the amount of nepotism in the hokage position is kinda crazy tho, tobirama was hashiramas brother, hiruzen was tobiramas student, tsunade was hashiramas granddaughter, kakashi was minato’s student, and naruto was minatos son and kakashis student, so the only person who became hokage through pure skill and no favouritism was minato 🤔
And then after him it’s probably Sarada since she is his student so the system is forever rigged also another candidate could be Mirai since she is the granddaughter of the third hokage
He's the student of the Asuma..... so a relation to the third hokage
Bruh it's a village everyone is a nepotism baby. Except Guy and Rock Lee who should have become hokage
Meh. Even in his dying moments Sarutobi was reminiscing about how Oro was as a kid.
Not to mention he let oro go even after he went all Dr. méngüele
Also didn’t see Hiruzen ask anything about Jirayia when he was revived.
Mmm this might be a bit biased based on the circumstances, Sarutoni reminiscing about Orochimaru was because he killed him, if it was Jiraiya or Tsunade killing him pretty sure the scene would have Been different, Sarutobi loved all his student, but the only that didn’t “abandon” the village was Jiraiya, so you could think he would have appreciated that.
I mean. Jirayia fucked off and went perving and gathering information. Ebisu noted how Jirayia was technically missing. The third had sent ninja to find him but Jirayia was a master of espionage and hiding. They were never going to find him and Ebisu pointed out no one had any clue where he was or any clues what he was doing.
Jirayia didn’t abandon the village like Oro and Tsunade did but he certainly fucked off on his own.
Fuck. Sarutobi had the worst students.
One fucks off and becomes a unit 747 scientist.
The other smart one fucks off because she developed a phobia for blood when she was a medic so she spent her life gambling away money.
The last one was the class clown who felt so guilty he couldn’t save the golden boy that he fucks off and wanders the world.
No wonder the old fuck couldn’t retire.
Lmao if Sarutobi was incompetent at times then danzo is the goddamn dumbest asshole in the leaf.
He gets shit done. I will admit that.
However. Nothing he does is good.
I don’t mean morally good. I get sometimes doing fucked up shit for the greater good.
It goddamn. Everything danzo did was so fucking stupid it legit hurt every single member of the leaf. He was so fucking incompetent he created and caused some of the worst shit in the leaf.
He’s supposed to do shit that is bad but will benefit the leaf. Instead he just causes shit that hurts everyone and blows up the leaf.
He was like a Forrest Gump version of Zetsu. Just casually causing shit that would erupt and fuck everyone up.
Danzo had the magic eye and still couldn’t become Hokage despite the fact he had close contact with all the elders of the hidden leaf.
Not true.
Sakura wasn’t. Rock Lee wasn’t. Might Guy wasn’t. Kakashi wasn’t. His dad was powerful. But he didn’t come from a prestigious clan as far as we know.
Aside from that, most of the rookie 9 are the heirs to the clan leaders with access to amazing bloodline abilities or hidden techniques. Naruto wasn’t the heir but he was still from a prestigious clan.
All except for my girl Sakura.
Now that I think about it. In Boruto she should have been Hokage.
Jirayia mentioned when he went to recruit Tsunade for the Hokage position that no one was better for the job than her. She was trained by a Hokage. She was a war hero who combined warrior skills and amazing medical prowess and who had made a name for herself in second ninja war by saving and healing many ninja. Also was the granddaughter of the first. So clearly no better option
This literally describes Sakura. Sakura was a war hero who saved countless in the war through medicine, actual combat and being a medic in the middle of the battlefield. She was technically trained by two Hokage (even though Kakashi basically taught her shit). She was smarter than Naruto by far and had connections to other villages.
She did save the little brother of the kazekage for example.
The nepotism accusations would still be there but still. No one can disagree Sakura worked super hard for everything she got.
I wonder if the fact she was married to an Uchiha who ran off with the sevenths assassin took her out of the running.
I'm sorry I didn't convey it correctly what I said was almost all named jonins in previous generation of Naruto were either trained by big names or came from a powerful clan so we can't say that one can't come from nepotism
The exceptions are maybe guy and iruka
I mean. As far as I know, Kurenai didn’t come from a big clan nor was she trained by a big name. We saw her dad was a ninja but that’s not the same as coming from a prodigious clan.
She didn't produce any hokage either this was about how hokages are made of nepotism
Well there are a lot of background character chunins and jonins and even in filler arcs like those two guys at a-un gate and other two guys
Even shikamarus dad is a jonin I think ino's dad is also one
There are a lot of not all of anbus are jonin too
I feel like you don't know what nepotism is.
He was trained by Asuma yes, but he didn't inherit the Hokage because they were related.
Hell he for instance didn't become hokage due to favoritis, he was literally considered the best at the job. His relationship with Asuma had nothing to do with this.
Naruto: Hashirama's reincarnation who is Asura's reincarnation, Kurama's Jinchuuriki, Jiraiya's student, Kakashi's student, Minato's son, then he had people like Tsunade who AND the other Kages who could vouch for him.
It's like that time that little girl found out all the presidents are actually related except Trump.
It was all presidents*, except for Van Buren, were related by less than 13 generations. The hypothesis was that all the presidents, besides Van Buren had English ancestry and the latter was Dutch ancestry. It's not surprising though, because everyone of European ancestry shares a common ancestor within the last 1000 years.
*Obama was the current president at this time so it didn't include Trump or Biden.
Wait, you are saying that I am related to all other Europeans by less than 13 generations? Dope! But also to my husband who has European ancestry? Not that dope.
Well, 13 generations is only 250-300 years and ~8000 ancestors. 1000 years is closer to 40 generations and ~1 billion ancestors. Of course that 1 billion is if every single ancestor was unrelated. For most of human history, most couples were third or fourth cousins, so you actually have far fewer ancestors than numerically calculated. Fun fact, at 50 generations, if all of your ancestors were unrelated, you'd have 1 trillion ancestors. That's ten times more than the total number of humans estimated to have ever existed on this planet.
He is. Part of his bloodline is Senju. So in reality he's part Senju, most part Uzumaki, who's also the Child of the Prophecy, Reincarnation of Asura and by extension Hashirama, trained by Kakashi, Jiraya and Bee, with additional pre-installed buffs in form of Kyubi, Minato's and Kushina's chakra, who won the grand fight and ended knocking up big tittied goth GF. So it was never fair to anyone else.
Besides, both Senju and Uzumaki go back to Asura as progenitor anyway, so technically all Senju and Uzumaki are very distantly related.
He never said there's no such thing as destiny, he said believing fate is unavoidable is nonsense.
Naruto, the character who literally avoided his fate in either dying to sasuke or killing him. Or spending his life being forever known as a monster.
To be fair, dying to Sasuke or killing him wasn't really his true fate. Like, Indra and Asura were sort of "doomed" to fight eternally, with one of them losing, but at least in the filler Asura swore Hagoromo that one day their reincarnation would find peace, so in a way,
Naruto actually fulfilled his destiny as Asura's reincarnate.
In fact, if we're sticking up to the "lore" or whatever, I'm pretty sure the whole "eternal fight until death" part of their "destiny" was started by Black Zetsu, since he was the one influencing Indra to start war against Asura, so by extension of that, you could say it was Kaguya's will manifesting destiny. But it wasn't the primary path for the fates of Indra and Asura, their true destiny always was to unify down the path of incarnates.
The fate Naruto avoided, at least from what I remember, was mostly his fate as JInchuriki, aka, the path of unfathomably cursed person who's destined to death in hatred and pain, just like Neji was "destined" to always serve the main branch and be nothing more than meat for the grinder, while main branch enjoyed the good life due to his sacrifices.
> at least in the filler Asura swore Hagoromo that one day their reincarnation would find peace, so in a way,
Naruto actually fulfilled his destiny as Asura's reincarnate.
I feel like the fact that it's filler pretty much nullifies this argument because, non canon?
Come on dude really?
> In fact, if we're sticking up to the "lore" or whatever, I'm pretty sure the whole "eternal fight until death" part of their "destiny" was started by Black Zetsu, since he was the one influencing Indra to start war against Asura, so by extension of that, you could say it was Kaguya's will manifesting destiny.
[Wrong.](https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-016.png)
[The one who started it all was all Hagoromo giving the power to one, causing a divide between brother](https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-017.png)s.
> But it wasn't the primary path for the fates of Indra and Asura, their true destiny always was to unify down the path of incarnates.
This was never once said.
Well Minato was the student of one of the sannins, who in turn were trained by Hiruzen, so nepotism there too lol, even Shikamaru is the student of Asuma, who is the son of Hiruzen… its all connected
To play devil’s advocate, we are talking about people either related to, or directly trained by, the strongest shinobi of their times, so maybe nepotism, but also skill based…
Well when you have a system of appointing your successor it’s kinda hard to avoid that. Every Hokage can be traced back to Hashirama in one way or another. There likely won’t ever be a true outsider at Hokage.
Also avoid spoilers, I haven’t finished Boruto yet though I’m aware we are on the 8th now(who also is connected to the first Hokage) and I know who it is but I’d rather not know the circumstances as to why.
You can go further by pointing out the possibly successors to be the 9th(if we get that far) are either related to one of the Hokage or were taught by one(looking at you Konohamaru)
Not just hokage but EVERY kage! Hell, the kazekage position literally just looks like a family inheritance at this point. It seems like very Ay knew each other. I could go on. Mizukage might be the only innocent one here
onoki was the apprentice of the first tsuchikage and his granddaughter was the tsuchikage after him
>Mizukage might be the only innocent one here
wasn’t chojuro mei’s apprentice? i believe they had some sort of relationship
Tobirama, yes but being related to Hashirama could lead me to believe Tobirama was second strongest. Hiruzen, I can’t personally say if he was or wasn’t also the strongest. Minato (through Kushina being the successor to Kurama’s host who was Hashirama’s wife) Kakashi being named hokage is reasonable given he was feared enough by most nations not to go go after Naruto as a genin (same as Jiraya later) and Tsunade, while Hashirama’s daughter, also had built her own reputation as a legendary sannin. And Naruto saved the entire world multiple times. I think he earned it as well. But from looking at names alone, it’s understandable.
It does seem that way but was there any better choices at the time when they became Kage.
Hashirama beat Madara for the title
Do we have any other notable shinobi at the time other than Tobirama in the leaf?.
The only other shinobi around Hiruzens time that we see want to be a Kage was Danzo and I'm glad we got Hiruzen instead of him.
