#idk its crazy to me that people will willingly tell others their wrong in their worship when it comes to Hellenism

[eightofpentakles]

bless Lady Hestia for being the one to steer me away from that does me no good <3 she will always be there bless her

[moonlightchn]

~WHOLESOME WEDNESDAY~

Not to be a soft motherfucker but I've been wanting to do this again for a week now so I guessed I would try my best to fit as many of my thoughts here as I can without being annoying or tumblr fucking up plz bear with me heh but we know none of those are actually possible anyway so THERES THAT also this is fucking long wow ANYWAY

WARNING WORD VOMIT sjsjsjsj I dont even know what i wrote I'm sorry but I'm tagging yall anyway

Some of you I speak to on a daily basis, yknow? Like,, as admin. And its fucking insane because like- I don't know but like isn't it insane? sjajsjsj How fast some people come to grow in your heart and get under your skin and become so important for you. I think it's crazy. That in four months or so I've made more friends in here that in my whole life and I've learned so much about life and myself and I've gotten marked and some of you imprinted on my mind and heart forever. And like HELL I wasn't here when most big dramas happened but I was here for two very big ones and like??? idk it feels like all of us have been through shared crises and somehow grown closer sjajskwjs idk I'm weird and im sensitive today and I just feel like wow what would I be doing without all of you right now? probably studying. or scrolling Twitter in which I never spoke to anyone. or watching Instagram stories and getting sad over how all my ex class partners are still in contact and hang out and keep strong relationships while I just sit here. like, I know we all say this place sucks and we hate it and its toxic and don't get me wrong of course some people is fucking shitty and they take a toll on a lot of others but that like... it also happens in real life yknow?? but like in real life how many people do you think would actually idk sit with you through a panic attack or stay up with you till 8am or wake up in the middle of the night or rave with you or hype you up or have meme wars or send you daily jokes or just randomly tell you how much you mean to them or make posts asking where you are when you disappear or been gone for too long or make people that doesnt know you send you birthday wishes? like I'm not saying it doesnt happen but isnt it wonderful that it happens HERE with US where maybe out of 10 people only 2 know each other in real life? Isnt it wonderful that we're from all around the world? that you half of the time dont realize someone isnt from English speaking places because they're too good or even when they're not that good no one judges you because this is such an inclusive and wonderful place for people of all races and colors and sexualities and nationalities and body types and hair colors?

idk I'm just RAMBLING but like I wanted to let everyone know that even if we dont speak, even if we NEVER spoke, even if we're only on each others tag lists, or even if I was and you took me off or I took you off or if you deleted or if you have 817383 bots and you speak to me in all of them or only one or whatever PLEASE just know that I love you so much and I appreciate you and you're awesome and if you made some mistakes know that you CAN fix them you CAN learn and be better you CAN grow.

I believe that everyone is capable of learning and changing and everyone deserves a second chance as long as they genuinely show the intention of changing and bettering themselves. I believe that we're capable of forgiving and maintaining healthy relationships without hard feelings. I believe we all have goodness. I believe we all are small universes and we have stars in our eyes and supernovas in our brains and a million things to discover and I believe its funnier to be together than alone and I'm rambling again but like idk just yesterday I was sending someone a message telling them how maybe I'm fucking delusional and naive because who the fuck goes out on their daily saying "be skeptical. dont trust too much. always pay attention" but then after two days of talking with someone they're fucking platonically whipped and would sell their soul as long as they can see those around them happy? trick question I know many of you do too which WORRIES ME PLZ DONT PUT YOUR HEARTS ON THE LINE SO EASILY I drifted I forgot what I was saying oh welp

