Pre-Ramble
I discovered I had more to say about this topic and this series than I originally thought. It’s become a massive essay about Naruto, mostly as a reflection for me and how I feel about the series and how it’s turned out. I still like the series, and I still read it, because it’s highly entertaining – there’re aspects of it that badly needs fixing though. .. and sorry for the lol-texts. I couldn’t help myself… [Edit: Click the pictures for more details. There are a few with cut-offs]

The title there goes for practically every single one of the ninjas in this series. Actually, the only time I can remember there was a whole lot of stealthing going on, they were considered weak, almost to the point of comical relief (unless they were comical relief, and I just didn’t find it funny. I usually don’t find comical relief funny. Funny eh?). Unless you count the times they were hiding from an enemy, contemplating a clever and sneaky, but obvious, attack on their foe. There’s no such thing as a stealth-kill in this series. Which makes me wonder what you might consider an assassin, and how potentially badass they would be, because they, you know, do actual sneaky stuff. “I R TEH BOOGIEMAN!”

Truly Sneaky?
From here on Naruto becomes a difficult topic. When a ninja has been mentioned, you think about a guy in black gear with lots of shady tricks and abilities that comes sneaking in the night to make sure you won’t see the next day. When you mention a ninja in Naruto, you are actually talking about a martial artist that knows magic. No shit, actually. Boiled down, Naruto is about Kung-Fucking-Fu Mages, and the more physical training you do, the more magical stuff you can throw around like bad breath, as well as getting better at the magicky stuff over time. The focus is of course on the obvious, the magicky stuff. It’s flashy and cool. The straightforward physical combat is severely downplayed, and is most often watered down to a “Y HULO THAR BUDDEE! FUN 2 SEE U HEAR!” that goes on for about 3-30 seconds, and then they jump away from each other, ready to do some serious smack-talk for 3 episodes (or 3 manga-chapters). “U SUXX!”. “NO! U SUXX!”

Magical Ninjas
The aforementioned smack-talk is quite often intermingled by a series of minor jabs at each other, be it through throwing knives, dubious minor magic, or dubious major magic that we can’t see because it’s, well, sneaky. I guess that’s where the ninja heritage comes into play, although I doubt it. In most cases the magicky stuff is either a show of brute force, a contest of stamina, or some hidden and clever chess-game that we’ll never truly understand because compared to these masters of chess, we’re dumb and blind. Well, we’re of course awed by the explanation that we get in the end, when it’s too late for the oppoent, and then we’re similarly awed by the resulting smack-down. If it’s a flashy smack-down we become even more awed [Ref: Naruto Vs. Sasuke - Angry Emo Kitties Final Fight]. “U SEE WUT I DID THAR LOL?!”.

Characters
The gallery of characters is surprisingly strong in this series, surprisingly so actually, side-characters tend to be weak(er). We have all these weird characters with strange and freaky abilities, magicky abilities, and even weirder, stereotypical personalities (I’m look at you Gai! Maito Gai, weirdest dude there. Maito Gai – A Mite Gay?). You would think an ensemble of the 50 most standard and dull-ass bunch of characters would be just a tad boring, but this is where Naruto shines – the cast of characters. No matter who you’ll be spending time with you can be sure that you will be in the company of some weirdo guy that’s forever doomed to be entertaining because he’s hilarious in a number of subtle ways, or because he’s just not like the rest of the crew. “LOL I R SPESHUL RITE?!”.

The Good Guys
There’re no two characters alike, they’re all a bunch of weirdo stereo-types, they’re comical in their exaggerated vices and virtues. You’ve got the heavy-drinking Tsunade that’s old enough to be your grandmother, with a bosom the size of Mount Doom. There’s the eternal enigma and silent-type awesomesauce guy, Kakashi, with an exploitable weakness for ecchi-books. Let’s not forget the previously over-emo Sasuke, the most popular character in the series for years (yes, they ran polls about it) who has a magickal thingamajig in his eyes that gives him a hefty advantage against other magicky abilities. He’s our beloved hate-object. Or atleast he used to be, he’s not as whiny anymore, just silent and focused, not to mention a bit older and more powerful. Let’s ignore that he was in company with Orochimaru for 3 years, the lech. Ew. “PLAY WIT MY 1 EYED SNAEK PLZ!”

