coolcat37383

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Can you give recs for where to read Naruto manga?

Coloured manga (VIZ translation I think). [link]

Black and white manga with better translations (from what I see) than VIZ's "taking a lot of personal liberties" one [link] I just selected a random chapter, but it allows you to pick between 3 different sources.

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work.

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Fortunegiver

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“ you don’t have to think your heart is made of steel “ [►]

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Batgirl, robin, and catwoman sketches

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RIP to the goat, Akira Toriyama

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One Piece drawing session. Luffy, Zoro, Kuma, Garp, Kaido, Mihawk, Sanji, Kizaru

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The Dark Knight for Character Design Challenge

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Here’s my Sasuke piece for the Gallery Nucleus: Naruto the Tribute Exhibition! Thanks to @gallerynucleus and @vizmediaofficial for letting me participate in this amazing experience. You can go check it out at Gallery Nucleus until November 25th! 

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Hideaki Sorachi x Masashi Kishimoto Gintama Exhibition (Dec. 23, 2016, to Jan. 9, 2017)

From December 23, 2016, to January 9, 2017 the Gintama exhibition named Dai Gintama Ten took place at Tokyo's Akihabara UDX. Visitors received a pamphlet that contained illustrations from Gintama, a message from Sorachi and collaborations with other manga artists.

You can find the content most of the pamphlet here

But in this post I'll translate the comments from Masashi Kishimoto

Kishimoto-sensei's comment: Regarding the NARUTO parody in Gintama… I think I vaguely recall Sorachi-sensei asking me for permission. To avoid seeming petty, I probably gave him the go-ahead, saying something like, 'Go for it, no problem!' …Wait a minute… Wasn't that Daiamon-sensei in Taizo Mote-oh Saga who said that? …Oh, right, I definitely gave Sorachi-sensei the OK too… I think. Regardless, I love Gintama's NARUTO parodies; they're hilarious! I'm thrilled he did it, and it genuinely made me laugh! Congratulations on the Great Gintama Exhibition!

Sorachi-sensei's comment: Wait, that was a memory with Daimon-sensei, right? Don't you have anything to do with me, sensei? Kishimoto-sensei is considered one of the top two most respectable people in Jump, and in the editorial department, getting assigned to Kishimoto-sensei is a cause for celebration, while getting Sorachi-sensei is seen as a disaster! The difference in their people skills is that stark. But early on in my serialization, he told me, "The bonus pages in the tankoubon are interesting." At the time, I had no one else praising me, so it was a huge encouragement… Wait, was that Daimon-sensei who said that…? Oh, right, at the New Year's party, I was so intimidated by the big-name mangaka that the only one I dared to talk to was this guy with a crew cut… No, that was definitely Daimon-sensei. Anyway, I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Kishimoto-sensei and Daimon-sensei for helping me keep Gintama going all this time. Thank you.

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thank you @magmavox for commissioning me to draw sasunaru again! ☺️🫶

commission link -> (x)

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Gaara's outfit is mine, but it's Gaara from the 9th movie🖤

in this universe he didn't become Kazekage, he is his father's favorite, cheerful and loud

[coolcat37383]

had a good day today so i wanted to draw something fun

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someone just said "ew" to narusasu and said "they have no chemistry" and i have never had a more visceral reaction. safe to say i won't be communicating with them further

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and then I disappear again

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On Gaara's and Naruto's friendship

And why it's not good and negatively impacts Gaara's character

While there's many things to criticize about Gaara's character, one of his biggest flaws, I think, is his bond with Naruto. Now, I'm not saying it's bad that they're friends or that Gaara idolizes him. What I'm saying is that they haven't spent nowhere near enough time together to actually get to know each other and justify that absolute devotion Gaara has for the mc. There's no correlation between the amount of screentime they have together and the way Gaara views Nart like some kind of savior deity. Especially, cause their friendship feels kinda one-sided? Naruto, of course, likes Gaara and sympathizes with him as a fellow jinchuriki. But not to the point that Gaara does.

Gaara was first introduced in the chunin exams, as we all know. Through the entirety of this initial arc, Gaara and Naruto show very little interest towards each other. During Gaara's 1st appearance onscreen, he showed a lot more interest in Sasuke because of the Uchiha's innate skill and talent, as well as that 'inner' darkness Gaara felt within him. The first time Naruto ever showed interest in Gaara was in his fight vs. Lee. That is, because Kankuro, bless his heart, took on the narrator role to explain how Gaara's sand worked. The next time, they met face-to-face was in the hospital in Lee's room, where Gaara basically infodumped his whole backstory to him and Shikamaru, finally revealing he's also a jinchuriki (if I remember correctly). Nart and Maru would've also died there if it weren't for Gai sensei walking in last minute.

