Naruto News

Recently there’s been some new developments going on with our favorite ninja shounen hero…

First of all, I came across this interesting news item the other day:

(source: LELOLA)

“Post Time-Skip Narutimate Accela for Playstation 2 – Spring 2007!
The promotional and hype machine works just as well in Japan as it does in America, often you can tell a lot just by what companies are willing to release, without officially saying it. Today, scans from the newest edition of the Narutimate Hero series, Narutimate Accel (it would be the fifth game in that series) have surfaced. The difference with this game, the characters are in their post time-skip outfits. This is significant because of the fact that no video game for Naruto has been based solely off of the manga, they have waited for the anime to be there. The release date for the game is also significant, scheduled for Spring 2007, it only goes on to help solidify the claim that the Naruto anime fillers will end in the Spring. And what better way to celebrate the return to Konoha than with a brand spanking new videogame that is following the same storyline! View the scan by clicking here. We will have more information on this game as it becomes available.

Post Time-Skip Narutimate Accela for Playstation 2 – Spring 2007!
It has now been confirmed that the Japanese Naruto anime series will be returning to it’s original storyline as told in the Naruto manga series, coming this next February, a few short months from now. Along with returning to the story, Naruto will be getting a brand new name to go by. It is nothing big that will blow your mind, but nonetheless a couple of words have been added – Naruto: Hurricane Chronicles – which appears to play reference to Naruto being a Wind Element user. This is also the name that the fourth Naruto movie, due to be released in theaters next Summer, will be going under as it is a movie that will take place after the time-skip. Now there, is something to the thankful for this Thanksgiving.”

I can’t believe the Naruto fillers are FINALLY going to end. LOL, I haven’t watched new episodes of Naruto in quite a while. I started watching the very early filler episodes, but then I eventually stopped, first because I was watching too much other anime at the time, and also because I could see the quality of the series slowly declining and I had heard that the fillers were just going to get worse from that point on. I think the last episode I watched was 144. I did read a little of the manga from where the anime left off, but I didn’t get any further than the arc about Kakashi’s past, again because I was watching too much other anime and I’ve been busy with lots of other things. But once the anime gets back on track with the main storyline, I will definitely start watching it again!

Which leads to some more(though slightly disappointing) Naruto news. The fact that the popular fansub group Dattebayo, will no longer be fansubbing new episodes of Naruto, but will be fansubbing Pokemon Diamond & Pearl instead. I’m glad in one way because, since I’m one of the few fans who likes both Naruto and Pokemon, that means I won’t have to watch Pokemon D&P raw anymore(though it’s good Japanese practice for me =P), but I feel bad for the dedicated Naruto fans who have watched all the episodes via Dattebayo up to this point. However, there’s no doubt in my mind that another fansub group will pick up subbing such a popular series, especially when the filler episodes end.

And one last bit of Naruto news, the full version of the newest Naruto opening song “Yura Yura,” is now available! I uploaded an mp3 of it which you can download here.

I have to say, it’s an awesome song and it’s definitely my most favorite of all the Naruto songs ^_^ It doesn’t sound much like a Naruto-ish kind of song, but maybe that’s to signify the change that the series is going to go through soon =) And if you haven’t seen the actual opening clip of the song, I uploaded it along with the new ending “Scenario” here.

Although I haven’t been watching the filler episodes of Naruto(or reading the manga), I do watch the new dub episodes every week on Cartoon Network. As I mentioned before in my Bleach dub post, I think the Naruto dub is good and that fans complain too much. I can’t find any significant mistranslation or miscasting in it, and the fact that they leave a lot of the blood, violence, and dark themes intact, despite the fact that it airs on Toonami and not Adult Swim, is more than enough of a reason to consider it at least a decent dub. Anyway, the dub just finished the Naruto vs Neji battle. It’s been over a year since I first watched those episodes, and they reminded me how good the Naruto series used to be and how much potential it has. Neji’s whole conflict about destiny and the background story of the main and branch families of the Hyuga clan are just so interesting and engrossing. Though I haven’t read the latest chapters of the manga, I’m really hoping that when the filler episodes end, the quality of the first 136 Naruto episodes will be revived in the Hurricane Chronicles! ^_^