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Rating: 8.7/10

Impressions:

So Naruto and co. have finally left to seek out Gaara, which means things should start heating up soon. The pace still hasn’t changed much, but seeing as how we’re getting to an interesting part of the story, the pace should be less obvious than usual. However, if all the upcoming fights end up something like Gaara vs Deidara (long and drawn out), that will be very boring indeed. Anyway, I look forward seeing Naruto, Kakashi and Sakura fight in the future, though for the moment it would be Sakura’s tag team battle that has my highest interest. Quality has improved as well, which I believe should hold for some time at least.

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Popularity: 15% [?]

Rating: 8.6/10

Impressions:

Sakura has certainly proved to be quite impressive with her medical skills, thanks to Tsunade. She still has her battle abilities to show off (hopefully in the near future—the pace of the anime is still not looking too good). The same goes for Naruto, who has been quite useless up until now. This is the problem with dragging out things, it brings in excessive amounts of one idea and neglects another. At the moment, I just want to see the results of Naruto’s training properly, and perhaps in a few years, see Naruto further his abilities and develop ‘that’. Actually, maybe it’s just the horrible pacing that’s getting to me.

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Popularity: 12% [?]

Rating: 8.4/10

Impressions:

Naruto’s sense of justice and companionship is a bit too extreme in my opinion. Yes, he’s childhood means that he would probably feel this way, but the theme has been recurring too often and is getting rather old. On the other hand, he is definitely stronger now, which at least means he has some power to fulfil his desires to help others now. Speaking of getting stronger, Sakura’s healing abilities have been superb and it’ll be fun watching her in action next episode. I’m probably most interested in Sakura’s increased abilities at the moment since she hasn’t really been depicted as such a strong character before.

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Popularity: 16% [?]

Rating: 8.2/10

Impressions:

Even though Naruto at this point is still tedious and dragged out, this episode does have a slightly faster pace, covering some three chapters of the manga (though this is again a double episode). Also this is quite irrelevant, but I have to mention that I really like the scene of when Sakura was small, hiding behind someone’s legs. Knowing how Sakura usually looks like a man or worse, this nice little scene could well have been accidental, only an accident which turned out cute. xD Ah, if Sakura was actually cute, I might mike Naruto a lot more…hmm that does go to say my lack of interest in Naruto as well.

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Popularity: 23% [?]

Rating: 7.8/10

Impressions:

The one major reason I am being extremely put off from watching this show is the crazy slow pace. Only one chapter is covered over these two episodes. That’s just insanely bad if you ask me. Everything is dragged on so much it makes me want to just skip a few scenes every two minutes. Amazingly, if Naruto Shippuden manages to cover only half a chapter each episode, it will never catch up to the manga. But by doing this, it will probably destroy its fanbase. I would much rather just read the manga; the images look better and the pace would obviously be faster.

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Popularity: 17% [?]

Rating: 8/10

Impressions:

So this week we get the conclusion/aftermath of the bell test as well as a cliffhanger ending for Gaara and his fight with Deidara. The pacing is still rather slow, though it’s finally sped up at least. The quality is much higher as well now, and I don’t understand why the producers didn’t animate the first few episodes like this as well. Anyway, I really think the Gaara fight was dragged out far too long. By the end of it, it had become tedious and repetitive. I generally dislike fighting between controlled objects/monsters, and this was no exception (sand vs clay). Next episode will hopefully see some faster pacing!

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Popularity: 46% [?]

Rating: 8/10

Impressions:

Although this episode comprises of two really dragged out fights, it’s a lot better than the previous episodes. The quality is definitely higher, and the music is integrated better. What amazes me though, is that so far the anime has only covers two manga chapters (that’s 4 episodes to 2 chapters). I wonder how long the series will progress this unbelievably slow for. It’s so dragged out it’s almost filler-like. I doubt many fans would like to see Naruto this way. Like last time, I still think it’s better to go through the chapters at normal speed, then finish off this season when it gets to a major turning point in the story. When the manga gets enough ground, a third season can start.

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Popularity: 42% [?]

Rating: 7.5/10

Impressions:

I’ve decided to not include manga screens in Naruto posts, as I’m sure plenty of you already do read the manga. This is also due to the fact that I don’t like the show enough to bother with extra work in posts. This episode really drags out too much and is so incredibly boring and draining, EVEN THOUGH I watched it at 2x speed. There realy needs to be a helluva lot more music here and there. There are far too many pauses and silences, and none of this is to develop any characters or anything. It’s just plain stretching of the plot. I think many Naruto fans will be disappointed with this sequel, unless the quality improves soon.

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Popularity: 30% [?]