The Bad Guys
Now, that was the good guys, except for Orochimaru, who was eventually killed by Sasuke, or so we think. I doubt that chapter’s concluded just yet, his death was too obvious. Orochimaru’s the kind of bad guy you have to love, despite being an icky and ew bastard that makes you think of a pervert that likes watching dubious porn, simply because he’s such a completely unlovable character. If Kishimoto Masashi, that’s the author of the manga, ever made the perfect villain, Orochimaru’s it. There’s also Sasuke’s arch-nemesis, his brother Itachi, who killed off the entire clan to prove a point (++, but I won’t be spoilering it right now), and is generally overpowered. To be quite honest I don’t really picture Itachi as such a massive villain like Orochimaru, but my suspicion lies with the incessant whining of the character of Sasuke downplaying it. A major bad thing is easily downplayed and turned unimportant if someone’s harping about it constantly, and that’s what was done in the first 90% of the series. Yes, that means I’m entirely umsympathetic to Sasuke’s pains. “I HURTZ! MORE TAHN U!”

Combat
The combat-system in Naruto is pretty complicated, in a sense. The melee is straightforward, while the magicky stuff can be as esoteric as the author wants, which can be pretty damned wonky. If you’re not a 100% melee kind of guy, you’re not going to be doing a whole lot of close combat, you’ll preferably stand 10-30 metres away preparing some kind of scary and efficient attempt at taking down the opponent. There are what, 3 of the melee-types in Naruto? Gai, Rock Lee and Naruto? No, Tsunade and Sakura as well. Of all of those, only the character called Rock Lee is completely melee-based, all the others are able to sprinkle some magical fairy-dust around when applicable. The rest mix in the odd chakra-magic (the name of the magicky battery. You run out of it, you run out of magicky stuff, most likely not able to move either, since it’s connected to stamina). With the exception of Naruto, all of these people are generally quite successful in their endeavours, as far as we’ve been able to tell, and they use their magicky chakra along with their tricks happily and efficiently. “I HIT U 4 LOLTGHOUSAN!”.

The Protagonist
No series would be quite the same without a protagonist to cheer for, and Naruto is no exception to this. In the beginning we sympathized with his loneliness, his desperation for attention and friends, and his desire to accomplish something. We wanted him to stop being miserable and sad, we wanted him to be special, beyond being the outcast of the village. We wanted him to be awesome, we wanted him to be the hero. And so we cheered him on when he stole something special so he could learn a forbidden jutsu (that’s what they call the magicky things in Naruto, jutsus) through a forbidden scroll that was really powerful and awesome. Of course, we had no freakin’ idea what this really was until we were shown, and we had our first moment of “Whoooooaaaah… awesome” when Naruto created a thousand clones of himself, accompanied by the fantastic music that’s become the hallmark of the series epic moments, and laid down the smack. Now, why did he steal this scroll to learn this forbidden thing? Two reasons, to get attention, and a desire to protect the village. This outcast boy that’s been ignored and avoided as much as possible has a tremendous desire to become the Hokage (leader of the village or something) to protect the village, despite everything. “LOL U SAD SMAKDOWN!”

Now, the character went through some pretty memorable moments, building up as a character, letting us get to know him, and the highlight of this was when they were in the Land of the Hidden Mist, or whatsitsface. Naruto came up with an amazing move, all on his own, one where he changed himself into a ninja-star (or whatever it’s called), and let Sasuke throw him. The throw was a miss, an intentional one, and what happened then has been lost in the Mists of the Hidden Memory. What I remember from this episode is that I thought it was so awesome that Naruto had developed to the point where he was tactical and innovative, and from here on I was pretty devoted to the series. “LOL LIEK FANBOI?!”

