wasnt that naruto killing haku didnt mean that kurama didnt help, his point was that kurama coming out didnt change the outcome at all, naruto would have lived, sasuke would have *probably* lived, haku would have died yada yada. the cutting up and pausing was also kinda of manipulating a bit of what swag was trying to convey
How can you have a genetic propensity for fighting biju. That's like passing down the ability to skip rocks perfectly
That's wtf I was asking
Yeah no, the point of Kurama messing with Naruto's early chakra control has been brought up, I can't remember by who either Kakashi or jiraiya, and maybe an anime throw away line, but swag has that correct. And like, it is correct, for a child he has such a large chakra pool that trying to control fine input/outputs of it is really difficult due to kurama's chakra leaking out adding to his probably already impressive base pool of chakra. Like trying to move 1kg a mm Vs 50kg a mm, it'll be easier to move the 1kg without overcompensating. Hence when Naruto first did the multishadowclone jutsu he made tons cause he just couldn't hold back/be chakra efficient.
Naruto is more than just an underdog
Sad to say, but Swags right on this one dude. And you didnt evan actualy discuss enything of value
11:07 i think the idea of Kurama messing with Naruto's Chakra comes from Jiraiya saying something to the effect that Naruto isn't using his Chakra correctly, he has more than he realizes, and even more when you factor in the Nail Tails, and essentially he can kind of just blunt force justu to work if he pours his massive energy into it. But I also don't have a massively successful Naruto RUclips, so I might be wrong
I thought underdogs at some point are supposed to overcome being the underdog and start getting w’s
Naruto is a story about ending the cycle of hatred
29:4 8ut Naruto lost his control over Kurama even in the training
I'll preface this with saying I directly disagree with your idea of Naruto being Hard Work v Talent. Naruto is shown working just as hard as the "more talented" Sasuke yet they both grow basically the same amount (succeeding in tree walking) as early as the Land of Waves.
It also has the distinct showing that no matter how hard someone works they won't always achieve their goals. It straight up showed this in Gaara v Lee
I feel like making a manga where the main character is perfectly and underdog is impossible. They're the main character which means that for the story to be satisfying they're certain to attain their goals.
The only time Talent vs. Hard work is a story driving plot point is Chunin exams which happens after this and focuses mainly on Lee.
I'll probably edit this over the course of my reaction
Kakashi 100% knows how hard Lee has worked. He's best friends with Gai and given Gai has been teaching Lee how to open the gates then Kakashi certainly made an accurate assumption on how hard he's training. The thing though? He said "no amount of mere hard work would be able to accomplish that" as in if Lee truly had zero talent he could work 10 times as hard and still not achieve that. Also for your point on the sui cide corps, finding people who have a talent allowing them to learn the gates doesn't mean anyone putting in effort can do it, just that Lee knew how to find people with the talent to do it (especially given how it's likely a majority of people couldn't learn it and dropped out for more reasons than just being unable to put the effort in).
On how Kurama negatively affecting INaruto's control l'd assume swag used facts to make inferences. Naruto in Shippuden is blatantly still unable to use the clone justu in spite of all his training which gives the implication that something is preventing him from properly using his chakra that way. The other thing is how when he befriends Kurama a lot of his control based problems vanish, most specifically his ability to create the rasengan with one hand
For swag's comment on Kurama's power getting him closer to being Hokage that's more in Naruto's mind. In his eyes the Hokage is the strongest person around who everyone respects. He doesn't get the view of respect first, Hokage second until quite a bit later. So as far as Naruto would think Kurama's power would tangibly get him closer to the power needed to be Hokage
His whole reason for talking about Kurama and how Naruto's use of it is wrong is just a rebuttal to the idea that Kurama was an advantage to Naruto when it not only wasn't an advantage but was a disadvantage until Naruto earned the power through hard work
It is indeed the yang half of Kurama but his point is that Yang is by virtue more agressive than the Yin half especially given Minato was able to befriend Yin.
