Naruto, Chapter 473
WOW. Kishimoto wasn’t playing this week. Killer Bee and Kisame have been tussling for weeks, and today put an end to the madness.
Kisame was pushed into quite a corner last week, with Samehada, his key to invincibility, switching sides and leaguing up with Bee. This chapter opens with Kisame holding one of Bee’s blades, and preparing to take out the fallen rapper. Too bad it wasn’t gonna work out this way.
One of my favorite aspects about manga/anime is seeing the rawest people participating in battles together. We’ve already witnessed the pure power of the Raikage during the Kage/Sasuke battle, and because of his strength, he quickly climbed my list of the most exciting characters. When he showed up during this fight to help Bee … I got hype. As if seeing Killer Bee and the Raikage on the same page isn’t exciting enough, they took it to the next level as soon as the Raikage showed up. The mighty Hoshigaki Kisame, wielder of Samehada, and called the “Monster of the Hidden Mist”, was defeated in mere seconds by a double-team attack, courtesy of the Kumogakure brothers. I literally almost dropped my coffee on my computer. CRAZY.
The rest of the chapter was pretty much a wrap-up: the Hokage’s switch-a-roo technique was concluded, Suigetsu and Juugo were inconveniently discovered as/by samurai in the Land of Iron; and Sai is going to tell Naruto the full truth of what Sakura was trying to get across a few issues ago. Overall good week — pour one out for Kisame cuz that dude is GONE!
C’mon next week!!
^Favorite Moment: Not even a question — when Killer Bee and the Raikage double-dragoned Kisame and promptly took this dude’s head off. Probably one of my all-time favorite Naruto moments, actually — glad to see such a jerk go the great sharkbowl in the sky! Peace out!!!
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Naruto Shippuuden, Episode 137
Another great episode in the pivotal fight between Sasuke and Itachi. Last week left us with an image of Sasuke’s eye being torn out by Itachi, and that’s exactly what it turned to be — an image.
The entire conflict was another genjutsu by Itachi to show Sasuke his death … the thing is, though, this wasn’t just any genjutsu — Itachi broke out the Tsukuyomi for this. Amazingly, Sasuke broke out of this — the most powerful genjutsu in Naruto — with only his regular Sharingan against Itachi’s Mangekyo. As Sasuke stands, (both eyes intact and in his head) genjutsu is rendered irrelevant, and a straight ninjutsu battle ensues. Sasuke has the upper hand, partially due to Itachi’s shock at having his most powerful illusion rendered useless, and partially because Itachi is actually going blind. After a brief stand-off, Sasuke blows the ceiling off the place (literally), and the brothers find themselves on the roof, face to face.
Looking at each other, they both unleash the basic (but still powerful) attack of the Uchiha clan, the Great Fireball technique. Flame to flame, the clash reaches a standstill … until Itachi reveals the next secret of his Mangekyo Sharingan — the almighty black flame, Amaterasu. I don’t even want to get started on explaining the raw power of this technique. The black flames burn through Sasuke’s fireball, and eventually succeed in burning him to a crisp — or so we think. Sasuke has another trick up his sleeve, and uses Orochimaru’s patented body regeneration technique to save himself from a fiery death.
As the episode ends, Sasuke unleashes a mighty flame attack into the air, and the brothers stare each other, out of chakra, waiting for each to make the next move — which Sasuke seems confident will work out to his favor, of course.
A very good episode and great animation — looks like the Naruto creators finally got the message. C’mon next week!!
Favorite Moment: Right after the Tsukuyomi is broken, Sasuke goes into ninja-mode and unleashes a Shadow Shuriken technique on his older brother. Itachi dodges it, but is tricked, as the shuriken is rigged, and at the tug of a wire by Sasuke it explodes shrapnel-style and pierces Itachi square in his leg — and this wasn’t an illusion. Trickery at its finest!
じゃあまた!
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Oh, and since I cheated ya’ll out of neglected to put up a Girls, Girls, Girls post yesterday (it was Thanksgiving, give me a break), here’s a young lady to enjoy. Go ahead and start Googling (is that a word…?)!
Marlene Favela
Indeed.
_Reverend Zombie 14.09
Humanzee … is that you?
Last Sunday the winners of the Miss Earth 2009 Pageant were decided. Out of the more than 80 gorgeous environmentally conscience contestants, at least four took a shot at titles such as Miss Earth Fire, Miss Earth Water, Miss Earth Air, and most importantly Miss Earth. Literally hundreds upon hundreds of pictures and a few videos after the jump.