Thinking about how sad the end to Sasuke’s story is and how his grief and anger is minimised.

Rewatching parts of Naruto and seeing Naruto declaring to sasuke to put all of his hatred onto him and that he’s the only one that can take it is actually so strange. Don’t get me wrong this isn’t hate for his character (okay maybe mild hate because he does do a lot wrong, but so do most Naruto characters and I’m not here to get into that rn). It’s just I find it kind of off… (I know people use this moment as a great sns scene and I have no hate against that ship! This is nothing to do with sns) Sasuke’s grief for his clan and deep seated anger at the village and world is beyond valid. Naruto’s declaration feels slightly entitled? I understand they were friends for a bit and went through a lot together during the short time they were a team and how sasuke is one of Naruto’s first proper connections so it’s all very important to him and so on. It’s just… this isn’t about him? He’s got nothing to do with this? I know it’s about trying to “help” sasuke who is self destructing to get revenge and justice. I’ve spoken before how this fandom compares characters’ traumas a lot and how that’s odd, including how Naruto doesn’t compare to sasuke - both had truly dreadful childhoods, I just think they’re two different traumas and whilst both lonely, are lonely in different ways and for different reasons. And also sasuke is so much more than just lonely. Naruto doesn’t understand Sasuke’s trauma and doesn’t understand his anger. The whole of team 7 disregarded his grief and trauma. At the end of the show Naruto fails to give the Uchiha any justice as hokage and sasuke is manipulated into believing he needs to “repent” and to protect the village. It’s such a sad story. I could say a lot more and this isn’t well articulated at all but anyways… if people disagree or have another interpretation I’d love to hear!

I just found your blog recently, I hope you don't mind that I've been crawling through and liking so many posts. I've always loved Sasuke and never minded Itachi, he was a good villain but it may be saying something that his crimes (while not insignificant) are only rated so highly (from my pov) because he did it all in one night. There are plenty of ninja who did far more heinous things for worse reasons (Orochimaru is a far worse person let alone dangerous villain), so while the big reveal of the plot around Itachi's betrayal was somewhat surprising, it was not exactly "shocking" so much as it felt like it recontectualized things.

I don't really think it makes sense for ss fans to even bring up that "S*kura would never put Sasuke through what Itachi did" considering she was never and would never be in a position to act as Itachi did... but very few ship vs ship arguments are made with "good sense" in mind. (I actually liked her genin arc, she changed from her rather damaging pushy behavior to taking ownership of her own emotions but that then backslid during shippuden... making her once again pushing her own agenda without anyone's input)

I just found your blog recently, I hope you don't mind that I've been crawling through and liking so many posts.

I don't mind that at all. Don't worry about it.

I've always loved Sasuke and never minded Itachi, he was a good villain but it may be saying something that his crimes (while not insignificant) are only rated so highly (from my pov) because he did it all in one night.

I believe it's true but it's also a dreadfully one-dimensional way to look at the situation when a myriad of information is later provided to give context to the whole thing. He's introduced as a cold-blooded killer with zero redeeming qualities, which after the reveal turns out to be more nuanced and layered than we earlier thought. While his actions are still unforgivable, there's so much more to it. So, sticking to what he's shown as initially and refusing to acknowledge anything and everything that follows afterwards isn't how you assess a character or a piece of media in general. It's just looking at his actions and motivations on the face value and refusing to take a deeper look like a petulant child.

There are plenty of ninja who did far more heinous things for worse reasons (Orochimaru is a far worse person let alone dangerous villain), so while the big reveal of the plot around Itachi's betrayal was somewhat surprising, it was not exactly "shocking" so much as it felt like it recontectualized things.

I would not be comparing Itachi with the likes of Orochimaru who was evil and never showed an ounce of remorse.

He did this. This is creepy as hell. Itachi would never, ever do this.

Now, Itachi's crimes are horrible but there's more to them than just "he followed the orders and killed his clan" and "he traumatized his little brother." People tend to downplay his trauma because he isn't a perfect victim and his reaction to the life he lived deeply affects Sasuke. He's only seen as a perpetrator, when, in truth, he's a perpetrator because he's a victim first. There are lot of things he had to learn and acknowledge, but he never rationalized his crimes.

Among his many objectives to die at Sasuke's hands one was that he wanted to be punished for his crimes by the person he'd hurt and wronged the most, because of all things, Sasuke didn't deserve to go through any of what he did.

The guilt he lived with would have been colossal because forcefully prolonging the life so he could be punished for his crimes that weren't even entirely his own fault is a big deal. This is why he's so well received among the audience as well. He doesn't feel entitled to being treated right or with respect. He doesn't think he's worthy of forgiveness or deserves justice.

During his fight against Kabuto, his interaction with Sasuke is also quite interesting. He keeps telling Sasuke and Kabuto both he's not worthy of the praises they shower on him. And he actively avoids looking into Sasuke's eyes.

There are moments he looks in Sasuke's direction, but mostly he avoids looking at him. This is just one example. It's the body language of someone who's heavily guilt-ridden, someone who feels disgusted with himself especially the way he asks both Kabuto and Sasuke to not see him as a good guy.