Anyway for some of you i have so much to say I could write endless paragraphs about you about admins and characters and life and wow I do speak a lot to admins sometimes I speak more to admins as admin that the characters and for some others I can only say a few things or wish you to have a good day some of you I only ever spoke to your character or we talked too little or never at all wow I say that a lot but like one thing yall have in common is that I love you so much even if you don't know me or dont care alright I dont care if you don't care I LOVE YOU and you can FIGHT ME if you dont wanna accept it smh I just want you to know that this place so many of you have been feeling is crumbling down or hurting them or isnt the same anymore is MY safe place too is a place where I feel comfortable and secure and I know, well decide to believe, that you guys would never do willingly anything to hurt another and yknow sometimes I just sit in bed and look at my account and I'm like wow I suck I should delete but then I'm like I could never do that to you I really couldn't because I've been told so many times I'm peoples safe place too and I would never want to take that away from you yknow

I mean I'm not gonna say we shouldn't pay attention to the bad things that happen because this is somehow our home and it's on us to protect it but I think that we shouldnt focus so much on it. because theres still so many good things that we overlook when we think of the bad or when we let things get to us or when we decide to act out of impulse and not think through stuff yknow

ANYWAAY what I'm trying to say is that I love you all so so so so so much and this is my safe place because you're here for me when I need it and I would never give you guys up for anything and like i have so many people for whom i stay daily and try my best and I hope that someday when you need a reason i can be that for you too because I've said this in private but I want everyone to know that this is my corner too and I will always fight for it and protect it so like we can all fight for it together whenever things get rough or you can leave me alone and maybe I'm being super dramatic and putting a lot of weight on this but I started overthinking like halfway and in just tthink that I want to keep yall close to me and my heart forever ok so stay safe and healthy and happy yeah fight for your happiness fight for what you deserve fight for what you want and don't let anyone ANYONE EVER take away from you your joy and your spark and your will to be yourself ok bye

[piercebaron]

episode 22 and adaptations

Actually, I do want to talk about it! I feel like episode 22 encapsulates my “weird” feelings towards the anime adaptation and how it has cut and reframed certain things. It’s not bad? Just weird. 

Spoilers for the Plunderer anime and for the manga, up to chapter 36. 

prefacing all of this with a general note: if you’ve only seen the anime, please read the manga. You’re valid, I’m so glad you’ve been enjoying the anime, but please read the manga because as horny as Minazuki is (and the man is . . . very, very much so), his art is also amazing and some of his panels deserve a second, third, or even a fourth look. The little details here and there actually crop up later and become important, and it’s just great. Chapters 46 - 53 are some of my favorite in media in a long, long time and I absolutely cannot wait until they’re released in an official capacity so I can fork over my money for them.

(seriously, you guys don’t know how hard I’ve tried to legally purchase volume 13. I want to give my money to this series so bad.)

This will also be a little scattershot and bounce around between other episodes, so apologies in advance. I’m trying to double-check chapters and whatnot as I go but if I get something wrong or miss something, please don’t hesitate to correct me in the replies! I’ve been watching the anime through Funimation’s site -- dubbed up through episode 11 and then subs from then on. 

Adaptations! Adaptations. By their very nature, they are not a 1:1 sort of thing. A lot of times, you’ll hear people say “read the book” when a movie adaptation of said book comes out. This is because by its very nature, a movie adaptation simply can’t capture everything in the book -- nor should it. Little things will slip through the cracks. This doesn’t make the movie adaptation bad, necessarily, just that it loses something. 

By the same token, if someone tried to do a direct 1:1 adaptation of a book where, say, the book is used as a script (which is an extremely bad idea for so many reasons, please have a script oh my goodness), chances are it’s not going to be a very good movie. There are musicals, for example, where when filmmakers try to make them into films, they flop because they’re not “cinematic.” The directors didn’t take into account the shift in mediums or, more likely, they sorely underestimated it. Understandable, since it’s two visual mediums, but still.

This is all leading up to me talking about Plunderer, I swear.

Manga to anime is a tricky, tricky thing. A manga has [X] amount of pages to work with, depending on if it’s a weekly or monthly series (or even some different increment!). The author, then, has to structure their chapters accordingly, moving things along to keep the reader interested while also controlling the ebb and flow of the story. Note how when the chapters end, they’re engineered to keep you wanting to read more!

