#naruto parallels

[joy-girl]

Naruto 416 // Naruto 448

Uzumaki Naruto // Uzumaki Nagato

[yutamayo]

"Ironic, that justice so often spawns from evil." - All Might

[team7-headquarter]

— HAKU AND SAKURA PARALLELS ( 2 / ? )

But what has been hammered into me... is the unbending spirit of my master!

[villainsandvictimsalliance]

I love how @haleigh-sloth and me keep going back and forth with our comparison between Naruto and Sasuke and Deku and Tomura, (you can check this link and this link to understand more of this).

I just sat for a second thinking about it.

Let's go first with Tomura and Sasuke. Aren't both of them victims of their hatred? A hatred that is not original in them, but that someone put in place as a part of a bigger picture. They were both little siblings trying to do their best to reach the expectations of their parents, with a very sweet mother and a very strict father. And both their families got completely murdered. Although there's a clear difference between who did it in both cases, both Tenko and Sasuke were filled with shame and rage for not being able to stop it or doing the killing. Both Tomura and Sasuke too had to remember that terrible day in more than one ocasión, and had external people pressuring them to avoid a possible healing process.

Thinking about the relationship of AFO with Tomura, it also reminds me of Orochimaru and Sasuke. The invasive power taking over their bodies, the isolation, the idea of forming a group of friends to use them, even the color palette matches: the purple and black and red and grey and white.

Both Sasuke and Tomura are the product of a society full of violence. In Sasuke's case, the battle between Konoha's form of government and the Uchihas (don't judge me too hard, it's been many years since I last saw Naruto Shippuden). For Tomura, it was the fight between AFO and OFA. They weren't exactly pieces of the game, but life and society and family forced them into it.

There are many differences, of course. There are more parallels of Sasuke in bnha, and there are completely opposites like Shouto, (he and Dabi are a negative copy of Sasuke and Itachi). But then you have, like I said, the similarities of AFO and Orochimaru.

Wanting to live forever, experimenting on dead bodies (Doc Ujiko serves as an extension of AFO), the many servants willing to die, the grooming children and using them... Orochimaru and AFO share the god complex in terms of seeing life as a group of arbitrary facts that can be altered to one's needs. They criticize society in terms of wrong or right and have a very fucked up morality because of that.

With Naruto and Deku, it's so easy to see. Cheerful, yet discriminated and lonely. Good with kids (Konohamaru, Inari, Eri, Kota), with older people, have many teachers and mentors trying to help him (and sacrificing themselves for him), a colorful group of friends his age, spring themed designs (Deku is full of green and prosperity, Naruto full of yellow like the sun, both implicating grow, light, power).

Both have a power that has been passed on from generation to generation, and they have had the help of the other users of the power in their favor. Both their powers have certain personality willing to give them a hand. Both their mentors (Jiraiya and All Might) are cheerful big dudes, very wise, who yet have fucked up before and have failed in saving or helping certain people. Their principal powers are related to air, have messy hair, bla bla bla.

What I care about the most is the fact that they started as outcast in search for a secret method of getting good to be a proper hero/ninja. They were very lonely in their childhood, but they never gave up. They are very rebellious too. They're choosing their own way, inspiring people with it. And they are very empathic, sensitive when they see injustice, it doesn't matter if they are villains or enemies.

They fight to bring back home and help and redeem their counterparts: Sasuke and Tomura. They are mirrors of each other, light and dark, death and birth, moon and sun. They all know loneliness, they all know how heavy is the weight of the social opinion. And they communicate with words no one else could hear. Their hearts are connected, they can get in each other's minds.

You know, there's this whok academic issue about the Me and the Others, and who our world is built in terms of what I recognize as the person who sees, the viewer, me, my identity, vs the other, the strange, the different, the unknown, etc.

What happens with Sasuke and Naruto and with Izuku and Tomura is that they recognize themselves in the other. There's a type of recognition you can't understand or explain, one that makes you want to protect the other because you see yourself in that person, and it's like seeing yourself getting hurt. That recognition, that knowledge, is love in terms that lack words. It's about shared experiences, about bonds built by going through the same traumas.

It summarize in Sasuke and Tomura wanting to go home more than anything, but not feeling like they are worthy.

They feel dirty, they're searching for forgiveness, they feel guilty and ashamed, like monsters, like people who can only destroy and can't get better. They think "What if I do it again? I am evil. How can I love? I am evil. I must be lying when I say I love my friends, because I am evil. I am a killer. I am a coward. Bla bla bla”.

And what do Naruto and Deku do about it? They bring them unconditional love. A light só strong that shines through every shadow, a hand always extended, an unbreakable will. Trust. "You are not evil". To face an identity crisis, they bring the view of the outsider, saying "I am seeing through the fog clouding your eyes and you're good, you're worth it, you are already getting better, you have it in you to grow and heal and change. The things in your mind are not the truth, trust me. I will never fail you. Trust me. You have not failed me”.

I think it is half a tale of how we all are very afraid of being bad and how we need people to remind us that we have a choice. We don't have to stay closed in our mind with our demons. We can communicate. We can reach for help. There are people out there, there are people out there, who believe in us even if we don't understand why. People who would go to the end of the world to save us. Because we all deserve a little saving and we all have the ability to be the person bringing that comfort, extending that hand, supporting the ones who can't stand by themselves.

Even when there are many differences between Naruto and Sasuke and Deku and Tomura, the message is very similar. I don't know why so many people hate so much the whole thing being about friendship. Aren't we all looking for someone to connect with? That understand us? Don't we all need people by our side? Isn't this all about how we need to learn to communicate with others so we can avoid tragedies? About how being selfish and proud will only isolate us and make us suffer even more?

This is an already long post and I don't want to make it longer. I would love to see more comparisons between Bnha and other Mangas, so this is my contribution.

[shigaymaru]

MinaKushi & NaruSaku

[meezumaki]

[veenia]

Parallels❤️ Naruto & Sakura With Hinata

[joy-girl]

Naruto 328 ~ first encounter // last encounter with Asuma