The Protagonist Struggles
Ironically that’s where it all went downhill. From here and onwards all you get to see Naruto do is use Kage Bunshin (the forbidden technique, meaning Shadow of Something, or perhaps Something of Shadow, but what he does is make clones of himself) ad nauseum, atleast until he learns Rasengan (a whirly ball he holds in his hand, and when presses against the opponent, more on that later), and we get to watch him use Rasengan and Kage Bunshin ad nauseum. To be quite honest there’s nothing new throughout the series from here and onwards, with the exception of the Nine-Tailed Fox-Demon thingamajig inside him that gives him an extra boost. While it’s awesome to look at Naruto in über-mode, it does get pretty tiring to watch this Three-Trick Pony do absolutely nothing new and interesting all the time. “SUPER SAIYNA LVL 72932?! LOL!”.

Ponies!
Now, I would be kind of ok with the whole concept of this Three-Trick Pony if it was a truly awesome pony. It’s not. I mentioned that Naruto was a melee-type, one that relied exclusively on beating the living Zeus out of his opponents. More irony, it’s usually Naruto that gets this deity beaten out of him, because his skill at hand to hand combat is about as awesome as mine. What we end up seeing is Naruto making a whole bunch of Caged Munchkin clones that charges at the opponent with little success. He then either hides to try again, or he aims to sneak in a Rasengan. Now, I mentioned how utter crap he was at melee? Well, the thing is, if you suck at melee, and your two ultimate moves are based on melee, alternately that’s all you can think of using it for, would it make sense that he manages to land the sodding thing? Nope, and that’s what happens. The most exciting thing we get to see is how he’ll be able to land this powerful whirly-ball on his opponent, quite often after a bunch of tries. Which is extremely unexciting after you’ve seen it a few times. “LOL WHIRYL BALLZ!”.

Stopped Making Sense
Where did the innovation and ability to excel go? He picked up a forbidden technique in hours. He excels at changing forms (which he hasn’t done in ages either). He’s got the stamina from hell. He’s got a demon inside of him that gives him power. He’s got so much going for him, so why does the author insist on keeping him a Narutard? In the latest iteration of the saga of Naruto, Shippuuden, we get to see him start learning about a new trick, using elements from nature, and that some can use this, and some can use this element. The author of the series introduced another element! So Naruto has to learn about his element. Of course, we’re presented with a dumbass Naruto that just doesn’t grasp it, so they figure that Naruto should make a million clones of himself that can practice this stuff, since they are each an individual. Neat perk, you go work, I go play. Kek. So, as usual Naruto is Narutard. He spends ages learning something, and now he’s even boosted by this really awesome trick. but why doesn’t he use his most awesome and proficient trick more, develop a branch that he knows better instead of insisting on learning some dumbass incarnation of a previous Hokage’s super-trick? “LOL NARUTARDZ!”.

The Plans?
Seriously, for all the good things in this series I get the feeling that the creator of Naruto just doesn’t get it. Naruto was awesome, now he’s a muppet. The reason I’m interested in the series at all has nothing to do with Naruto himself, although I do hope he’ll suddenly start to shine. No, I like the series because of the supporting cast. They’re awesome. I love them all. From Chubby Chouji to Sad Sakura, they’re all quirky and fun, interesting and varied. Naruto is just uninteresting. He doesn’t develop in any direction that seems remotely natural. It seems the author ate too many funny shrooms at some point, or just ran out of ideas. Most likely he lost his first flow-chart, and forgot Naruto’s existence, leaving his assistants to fix all the errors, and every time he sees Naruto become interesting he goes “WTF?! WUT R HE?!” and brings out the eraser. Stupid assistants eh?

The End
Shit, I could go on and on and on about this topic and how Kishimoto seems to have completely forgotten Naruto’s roots and how he’s become a parody of himself and bad story-telling. When I went to school I learnt about something called the “red thread” that’s supposed to go throughout the entire text/story/whatever. Naruto’s lost his for now. Let’s hope it’s picked up again at some point in the future, so that Naruto once again can be awesome like he once was.