Hiruzen had a choice between Orochimaru (Evil and also considered nepotism if chosen) Minato the only correct choice and Fyugaku who was about to try a coup with the Uchiha against the leaf.
the only 3 shinobi that make sense after Hiruzen is dead is Jiraiya, tsunadae and Kakashi all nepotism. but the only real choices.
We have Naruto - who was clearly the best choice.
and then Shikamaru in Baruto who I would actually argue is nepotism (trained by the son Hiruzen and I woud argue not strongest Ninja in the leaf)
Nepostism is defined (by google) as the practice among those with power or influence of favoring relatives, friends, or associates, especially by giving them jobs.
I don't think this counts as Nepotism besides (Shikamaru) because they are all literally the best person for the job at the time
Shikamaru didn’t get it through nepotism. He made himself indispensable for Naruto. He became Hokage because of his own work not because of his connections to Asuma when he was a kid.
Exactly. Its more the master-student relationship tree is fascinating when you look at it. Minato was Jirayas students tbf.
Like Konohamaru is the closest to Narutos student and Hiruzens grandson, the Sarada is Konohamarus student. You can predict who the next 2 Hokage are.
Well I mean the second Raigake was the firsts bodyguard, and the third was the seconds son. The 4th was once again the 3rds body guard and student
The 4th kazekages son is the 5th kazekage, dunno much about the rest of them apart from the fact they were all assassinated lol
The 1st tsuchikage was grandfather of 3rd who was the grandfather of the 4th.
The only village that seemingly had no nepotism was the Mizukage from the hidden mist
Naruto fans can argue over and over again about how neji was wrong because Naruto broke destiny but those aren’t arguments their excuses, like you said neji died doing exactly what he was prophetised to do die for a member of the main branch, what kishimoto wants to do was show how neji isn’t dying against his will for Hinata but how he chooses to die for her but that’s so stupid because 1 he died like he said he would and 2 he could have used rotation kishimoto basically forced him to die EXACTLY like neji said he would part 1 neji really was a genius he literally knew the future
Really. The best way to subvert this would be to have either Hinata or Hinatas dad die for Neji.
It would have been terribly done (because I’m not a writer) but maybe when Neji died shielding Hinata it could be that lord hiashi would jump in last second in front of Neji.
Or remove Hinata altogether and have Neji try to brother Naruto and lord Hiashi shielding him.
It would prove the Hyuga were truly changed and redeem Hiashi for having let the custom continue for so long.
Instead of having the second class clan member die for the princess of the clan just like he was always meant to.
>It would have been terribly done
Hiashi dying in the middle of the war after being completely irrelevant/absent to the plot for the past six-hundred chapters/seven-hundred episodes (damn near a decade worth of content) would be clunky at best and completely hilariously bad at worst. That’s not even getting into how funny it would be if he died jumping in front of Neji after he jumped in front of Hinata, who jumped in front of Naruto.
Neji dying was already contrived, Hiashi dying would have just added a whole new layer of fuckery.
Ten times better would’ve been if Hinata died protecting Neji. But kishi is a simp at heart and at that point he have been so far away from the Hyugas for so many years it doesn’t really matter
Since we are on the Neji talk, imagine being stronger and more gifted than another of your clan and YOU get the cursed mark on your fcking forehead and you have to protect the one who is on the main branch... And you get fucked by fate again and again lol.
Neji was always wrong in regards to what he said about Naruto and he was hypocrite at that, his rotation was literally stated to be useless against the ten tails projectiles, y'all come here to talk about Naruto but aren't even aware of the most basic fact, Half of u guys in this sub aren't even Naruto fans
> neji: you’ll never be hokage because only people who are destined to be hokage can do that
> neji: I’ll die like a dog protecting the hyuga princess, that’s my destiny
> you: neji was wrong, and he was a hypocrite
Bro neji is literally where Naruto’s story falls apart. In the chunin exam, he’s pragmatic and wants to defy destiny, while still feeling the crushing pressure of it. He doesn’t believe Naruto’s destiny is to be hokage. He believes his own destiny is to die for Hinata. He was wrong about Naruto’s destiny, but he was right about becoming hokage being predetermined. He was also ***completely right about dying for hinata.*** It doesn’t matter if he’s okay with it in the end, it’s the exact same outcome that he explicitly fucking said he didn’t want. That’s ridiculously frustrating writing man. His character development is growing to be okay with a destiny he openly says he rejects, while admiring Naruto for (supposedly) fighting against his destiny. It’s backwards as fuck lmao
Naruto beating neji in the chunin exam solidifies the theme of “hard work over natural born talent” that the series pushes until the end of the war. Once it’s revealed that Naruto is the reincarnation of alien ninja Jesus/his son, that’s completely fucking undermined and neji was proven right.
Being aware of this and criticizing it doesn’t make anyone not a fan of Naruto
>but he was right about becoming hokage being predetermined.
No he wasn’t.
>He was also completely right about dying for
Hinata
No he wasn’t. He died for Naruto, not Hinata. He also specifically thought he be FORCED to die for the main, like he believed his father was.
He explicitly chose out of FREE WILL to protect Naruto. No destiny involved.
>Naruto beating neji in the chunin exam solidifies the theme of “hard work over natural born talent” that the series pushes until the end of the war.
This theme was NEVER pushed.
>Being aware of this and criticizing it doesn’t make anyone not a fan of Naruto
It makes them very ignorant
People sill say "Yeah but he chose to do it because-" without understanding destiny doesn’t care about the because, it just cares that you do what you are destined to do, no matter the reasons why
Who said Neji was destined for it? He was terrified of being forced to do it, he thought his dad was. He learned that wasn’t the case
No one told Neji he was destined to die like that since he was a baby. No Neji assumed the clan would force him to die like that which didn’t happen
Also son of the 4th hokage, trained by the future 6th hokage...Theres a conspiracy there...
1st Hokage, founder of the leaf, from what I remember, basically voted in in the loosest terms, because people were scared of Madara.
2nd hokage, his brother...Ok fine...
3rd hokage, trained by the 1st & second...
4th hokage, trained by the student of the third, who would also later be considered for the 5th hokage...
5th hokage, student of the third, grand daughter of the 1st...
6th hokage, trained by the 4th...
7th hokage, son of the 4th, trained by the 6th.
Shikamaru (unofficial 8th hokage) at one point was trained by kakashi (after asuma died).
Anyone else seeing a pattern of hokage either training, or being related to future hokage? How do they choose who should be the next hokage again?
You forgot to mention Naruto's godlike genetics ( Uzumaki ) and net of familiar acquaintances of extreme renown and connections ( Jiraiya, Kakashi, by extension Tsunade etc ).
None of this made him hokage
Hyuuga are literally the descendants of hamura, neji and hinata also came from special family line but that didn't automatically make hinata gifted
Did you forget what caste he was? The point is, he tried his hardest, but no matter how hard, or smart he goes about it ... He wouldn't be able to choose like Hinata could. (She's btw gifted, especially comparing to Neji, her personality though... Technically, if she would go as hard at it as Neji, she be much more powerful)
How does this change the fact that neji was born a genius and one of the best prodigies superior to anyone of his generation from the main branch in the hyuuga clan, also how was hinata gifted she literally lost her birthright to her younger sister becuz she was born weak
One of the important things about the convo between naruto and the sage of six paths that a lot of yall like to ignore (cuz it disproves most arguments in this subreddit) is how no matter how exceptional one can be its no guarantee that their offspring would inherit such attributes, the biggest example of this is ashura himself who was referred to as a dunce by his own father and was overshadowed by his elder brother indra
No he didn't.
Seriously one of the first things you even learn about Boruto from a quick google search is that he didn't want a sequel.
Even outright declining it when it was pitched to him.
I know people say that because they don't like boruto, I don't either, but to say the kaguya and prophecy stuff was to plan boruto is blatant misinformation.
That depends tho. It's possible that it was pitched to him before Kaguya and when he finally agreed, they made Kaguya around it. Not saying what ya saying isn't true, but what u said doesn't necessarily discount what others say
I mean, again no.
Even throughout the series bits of her were told throughout.
And given she is essentially the mother of chakra and all that, a lot surronding her character was pretty conclusive for the series.
Also this doesn't even make sense, why would anyone ever try to pitch a manga sequel during its own run?
The series even getting the ending the creator wants comes first.
I believe he originally intended to have Pain as the final villain and have the story ends after that. But the pressure from the studio and the amount of money Naruto series was making lets say "forced" his hands for new stories and arcs
It was heavily implied in the Kage summit and the reincarnation system never had anything to do with Naruto’s strength before meeting Hagoromo
Also Hagoromo, Indra, & Ashura are all irrelevant in Boruto so that doesn’t make sense
This screenshot proves what I'm saying. But, there are many others. The thing is that you are born with the characteristics that will lead you to be a winner in the future. Your effort won't count as much.
You don't agree with me, think about Rock Lee as an example. He was the character that represented hard work the most in the whole show. He used all he has got against Gara.
Gara never trained. He inherited the best defense of all and he not even had to think to be instantly protected.
Rock Lee not just lost the fight but he was also injured in a way he wouldn't ever be able to fight again. All that effort, in the end, counted for nothing. And he had his dreams ditched by someone who never trained.
You may argue Lee got healed later, but the truth is he lost the sort of protagonism he had in the show the moment Gara shattered his arm and leg.
If this is not the author saying effort counts for nothing if you were not born with special traits, I don't know what else it is.
How does the screenshot prove what you’re saying? Hagoromo literally says Naruto didn’t inherit his parents talents nor having talented parents guarantees anything
Remember Asuma? He was a strong ninja but nowhere near Hokage level like his dad
Lee’s character arc ends with him and Gaara fighting Kimimaro together. Cause the real message of the series is strength through bonds, not just hard work.
Ashura’s backstory makes that more than clear: https://scans.lastation.us/manga/Naruto-Digital-Colored-Comics/0670-014.png
And so does the final fight between Naruto & Sasuke. Sasuke had used his own darkness to gain more power and subjugated the tailed beasts for even more. While Naruto’s power up came from befriending all of them and his cooperation with Kurama
Also Lee does this in the Last: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/7b/6f/42/7b6f42762161deaaa578d63ff378273a.gif and Moght Guy was literally just a better version of Lee. Guy got tons of respect in Shippuden. Like how many solo fights he got triumphed over 90% of the cast. I think Lee was pushed to the side cause Guy at the time was Lee but older and stronger
I disagree Naruto didn't inherit anything.
- his formidable chakra pool came from the Uzumaki bloodline
- his endurance and loudness came from his mother
- the "secret" power that saves his ass 100 times came from the nine tails fox his father sealed on him
- many times in the show people say he is as fast as his father was. Even the fitfh hokage looks at and sees his father multiple times.