I feel you're just distinctly wrong on powerful ninjas come from powerful ninjas. Yes, genetics do exist in Naruto to pass on talent but you neither need a powerful parent to become powerful, 2 of 3 Sannin don't have parents who were ever suggested to be super strong, and then there's Sakura who's parents are straight up civilians I'm pretty sure, nor are you destined to become ultra powerful with powerful parents, Asuma is and A-level jonin born to the strongest of all living Kage. Just because it is extremely common doesn't make it a rule
The point that a select few don't singlehandedly shape history is completely true. Swag goes into this but without the help of countless other people there would've been no way for things to get to that fight. While Team 7 and Kaguya's fight may have decided how the world would go so did countless other things with other people. Saying that only those people shaped history because of them being the ones in that fight is dumb. It's like saying only Madara and Hashirama matter in all of the history of Shinobi villages because they are the first two to make one
Being child of prophecy I'm pretty sure is just "bring about a great change" not bring peace. His goal for the great change just happened to be peace. In fact "great change" is a very weak fate in comparison to what Naruto wants to do because things like creating Ninjutsu from Ninshu or the creation of the Hidden Villages were both "great change"
For the expecting a lot of himself it's less that he has an ego believing that he will become that and more he feels he needs to do that. Swag is saying he has way more determination than anyone would be expected to.
For the forbidden scroll he learns it almost immediately and can do it effectively because of genes and Kurama. That's an immediate showing of talent directly opposing the fact that you think he was meant to be a showing of pure hard work
1:37:48 this specifically is the thing that I agree with the most. Naruto's story was about how anyone can change the world if they try hard enough. It's an underdog story of someone who wants to flip the world on its head because he disagrees with the way the world works. Anyone regardless of level of talent or amount of hardwork will be an underdog in that story because that takes way more than power.
While you point out that power is required to be able to Talk No Justu you're only half right. People can be born good speakers but 99% of the time Naruto Talk No Jutsu's someone is because of how he was born. He was hated so he developed empathy for those who are suffering. Empathy isn't a skill that can be developed by training or hard work.
The talk about what people Talk No Jutsu'd did was meant to be an example of how many crazy things happened as a result of Naruto and how those trying to accomplish even one of those things would make you a massive underdog yet Naruto did them all. Also showing how many of Naruto's success required much more than power that came as a result of his privilege and natural talent.
By Hashirama having significantly better gifts he probably means the extremely busted Wood Release.
End of video: I disagree with you on your particular belief on the main message of naruto but I did enjoy your video and the counterpoints that you brought up because a lot of them were true.
I just personally feel Hard Work beats Talent as a message is just impossible to argue for because it would only ever be true if Talent doesn't work hard which would cause the characters to less entertaining because it requires the mc to be the only hard worker.
gotta love the "Orochimaru was unable to use his arms vs naruto" followed immediately by the clip of him using his arms to summon the three Rashōmon Gates.
Swags take saying lee was a genius lost me. Lee was just determined and had to work 3 times harder to get on par with neji and saskue
Technically Kakashi said that. And prefaced it by saying Lee was achieving things that you wouldn't be able to do by just working hard
Acting as if sasuke and neji didn't work hard as well lol. Lee is literally a genius, if Kakashi says so then he is.
Thank you for this reaction lol, genuinely mean it and completely agree.
bro why is this in 720p?
I LOVE THIS VIDEO PLZ NICK MAKE MORE
I think you can look at it either way. I think that he was conceived as an underdog character and certainly was presented that way early in the story. But once he started to unlock 9 Tails powers, sage powers, and then it was revealed that he was the son of the Fourth Hokage, and also a reincarnation of the heir to the Sage of Six Paths, he could never be an underdog.
I mean naruto was never really about hard work overcoming things.