And this is why I ended up discussing characters earlier by the way. Hot topic in my head!

Another thing about kids, or rather childishness; why on earth do anime and manga accept the most horrendous and childish arguments ever presented without some semblance of reply? “My family died, my poor sweet sister died, and I have nothing but revenge left to live for. Your pain is nothing compared to mine, NOTHING! I HURT MORE THAN YOU!” (Because all those other people that died and lost their families are weak and simple that won’t pick up arms to fight these bastards that fought to protect your country and ideals “just” because their loved ones died…).

The reply is more often than not “…[cricket](no idea why there’s this silence)…” or “…[blush](bullseye, you hurt more than me)….” or “…[sadface](you are so mean)…”. Wait, what? This is from ‘Gundam SEED Destiny‘ by the way. The emo-troll protagonist yawn-fest said something along those lines. The series that I had looked forward to seeing so much suddenly went into a lurch shortly after that as the (current) protagonist kept being 6 ways more hurt than Sasuke could ever be, 6 times as tormented, and 6 levels less awesome (which speaks volumes…). Atleast Kira came back later in the series, with a bang, and all was well – making the series the awesomefest I’d looked forward to.

You need only take a look at the latest movie ‘No Country For Old Men‘, the villain Chigurh (or Sugar /gloat). Throughout the entire movie the character didn’t change one spit, he was a mass of relentless malevolence from the first time we saw him, never yielding, never stopping, always moving on with the same constant focus and ideal – to get his job done. He was flawless, his methods infallible, and the whole thing was so thuroughly awesome I find myself thinking that this is the guy that should have been Darth Vader’s son instead of that crybaby Luke.

Anyways, my point is that there are characters that are enjoyable when they never change, or to be more precise, they can emerge as one of the strongest meetings in a book, movie or comic for a long time, if not ever. You see, Chigurh never changed throughout the movie. Alot of people claim that he changed in the ending when he showed kindness towards the kids after the crash. No change, bub, not at all. It was another side of him. He’d done the job, there was no reason to be anything but fair with the kid. The kid wasn’t a part of the job – insisting on paying for the shirt was just another extension of Chigurh’s values, or codex, whatever you wish to call it. Yet, what people jump at is that Chigurh looked human there, that he was changed by the crash, the feeling of mortality had “crashed down” on him. He’ll look mortal and “normal” if you completely ignore the fact that he was completely ignoring the pain in his own damned broken arm. No, Chigurh didn’t change one spit, and that’s why we’re awed by his character just like we felt a strange compelling compassion with the “hero” of the story as well. He didn’t change either. So why did we love these characters if all they did was keep doing the same stupid things the whole way through?

We keep reading idiotic mangas like Ranma 1/2 from the beginning to the end (the series was a smashing success commercially) despite the fact that the characters never really changed. We saw a few new abilities learned, we were introduced to a bunch of new characters, and there was always something new happening. Except for the characters changing. The characters were introduced one way, and I’ll be damned if we didn’t leave the series with the characters being the exact same way that they were introduced. To me this is one of the cases were my previous question doesn’t ring true, atleast personally. When I was done with the whole Ranma series I was so sodding tired of this series I was happy to put it down. The least thing the author could have done was giving us some sort of closure on the relationship between Ranma and Akane where they didn’t act like 5 year olds around each other.

Characters learning new moves and tricks are all nice and well, but over the course of such a massive manga as Ranma managed to be I would expect something more. I don’t expect a massive change, no, I expect to see a different side of the characters over the course of the story.