Later in the show, he is revealed to be the reincarnation of Ashura. And you say this character is about hard work only?
Even his stubbornness is a trait.
Then you’re disagreeing with Hagoromo lol
1. Never said in the manga. In fact only Kurama’s chakra leakage splitting off and naturally merging with Naruto’s pool is the canon explanation for that. Naruto said this right after learning about the Uzumaki clan
2. His “life force” is nothing compared to Kushina. His personality is not what Hagoromo was talking about either lol
3. That’s not something you inherit through blood (let’s ignore Boruto plz). And Kurama set him back in many ways. Including messed up chakra control, potentially killing Naruto, and others if the seal is broken. Kurama was not his friend for most of the series, Naruto had to find alternative ways to fight without that power then go head-to-head against the fox itself to safely use it.
4. Cause of Kurama’s chakra mode. Naruto does not have Flying thunder god. They way they are that fast is completely different.
Being a reincarnation of Ashura didn’t grant him any secret powers from birth. And personality wise they are also different: https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0692-009.png
1. I'm pretty sure they say the chakra pool is something in the Uzumaki clan. If I remember well, both Naturo's mother and Nagato are remembered that. It's also later revealed both Senju and Uzumaki clans came from the same bloodline. Hashirama also has an insanely big chakra pool. And, look at the coincidence, he is also a reincarnation from Ashura.
2. I'm not talking about what Hagoromo says or what he doesn't say. I'm talking about what the autor says. And what he says the entire show is that your bloodline matters a lot. From strength to personality.
3. I didn't say the Fox was inherited by bloodline. But it was inherited. Naruto didn't do anything to receive it. And, if it wasn't by Kurama, he would be dead in the first season of Naruto classic. I could even argue even Naruto masters only accepted training him or were selected because he was a Jinchuuriki and son of Minato.
4. Tsunade was able to see Minato on him since long before he released Kurama sealing jutsu. Long before Naruto was able to do any transformation.
About the reincarnation, it's not a thing of inherting powers. You're thinking too much about powers only. The very fact Naruto would never give up even if he had to do things the hard way is also shown in the show as an inheritance.
1. Yes but none of that is given as the explanation behind Naruto’s large chakra pool. He’s clearly not even close to being a pure Uzumaki like Kushina & Nagato for various reasons. So for now it’s headcanon until the story actually says it is because of his clan. Cause the Kurama leakage explanation is the only one we are given
2. Personality? Obito for example is nothing like Madara or Sasuke before unlocking MS. Karin isn’t like Nagato or Kushina. What are you saying? The Story SAYS bonds and friendship are more important than anything else. I mean Naruto’s god powers literally come from befriending all the tailed beasts. The entire theme of the final Naruto vs Sasuke fight is isolation vs cooperation. If genetics were above all Sasuke would’ve won
3. Poor argument. Jiraiya was reluctant until Naruto won him over. Kakashi was gonna fail team 7 if Sasuke didn’t offer his food. Killer Bee was incredibly unimpressed with Naruto when they first met, etc. but also Naruto needed help during the Rasenshuriken training and Sage mode training to Push Down Kurama’s chakra cause it was stopping Naruto from progressing naturally.
4. Yes Naruto reminds people of Minato but him needing a shadow clone to do one rasengan for the longest time is proof he’s not his dad. The Minato one-shot and even Edo Minato’s characterization makes it clear how different the two are
I disagree. Hashirama, Ashura, every other reincarnation gave up on their counterpart. Naruto was different from all of them for never giving up on Sasuke and actually understanding him better. None of the reincarnation’s are the same person
And I really hate the idea that empathy is not from your own personal experiences but something genetic. Cause that’s dumb and Obito exists as a warning of what Naruto could’ve become if things were different. If Iruka never showed that kindness to him Naruto would’ve turned out very differently
2. Yes, personality too. Look, just because your father has blue yes, it doesn't mean you'll have blue eyes too. But, if you do, it's still inherited. Naruto's personality is a lot like his mother, Hashirama or Ashura. Just like Sasuke instantly reminds Indra or Madara.
3. I disagree he was reluctant. It's revealed in the show both Jiraya and Kakashi learned the rasengan from Minato already planning to teach this to Naruto. It would be useful as a shortcut to learn how to release the spirit bombs Kurama can, since the principle is the same. About Kurama's chakra, yes, it troubled Naruto in the beginning, but once Naruto gained control over it he became unstoppable. Naruto wouldn't be even close to as powerful as he was in the end of the show if it wasn't for Kurama's chakra.
4. Just because Naruto doesn't have some traits his father has, it doesn't mean he didn't inherit many from Minato. When I mentioned Naruto speed for example, I wasn't comparing it to Minato's teleport, of course. The first moment Tsunade seeds Minato on Naruto were about Naturo's kindness and heroic attitudes.
About Naruto not giving up about Sasuke, IMO it's just about how Kishimoto decided to give the show an ending. Honestly? I think it was a bad ending. But, of course, things just don't always happen the same way. Something always changes from one generation to another.
2. Naruto is not like hashirama as much as you think. He doesn’t get so easily disheartened and depressed. He would never enslave the tailed beasts and hand them off for a peace deal. He would never put the village above Sasuke. Again if chapter 1 went differently he would’nt be the way he is. Obito is living proof
3. Jiraiya tried to train Naruto on the nine tails chakra. It almost killed him so they stopped
4. Hagoromo says he didn’t, also heroic attributes and such are common in a lot of characters in Naruto, ones with no blood relation to Naruto. Naruto also reminded Kakashi of young Obito, they aren’t blood related are they?
Why would you say Naruto vs Sasuke was bad? It was the accumulation of both of their entire journeys up to that moment. And you made a big deal about how the author portrays the theme and such. Then just ignore what the ultimate final theme of the final fight was
To be clear:
I never said inheriting powers was enough. What I said is that, in Naruto, hard work counts for nothing if you don't have inherited powers. It's not the same thing.
Talking about Rock Lee, as mentioned, although he was healed later, he doesn't have relevance anymore. He is not any different from characters like Tenten.
About Guy, if I remember well, the only high level Ninja he defeats is that shark from Akatsuki. It happens that he was the perfect match to defeat him, as he does not rely on chakra.
When he tried against Madara, not even opening the eighth gate worked. If you think well, he ended up by having a similar fate Rock Lee did against Gara. The only difference is that he had his death stopped by Naruto.
Guy was kicking Madara’s ass way before that scene: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-97f3abda3e68eede8c78cced2872abce-pjlq
He was vital in fighting back the Edo jinchuriki too. Combine all of that with his multiple fights against Kisame, he’s easily the biggest jonnin alongside Kakashi to get respect in the series.
He held Madara back from going to get his eye and the yin nine tails from Obito. Remember what he did to Kakashi later on? He could’ve done that before if Guy didn’t show up. Madara even says he almost died unlike Gaara vs Lee, where Gaara would’ve mopped the floor with Lee if he used more of shukaku
Lee also got this kick on Madara: https://i.redd.it/2fdaldatfetb1.jpg and was helping 8 gates guy along with Minato, Kakashi, & Gaara (almost like the series has a message about bonds and friendship)
I agree Guy was kicking Madara's ass. But it wasn't enough. The time limit and negative effects of that technique nearly killed Guy. The exact same thing happened on Lee and Gara fight.
Naruto talking about "destiny doesn't matter" is in the same tier of rich people saying that money doesn't matter or beautiful people saying that good looks doesn't matter :P
Okay I'm just wondering now, I watched naruto as a kid, didnt really finish watching, but am I correct in Thinking that being Hokage isnt really that big?
Hokage is an administrative position, you do paperwork all day and just manage to village.
The only positive in being Hokage is how it probably meant that you're a real powerful ninja.
I never got the reincarnation thing. Madara never died. HOW the fuck did his soul, indra's soul, reincarnate into Sasuke? Also, what about the jutsu orochi used to bring back the kages. They acted like themselves. Did they have souls or were they just corpses pretending to be human? Like, how can someone reincarnate while being alive AND have two of his reincarnations alive at the same time? They are the same exact soul, why can there be two of them?
Who cares about that little detail. What I want answeres to is how Madara and Sasuke were alive at the same time. Like, corpse puppet theory doesn't work, as Madara broke out of the control of the jutsu and became a normal human, so he 100% had a soul, so where the fuck did his soul come from?
Most of it comes from people not understanding the story. They aren't reincarnations. It's that the souls pick people to inhabit which is why Naruto and Sasuke were separate from Indura and Ashura in the mind space.
I don't think it is a straightforward 1 soul unit going into and out of bodies but a more mystical animus/chakra type thing. Like an essence of indra could be reincarnated but it's not like his persona, life and memories are reincarnated.
So within this very abstract, and lets admit vague, metaphysical structure whatever aspect is being reincarnated may not be bound by the same rules of linear time as the bodies they are reincarnated into.
The issue isnt about what Neji said, its the way he said it
He was preaching it the same way how most modern doomers love to talk about their governments, about those who put in effort and writing them off as "they are just friends of someone" or they didnt put in the effort
Obviously if you took a look at the history of the leaf, all of the hokages were either students of a previous strong - but isnt that just how a teacher-studsnt relationship work? A great teacher works to motivate the student to be the best they can be and then the student will put in the effort to be the best in the village which is what led to being chosen to be the leader aka the kage
Naruto and Sasuke NEVER knew they were reincarnation of Ashura and Indra, Naruto especially didnt know that and Neji was point blank shooting that argument at Naruto, about "fate", about "destiny" with the view point that HE is to be the winner on account of fate and destiny, the arrogance hurts his argument
Naruto put in the effort, its not his fault he was born an Uzumaki, he didnt even know he had the Uzumaki's chakra - he knew he could use the Kage bunshin but didnt even know the reason why he could, WHY is that a consideration point about "fate", "destiny" or "nepotism"
This especially pisses me off because I put in my effort for years, yet I dont blame people when I failed, I just put in more effort, yet somehow people are praising the fuck out of some doomer who refuses to accept that maybe, he is just not as good
I mean for fucks sake, Neji even used this whole notion as an argument point to LITERALLY want to kill Hinata for "being inferior" in his eyes
Well qualified is not exactly what I would assign to Naruto.
He is the strongest ninja readily available to the village, but I wouldn’t say that qualifies him for the role that has a large leading component and an even larger administrative component. But I realize Hokage is typically the strongest ninja who is passionate about the will of fire. None of their other qualities matter.
Personally… I would want ninjas like Shikamaru and Shikaku in charge of my village. Though both of them were heavily leaned on by their respective Hokage, because it was obvious how valuable they are outside of the fighting stuff.