I don't really think it makes sense for ss fans to even bring up that...

Oh, obviously. She was never placed in the circumstances where she had to make hard choices keeping someone else in mind. Not just that, Itachi did what he did because he wanted to keep Sasuke alive, because the life he'd lived showed him death was the worst thing to happen, so he wanted to protect the person he loved the most from this. When it came to her, though, instead of learning his reasoning, she jumped to the conclusion that Sasuke needed to die. She wanted to do this to "save him from the darkness." Funny, because he was the same boy who'd sacrificed himself to save Naruto's life not too long ago. Who'd wanted to save her life at any cost from Gaara. Who had killed Orochimaru and Itachi - the most dangerous criminals. He'd also freed Orochimaru's prisoners. Considering Konoha was following his trail, the news of this would have reached Konoha too. Despite this, her first response to learning Sasuke falling into darkness was that he should be killed.

I actually liked her genin arc..

Same. I liked those bits. And she was brilliant in Pain arc as well when she saved lives of the wounded Shinobi and civilians, and also during the war arc. But she should have moved on from the person who'd done nothing but brutally humiliate her, reject her. It's not even a character flaw, it's just... Idk what it is.

I absolutely can not stand when people say Sakura deserved better - SHE LITERALLY GOT WHAT SHE WANTED. She's the one who chased after, obsessed over and basically annoyed the boy she wanted into getting with her, when Sasuke REPEATEDLY told her to fuck off. He could not make it clearer he was not interested and now she's miserable with a husband who couldn't care less about her and IT'S EXACTLY WHAT SHE WANTED.

It's not Sasuke's fault he was pressured into getting with her. He was literally guilt tripped about how he doesn't love her even though she apparently loves him so much (she literally tried to kill him).

One of them deserved better, and it definitely wasn't Sakura.

It’s baffling how Sakura or Hinata stans don’t realize they are treated the same by the narrative. They bash the other girl and are able to pick up all the unflattering moments and red flags, but when it comes to their favorite, it’s like all those basic observation skills just disappear into thin air.

I mean look at this:

Sakura hesitates, but decides to act on her selfish feelings (of needing to be on par with Naruto and Sasuke and to have them, especially Sasuke, look at her) and charges at the enemy despite not having a plan nor knowing about Madara’s true powers.

This act served no purpose other than to satisfy her own ego and to have Sasuke look at her.

No surprise, she gets immediately stabbed without making any damage to the enemy, and needs to be saved. Right after this scene, she is shown to be shooked by Madara’s powers while Naruto and Sasuke are fighting him. She had no idea what she was doing. She overrestimates her own abilities constantly.

She fails to be useful when it comes to doing damage to the enemy.

She is ignored by the object of her affection whose attention she desperately wanted. He wasn’t concerned for her at all, even Sakura realised it, and Kishimoto went out of his way to point this out.

I repeat, she was ignored by the guy whose attention she wanted and this was high lighted by Kishimoto.

Hinata hesitates for multiple pages, and is directly told that she would only cause Naruto trouble if she interfered, but decides to act on her selfish feelings (her need to confess her love to Naruto and to have him look at her) and charges at the enemy with no plan.

This act served no purpose other than to talk about her feelings and have her crush’s attention on her. She actually put the whole village and Naruto in danger.

She gets immediately one-paneled without making any damage to the enemy, and needs to be saved.

She fails to be useful when it comes to doing damage to the enemy.

She is ignored by the object of her affection whose attention she wanted. Naruto doesn’t even go talk to her, to him it’s enough she didn’t die.

I repeat, she was ignored by the guy whose attention she wanted, and this was high lighted by Kishimoto.

But the stans will not see any of this somehow. The similar patterns go right over their head. And this is not even the only similarity you can find in the text.

Alright, quick rambling because you lot keep, to this day, misreading panels of a manga aimed at teenagers:

No. Sasuke never doubted his path. No, Sasuke never thought about quitting his revenge. No, Sasuke was never "considering" forfeiting or letting Itachi go. No. No. No.

Sasuke, at most, doubted whether to leave or not Konoha (and his friends, Naruto and Sakura) behind -yet there was NO DOUBT in his mind about carrying out his revenge, once Kakashi (the genius), told him to "quit seeking revenge", there was almost no reason for Sasuke to stay, as the man who was teaching him to (again) fulfill his goal, something he specified he was aiming for on their very first meeting and the thing that pushed him to go further; suddenly told him to forget it -to focus on something else.

Naruto and Sakura made him doubt whether to seek help outside Konoha's framework, yet there was never any single indication that he was actually rethinking his entire revenge.

Learn how to read.

True Uchiha clan not that bulshite shown in the Boruto series so called fake Uchiha pathetic historically ignorant family( Sakura and Sarada who treat clan crest some sort of ornaments or achievements or trophy to brag about or show off for them without knowing its struggle and past history and how you get to wear it) or how the story tries to revise Uchiha tragedy and the oppression and racism against the Uchiha collectively.

wdym this isn't the original version

YES this is what I’ve BEEN saying

Fuck SS

Sasuke and Karin in NARUTO stage play ❤️❤️❤️

Another example of Sakura's superficial infatuation with Sasuke.