They don't have any further interactions until the very end, during Konoha crush, when all Hell broke loose, and the responsibility of stopping Gaara fell on Naruto's shoulders. They did have another scene where they met at the stairs leading to the stadium during the final stage, where Gaara walked by Nart and Maru after having killed two dudes and the two kids were paralyzed in fear. When Nart first arrived at the clearance in the forest where Gaara was going crazy, threatening to kill Sasuke, he genuinely couldn't even remember who that was:

Yes, I know Gaara's half transformed, but his physical features are still recognizable. He's the only kid with red hair, sand powers, and a gourd on his back. Not to mention, I'm pretty sure? Gaara had already revealed the fact that he was a jinchuriki to Naruto. Yet, with all that knowledge, Naruto could still not recognize him. It just goes to show how little Naruto thought of Gaara cause at that moment he was very likely busy thinking of his village getting destroyed and his friends' lives being in danger, that Gaara completely slipped his mind. Despite that, they fight, Naruto manages to win, and proceeds to talk-no-jutsu Gaara to make him see the light and change his entire values and morals. Values and morals that had been deeply scarred into his brain after a lifetime of trauma and abuse all erased after a good punch to the face and a conversation.

As we can see, they have very few interactions in this arc. They genuinely didn't care about each other for the longest time, and it's not until the very end that they finally acknowledged each other's existences. Gaara spent the whole arc obsessed with Sasuke and wanting to kill him cause of his darkness. It's worthy of note that while Naruto does have some scenes showing slight interest in Gaara, like the Rock-Lee fight, Gaara has no scenes shown caring for Naruto at all. Until he's beaten into submission, that is, and then he suddenly starts looking at the blond with stars in his eyes. Like what?

I also don't know if people remember that, after the chunin exams, they have 0 other canon interactions through the remainder of classic Naruto. They have no scenes together in the Sasuke rescue arc, as during that arc, Gaara only had one appearance, saving Lee, and Naruto was too busy fighting Sasuke. There's one filler at the end, where Matsuri is kidnapped, so the sand sibs have to rescue her with help from the Leaf kids in a parallel to the SRA. But I don't think it should count cause: 1- it's a filler, and 2- Gaara and Nart also don't have many interactions in this. While Temari and Kankuro do receive help from Maru, Kiba, and Chouji, respectively, to defeat the villains they were put up against. Gaara chose to fight and defeat the main boss all on his own, while the other kids all just watched on the sidelines. In fact, I'd say this filler even gives a slight development to a Kank-Nart friendship cause after the main big boss was defeated, Kankuro does have one scene telling Naruto that Gaara had changed because of him or smth. I, of course, don't remember the exact words, but he was acknowledging Naruto's effect on Gaara.

Their next canon interaction is in Shippuden, and it gets even worse once you remember that once again, they're only given all of 5 minutes together onscreen. Gaara spent like 90% of the arc dead. Same as with the chunin exams, him and Naruto don't get to interact until the very end, when Gaara was finally brought back thanks to Chiyo's life transfer jutsu. In fact, I'm pretty sure that, if we were to compare them, Naruto has actually had more screentime talking to Kankuro in this arc than talking to Gaara. Yeah, Naruto cried for him when he saw Gaara dead. He fucking ripped Deidara's hands off, and he also lashed out at Chiyo because of the way they treated Gaara. But these are all things that happened while Gaara was still dead, so he wasn't aware of them. Looking at all these things in retrospect, it also makes no sense that, while having Shukaku extracted from him, Gaara kept fantasizing about Naruto in his minds cape. There's no way he was aware, in the state he was in, t7 would be the one sent to rescue him, and that Naruto did all that stuff defending him. From Gaara's side, up until that point, the only canonical positive interaction he's had with Naruto is their fight and subsequent talk in the chunin exams. That was somehow enough to make Gaara fantasize about him and only him while he was dying. No memories or thoughts of his siblings, of course. Only Naruto.