Hell naruto himself in the first few chapters yeah I slept through any of the hard classes in the academy but also mastered a B rank(also A rank) in the shadow clone Justu in a day despite straight up having slept through the classes on what is chakra which would probably have helped him with learning stuff
Honestly the Chunin exams is the best example of this with both Rock Lee Vs Garra and Naruto Vs Neji.
Rock Lee the poster child of hard work works(even if he was the only one of the three of him, Neji and Tenten who succeeded in the first gate training that Guy made them all do) Vs Garra the person with basically the sand control power he was given and forced to master by having assassin try to kill him but does have an Auto defense. Garra wins that Fight so Talent Beats Hard work.
Neji the one who spends a month training with Tenten to become a better fighter and prepare to fight naruto and the rest vs the person who basically learned how to summon(which he doesn’t use), a bit of chakra control and how to access nine tail power at will(aka going hey nine tails lend me power). So once again Talent beats hard work.
Well more tailed beasts laugh at hard work.
This whole discussion is akin to real life. A lot of people arguee that meritocracy isn't real because there are rich kids and all, while others arguee that it's not like that because even if a parent pay for a better school, the kid still has to try very hard to achieve things. And both sides are kinda right. Yeah, having privileges don't garantee your future and you still have to try hard, but at the same time, the more privileges someone has, more he can achieve with less work, while someone with no privileges, sometimes won't achieve anything for lack of opportunity.
Everyone thinks the Ninetails messes with Narutos Chakra because when Jiraya is looking at the seal he notices there's a second seal, placed by Orochimaru. Orochimarus seal is what was messing with Narutos chakra, Minato made the 8 trigram seal to where Kurumas chakra slowly leaks out to help Naruto. The seal was designed to help Naruto control Kurumas chakra, why would it allow Kuruma to mess up Naruto?
It seems like swagkage is trying to say that Naruto is always an underdog because Kurama doesn't help Naruto on his goal to becoming Hokage (his stated want). Being an underdog in his ultimate goal does not mean he is an underdog in the overall story though. He slowly stops being the underdog throughout the series.
This is a great video to start while at the gym. Over an hour long workout and I'm still not done!
Seeing two titans of the Naruto fandom like this is something I’ve only dreamt about up to this point.
Get him nick , how you say no beef then debunk 95% of his video . I’m hyped for a 1 hour + video … how’s your editor feel 😂😂😂
Crazy how he can make a live stream sound like a normal youtube video
Naruto is not about hard work beat talent
11:13 I remember it being said that Naruto's chakra control was bad because he had too much chakra. It could just be his Uzumaki lineage, but you can also interpret as the kyuubi being a problem there. Still, in Shippuden he pretty much had gotten over it completely.
17:34 also, even if wasn't literally regeneration, Kurama is a big reason why Naruto is so resistant, in every fight, he takes a lot of damage, and if he hadn't any healing factor, he would be knocked out way faster.
sigh... hard work beats talent is a basic level of understanding of the series and it is correct. HOWEVER. the more correct understanding is that not only hard work, but the ability to create connectinos and have strong enough bonds with more people helps solve more problems than it creates. Naruto never killed anyone. Naruto always tried his best to befriend the pepole he encountered minus kakuzu. From start to finish he did this. That is not something an ordinary person who works hard can accomplish. Naruto may not have had to put the hours in to being strong that lee did, but lee also never put anything into person to person interactions.The dude was always punching or kicking a tree/rock. The dude never communicated with someone outside his team. He didnt understand the delicate balance between peace and war. Not how naruto did. Please stop giving him AND SAKURA for those few of you.... so much credit for the MC position.
29:55 it was 3 because he was edo tensei and he was trying to suppress the nine tails as well
Lee was a ln example of a great underdog. Could do nothing with ninjursu or genjutsu and was only barely okay with taijutsu. Then he met Guy who helped him learn to become a taijutsu master. It was his extreme dedication and hard work that allowed him to become such an extreme powerhouse. All Guy did was direct that dedication and tenacity toward a goal worthy of someone who works so hard