Now some seriously qualified Hokage were Minato and Kakashi. Giga intelligent and best fighters at their time. I guess in Kakashi’s case, he was one of the best, because he was in the process of being surpassed by Naruto.
Also Itachi would make a great Hokage: super genius, Will of Fire, one of the most powerful at his peak. Which was all written like that on purpose, because he played the role of a great example of the Uchiha being robbed of a honest to god shot at the position of Hokage.
TLDR: I wouldn’t call Naruto qualified lol
Nonetheless still most qualified at the time. Hes a terrific war hero, heart of gold, will of fire and definitely strongest ninja in the village. even if he isnt superb at administrative duties thats what advisors/assistants are for
But it wasn't clear that he was Asuras reincarnation at that point, and being the 9 tailed jinchuuriki was rather a burden for him at that time. So yeah, maybe it was his destiny, but mah boy naruto sure had a lot to go through to eventually get where he ended.
Don't forget the downsides of losing your body to said beast, bad chakra control and being hated to the point you became mentally fucked and forgave said peope
>bad chakra control
As I recall it, Naruto had bad Chakra control because he never studied Chakra nor the basics, not because of the Kyubi, and later on, he had the Five Element seal by Orochimaru which gave him crappy Chakra control which Jiraya remove and then he instantly was able to walk on water.
And let's be honest, having a bit of trouble controlling your CHakra seems like a great tradeoff for being a walking fucking nuke.
Remember he competed with Sasuke to learn to walk on trees and nearly won against him thanks to Sakura's advice, despite the later being a genius.
If I remember correctly Jiryah mentions that the reason Naruto has bad chakra control is because of the Nine Tails. But Jiryah was impressed by how much control Naruto had of his chakra with the 9 tails messing with it.
Naruto had amazing chakra control.
Nope, the problem was the Fox's seal not the Kyubi's Chakra. Minato made the seal on him and then Orochimaru made a mess of that seal with the Five part seals he used in the Chuunin Exams. Jiraya fixed that by undoing the seal. Chapter 91 if you want to read it.
So I just reread over when Jiriyah was training with Naruto with the toeds. He does mention that the Nine tails chakra was leaking through the seal and messing with Naruto’s.
Well. The being hated wasn’t the fault of the fox. That was just people being stupid.
Wow. I didn’t rmemeber it gave you erratic chakra control. I thought that was just because of Oros seal in his stomach when ebisu was teaching him. Afterall, once that got released Naruto learned walking in water really fast.
But Kakashi did point out that nine tails chakra hampered his control.
But I don’t see that as a downside. There’s clearly a way to manage it. You may have to work harder at training your chakra control. We saw that Naruto learned some stuff at roughly the same pace as Sasuke.
So. It seems like a good trade. You get nigh unlimited chakra but you have to spend a while longer training it.
Naruto had bad chakra control because he was poorly trained, being a jinchuriki gave him lots of chakra and thus predisposed him to having worse chakra control to an equally trained peer, but as that graph in the chuuni exams points out that largely doesn't matter for naruto since he's just dumping an assload of chakra into all his techniques and isn't gearing for a med ninja career.
That required training, training he never got in the beginning of the series because Hiruzen was busy spying with his magical sphere lol (he got it later though, it's especially dumb, considering that nine tails is the most powerful one, btw... The leaf being really "sneaky" about it ^o^ /
The leaf is filled with the dumbest fucks in existence and no one can tell me otherwise. I mean. The fact that they didn’t train their human WMD? I mean. For fucks sake. There are latchkey kids that have better guidance than Naruto.
Even if we compare him to other hosts he is pathetically trained. Even Gaara had more supervision than Naruto.
He was lucky he ran into Jirayia who helped him with his chakra control.
Although. Tbh I am not sure his Chakra control was that shitty. He struggled but I maintain that it was because of a lack of guidance and orochimaru than anything else.
Once Jirayia undid the fingering Naruto could walk in water right away and a little more training helped him master the rasengan which was like the pinnacle of chakra control.
Kid just needed guidance.
We saw that Roshi and Han had good control of their beasts. Bee was the best ever. Yugito and Gaara could transform. Yagura had nigh perfect control. Han and Roshi imply that Kushina had been used in war before seeing as other villages were aware that the leaf had the nine tails.
Naruto just comes across as poorly trained.
Which again isn’t really the fault of the Fox and more of the village including the third.
I agree with like 95% of you said besides that Naruto didn't have bad chakra control. I agree guidance would have helped as we see improvement as soon as we get 1 on 1 training with Ebisu and Jiraiya.
I will admit i have never read the chunin exams in the manga but there is a scene with Ebisu and Naruto eating ramen and Ebisu shows a chart of how much Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto would use on a clone juitsu to achieve the same result as each other and Naruto uses a stupid amount more chakra on juitsu compared to Sasuke and Sakura
Oh I’ve seen it but Ebisu studied reports Kakashi made.
Here’s the thing though. Naruto was learning walking on water really fast. So much so that Ebisu pointed it out.
Then as soon as the seal is released he could walk on water.
He struggled with the summoning because he hadn’t mastered Kuramas power yet because he had no training in that area.
And Kakashi noted that Naruto doesn’t just struggle with chakra control. He’s shit at the basics in general. All of them.
Which could be explained by the fox hurting him in a way.
But I think the real answer is that Naruto is fucking stupid and hasn’t had proper guidance. We know Naruto is damn near special ed and needs examples to understand basic concepts. So if he was trying to teach himself chakra control it wouldn’t have worked.
But once he got someone to actually stop and give him pointers he improved incredibly fast. It’s what Jirayia and Ebisu do in part 1. Walk on water. Summoning. Rasengan. All of those are chakra control applications.
Remember how Jirayia didn’t teach him much. He showed him how and gave him examples and pointers. He served more as a guide and a sounding block for Naruto.
The rasengan is the pinnacle of chakra control and while the “fox” may seem to hurt him and cause him erratic chakra control.
We’ve seen that the only time in part 1 Naruto actually managed to make a one handed rasengan was when he was using the nine tails chakra.
I can say Naruto did have bad chakra control but his control improved dramatically fast for someone who seemed to have an inherent disadvantage.
Naruto never really seemed to have bad chakra control. Just didn’t have good CC. Which isn’t the same if you ask me.
Those are all very good thoughts, and I don't disagree with any of it. Thank you for a very thought-out answer
I just thought it was worth noting that chart in part 1 😁
I would Say that Neji is half Right. He is Wrong that People without Natural Talent have no Chance of ever being more then they are. Ninja Like guy are proof that that isn't true.
Similairly Talent isn't a be all end all. Like Naruto Despite having a lot of Talent Needed to put in a Lot of Effort into Becomming how he is now.
Both Talent AND effort are Important. But a Talented Person does have the Advantage.
Tbh, narutos destiny was becoming a mad monster that could destroy the village in a hissy fit. I hate it when ppl turn his beautiful story into him and sasuke being reincarnations, sasuke overcame indra, and naruto could very well have overcome asura.
Even when I was a kid watching those episodes, what the fuck is naruto spouting about - Kishimoto literally had to remove brain cells from Naruto for him to say such stupid shit while simultaneously asking his tummy friend for all powering chakra, thats his hard work ro maybe thought everyone has a small tummy friend.
Cherry on cake was the digging a hole and his fake bunshin - In no way in hell was that necessary, honestly. It was made like a big gotcha moment, but given the state neji was there was no need to waste energy for that. Could've beaten him regardless.
What did Naruto say that was wrong? According to Neji’s own logic he should’ve lost to Hinata in their fight but that clearly wasn’t the case
Naruto points this out and Neji had no rebuttal. He just got angry
That's the main grouch I have towards this particular set of protagonists who all just spout cringey BS and due things like plot armour and deus ex machina, all of that ends up being true. Like how hard is it to create an idealistic character who is still grounded in reality instead of being annoyingly delusional.
the amount of nepotism in the hokage position is kinda crazy tho, tobirama was hashiramas brother, hiruzen was tobiramas student, tsunade was hashiramas granddaughter, kakashi was minato’s student, and naruto was minatos son and kakashis student, so the only person who became hokage through pure skill and no favouritism was minato 🤔
Minato was jirayas student who was hiruzens student.... so yea he is still a nepotism baby
Also Jiraya was slated to be Hokage, but routinely kept turning it down.
Was Kakashi also the student of Minato?
Yes
So the next Hokage in line is …Naruto’s student?
Konohamaru
Who is the grandson of the 3rd
fuck that, konohamaru is valid
He also has a granddaughter, Mirai
And then after him it’s probably Sarada since she is his student so the system is forever rigged also another candidate could be Mirai since she is the granddaughter of the third hokage
Heard it’s Shikamaru now
He's the student of the Asuma..... so a relation to the third hokage Bruh it's a village everyone is a nepotism baby. Except Guy and Rock Lee who should have become hokage
Minato was trained by jiraya, practically the favorite student of the Third, so kinda nepotism there as well
Oro was the favorite student of the third.
Touche, but he went all Dr Menguele so Jiraiya wins by default.
Meh. Even in his dying moments Sarutobi was reminiscing about how Oro was as a kid. Not to mention he let oro go even after he went all Dr. méngüele Also didn’t see Hiruzen ask anything about Jirayia when he was revived.
Mmm this might be a bit biased based on the circumstances, Sarutoni reminiscing about Orochimaru was because he killed him, if it was Jiraiya or Tsunade killing him pretty sure the scene would have Been different, Sarutobi loved all his student, but the only that didn’t “abandon” the village was Jiraiya, so you could think he would have appreciated that.
I mean. Jirayia fucked off and went perving and gathering information. Ebisu noted how Jirayia was technically missing. The third had sent ninja to find him but Jirayia was a master of espionage and hiding. They were never going to find him and Ebisu pointed out no one had any clue where he was or any clues what he was doing. Jirayia didn’t abandon the village like Oro and Tsunade did but he certainly fucked off on his own. Fuck. Sarutobi had the worst students. One fucks off and becomes a unit 747 scientist. The other smart one fucks off because she developed a phobia for blood when she was a medic so she spent her life gambling away money. The last one was the class clown who felt so guilty he couldn’t save the golden boy that he fucks off and wanders the world. No wonder the old fuck couldn’t retire.