Of course, there's their last scene where Gaara thanks Naruto and uses his sand to make him hold his hand, and Nart is blushing all embarrassed. I just find it irritating that Naruto was the only one to get Gaara's thanks. Not the rest of t7. Not team Gai, who, while decidedly, didn't do much, still had to go against one of the most powerful Akatsuki (Kisame). Not his own siblings. Only Naruto. Gaara and Gaanaru fans can romanticize that scene all they want, but to me, it only served to make him look like an asshole.

Then there's the Kage meeting arc, where, for the first time since the chunin exams, Gaara's allowed to confront Sasuke again. He has his whole moment giving him a speech about not losing himself to the darkness, not choosing that path, and shedding a whole total of 2 tears for Sasuke. Before, he also joined with the others in attacking the Uchiha. It's not until the very end when the sand sibs are heading back home that they come across Naruto and Co. Gaara tells him about the war, and Naruto fucking pushed Gaara's hand off his shoulder, refusing the gesture of comfort. After that, the sibs just leave without saying anything else. As we can see, a very common running theme with their friendship is that they only get to interact for a few minutes at the end of an arc, usually cause Naruto is too busy chasing after Sasuke, or one of them is absent in some way. It's also why these scenes seem so ridiculous to me:

Gaara claims he knows Naruto very well. He even ponders to himself what Naruto would do in a situation like that. But it makes no sense because there's no way Gaara knows Naruto as well as he claims. They barely spent any time together onscreen. There's no way they kept in contact during the timeskip to Shippuden, as I'm sure Naruto's locations during his travels with Jiraiya would've been kept a secret for his own safety, so Akatsuki wouldn't be able to track him. I'm sure no one but probably Tsunade and the council elder geezers had an idea of where Jiraiya would be taking him. Not to mention that, at that time, Gaara would've also been super busy with the whole..... becoming Kazekage and trying to prove to his village that he's all good and trustworthy now.

Finally, there's the war arc, where they do have some fights together, mainly against some of the revived Kage, but at that point, it's way too late to try and sell their friendship as this super incredible, unbreakable bond. What I wanted to bring up is this scene in particular:

Where Gaara thanks Shukaku cause in his own words,'it was thanks to him he got to meet Naruto.' I hope you see now what I mean by their friendship being one-sided. Guys, Gaara is literally thanking the sand demon that ruined his childhood just cause, in the end, it all led to meeting Naruto. There's no way Naruto loves him that much. Most fans like to take and interpret this scene as a romantic gesture, which is okay. I won't deny that Gaara is very likely a little gay for Naruto. The problem is, once again, that they've barely spent any time together for their supposed friendship to get that strong. Especially not before the war, as Naruto was sent to that secret island for his training with B, just to keep him safe from the war, as him and B were the only jinchuriki Akatsuki still hadn't gotten their hands on.

At this point, Gaara doesn't even care that Shukaku also played a role in ruining the childhoods of his siblings, and it's because of it that Gaara constantly threatened to kill them in their childhoods. He really doesn't care that he put Kankuro's and Temari's lives at stake due to Shukaku's influence, Naruto is the only important one. It's the fact he so blatantly disregarded his siblings' pain at the hands of Shukaku cause it all led to Naruto. I mean, I guess it makes sense that he literally doesn't love his siblings in canon, or at least, doesn't care about them. If he did, he wouldn't have sealed Rasa the moment the old man was defeated. He would've immobilized him just enough to let Temari talk to him, too, as well as sending someone to go get Kankuro, so he could also get a chance to spit in his dad's face.

I'm gonna end this here, but in short: their friendship doesn't make sense. If we were to compile all their canon moments together into one video, I'm sure it'd come up to only 1 hour or less. Definitely less. It's just another massive flaw in Gaara's character and the main reason I find him so shallow that a big chunk of his personality gets absorbed by Naruto, and he's so rarely allowed to show any other traits. It makes sense that his talk to Sasuke at the Kage meeting is so exciting and cool to the fans. That was literally the first time he was seen expressing other emotions not directly related to Naruto in hundreds of episodes. Even then, his talk with Sasuke was all about Naruto. Gaara literally just wanted Sask to go back, so Naruto wouldn't hurt in his absence and trying to get him back. It literally drives me honkers bonkers every time I see people praising Gaara as one of the best written characters in Naruto, one of the best developments, or the worst offender: one of the best written side characters in Shonen. How can your standards be that low, lol.

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The girls are fightingggg