We all love roleplaying games, don’t we? We love getting that new sword, that new skill, that character for the party, even that castle or spell. That’s character development? Or is it character enhancement? Let’s take Neverwinter Nights 2 as an example here. The hero wakes up in a cave, utterly confused and estranged. He has no idea where he is, or what that mad woman is helping him for. Now, what happens with our character as we progress – he answers questions, breaks open locks, and kills stuff. At what point during the story-line does the character change? Do we really change the character when we answer this and that question, make this or that enemy, or do we just reveal different sides of him/her? If we were to go against what we’ve decided to do in the past, would we be changing it, or would we be acting out of some plan, eventually just revealing a side of ourselves? Learning new things, does that change us, or perhaps just the perspective. New information, new glasses, but the same person, nothing different internally?

Before I go off rambling completely incoherently I’ll get back on track – storytelling and characters. What I’m curious about is at which point in the story do we need a change in our characters, a real one, or a new development that’s expected or desired, before it’s growing stale?

In the case of Ranma we never see any change, and in the end of the series I was personally so tired of it all that I was happy to put it down. It was very much the same with Fruits Basket, there was so little change, yet the author kept droning on about the same things over and over again before, in the end, there was a breakthrough where the main character got his head out of his butt. In the case of Gundam SEED Destiny we had to watch it all the way through to the end before we saw emo-pansy cry over having lost everything, and I gloated. In the very end of the series he meets his nemesis and we see that he’s understood something, and suddenly for the first time in the whole series I actually found myself inching towards liking him.

I know I’ve been annoyed at the stale and unevolving Naruto that never really changes, nor really does anything smart. I know alot of characters that bother me for this reason, they never really change enough to be interesting, yet that might be the exact reason that I keep reading the story, something changes. Something changes enough for me to read on, waiting for the real change that I’m hoping for.

I lost my trail there, so I’ll leave it at that for now. I still wonder though, what do you see as a change, or development, in a character that breathes fresh air into it and takes the story onwards to another and entirely new level? When does a story and it’s characters grow stale and boring, or possibly stupid and annoying?

So I’ve finally read all the books (on my HTC Touch Dual) and they were a sweet read. With loveable, believable and interesting characters from the start to finish Philip Pullman managed to make me a very happy bugger. Except for the ending. I want happy endings. I should, one day, point out what a happy ending is, exactly, so that everyone can know, once and for all, how to tailor a story for me. On the other hand the rest of the books were simply amazing, so I won’t spend too much time lingering over the relatively bad ending that made me feel a tad upset. Although in this case, unlike previous cases, I’m actually quite satisfied with the ending. Which I won’t spoil, of course. And I did say I would stop pointing out the ending. Gah. Sorry.

Sadly there was a scarcity in cool pictures from the books with all that lame text, so I took some liberties (unless you noticed I put a picture from the movie in!) in picture-material. I’m not entirely sure you’d be too thrilled if I started posting “screenshots”(?) of books in the post.

As we all are aware of, by now, we get to know the amazing girl Lyra Belacqua, a young girl destined for greatness and who’s thrust onto a journey that will change the course of mankind forever. Sounds cheesy? Of course, but I love it, especially when it’s done as well as this. We even get to meet a new character in the second book that’s supposed to be a co-main-character. Usually I hate those kind of characters that’re added far into a book, or in the second book, or fifth, but Will here’s special in many of ways. Not only is he the perfect opposite of Lyra, he’s also awesome and thrust onto a journey that will change the course of mankind forever. Cheesy? Hell yes, and I totally love it!

Regardless of cheesy synopsises (I know that’s not a word, but it’s alot more fun than ‘synopses’) and poor endings these books are brilliantly written and the characters are worth the read alone. From the flight from the wicked Mrs. Coulter (who thinks experiments upon children is cool and has a bananas monkey (bananas, monkey, get it?)) and to the massive sundering of the wall that separates dimensions (the one that we never got to see in the movie) through the death of a child (I was looking forward to seeing the movie-version of this kid die) in the first book I’ll admit I was hooked. The book’s a departure from your ordinary kind of story-telling where the heroes brandish mighty magics, massive swords, or save the world by accident when they suddenly find their mysterious mojo and blast the evil emperor (who’s usually really cool, and misunderstood). I’m not entirely sure how to explain it in further detail without going into needless spoilers, so I’ll stop right there in regards to the first book. It’s a brilliant book, damnit, so go read it!