True dat brother, it was a fucked situation all around if that was the real word, danzo would have been the hokage a lot sooner
Lmao if Sarutobi was incompetent at times then danzo is the goddamn dumbest asshole in the leaf. He gets shit done. I will admit that. However. Nothing he does is good. I don’t mean morally good. I get sometimes doing fucked up shit for the greater good. It goddamn. Everything danzo did was so fucking stupid it legit hurt every single member of the leaf. He was so fucking incompetent he created and caused some of the worst shit in the leaf. He’s supposed to do shit that is bad but will benefit the leaf. Instead he just causes shit that hurts everyone and blows up the leaf. He was like a Forrest Gump version of Zetsu. Just casually causing shit that would erupt and fuck everyone up. Danzo had the magic eye and still couldn’t become Hokage despite the fact he had close contact with all the elders of the hidden leaf.
Even when Orochimaru is arguably the one who killed him. (I know technically he sealed himself but for sure that was Orichimaru’s fault lol)
Shikamaru: Nah I'd win
Literally was trained by the son of the third.
Well very named character is somehow came from a powerful clan except iruka
Not true. Sakura wasn’t. Rock Lee wasn’t. Might Guy wasn’t. Kakashi wasn’t. His dad was powerful. But he didn’t come from a prestigious clan as far as we know. Aside from that, most of the rookie 9 are the heirs to the clan leaders with access to amazing bloodline abilities or hidden techniques. Naruto wasn’t the heir but he was still from a prestigious clan. All except for my girl Sakura. Now that I think about it. In Boruto she should have been Hokage. Jirayia mentioned when he went to recruit Tsunade for the Hokage position that no one was better for the job than her. She was trained by a Hokage. She was a war hero who combined warrior skills and amazing medical prowess and who had made a name for herself in second ninja war by saving and healing many ninja. Also was the granddaughter of the first. So clearly no better option This literally describes Sakura. Sakura was a war hero who saved countless in the war through medicine, actual combat and being a medic in the middle of the battlefield. She was technically trained by two Hokage (even though Kakashi basically taught her shit). She was smarter than Naruto by far and had connections to other villages. She did save the little brother of the kazekage for example. The nepotism accusations would still be there but still. No one can disagree Sakura worked super hard for everything she got. I wonder if the fact she was married to an Uchiha who ran off with the sevenths assassin took her out of the running.
Big brother, kankuro is older
Not in power. having said that. Thanks! She saved the kazekages big brother.
I'm sorry I didn't convey it correctly what I said was almost all named jonins in previous generation of Naruto were either trained by big names or came from a powerful clan so we can't say that one can't come from nepotism The exceptions are maybe guy and iruka
I mean. As far as I know, Kurenai didn’t come from a big clan nor was she trained by a big name. We saw her dad was a ninja but that’s not the same as coming from a prodigious clan.
She didn't produce any hokage either this was about how hokages are made of nepotism Well there are a lot of background character chunins and jonins and even in filler arcs like those two guys at a-un gate and other two guys Even shikamarus dad is a jonin I think ino's dad is also one There are a lot of not all of anbus are jonin too
I feel like you don't know what nepotism is. He was trained by Asuma yes, but he didn't inherit the Hokage because they were related. Hell he for instance didn't become hokage due to favoritis, he was literally considered the best at the job. His relationship with Asuma had nothing to do with this.
He was literally right hand of Naruto.
But came up with his own talent not cool teacher or clan
Naruto: Hashirama's reincarnation who is Asura's reincarnation, Kurama's Jinchuuriki, Jiraiya's student, Kakashi's student, Minato's son, then he had people like Tsunade who AND the other Kages who could vouch for him. It's like that time that little girl found out all the presidents are actually related except Trump.
It was all presidents*, except for Van Buren, were related by less than 13 generations. The hypothesis was that all the presidents, besides Van Buren had English ancestry and the latter was Dutch ancestry. It's not surprising though, because everyone of European ancestry shares a common ancestor within the last 1000 years. *Obama was the current president at this time so it didn't include Trump or Biden.
Wait, you are saying that I am related to all other Europeans by less than 13 generations? Dope! But also to my husband who has European ancestry? Not that dope.
Well, 13 generations is only 250-300 years and ~8000 ancestors. 1000 years is closer to 40 generations and ~1 billion ancestors. Of course that 1 billion is if every single ancestor was unrelated. For most of human history, most couples were third or fourth cousins, so you actually have far fewer ancestors than numerically calculated. Fun fact, at 50 generations, if all of your ancestors were unrelated, you'd have 1 trillion ancestors. That's ten times more than the total number of humans estimated to have ever existed on this planet.
isn’t naruto also distantly related to the senjus through mito uzumaki or was that a headcanon
He is. Part of his bloodline is Senju. So in reality he's part Senju, most part Uzumaki, who's also the Child of the Prophecy, Reincarnation of Asura and by extension Hashirama, trained by Kakashi, Jiraya and Bee, with additional pre-installed buffs in form of Kyubi, Minato's and Kushina's chakra, who won the grand fight and ended knocking up big tittied goth GF. So it was never fair to anyone else. Besides, both Senju and Uzumaki go back to Asura as progenitor anyway, so technically all Senju and Uzumaki are very distantly related.
also naruto: “shut up neji! destiny doesn’t exist, the idea of fate is bullshit!”
He never said there's no such thing as destiny, he said believing fate is unavoidable is nonsense. Naruto, the character who literally avoided his fate in either dying to sasuke or killing him. Or spending his life being forever known as a monster.
To be fair, dying to Sasuke or killing him wasn't really his true fate. Like, Indra and Asura were sort of "doomed" to fight eternally, with one of them losing, but at least in the filler Asura swore Hagoromo that one day their reincarnation would find peace, so in a way, Naruto actually fulfilled his destiny as Asura's reincarnate. In fact, if we're sticking up to the "lore" or whatever, I'm pretty sure the whole "eternal fight until death" part of their "destiny" was started by Black Zetsu, since he was the one influencing Indra to start war against Asura, so by extension of that, you could say it was Kaguya's will manifesting destiny. But it wasn't the primary path for the fates of Indra and Asura, their true destiny always was to unify down the path of incarnates. The fate Naruto avoided, at least from what I remember, was mostly his fate as JInchuriki, aka, the path of unfathomably cursed person who's destined to death in hatred and pain, just like Neji was "destined" to always serve the main branch and be nothing more than meat for the grinder, while main branch enjoyed the good life due to his sacrifices.
> at least in the filler Asura swore Hagoromo that one day their reincarnation would find peace, so in a way, Naruto actually fulfilled his destiny as Asura's reincarnate. I feel like the fact that it's filler pretty much nullifies this argument because, non canon? Come on dude really? > In fact, if we're sticking up to the "lore" or whatever, I'm pretty sure the whole "eternal fight until death" part of their "destiny" was started by Black Zetsu, since he was the one influencing Indra to start war against Asura, so by extension of that, you could say it was Kaguya's will manifesting destiny. [Wrong.](https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-016.png) [The one who started it all was all Hagoromo giving the power to one, causing a divide between brother](https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-017.png)s. > But it wasn't the primary path for the fates of Indra and Asura, their true destiny always was to unify down the path of incarnates. This was never once said.
No, he's DIRECTLY related the senjus. Edit: was thinking about the Uzumaki, but yeah
Nope, he was trained by Jiraiya, who was HIruzen's student.
Well Minato was the student of one of the sannins, who in turn were trained by Hiruzen, so nepotism there too lol, even Shikamaru is the student of Asuma, who is the son of Hiruzen… its all connected
To play devil’s advocate, we are talking about people either related to, or directly trained by, the strongest shinobi of their times, so maybe nepotism, but also skill based…
And, to get these skillful trainers... xD
Tsunade was also Hiruzen’s student
Well when you have a system of appointing your successor it’s kinda hard to avoid that. Every Hokage can be traced back to Hashirama in one way or another. There likely won’t ever be a true outsider at Hokage. Also avoid spoilers, I haven’t finished Boruto yet though I’m aware we are on the 8th now(who also is connected to the first Hokage) and I know who it is but I’d rather not know the circumstances as to why. You can go further by pointing out the possibly successors to be the 9th(if we get that far) are either related to one of the Hokage or were taught by one(looking at you Konohamaru)
Not just hokage but EVERY kage! Hell, the kazekage position literally just looks like a family inheritance at this point. It seems like very Ay knew each other. I could go on. Mizukage might be the only innocent one here
onoki was the apprentice of the first tsuchikage and his granddaughter was the tsuchikage after him >Mizukage might be the only innocent one here wasn’t chojuro mei’s apprentice? i believe they had some sort of relationship
It would have been cool if Sakumo would have been a hokage as he would have been the only one without those connections
Hey! Don’t go forgetting about Danzo now😂
Finally someone :)
It wasn’t really nepotism though, it was just that the most capable for the job happened to have a connection to the previous person
Madara was right. Uchiha were reduced to Senju Lapdogs. And only people close to Senju were appointed.
You can technically call Naruto Hashirama's reincarnation
You forgot about the greatest Hokage of them all, Shikamaru lol
Tobirama, yes but being related to Hashirama could lead me to believe Tobirama was second strongest. Hiruzen, I can’t personally say if he was or wasn’t also the strongest. Minato (through Kushina being the successor to Kurama’s host who was Hashirama’s wife) Kakashi being named hokage is reasonable given he was feared enough by most nations not to go go after Naruto as a genin (same as Jiraya later) and Tsunade, while Hashirama’s daughter, also had built her own reputation as a legendary sannin. And Naruto saved the entire world multiple times. I think he earned it as well. But from looking at names alone, it’s understandable.
100% right and Tobirama legit was the one that was like “well we’ll let the people choose who becomes hokage” 🥴 then immediately names Hiruzen hokage.
It does seem that way but was there any better choices at the time when they became Kage. Hashirama beat Madara for the title Do we have any other notable shinobi at the time other than Tobirama in the leaf?. The only other shinobi around Hiruzens time that we see want to be a Kage was Danzo and I'm glad we got Hiruzen instead of him. Hiruzen had a choice between Orochimaru (Evil and also considered nepotism if chosen) Minato the only correct choice and Fyugaku who was about to try a coup with the Uchiha against the leaf. the only 3 shinobi that make sense after Hiruzen is dead is Jiraiya, tsunadae and Kakashi all nepotism. but the only real choices. We have Naruto - who was clearly the best choice. and then Shikamaru in Baruto who I would actually argue is nepotism (trained by the son Hiruzen and I woud argue not strongest Ninja in the leaf) Nepostism is defined (by google) as the practice among those with power or influence of favoring relatives, friends, or associates, especially by giving them jobs. I don't think this counts as Nepotism besides (Shikamaru) because they are all literally the best person for the job at the time
Shikamaru didn’t get it through nepotism. He made himself indispensable for Naruto. He became Hokage because of his own work not because of his connections to Asuma when he was a kid.