Anime is similar in that respect, except the crew has 20-22 minutes to fill over the course of 12 to 24 episodes depending on the series order. Plunderer, ftr, had a 2 “cour” order from the get-go. They have to plan out the series as a whole, figuring out certain things like, where will the season end? What are the big beats, when will we hit them? Etc. It’s no coincidence that the “school” arc started right around episode 12, which is the halfway point of the series; note how there was that filler episode with Hina and Lynne cooking, after all. 

When I started watching the anime after reading the manga, I assumed they’d end the season with, roughly, the end of chapter 36. It’s a nice “resolution” to a lot of things that had been building up over the series. Hina and Licht are finally together, Licht has resolved to keep his mask off and face the future, Jail has a new direction, Lynne -> Licht is basically resolved, and Pele’s layers finally get peeled back just a bit. 

I saw some predictions online that they’d leave off at the cliffhanger in chapter 39 and while that’s a good guess, in terms of narrative ebb and flow for an anime, it doesn’t really line up. They’d really have to rush some stuff (Charles!! i love you, charles) to get there and in terms of a product that they want to be able to market in several territories, it makes more sense to give it some feeling of resolution. That said, what’s more likely along that vein is us potentially getting some sort of stinger at the end of episode 24 with one character talking to That Certain Character, and us getting a brief, shadowy shot of said character to make people go “ohhhhh shit, dude.” 

but idk this anime has made some strange choices.

Going into that! I’ve mentioned this here and there and talked about it with a friend, but the choices the anime has made in terms of adaptation is, uh, pretty strange at times. When changes get made, my instinct is to try and think through why they were changed and, ultimately, if it really affects the story in any way. If I went through the entire anime, it would be an extremely dull read; please know, however, that I am forever sad we missed Jail’s computer antics and Pele being the ultimate shit when it comes to Nana’s video, even if I understand why they were cut. 

That said, episode 22 is a perfect example of this, so uh. Let’s dive in, shall we?

The chapters that episode 22 covers are chapters 33 and 34. The events leading up to it are pretty much the same, but episode 22 contains some divergences. Going through them quickly:

We see more of Pele and Hina trying to stop Douan from going after Lynn.

Sonohara doesn’t show up during this confrontation. Hina gets her “the body was too clean” line instead.

Because Sonohara doesn’t show up, it’s Douan who attacks Lynn instead, causing her injuries with rocks. In the manga, Sonohara shows up, is drugged by Douan, and shoots a couple of bullets at Lynn.

Nana is just randomly lurking around?? In the manga, it’s clear she got caught at the same time. I’m really not sure what was up in the anime. Douan just yanks her out from behind a wall.

Douan sits with Nana, Hina, and Pele until morning, telling them he’ll kill them at dawn if Licht doesn’t show up. In the manga, he sits back and lets Sonohara terrorize them with a game of Russian Roulette, and Hina promptly (without words) calls Sonohara’s bluff.

Jail doesn’t show up in this episode at all. Instead, Hina gets his “did you check?” line.

We actually see Nana leave with Pele when he takes Lynn off. It looks like we’re going to actually see Doctor Pele in action, maybe? Hina is later sent off to help them.

Sonohara shows up towards the end, already drugged. Based on Douan’s line, it’s assumed that she was drugged off screen by the Secret Service. In the manga, he forcefully injects her.

The end of the episode sets up episode 23 to be Licht vs. Douan and Sonohara, with the preview showing Jail jumping into the fray.

whew, that’s a lot. 

I actually get why most of these changes were made! Setting up the penultimate episode of the series to be this big battle is a necessary change for an anime. And narratively speaking, this is much cleaner than it was in the manga, where Sonohara shows up briefly at the beginning of chapter 33, is drugged, and then basically exists to be crazy and antagonize people. It’s less balls in the air for the staff to have to juggle and for the audience to follow.