When I picked up, or clicked on, the second book, The Subtle Knife, I was immediately disappointed that I had to be introduced to another character. When I’m this far into the whole reading business I’m rarely interested in having to get to know another character, especially when I was so fond of the previous characters. Young Will’s definately not a disappointment though. Tough, sneaky, and having balls the size of an elephant while still being only 12 or so I found myself enjoying the story about Will. Resourceful and smart, he doesn’t come across as your average 12 year old with an attention-span that makes mine look like the Orient Express in comparison, no, he’s just awesome. You’ll like him too, I’m sure. Or I’ll be angry at you for not agreeing with me.

As a matter of fact we were introduced to lots of new characters in book two and three, all of them great. I won’t bother going into them here, and I’ve said it before; Philip Pullman’s awesome at creating wonderful characters.

The second and third book should almost be considered one book, while the first one’s a prelude, because the first one acts as a backstory to get you introduced to some parts of the universe and get you going, putting the main part of the action in the next two. It takes you from the desolate world of the city of Cittàgazze where Will finds The Subtle Knife, and huge parts of the action unfolds, to the third book where they both enter the world of the dead to come to terms with past actions and solve a few problems created by the Authority.

Throughout all of this we follow Lord Asriel and the infamous Mrs. Coulter around. Asriel is introduced as the guy that “…didn’t pick a fight with the Magisterium because they were too weak…”, and Mrs. Coulter’s the woman that lies and cheats because she can, and will do anything to see how far she can take it. That’s the impression we get atleast. Two powerful people, in each their way, that we get to see far too little of during the books, although I suspect some of the magic about them would be lost if we got to know them better. Other notable people is the amazing Lee Scoresby, heroic from start to finish; Iorek Byrnison, the mastersmith; Serafina Pekkala, the wisest woman of them all; and many more. Simply put: I find the gallery of people in these books to be amazing.

Right now I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t know what else to write without spoiling anything. I could mention how Philip Pullman disses the Catholic Church in this series, or how he portrays all that is holy to be a sham and so on, but to be honest I don’t really give a shit about all of that. It’s a great read regardless of ulterior motives and themes. Some people might wax their penis/boobies by trumpeting out the vilifications of this book, and joyfully jump at the chance to throw shit at the church or Pullman, but it’s not my cup of tea. If you want to do that I’m more than happy to argue it out with you’n your friends, I’m just not going to bother getting into it here.

The three books are awesome, and I read them as great books. If you want to read three brilliant books with brilliant characters and a sweet story I recommend you pick up His Dark Materials.

Wow, who’d have thought a nose could look that cool.

The Shock Doctrine – If you don’t bother checking out any links that I’m posting here, I seriously recommend this one at the least. There’s a fragrance of truth in it. She forgot to spell out clearly for people that “Some people will take advantage of any situation”.

Then to the second most interesting link I could find, the iPod one. In this case it’s the iPod Touch, and I present it in two different versions; the cheap one and the way more expensive one. At a glance you might think that there’s not much difference in those two prices, because who in their right mind would have such immensely differing pricing on an object readily available from the Amazon.com store? The difference in price is $458.39 vs $299.00 ( not included whatever shipping costs ). Why aren’t norwegians rushing off to Amazon.com to buy the little beauty at an incredibly lower price? Because there’s a tag that says “Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.“. Great way to handle the incredibly weak dollar?
Found this looking through Amazon to compare prices on mp3-players, and perhaps cell-phones, and I find it really annoying. What can you do though?

This one was just… odd… and I had to add it.

Edit;
The emeddage seems to wonk up things for Deandri, and I won’t bother doing that anymore.
In addition I’ve found an odd bug that makes WordPress delete stuff when I’m trying to edit my posts.
Odd day.