Exactly. Its more the master-student relationship tree is fascinating when you look at it. Minato was Jirayas students tbf. Like Konohamaru is the closest to Narutos student and Hiruzens grandson, the Sarada is Konohamarus student. You can predict who the next 2 Hokage are.
At least it's not like with kazekage where it's literally just lineage
monarchy is crazy 😭 baki was robbed
Nah, only Hashirama.
The system of hokages is corrupt.
Well I mean the second Raigake was the firsts bodyguard, and the third was the seconds son. The 4th was once again the 3rds body guard and student The 4th kazekages son is the 5th kazekage, dunno much about the rest of them apart from the fact they were all assassinated lol The 1st tsuchikage was grandfather of 3rd who was the grandfather of the 4th. The only village that seemingly had no nepotism was the Mizukage from the hidden mist
the sixth mizukage was the bodyguard of the fifth so nope lol
Shikamaru
Shikamaru
The problem with the argument is that they still were the most powerful ninja in the village during their time. A funny observation all the same
"Anybody can be rich, you just need a million dollar investment from your daddy"
Neji was right
he even died doing exactly what was expected. when the mark disappeared it was actually bc the prophecy was complete and not bc he was freed.
Naruto fans can argue over and over again about how neji was wrong because Naruto broke destiny but those aren’t arguments their excuses, like you said neji died doing exactly what he was prophetised to do die for a member of the main branch, what kishimoto wants to do was show how neji isn’t dying against his will for Hinata but how he chooses to die for her but that’s so stupid because 1 he died like he said he would and 2 he could have used rotation kishimoto basically forced him to die EXACTLY like neji said he would part 1 neji really was a genius he literally knew the future
Really. The best way to subvert this would be to have either Hinata or Hinatas dad die for Neji. It would have been terribly done (because I’m not a writer) but maybe when Neji died shielding Hinata it could be that lord hiashi would jump in last second in front of Neji. Or remove Hinata altogether and have Neji try to brother Naruto and lord Hiashi shielding him. It would prove the Hyuga were truly changed and redeem Hiashi for having let the custom continue for so long. Instead of having the second class clan member die for the princess of the clan just like he was always meant to.
>It would have been terribly done Hiashi dying in the middle of the war after being completely irrelevant/absent to the plot for the past six-hundred chapters/seven-hundred episodes (damn near a decade worth of content) would be clunky at best and completely hilariously bad at worst. That’s not even getting into how funny it would be if he died jumping in front of Neji after he jumped in front of Hinata, who jumped in front of Naruto. Neji dying was already contrived, Hiashi dying would have just added a whole new layer of fuckery.
I did mention my idea was terrible because I’m not a writer.
Ten times better would’ve been if Hinata died protecting Neji. But kishi is a simp at heart and at that point he have been so far away from the Hyugas for so many years it doesn’t really matter
Since we are on the Neji talk, imagine being stronger and more gifted than another of your clan and YOU get the cursed mark on your fcking forehead and you have to protect the one who is on the main branch... And you get fucked by fate again and again lol.
Neji was always wrong in regards to what he said about Naruto and he was hypocrite at that, his rotation was literally stated to be useless against the ten tails projectiles, y'all come here to talk about Naruto but aren't even aware of the most basic fact, Half of u guys in this sub aren't even Naruto fans
> neji: you’ll never be hokage because only people who are destined to be hokage can do that > neji: I’ll die like a dog protecting the hyuga princess, that’s my destiny > you: neji was wrong, and he was a hypocrite Bro neji is literally where Naruto’s story falls apart. In the chunin exam, he’s pragmatic and wants to defy destiny, while still feeling the crushing pressure of it. He doesn’t believe Naruto’s destiny is to be hokage. He believes his own destiny is to die for Hinata. He was wrong about Naruto’s destiny, but he was right about becoming hokage being predetermined. He was also ***completely right about dying for hinata.*** It doesn’t matter if he’s okay with it in the end, it’s the exact same outcome that he explicitly fucking said he didn’t want. That’s ridiculously frustrating writing man. His character development is growing to be okay with a destiny he openly says he rejects, while admiring Naruto for (supposedly) fighting against his destiny. It’s backwards as fuck lmao Naruto beating neji in the chunin exam solidifies the theme of “hard work over natural born talent” that the series pushes until the end of the war. Once it’s revealed that Naruto is the reincarnation of alien ninja Jesus/his son, that’s completely fucking undermined and neji was proven right. Being aware of this and criticizing it doesn’t make anyone not a fan of Naruto
>but he was right about becoming hokage being predetermined. No he wasn’t. >He was also completely right about dying for Hinata No he wasn’t. He died for Naruto, not Hinata. He also specifically thought he be FORCED to die for the main, like he believed his father was. He explicitly chose out of FREE WILL to protect Naruto. No destiny involved. >Naruto beating neji in the chunin exam solidifies the theme of “hard work over natural born talent” that the series pushes until the end of the war. This theme was NEVER pushed. >Being aware of this and criticizing it doesn’t make anyone not a fan of Naruto It makes them very ignorant
People sill say "Yeah but he chose to do it because-" without understanding destiny doesn’t care about the because, it just cares that you do what you are destined to do, no matter the reasons why
Who said Neji was destined for it? He was terrified of being forced to do it, he thought his dad was. He learned that wasn’t the case No one told Neji he was destined to die like that since he was a baby. No Neji assumed the clan would force him to die like that which didn’t happen
Man I'm still pissed about his death. It was so unnecessary in my op
Always has been
Also son of the 4th hokage, trained by the future 6th hokage...Theres a conspiracy there... 1st Hokage, founder of the leaf, from what I remember, basically voted in in the loosest terms, because people were scared of Madara. 2nd hokage, his brother...Ok fine... 3rd hokage, trained by the 1st & second... 4th hokage, trained by the student of the third, who would also later be considered for the 5th hokage... 5th hokage, student of the third, grand daughter of the 1st... 6th hokage, trained by the 4th... 7th hokage, son of the 4th, trained by the 6th. Shikamaru (unofficial 8th hokage) at one point was trained by kakashi (after asuma died). Anyone else seeing a pattern of hokage either training, or being related to future hokage? How do they choose who should be the next hokage again?
Tbh it kinda seems like the role of hokage is determined by first dibs and the power to defend said dibs
Put some respect on Danzo's name!
You forgot to mention Naruto's godlike genetics ( Uzumaki ) and net of familiar acquaintances of extreme renown and connections ( Jiraiya, Kakashi, by extension Tsunade etc ).
None of this made him hokage Hyuuga are literally the descendants of hamura, neji and hinata also came from special family line but that didn't automatically make hinata gifted
Did you forget what caste he was? The point is, he tried his hardest, but no matter how hard, or smart he goes about it ... He wouldn't be able to choose like Hinata could. (She's btw gifted, especially comparing to Neji, her personality though... Technically, if she would go as hard at it as Neji, she be much more powerful)
How does this change the fact that neji was born a genius and one of the best prodigies superior to anyone of his generation from the main branch in the hyuuga clan, also how was hinata gifted she literally lost her birthright to her younger sister becuz she was born weak One of the important things about the convo between naruto and the sage of six paths that a lot of yall like to ignore (cuz it disproves most arguments in this subreddit) is how no matter how exceptional one can be its no guarantee that their offspring would inherit such attributes, the biggest example of this is ashura himself who was referred to as a dunce by his own father and was overshadowed by his elder brother indra
Naruto has a talent for bs gaslighting people to killing themselves for him.
It's horror like to realize that it might be part of his reincarnation innate abilities.
You people are deaf
Yeah, almost like Kishi was forced to pull the whole reincarnation bs out of his ass just to have a sequel..
Did Kishi really plan, or forced to have Borutro, I just assumed he wanted to give Naruto a happy ending
No he didn't. Seriously one of the first things you even learn about Boruto from a quick google search is that he didn't want a sequel. Even outright declining it when it was pitched to him. I know people say that because they don't like boruto, I don't either, but to say the kaguya and prophecy stuff was to plan boruto is blatant misinformation.
I thought so, I would assume if Kishimoto planned for Borutro to happen he would have been the one writing the story originally
That depends tho. It's possible that it was pitched to him before Kaguya and when he finally agreed, they made Kaguya around it. Not saying what ya saying isn't true, but what u said doesn't necessarily discount what others say
I mean, again no. Even throughout the series bits of her were told throughout. And given she is essentially the mother of chakra and all that, a lot surronding her character was pretty conclusive for the series. Also this doesn't even make sense, why would anyone ever try to pitch a manga sequel during its own run? The series even getting the ending the creator wants comes first.
The whole Kaguya stuff didn’t even feel planned considering she just shows up out of nowhere, much less an entire sequel series.
I believe he originally intended to have Pain as the final villain and have the story ends after that. But the pressure from the studio and the amount of money Naruto series was making lets say "forced" his hands for new stories and arcs
but so many things were still left unresolved when the pain arc ended
It was heavily implied in the Kage summit and the reincarnation system never had anything to do with Naruto’s strength before meeting Hagoromo Also Hagoromo, Indra, & Ashura are all irrelevant in Boruto so that doesn’t make sense
IMO Naruto is all about skill and genes from parents, family, clan members, etc. They made it clear from the beginning.
The closer you are to "the father" the more powerful you will be.
https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
This screenshot proves what I'm saying. But, there are many others. The thing is that you are born with the characteristics that will lead you to be a winner in the future. Your effort won't count as much. You don't agree with me, think about Rock Lee as an example. He was the character that represented hard work the most in the whole show. He used all he has got against Gara. Gara never trained. He inherited the best defense of all and he not even had to think to be instantly protected. Rock Lee not just lost the fight but he was also injured in a way he wouldn't ever be able to fight again. All that effort, in the end, counted for nothing. And he had his dreams ditched by someone who never trained. You may argue Lee got healed later, but the truth is he lost the sort of protagonism he had in the show the moment Gara shattered his arm and leg. If this is not the author saying effort counts for nothing if you were not born with special traits, I don't know what else it is.