When Sai first meets Naruto, they get into a fight and he calls him a loser. Sasuke at first treated Naruto similarly, yet there were different motivations for these interactions. It doesn't even cross Naruto's mind that there are superficial similarities between Sasuke and Sai.

He is just deeply bothered that Sasuke got "replaced". Because for Naruto, no one could even take up Sasuke's space.

Sakura HOWEVER says that Sai feels familiar because HIS FACE AND HIS VOICE remind her of Sasuke. That is very superficial of her because even though they have both dark hair and eyes, that is where the similarities end.

It ones again shows that Sakura just liked the pretty, cool boy, but never even began to understand Sasuke's character, personality, and essence, something Naruto just understands intuitively without words. Hell, Naruto's struggle is giving them a f*cking label, that's it. The rest is crystal clear.

Even if you didn't ship them, they would both have been better off single and living together and being around each other as platonic soulmates. No matter what, their bond will never be surpassed by any other bond they might have.

He even defends his Sasuke way more than Sakura does. Who has the crush? xDDDD

Hi,it annoys me when Itachi is paired with Sakura, does anyone really think that the could fall in love with her?He won't even look at her,but how do you feel about this couple?

Anti-S*kura/ anti Ita*ku/anti ss content ahead.

I've written about it before too. Here.

It annoys me too. This is my honest reaction to the ship. (It's probably someone's art, so if anyone knows the artist's name or blog, please let me know. i'll credit them).

I haven't interacted with her fans a lot (their general hate for Itachi just makes me want to not talk to them), so the psychology behind anyone shipping her with Itachi is entirely lost on me. He would certainly not fall in love with her. I can't see him falling in love with anyone, least of all, her. He's so damaged and guilt-ridden, and he has absolutely nothing he can offer in a romantic relationship. He's broken, suicidal, and suffers from the most severe form of PTSD, so what can he do that she will find charming? In all of Itachi's ships, his partner(s) would have to work hard to make it work. We know she isn't the kind of person who does it, or pays attention to someone unless her own feelings are being rewarded or coddled.

I don't know how she's written in the fics (I've never read them), but if the writers are making her sympathetic, thoughtful, understanding, kind, generous where her ulterior motives do not lie, then that's just not her actual personality. You can't write their core characteristics as it is and think they can be shipped together. There's absolutely nothing he'll like in her. If he did think something of her obsession towards Sasuke he would have acquiesced to SS and reached out to her instead of Naruto.

She's just shoehorned into both Itachi and Sasuke's lives as their potential life partner, which is wild because Sasuke just didn't care about her until very last and Itachi... oh, well.

You guys really made me give more thought to her in the last 2-3 days than I did in the last 13 months of having seen and read Naruto. Many people unfollowed me recently, lmao. Could be a coincidence too that some deleted their blogs or maybe unfollowed me for other reasons. But still.. xD

There is just something really sad how Kishimoto wrote Sakura to fail constantly, humiliated her, with such vicious way too, and people still find a way to cherry pick some small moments (while ignoring how he often made those small moments nul right after) in order to make her seem like a capable and likeable character.

Something about it makes me uncomfortable. Why are people doing this? Why are you trying to fix what Kishimoto wrote? I'm sorry but he didn't want to write her to be a likeable character. Like I get people desperately want her to be good, but it seems such waste to try to defend the writing that doesn't exist.

For the love of god, here we go again:

Kishimoto is an excellent writer. He owes nothing to the fandom, he’s the creator and owner of his work, and whatever he decides to do is what you get. No, Sakura didn’t fail because she was “badly written” it was a clear decision on his part to make her that way, it’s not his problem you confuse “good writing” with likability and I’m sorry woke feminism ruined complex, sometimes straight up evil, female characters for you to the point where you believe them taking shitty decisions is an explicit reflection of the author’s misogyny instead of them exploring different types of personalities. If you believe InoSaku is a relationship with “wasted potential” that’s presented in a toxic manner because Kishimoto can’t write female relationships, take a closer look at every other rivalry inside the manga and tell me how many of them develop in a healthy manner, just because they have almost no focus doesn’t mean they don’t follow the exact same rules every other relationship of the same nature does. I’m sorry Sakura is so obsessed with Sasuke she diminishes every other relationship she possess in order to elevate her status inside Sasuke’s life, but Ino, who also considers Sakura her rival and who also likes Sasuke, behaves completely opposite to her, being able to move on and respect his rejection, how come is misogynistic if Sakura is the only one doing so? Have you read Naruto’s obsession with Sasuke? The manga is pretty much dedicated to it, how is Sakura’s fixation worse than his?

the thing about this panel is that kishimoto bothered drawing it when he could’ve just not add sakura’s reaction and introspection to what naruto said, it wasn’t necessary. not drawing anything would be more neutral to sakura than showing that she is aware of this information and yet never bothered doing anything or changing her behaviour towards sasuke. if her thoughts aren’t portrayed, people are allowed to infer she’s ignorant, but kishimoto made sure to show that she isn’t, or is willingly, he gives her the agency, what she does (or doesn’t do) about this matter is actually her own fault.