Douan’s character also gets some more depth. It’s funny because I feel like in the anime, he’s much more cruel than he was in the manga originally -- which is a feat, let me tell you. The anime flipped that in this episode, though, by not having Douan force the drugs onto Sonohara. 

The manga frames it as him doing it because he believes he knows what’s best for her, he’s trying to protect her in his own awful way, but it’s also, you know . . . nonconsensual as hell and gross on so many levels. This takes that off his shoulders which is a good change, honestly. 

But we lose some little character moments for the others in terms of streamlining. I think the thing that bums me out the most is Jail’s stuff. In the manga, after the confrontation with Alan, Jail steps in, calls Sonohara out and snaps her out of her drugged stupor without much of a fight (”without conviction, your bullets can’t pierce me”) and then slaps down the iron throne, telling Douan to shut up because Licht is coming. Chapter 34 ends with him just dead-eye staring at Douan like yeah, it’s annoying, but look. You’re the one who calls him a cockroach. Jail saying “did you check?” is a major mic drop moment and it’s basically when, from then on, Jail does not give a single flying fuck about the barons / aces. 

It definitely should be noted that some of these Jail moments will probably pop up in other ways in the next episode. I fully expect the bit about Sonohara’s bullets to come up, at least.

We lose out on Sonohara stuff too, though. She willingly throws herself into the lion’s den, shooting at Douan to distract him for long enough to allow Lynne to get away. It’s Sonohara who points out that Licht’s body was too clean -- something that makes more sense as someone who’s known him for 300+ years, knows what it means to be a baron / ace, and wasn’t immediately dragged off by the Secret Service. Her then terrorizing them while drugged is also a moment because when she forces Nana to play Russian Roulette, Hina immediately grabs the gun and points it at her head, firing all the “shots.” It’s empty, showing that despite the drugs, Sonohara didn’t want to kill them and Hina knew that all too well.

with all that said, I should note here that it’s entirely possible this scene will show up in some form next episode. Sonohara is still drugged and Hina, Nana, and Pele are all together in the bunker that is right nearby. I kind of doubt it given how the episode is framed and because narratively, it makes more sense to focus on the Licht vs. Douan and Sonohara -> Licht and Jail vs. Douan and Sonohara fight than to have Sonohara split off to randomly terrorize them, but. Like I said, this anime has made some strange choices.

Of course, character moments we get instead are Hina and even Pele being metal as hell. As much as I’m flapping my hands about losing the little character moments for Jail and Sonohara, it’s clear that they thought about how to utilize those moments while streamlining things, and they do work for Hina. And honestly, it’s really nice to see more stuff with her and Lynn? They get some cute panels later on in the manga (think chapter 55), but I like ladies and I like some lady solidarity. And Hina getting those little moments is on the same level as her straight up pointing a gun at her head all “you won’t kill me.”

and on a selfish note, I am actually really excited to see Pele tend to Lynn. The anime has been good about fleshing them out more and giving them little moments. My little shipper heart is delighted.

In the end, does it change much? Not really. These are small things, ultimately, just like how we didn’t lose much with the added filler and cut moments during the school arc. It’s all ultimately in the name of adaptation and while it’s weird, it’s not necessarily “bad.” It’s jarring for me as someone familiar with the manga (and having stared at some of these panels for so long, I’ve gotten really familiar with it), but thinking on it critically, yeah, I can see why. 

they better damn well do the “how did you know I could do surgery?” scene in the last episode though or I will be super bummed, okay. 

[ice-cream-beat]

hot take: Bartlow is an underhanded politician and a tool, but he isn't evil and petty like the anime would have us believe and is actually kind of understandable

(alternatively: literally no one else cares about this dude but I'mma rant anyway because I just really love this game)

did he try to instigate a war? yes

did he try to murder Alisha through both direct and indirect means? yes

did he try to buy Sorey out and threaten him when he wouldn't agree? yes

was he doing this in the best interest of his country? that's what we're led to believe.

yes, war is terrible and an absolute last resort. yes, Bartlow should have done more to try for a peaceful alternative (assuming he didn't already). yes, he is a trashcan human being and I like to burn him with Lailah's fire every time I go through the meeting scene. but

- Alisha herself testifies to what a crappy state the world is in, with both countries on edge due to dwindling resources. war is risky, war is expensive, and it takes up a lot more of those resources. Bartlow is cited as being good at what he does, so it's highly unlikely that war was his first preference, or that he jumped the gun to try and incite one without (what he believed to be) justification.

- Alisha attests to his value when she begs the assassins not to kill him. she respects him, even after knowing he tried to have her killed. this isn't a man who's driven the country to the brink of ruin to boost his own popularity and ego, like Scar from The Lion King or something. he's someone who has no optimistic delusions about the nature of humanity, is completely devoid of the faith and altruism that drive Sorey and Alisha, and has used whatever means necessary to keep the country functioning in the interest of the majority. "you have to crack a few eggs," as the saying goes.

- as awful as it was for him to target Alisha, the game itself stresses that she's pretty ignorant when it comes to politics and ruling authority. she preaches peace, which is good and right, but she has no real way of enforcing her ideals other than the optimistic outlook that "well if we don't attack hopefully our enemies won't, either." from Bartlow's POV, you're preparing for a "necessary" war to preserve your country, and then you have this woman going around on her soapbox and killing morale among the people. she's a well-known public figure, so of course your first attempt would be to reason with her -- but Alisha is morally hard-headed, so that doesn't go over well. you need to make the problem go away, and soon. murder is bad, but it's effective, especially when you can make it look like an accident.

- and now you have some kid who looks like he's barely through puberty coming in and threatening to do the same thing. he's heralded as the hero the people have been waiting for, the figure they'll all be looking to with religious zeal (and he’s lying, as far as you’re concerned, since you don’t believe in any of the legends) -- and worse, he's close friends with Alisha, so they’re probably conspiring together. what do you do? again, you appeal to him first, explaining what an important influence he is. you try bribing him, even. he turns his back on you and welp, this is another problem that needs to go away

tl;dr Bartlow is not the main antagonist of the game like he is in the anime lbh and with good reason. he's jaded, immoral, ironfisted, and at times cruel (with a purpose). you’re supposed to hate him. but when you consider his office and what's at stake, his actions make a dark, unfortunate kind of sense that can't just be written off as "evil for the sake of being evil.”

yeah, forcing Alisha to deliver the declaration of war was absolutely awful of him, but it was admittedly genius. if she refused, he could have her arrested (and thus remove her voice from the public) and have an excuse to attack Rolance prematurely, which would give his side an edge. he’s a major douche, but an intelligent one.

so, is he a good person? heck no

do his intentions justify his actions? in my opinion, no, absolutely not ("cool motive, still murder")

but at the end of the day I think Zestiria succeeded with Bartlow where Abyss stumbled with Mohs (even though Bartlow abruptly dropped off the map after a certain point and could've had a bigger role than he did while Mohs was hecking constant).

Zestiria doesn't give him too much time onscreen, but with some thought you can figure that Bartlow is smart, but callous, with good intentions (in the interest of Hyland) that you can see when considering his circumstances. maybe he used to be like Sorey and Alisha, bright-eyed and dreaming of a perfectly peaceful society, and that got beaten out of him over the long years of facing reality and hardship; maybe he’s always been this way. we don't know for sure, but we're free to imagine, and the game doesn’t try to force a lesson down our throats with him. either way, he was wrong, but understandable to a degree when you consider his position.

Abyss told you Mohs was sympathetic (several times, to the point of obnoxiousness one of my few issues with an otherwise perfect game), but that's hard to perceive when he's constantly backstabbing everyone, abusing his position as a neutral state, considering no alternatives other than "kill them all," is willingly brainwashed by the Score instead of thinking for himself, dehumanizes and objectifies an entire race of people, and refuses to admit his mistakes even when the very thing he's been obeying straight up tells him he is wrong, at which point it feels like he’s acting in the interest of his own ego before anything else. the game does its absolute best to make you hate his guts with a passion over the course of several arcs, and then abruptly tells you to feel bad for him. NO, THANKS

(disclaimer #1: granted, this is just my personal perception, obviously. maybe other people out there think Mohs was a good dude under all the crazy and Bartlow is the lowest scum of the earth, idk. to each their own!)

(disclaimer #2: I love Abyss, I consider it the best game of the series and my second favorite personally. the forced Mohs sympathy has just always bugged me.)

in hindsight, I wonder if the Zestiria anime was trying to mimic Mohs with the way it overplayed Bartlow, considering all the similarities it decided to make up (kidnapping Alisha's parental figure, turning her true parent against her, etc).

tl;dr Bartlow is trash but he deserves better than being grossly misinterpreted, fight me

[ryodan]

SasuNaru and the pinhole : part 2

This comes full circle in the Gara fight when Sasukes survivor guilt was shown on full display, with him stating he believes the only reason Itachi let him live was to be an avenger. Sakura comes in to take his attack and

1 thing I’d like to highlight, Sasuke throwing himself in front of them earlier was because he cared and it’s unlike his moral standard..and his last words would have been this

But to willingly and consciously give up his revenge because the pain of losing someone dear is a great deal of character development and refutes any argument that he did not care about Sakura. Not to say he would not have done the same for Naruto, but Kishimoto chose her for a reason.

Naruto sees this and remembers Kakashis and Hakus quote about fighting for the people you love making you stronger and giving you a stronger resolve and he charges up on chakra

‘Sakura-chan wa orega mamoru!’

‘I’ll protect Sakura!’

And he fights Gara, and teaches him about the pain of suffering on your own, shouldering pain with your friends and protecting them..the whole concept behind the series

Itachi happens and ofc you know sasuke is conflicted, his resolve is awakened

Now, sasukes inferiority complex dates back to his childhood, and that is why he compares Itachi to Naruto, both of whom are people who had a strength sasuke thought was unattainable to him

His petty side did show throughout a lot of the series

It was also shown on multiple occasions. Sasuke did not like Naruto catching up to him because it was another Itachi situation. Additionally Itachi dug salt into the wound by saying things like you are weak and I am not interested in you. The fact that he was interested in Naruto, who was getting stronger than him made his petty rise to like 5000 degrees, I don’t think anything that follows, or a lot of their ‘rivalry’ in part actually is justified. Their dynamic through this lens but not a single non sns fan ive met irl wasn’t annoyed by narutos constant bitching and sasukes constant petty side.

People also like to forget this happened

When he was practicing he was thinking that he was completely useless in a situation where somebody he cared about a lot was in grave danger,  which again correlates to his past. This is also him feeling inferior to Naruto but Kishimoto put the smile thing intentionally, in fact he put in there when he woke up again indicating it was a mix of a little of things making him feel inferior.

Since this is a post debunking most sns arguments ive ever been told to make ship this ship, I see people saying Sasuke cared more about Naruto than Itachi when he heard he was back. And while of course he did care a great deal, his best friend no matter how annoying their relationship is, is being targeted by the person who murdered his family in cold blood, of course he would not let shit like that happen again..but I feel like if anyone was viewing these scenes with an sns lens on it annoys me. The person who massacred a clan and made a child feel like he was not good enough to be slaughtered and that his own reason of living is to carry the moral burden of avenging his clan (no matter how great itachi is, that was the pov at the time for sasuke) was in town, sasuke was having flash backs all the way there and it was heavily sasuke x itachi related, in the worst of ways because of the torture. Naruto was like???? My friend??? Good, of course he’d be like that but the fact that some shippers see this arc as an sns arc pisses me off bc sasuke is not there to wank your fav as so many shippers in general see him..but this scene in particular makes me uncomfortable to think that people view the mental torture of this kid as a romantic arc bc he thought about his friends safety. Also, Naruto is a great friend I just wanted to say that tbh.  This scene is also interpreted wrong

This is the first time Naruto realizes he should get over Sakura, and again is a scene that refutes any ‘naruto was the only one who mattered in team 7’..because of all Team 7 mattered.’she hugged him shes selfish’ ah nah youre just reading the scene out of your ass if you say so imo

‘naruto went crazy when sasuke was hurt so it means he love sasuke’

Yes, ofc he does. He’s his best friend. It’s not romantic tho

To clarify : I don’t know id consider him to be in love with sakura? I always thougth it was a crush and he seemed to get over it so good on him, but the databook and certain chapters state otherwise? I don’t see at all imo but maybe it’s bc I am biased anti NS

Anywho, moving on to a scene that reprsents why I cant be fucked to pretend this relationship is healthy or that I can condone on it on a romantic level no matter how much I love the bond between them

‘he woke up from trauma so,,,,’ if he was acting dick-y I’d understand. He’s 12 so I will defend him because a childs brain can barely handle any of what hes been through (I mean gaara) but he straight up almost killed Naruto for inferiority complex reasons

Yeesh. What he actually says is めざわり, mezawari..the term the village described Naruto with all of his lonely childhood. Naruto jumps right back and says ‘you’re still weak’ after he witnessed the entire Itachi situation knowing full well that’s not something he should say right now. The went full out on each other knowing the other could die bc theyre petty? Sasuke goaded Naruto on so much the need to prove himself made him charge at him with full intensity to kill him. That’s a no from me. I mean that apple plate scene was crappy too, but in it’s intensity and relative to the situation I’m willing to let it :/ me

I understand the trauma aspect, but I don’t justify picking a death match with your friend bc they are getting better than you.

They explain my stance better than I can

Kakashi gets shit sometimes for this scene but I’d like to remind you that the Uchiha massacre was only a political problem in the series after the truth was revealed. Telling Sasuke to just let it go and share his pain instead was not the right way to go about it and Kakashi acknowledged that himself, it was not fair to the situation at hand but he did get through to him, so much so that sasuke went from shouting murderous statements to this, because Kakashi does understand the pain and guilt you feel when your loved ones are dead while you were helpless to help. Revenge is unhealthy…its even more unhealthy when it makes you take it out on people you love and end up hurting yourself more. I hear people say Kakashi and sakura are selfish for relating the situation to themselves, but so did Naruto and so would anyone. No one is that mother Theresa to not see situations as 2 sided.

To go even further into this, there is a thing I see that’s like Naruto was the only one who understood him? Naruto was the only one who didn’t. In fact, self admitted it himself. He was very naïve and did not see the situation through sasukes point of view for a long time

I give Sakura credit on this tbh

After the FOD  Sakura was imo, the most in tune with sasuke

Blah Blah blah confession happens, certain people call her selfish but she never made the revenge aspect about her

Or people who say she didn’t understand his resolve, or that she was doing it bc she just wants him to stay is dumb. Both naruto and sakura did it for both sasuke and bc they want him to stay. They forget she said ‘are you going to isolate yourself again’ meaning no, she understood a lot of his psychological reasoning than she is given credit for.

Idk how this is selfish, or kakashi saying I lost people and learned revenge isn’t healthy is, when everyone is doing it for his benefit.  I think it’s the mistranslation. Some people also think she has never attempted to understand where he is coming from better.

Or people who say its unhealthy bc ‘even if he cared, she didn’t know’ she did before and after

The first battle in the final valley only happened when Naruto jumped sasuke and punched him, Sasuke wouldn’t have gone as low as killing someone unprovoked..had it been Sakura he would have also obtained mangekyo.

He did power up using the pain he felt by the loss of their bonds, in fact the only time he ever thinks of them positively is them as a unit, he said it himself he thinks of them as family

That’s when sasuke almost killed Naruto to obtain mangekyo. Now, let me say another misconception. Sasuke doesn’t kill Naruto bc he is the person closest or dearest to him, that was and consistently remained to be his family. Itachi said kill your best friend the term he used was もっとも and tomo

Not 親友 shinyu 友達,友人 so many words that can indicate dearest person but that wasn’t chosen, instead that was.

 The curse of hatred activates when losing a person very dear, and experiencing self hatred because you couldn’t do anything, Like sasuke when he awakened sharingan in the night of the massacre. To further it to mangekyo the common trope among uchihas was to kill your best friend, to power it up you experience more emotional pain, to make it permanent you implant another uchihas eye to your own and that erases the risk of blindness. All of this ofc means more emotional pain, and no one wants to rebuke narutos status as sasukes best friend their bond is tight bc of the loneliness they know. But none of team 7 are sasukes dearest atm, its his family, his resolve to leave to avenge his family is strong only furthered by Itachis manipulation and his curse of hatred making him feel even more survivors guilt. The main source of his power ups aside from kagatsuchi have always been his family, the love he had for them caused him the most emotional suffering. I recommend these videos they explain it better than I do.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkbXG_USxX4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KhHE75GGoo&t=339s

There is ofc the emotional pain of killing a best friend , and its emotional pain of loss and regret that activates mangekyo anyways so when he gets a huge dose of it with Obito he awakens it and rapidly descends into the curse of hatred

Naruto wants to bring sasuke back bc he doesn’t want to see his friend hurt himself, and bc he wants his friend around coolio he even states sasuke is like a brother to him

Again confirming the #nohomo

This is where the fight gets problematic, ‘sasuke was killing naruto bc hes his dearest person’ is easily refutable but whats not refutable is that he wasnt thinking that for a big part of their fight, which is why kishimoto could never get away with any sort of romantic context on this ship. People talk a lot about heteronormativity when it comes to SNS but this is a gross representation of a gay ship, I’ve had that told to me by multiple gay male friends

Yeesh. And the smile is fucking over kill. Mind you, Naruto also has 0 explanation for this behavior so hes just getting beaten up by his friend who is saying ‘you being my best friend is all more the reason to kill you.’  

Thing Id like to add one that, and ill come to again..people say  naruto was the person who understood sasuke the most.. except that was towards the end..and he fully understood him by their final battle. If you remember me saying their bond is a concentration of the series themes, then this is not a surprise. You don’t need to know someones gut, nor experience what they experienced to share or understand their pain. As naruto learns more and more by every arc and experience, he understands sasuke more and by the end tries to communicate what he learned to him. The fact that it can only be Naruto was alluded to by Kakashi when he mentioned ‘the cycle that only ends by death’, then by pain mentioning the world being a cycle of hate, then by the prophecy and by the land of iron arc when Karin noticed sasuke and narutos double chakras and Naruto confirmed he is not fighting sasuke only in order to protect him when kiba accused him, hes the only one who can save sasuke and break the cycle. That’s why they communicate only through their fists, they are literally destined to it as they have indra and ashuras chakra within them.

This, does not mean Kakashi and Sakura did not understand sasuke. They got his motivations way more than Naruto did. 

After the fight sasuke refuses to kill Naruto because he refuses to be like Itachi, confirmed himself in the first reunion

Another sort of annoying thing the sns fandom does is devalue sakuras hard work, Naruto trained to get stronger, beat the akatsuki and bring sasuke back. Sakura trained to protect her  friends, better herself and bring sasuke back. Theres this stigma that because she ended up with a lot of peoples want to be fictional boyfriend that she must be selfish..naruto was willing to die with him!11!! K.

‘just because she had the resolve doesn’t mean anything bc she didn’t do it’ No, but she did what she could to the best of her abilities, however its established the only one who can fight him is Naruto over and over again. If it were her trying, itd be a one sided massacre on his side, and talk no jutsu doesn’t work on him…the only way to break the damn cycle is the child of prophecy, although she was still able to affect him with just words. That’s why shes the only one he ever outwardly thanked , he appreciates her effort way more than some fans give her credit for.