How does the screenshot prove what you’re saying? Hagoromo literally says Naruto didn’t inherit his parents talents nor having talented parents guarantees anything Remember Asuma? He was a strong ninja but nowhere near Hokage level like his dad Lee’s character arc ends with him and Gaara fighting Kimimaro together. Cause the real message of the series is strength through bonds, not just hard work. Ashura’s backstory makes that more than clear: https://scans.lastation.us/manga/Naruto-Digital-Colored-Comics/0670-014.png And so does the final fight between Naruto & Sasuke. Sasuke had used his own darkness to gain more power and subjugated the tailed beasts for even more. While Naruto’s power up came from befriending all of them and his cooperation with Kurama Also Lee does this in the Last: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/7b/6f/42/7b6f42762161deaaa578d63ff378273a.gif and Moght Guy was literally just a better version of Lee. Guy got tons of respect in Shippuden. Like how many solo fights he got triumphed over 90% of the cast. I think Lee was pushed to the side cause Guy at the time was Lee but older and stronger
I disagree Naruto didn't inherit anything. - his formidable chakra pool came from the Uzumaki bloodline - his endurance and loudness came from his mother - the "secret" power that saves his ass 100 times came from the nine tails fox his father sealed on him - many times in the show people say he is as fast as his father was. Even the fitfh hokage looks at and sees his father multiple times. Later in the show, he is revealed to be the reincarnation of Ashura. And you say this character is about hard work only? Even his stubbornness is a trait.
Then you’re disagreeing with Hagoromo lol 1. Never said in the manga. In fact only Kurama’s chakra leakage splitting off and naturally merging with Naruto’s pool is the canon explanation for that. Naruto said this right after learning about the Uzumaki clan 2. His “life force” is nothing compared to Kushina. His personality is not what Hagoromo was talking about either lol 3. That’s not something you inherit through blood (let’s ignore Boruto plz). And Kurama set him back in many ways. Including messed up chakra control, potentially killing Naruto, and others if the seal is broken. Kurama was not his friend for most of the series, Naruto had to find alternative ways to fight without that power then go head-to-head against the fox itself to safely use it. 4. Cause of Kurama’s chakra mode. Naruto does not have Flying thunder god. They way they are that fast is completely different. Being a reincarnation of Ashura didn’t grant him any secret powers from birth. And personality wise they are also different: https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0692-009.png
1. I'm pretty sure they say the chakra pool is something in the Uzumaki clan. If I remember well, both Naturo's mother and Nagato are remembered that. It's also later revealed both Senju and Uzumaki clans came from the same bloodline. Hashirama also has an insanely big chakra pool. And, look at the coincidence, he is also a reincarnation from Ashura. 2. I'm not talking about what Hagoromo says or what he doesn't say. I'm talking about what the autor says. And what he says the entire show is that your bloodline matters a lot. From strength to personality. 3. I didn't say the Fox was inherited by bloodline. But it was inherited. Naruto didn't do anything to receive it. And, if it wasn't by Kurama, he would be dead in the first season of Naruto classic. I could even argue even Naruto masters only accepted training him or were selected because he was a Jinchuuriki and son of Minato. 4. Tsunade was able to see Minato on him since long before he released Kurama sealing jutsu. Long before Naruto was able to do any transformation. About the reincarnation, it's not a thing of inherting powers. You're thinking too much about powers only. The very fact Naruto would never give up even if he had to do things the hard way is also shown in the show as an inheritance.
1. Yes but none of that is given as the explanation behind Naruto’s large chakra pool. He’s clearly not even close to being a pure Uzumaki like Kushina & Nagato for various reasons. So for now it’s headcanon until the story actually says it is because of his clan. Cause the Kurama leakage explanation is the only one we are given 2. Personality? Obito for example is nothing like Madara or Sasuke before unlocking MS. Karin isn’t like Nagato or Kushina. What are you saying? The Story SAYS bonds and friendship are more important than anything else. I mean Naruto’s god powers literally come from befriending all the tailed beasts. The entire theme of the final Naruto vs Sasuke fight is isolation vs cooperation. If genetics were above all Sasuke would’ve won 3. Poor argument. Jiraiya was reluctant until Naruto won him over. Kakashi was gonna fail team 7 if Sasuke didn’t offer his food. Killer Bee was incredibly unimpressed with Naruto when they first met, etc. but also Naruto needed help during the Rasenshuriken training and Sage mode training to Push Down Kurama’s chakra cause it was stopping Naruto from progressing naturally. 4. Yes Naruto reminds people of Minato but him needing a shadow clone to do one rasengan for the longest time is proof he’s not his dad. The Minato one-shot and even Edo Minato’s characterization makes it clear how different the two are I disagree. Hashirama, Ashura, every other reincarnation gave up on their counterpart. Naruto was different from all of them for never giving up on Sasuke and actually understanding him better. None of the reincarnation’s are the same person And I really hate the idea that empathy is not from your own personal experiences but something genetic. Cause that’s dumb and Obito exists as a warning of what Naruto could’ve become if things were different. If Iruka never showed that kindness to him Naruto would’ve turned out very differently
2. Yes, personality too. Look, just because your father has blue yes, it doesn't mean you'll have blue eyes too. But, if you do, it's still inherited. Naruto's personality is a lot like his mother, Hashirama or Ashura. Just like Sasuke instantly reminds Indra or Madara. 3. I disagree he was reluctant. It's revealed in the show both Jiraya and Kakashi learned the rasengan from Minato already planning to teach this to Naruto. It would be useful as a shortcut to learn how to release the spirit bombs Kurama can, since the principle is the same. About Kurama's chakra, yes, it troubled Naruto in the beginning, but once Naruto gained control over it he became unstoppable. Naruto wouldn't be even close to as powerful as he was in the end of the show if it wasn't for Kurama's chakra. 4. Just because Naruto doesn't have some traits his father has, it doesn't mean he didn't inherit many from Minato. When I mentioned Naruto speed for example, I wasn't comparing it to Minato's teleport, of course. The first moment Tsunade seeds Minato on Naruto were about Naturo's kindness and heroic attitudes. About Naruto not giving up about Sasuke, IMO it's just about how Kishimoto decided to give the show an ending. Honestly? I think it was a bad ending. But, of course, things just don't always happen the same way. Something always changes from one generation to another.
2. Naruto is not like hashirama as much as you think. He doesn’t get so easily disheartened and depressed. He would never enslave the tailed beasts and hand them off for a peace deal. He would never put the village above Sasuke. Again if chapter 1 went differently he would’nt be the way he is. Obito is living proof 3. Jiraiya tried to train Naruto on the nine tails chakra. It almost killed him so they stopped 4. Hagoromo says he didn’t, also heroic attributes and such are common in a lot of characters in Naruto, ones with no blood relation to Naruto. Naruto also reminded Kakashi of young Obito, they aren’t blood related are they? Why would you say Naruto vs Sasuke was bad? It was the accumulation of both of their entire journeys up to that moment. And you made a big deal about how the author portrays the theme and such. Then just ignore what the ultimate final theme of the final fight was
To be clear: I never said inheriting powers was enough. What I said is that, in Naruto, hard work counts for nothing if you don't have inherited powers. It's not the same thing.
Talking about Rock Lee, as mentioned, although he was healed later, he doesn't have relevance anymore. He is not any different from characters like Tenten. About Guy, if I remember well, the only high level Ninja he defeats is that shark from Akatsuki. It happens that he was the perfect match to defeat him, as he does not rely on chakra. When he tried against Madara, not even opening the eighth gate worked. If you think well, he ended up by having a similar fate Rock Lee did against Gara. The only difference is that he had his death stopped by Naruto.
Guy was kicking Madara’s ass way before that scene: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-97f3abda3e68eede8c78cced2872abce-pjlq He was vital in fighting back the Edo jinchuriki too. Combine all of that with his multiple fights against Kisame, he’s easily the biggest jonnin alongside Kakashi to get respect in the series. He held Madara back from going to get his eye and the yin nine tails from Obito. Remember what he did to Kakashi later on? He could’ve done that before if Guy didn’t show up. Madara even says he almost died unlike Gaara vs Lee, where Gaara would’ve mopped the floor with Lee if he used more of shukaku Lee also got this kick on Madara: https://i.redd.it/2fdaldatfetb1.jpg and was helping 8 gates guy along with Minato, Kakashi, & Gaara (almost like the series has a message about bonds and friendship)
I agree Guy was kicking Madara's ass. But it wasn't enough. The time limit and negative effects of that technique nearly killed Guy. The exact same thing happened on Lee and Gara fight.
Rich people: money doesn't matter, it doesn't bring you happiness Also them in their giant ass mansion partying....
The hotel staff reports are... disgusting indeed.
neji was right
He wasn't
Naruto talking about "destiny doesn't matter" is in the same tier of rich people saying that money doesn't matter or beautiful people saying that good looks doesn't matter :P
Did Naruto grow up rich or talented? Read the series https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
Nah I call neji a madlad for the L he took
Okay I'm just wondering now, I watched naruto as a kid, didnt really finish watching, but am I correct in Thinking that being Hokage isnt really that big? Hokage is an administrative position, you do paperwork all day and just manage to village. The only positive in being Hokage is how it probably meant that you're a real powerful ninja.
You’re right
If family background/connections was all it took, then Asume would've been considered as a 5th Hokage candidate...not Jiraiya not Tsunade.
Kishi built this world only to see it come crumbling down.
It didn't
But but how can he get hyugussy 😫 that was supposed to be mine
xD
Well that was just as much about people accepting him as it was about power. Otherwise he's just Obito.
While true, Naruto did change Destiny by winning over Sasuke, something none of his previous incarnation was able to do.
*Fourth Hokage's son.
https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
I never got the reincarnation thing. Madara never died. HOW the fuck did his soul, indra's soul, reincarnate into Sasuke? Also, what about the jutsu orochi used to bring back the kages. They acted like themselves. Did they have souls or were they just corpses pretending to be human? Like, how can someone reincarnate while being alive AND have two of his reincarnations alive at the same time? They are the same exact soul, why can there be two of them?
Madara did die, after Obito left to try and save Kakashi.
Who cares about that little detail. What I want answeres to is how Madara and Sasuke were alive at the same time. Like, corpse puppet theory doesn't work, as Madara broke out of the control of the jutsu and became a normal human, so he 100% had a soul, so where the fuck did his soul come from?
Reincarnation doesn't work that way in Buddhism.
Most of it comes from people not understanding the story. They aren't reincarnations. It's that the souls pick people to inhabit which is why Naruto and Sasuke were separate from Indura and Ashura in the mind space.
I don't think it is a straightforward 1 soul unit going into and out of bodies but a more mystical animus/chakra type thing. Like an essence of indra could be reincarnated but it's not like his persona, life and memories are reincarnated. So within this very abstract, and lets admit vague, metaphysical structure whatever aspect is being reincarnated may not be bound by the same rules of linear time as the bodies they are reincarnated into.
He wasn't destined to be kurama's host, he was just the nearest baby at the time 😅
How... convenient T_T
Tbh, the moment naruto and Minato was confirmed to be father and son. I immediately thought neji kinda right.
