A bright day and bouncy music start us off, and we get to see how Naruto starts his day. After the morning slog, our boy's ready to go! Mach five! Sakura and Sasuke're hanging around on a bridge waiting for Naruto, and right away we get a morning dose of awkward as the boys may have bonded over life and death struggles, but it doesn't mean they like each other very much. I feel bad for Sakura. Oh, and here's a question for you folks - what is it that Inner Sakura says at the end of each diatribe? 'Cause my subtitles say 'Cha!' and that's not it. Linguistic matters aside, Kakashi is late like always, this time claiming he got lost. Hee. Naruto immediately starts in on wanting more exciting missions, and like I said, you'd think he'd learn. What Naruto really wants is a chance to get out from under his own sense of owing his life to Sasuke, complete with really humorous imaginings of just how that'd go down.
Today's mission: pulling weeds. If that's the caliber of missions Naruto gets, no wonder he wants to do something more exciting. Wanting to outdo Sasuke, he pulls out everything and gets beaten up by a matronly ninja housefrau for his trouble. Then it's on to community service, as Squad Seven have to pick up garbage from the local river while Kakashi reads the next thrilling chapter in Make-Out Paradise. Naruto slips up and gets sucked away down the river, but Sasuke saves him from going over the waterfall. Hah! Now: Ninja dog-walking! While Sasuke and Sakura pick small dogs, Naruto gets a huge mastiff the size of a shetland point who immediately drags him into the Hidden Leaf trap-testing field. Naruto gets on Sasuke's case for being, er, awesome and Sakura's had just about enough of it. Kakashi comments that their teamwork's been crap lately. Interestingly, while he doesn't outwardly complain, Sasuke wants tougher missions, too. After Kakashi tells them to pack it in for the day, Sakura asks Sasuke if they can work on their teamwork. So THAT's what the ninja kids are aalling it these days. Sasuke blows her off, saying if she's got time to be girly over him, then she's got time to practice her jutsu. Which? Go, Sasuke. He crushes her by telling her that she's more useless on missions than Naruto. Naturally, Naruto takes this exact time to ask Sakura-on-the-edge if maybe THEY want to train together. Kakashi takes this time to wisely ninja vanish.
We don't get Sakura erupting on Naruto, but we do get him followed by a very persistent rock. It's Konohamaru! And friends from Ninja Preschool, Moegi and Udon. They're even wearing goggles to imitate Naruto! That's adorable. They ask if Naruto has time to play ninja, but he tries to beg off, wanting to train to out Sasuke Sasuke. Sakura staggers back, still reeling from the 'not-as-good-as-Naruto' blows. Konohamaru immediately gets the hilarious wrong idea, which Naruto confirms, and thus gets cratered into a fence for his deception. Number One Grandson calls Sakura an ugly wench, and our girl looks about half a step from going Super Saiyan. The bonk on Konohamaru's head no doubt resounded throughout the village. This does mean more and more people are willing to lay hands on the kid, so I guess that's technically progress for him. The kid just does not know when to stop (much like his mentor), and Naruto and the Ninja Apple Dumpling Gang have to flee a rabid Sakura, while I die of laughter. Their flight is blocked by Konohamaru bouncing off the leg of a masked ninja, complete with kunoichi partner.
At ninja HQ, Kakashi's reporting in and Iruka asks after Naruto. Things aren't going quite as well as they may like, but Kakashi says that it does mean it'll help Naruto get as strong as Iruka. Hey! New kids I think I remember from the third episode, and they have a kunoichi teacher. Cool. They also look wore out, and their teacher seems to have her ninja sense set off. So does a cigarette-smoking ninja and his squad, Ino and her pals. Back to Konohamaru, the (I now realize) face-painted ninja has poor kid up by his collar, and I notice they're not Leaf ninja. Sakura apologizes and Naruto yells at him to put Konohamaru down. The masked ninja's already kind of a bastard, wanting to bully Naruto. Our boy's temper finally snaps, but a charge at the ninja is stopped by some odd jutsu. Sakura finally stifles the not-helping Naruto, but the ninja just won't let the little kid go. He pulls back for a punch, changing the focus of the show from cruelty to animals to cruelty towards children, but he's stopped a well-thrown rock. Sasuke to the rescue! Sakura marks out, and I indulge her. The foreign kunoichi comments he's pretty cute. Down, girl. Sakura, Moegi and Udon immediately form the cornerstone of Sasuke's fan club, and Konohamaru thinks he picked the wrong idol to hero worship. The foreign ninja calls out Sasuke, unwrapping the... thing he has on his back, apparently called Crow. The ninja, Kankaro, is stopped by a dead-eyed red-headed kid named Gaara who's calmly standing on the underside of a branch, and even Sasuke doesn't know how in the heck Gaara pulled off being that stealthy.
Meanwhile, there's a council meeting of Jonin with the Hokage, because Big Things are afoot. It's time for something, and whatever it is, Kakashi thinks it's pretty sudden. The Hokage declares that in a week, the Chunin Exam will begin! I already think Squad Seven has an advantage - all the other kids were picking up litter and finding cats and whatnot. No contest.
Next Episode: Nothing says test prep like foiling a kidnapping!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment