Naruto Thread (Spoilers For Sure)

What bothers me the most about naruto is how the entire first half of it, at least, is just worthless. The entire premise of the set up is you have this bratty kid who is cursed and ridiculed, for having one of the strongest entities in their universe. It just so happens he inherited it and we should all hate him for it. Then they spout all this "HARD WORK CONQUERS ALL", in fact naruto vs neji just shoves that down your throat. Then we find out he's the 4th's son, one of the most revered ninja's, who was intentionally made the 9 tails host, where were supposed to believe this prodigy child is nothing more than an accident?

Fast forward now, and he's one of the strongest ninja, not by work, but this savant premise where he just inherently understands everything around him.

Yup, this has been touched on quite a few times.

• Naruto just doesn't treat its aesops very kindly.

[INDENT]

• While the story stresses the importance of working hard, Hard Work Hardly Works for anyone. All powerful characters have some form of power such as a bloodline limit, sheer talent, a sealed demonic beast or a cursed seal. Some people get lots of these. On the other hand, the characters notably lacking in talent like Rock Lee are badly outclassed despite working far, far harder than the likes of Naruto or Sasuke. Naruto, to put these points together, was a slacker at the beginning of the series, doesn't work as hard as Rock Lee and has The Gift in at least three forms. In other words, Naruto's sheer talent and plot coupons steamrolled all resistance.
  
• The track record of Screw Destiny is also rather poor.

[/INDENT]
[INDENT][INDENT]

• The moral of the Chuunin Exam's Naruto vs Neji fight was rather ironic: hard work will trump natural talent and a big heap of Screw Destiny was thrown into the mix. What brought him victory? If you guessed Naruto utilizing The Gift, you're actually right! His own natural gift/curse was simply way stronger than his opponent's! Seeing how his opponent's belief was that, regardless of your efforts, you'd never beat someone who was simply more talented, Naruto inadvertently proved Neji right. Eventually Neji fulfills his destined role as a branch member by sacrificing himself for Hinata, thus choosing to remain a caged bird.
  
• The intended aversion of You Can't Fight Fate was also slapped in the face right from the start, considering how prevalent Generation Xerox, family bloodlines and prophecy are in this series. Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto match up with the legendary Sannin and the latter two are members of powerful clans that trace back to the creator of Ninjutsu. Sasuke and Naruto in particular match up almost perfectly with the Sage's two sons.
  
• Naruto only has the gift/curse of the Kyuubi chakra because of who his parents are. If he hadn't been born the son of the Fourth Hokage Namikaze Minato and Uzumaki Kushina, he'd never have had the Kyuubi sealed in him. So, Neji was right in the fact that your birth determines your lot in life.
  
• On the other hand, Neji, after his defeat and finding out the truth about his father's death, concedes in an internal monologue that some things are predetermined, but the ones who pursue their dreams are truly strong. Naruto had the gifts from the beginning, but he wouldn't have succeeded as a ninja if he didn't put so much effort into improving himself.

[/INDENT][/INDENT]
[INDENT]

• There's the theme of the new generations surpassing the previous ones - this is, in theory, why Naruto and Sasuke manage to become stronger than Kakashi, Jiraiya, Orochimaru, and the like. However, that idea is utterly negated by the revelation that Madara Uchiha is capable of effortlessly defeating all five Kages at once. Hashirama was even stronger than that, and it seems as though only characters who were members of the older generation are allowed to accomplish anything meaningful during the Fourth Great Shinobi War - Itachi is the only one who can negate Edo Tensei, Tobi's plan would have failed a long time ago without Madara, in fact it actually was Madara's plan in the first place and the First Hokage (instead of Naruto, who would be the logical choice) talked Sasuke out of his insane vengeance scheme.
  
• In the beginning, teamwork was considered very important and nearly everytime someone tries to apply this, someone end up greviously injured or worse. Particularly the Chunnin Exams, where you use teamwork to get pass but the finals stage completely turns this around. Turning everything into a one-on-one tournament.
  
• One of the main morals of Naruto, as stated by kakashi, is that while those who break the rules are scum, those who forsake their fellows are even lower than that. We found out that Kakashi inherit this philosophy from Obito, who would had been killed if Kakashi just follow through with the mission. Instead we have Kakashi rescue Obito, who through a series of events able to be come Tobi. So if Kakashi had abandoned his comrades and completed the mission, Obito would have died instead of becoming Tobi. Then Nagato probably wouldn't have gone as insane, Naruto's parents would have survived and Naruto wouldn't have been an outcast, Minato might have stopped the Uchiha Massacre (making Sasuke nowhere near as messed up), the Moon's Eye Plan would have died with Madara, the Fourth Great Shinobi World War would have been avoided, and Akatsuki wouldn't be hunting down and killing Jinchuriki. Nice job screwing over the aesop, Kishimoto.

[/INDENT]