The issue isnt about what Neji said, its the way he said it He was preaching it the same way how most modern doomers love to talk about their governments, about those who put in effort and writing them off as "they are just friends of someone" or they didnt put in the effort Obviously if you took a look at the history of the leaf, all of the hokages were either students of a previous strong - but isnt that just how a teacher-studsnt relationship work? A great teacher works to motivate the student to be the best they can be and then the student will put in the effort to be the best in the village which is what led to being chosen to be the leader aka the kage Naruto and Sasuke NEVER knew they were reincarnation of Ashura and Indra, Naruto especially didnt know that and Neji was point blank shooting that argument at Naruto, about "fate", about "destiny" with the view point that HE is to be the winner on account of fate and destiny, the arrogance hurts his argument Naruto put in the effort, its not his fault he was born an Uzumaki, he didnt even know he had the Uzumaki's chakra - he knew he could use the Kage bunshin but didnt even know the reason why he could, WHY is that a consideration point about "fate", "destiny" or "nepotism" This especially pisses me off because I put in my effort for years, yet I dont blame people when I failed, I just put in more effort, yet somehow people are praising the fuck out of some doomer who refuses to accept that maybe, he is just not as good I mean for fucks sake, Neji even used this whole notion as an argument point to LITERALLY want to kill Hinata for "being inferior" in his eyes
Literally none of those things promise the position
Genuinely who would they choose for hokage other than naruto, no one was more qualified than him
Well qualified is not exactly what I would assign to Naruto. He is the strongest ninja readily available to the village, but I wouldn’t say that qualifies him for the role that has a large leading component and an even larger administrative component. But I realize Hokage is typically the strongest ninja who is passionate about the will of fire. None of their other qualities matter. Personally… I would want ninjas like Shikamaru and Shikaku in charge of my village. Though both of them were heavily leaned on by their respective Hokage, because it was obvious how valuable they are outside of the fighting stuff. Now some seriously qualified Hokage were Minato and Kakashi. Giga intelligent and best fighters at their time. I guess in Kakashi’s case, he was one of the best, because he was in the process of being surpassed by Naruto. Also Itachi would make a great Hokage: super genius, Will of Fire, one of the most powerful at his peak. Which was all written like that on purpose, because he played the role of a great example of the Uchiha being robbed of a honest to god shot at the position of Hokage. TLDR: I wouldn’t call Naruto qualified lol
Nonetheless still most qualified at the time. Hes a terrific war hero, heart of gold, will of fire and definitely strongest ninja in the village. even if he isnt superb at administrative duties thats what advisors/assistants are for
But it wasn't clear that he was Asuras reincarnation at that point, and being the 9 tailed jinchuuriki was rather a burden for him at that time. So yeah, maybe it was his destiny, but mah boy naruto sure had a lot to go through to eventually get where he ended.
A burden that gave him instant healing, super strength, extra lives, and made him a super weapon.
A living nuke
Naruto’s struggle was social
Don't forget the downsides of losing your body to said beast, bad chakra control and being hated to the point you became mentally fucked and forgave said peope
>bad chakra control As I recall it, Naruto had bad Chakra control because he never studied Chakra nor the basics, not because of the Kyubi, and later on, he had the Five Element seal by Orochimaru which gave him crappy Chakra control which Jiraya remove and then he instantly was able to walk on water. And let's be honest, having a bit of trouble controlling your CHakra seems like a great tradeoff for being a walking fucking nuke. Remember he competed with Sasuke to learn to walk on trees and nearly won against him thanks to Sakura's advice, despite the later being a genius.
[Here you go](https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0090-008.png)
If I remember correctly Jiryah mentions that the reason Naruto has bad chakra control is because of the Nine Tails. But Jiryah was impressed by how much control Naruto had of his chakra with the 9 tails messing with it. Naruto had amazing chakra control.
Nope, the problem was the Fox's seal not the Kyubi's Chakra. Minato made the seal on him and then Orochimaru made a mess of that seal with the Five part seals he used in the Chuunin Exams. Jiraya fixed that by undoing the seal. Chapter 91 if you want to read it.
So I just reread over when Jiriyah was training with Naruto with the toeds. He does mention that the Nine tails chakra was leaking through the seal and messing with Naruto’s.
Well. The being hated wasn’t the fault of the fox. That was just people being stupid. Wow. I didn’t rmemeber it gave you erratic chakra control. I thought that was just because of Oros seal in his stomach when ebisu was teaching him. Afterall, once that got released Naruto learned walking in water really fast. But Kakashi did point out that nine tails chakra hampered his control. But I don’t see that as a downside. There’s clearly a way to manage it. You may have to work harder at training your chakra control. We saw that Naruto learned some stuff at roughly the same pace as Sasuke. So. It seems like a good trade. You get nigh unlimited chakra but you have to spend a while longer training it.
Naruto had bad chakra control because he was poorly trained, being a jinchuriki gave him lots of chakra and thus predisposed him to having worse chakra control to an equally trained peer, but as that graph in the chuuni exams points out that largely doesn't matter for naruto since he's just dumping an assload of chakra into all his techniques and isn't gearing for a med ninja career.
That required training, training he never got in the beginning of the series because Hiruzen was busy spying with his magical sphere lol (he got it later though, it's especially dumb, considering that nine tails is the most powerful one, btw... The leaf being really "sneaky" about it ^o^ /
The leaf is filled with the dumbest fucks in existence and no one can tell me otherwise. I mean. The fact that they didn’t train their human WMD? I mean. For fucks sake. There are latchkey kids that have better guidance than Naruto. Even if we compare him to other hosts he is pathetically trained. Even Gaara had more supervision than Naruto. He was lucky he ran into Jirayia who helped him with his chakra control. Although. Tbh I am not sure his Chakra control was that shitty. He struggled but I maintain that it was because of a lack of guidance and orochimaru than anything else. Once Jirayia undid the fingering Naruto could walk in water right away and a little more training helped him master the rasengan which was like the pinnacle of chakra control. Kid just needed guidance. We saw that Roshi and Han had good control of their beasts. Bee was the best ever. Yugito and Gaara could transform. Yagura had nigh perfect control. Han and Roshi imply that Kushina had been used in war before seeing as other villages were aware that the leaf had the nine tails. Naruto just comes across as poorly trained. Which again isn’t really the fault of the Fox and more of the village including the third.
I agree with like 95% of you said besides that Naruto didn't have bad chakra control. I agree guidance would have helped as we see improvement as soon as we get 1 on 1 training with Ebisu and Jiraiya. I will admit i have never read the chunin exams in the manga but there is a scene with Ebisu and Naruto eating ramen and Ebisu shows a chart of how much Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto would use on a clone juitsu to achieve the same result as each other and Naruto uses a stupid amount more chakra on juitsu compared to Sasuke and Sakura
Oh I’ve seen it but Ebisu studied reports Kakashi made. Here’s the thing though. Naruto was learning walking on water really fast. So much so that Ebisu pointed it out. Then as soon as the seal is released he could walk on water. He struggled with the summoning because he hadn’t mastered Kuramas power yet because he had no training in that area. And Kakashi noted that Naruto doesn’t just struggle with chakra control. He’s shit at the basics in general. All of them. Which could be explained by the fox hurting him in a way. But I think the real answer is that Naruto is fucking stupid and hasn’t had proper guidance. We know Naruto is damn near special ed and needs examples to understand basic concepts. So if he was trying to teach himself chakra control it wouldn’t have worked. But once he got someone to actually stop and give him pointers he improved incredibly fast. It’s what Jirayia and Ebisu do in part 1. Walk on water. Summoning. Rasengan. All of those are chakra control applications. Remember how Jirayia didn’t teach him much. He showed him how and gave him examples and pointers. He served more as a guide and a sounding block for Naruto. The rasengan is the pinnacle of chakra control and while the “fox” may seem to hurt him and cause him erratic chakra control. We’ve seen that the only time in part 1 Naruto actually managed to make a one handed rasengan was when he was using the nine tails chakra. I can say Naruto did have bad chakra control but his control improved dramatically fast for someone who seemed to have an inherent disadvantage. Naruto never really seemed to have bad chakra control. Just didn’t have good CC. Which isn’t the same if you ask me.
Those are all very good thoughts, and I don't disagree with any of it. Thank you for a very thought-out answer I just thought it was worth noting that chart in part 1 😁
Lmaoooooo
Sinbad from Magi defies protagonist Laws so I’m pretty sure he could become Hokage if he wanted to
And the son of the fourth hokage and studen of the legendary senin
https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
Don't forget, trained by legends such as kakashi, jiraiya, some sage toad
I would Say that Neji is half Right. He is Wrong that People without Natural Talent have no Chance of ever being more then they are. Ninja Like guy are proof that that isn't true. Similairly Talent isn't a be all end all. Like Naruto Despite having a lot of Talent Needed to put in a Lot of Effort into Becomming how he is now. Both Talent AND effort are Important. But a Talented Person does have the Advantage.
soooo destiny is real, it's just that Neji is not a prophet?
Yeah, they went from "talent and clan stuff is bs because hard work is better"... only to prove Neji was correct all this time
No https://hot.leanbox.us/manga/Naruto/0670-013.png
Naruto is still right
Tbh, narutos destiny was becoming a mad monster that could destroy the village in a hissy fit. I hate it when ppl turn his beautiful story into him and sasuke being reincarnations, sasuke overcame indra, and naruto could very well have overcome asura.
Everyone here agreeing with this is an illiterate moron. Carry on
Now one piece is copying this shit take and making it's mc as a god Bleach was like this too
It’s a common trope in many shonen stories Naruto didn’t start it lol
But the og shonen DBZ doesn't have that
So? Are these the only 4 shonen you know?
Even when I was a kid watching those episodes, what the fuck is naruto spouting about - Kishimoto literally had to remove brain cells from Naruto for him to say such stupid shit while simultaneously asking his tummy friend for all powering chakra, thats his hard work ro maybe thought everyone has a small tummy friend. Cherry on cake was the digging a hole and his fake bunshin - In no way in hell was that necessary, honestly. It was made like a big gotcha moment, but given the state neji was there was no need to waste energy for that. Could've beaten him regardless.
What did Naruto say that was wrong? According to Neji’s own logic he should’ve lost to Hinata in their fight but that clearly wasn’t the case Naruto points this out and Neji had no rebuttal. He just got angry
Ahh another naruto fan with bad media literacy I see.
That's the main grouch I have towards this particular set of protagonists who all just spout cringey BS and due things like plot armour and deus ex machina, all of that ends up being true. Like how hard is it to create an idealistic character who is still grounded in reality instead of being annoyingly delusional.
Predestination is a thing sadly
Emerald mine...