Back to Jacob_Jeenault's Profile Jacob_Jeenault's Profile

I started watching One Piece around January of 2021, as a joke. The idea was, I knew most of my friend group would end up watching it someday, and that I could just spring it on them that I've seen the whole show upon being caught up with it, and threaten them with spoilers. Obviously that sounds like a stupid joke, but it basically meant that for watching One Piece, this big 1,000 episode show, not only would I get what enjoyment it must contain to keep it alive so long, but I could bully my friends with it, which means I had more motive ... to watch it and sit through it, yet I still couldn't make it to episode 200, even while skipping filler, it was just too slow and boring.

Story: 2/10
The story was actually really interesting and captivating until shortly after they enter the Grand Line. I loved it and within the first 100 episodes I had the show as an 8. But even I noticed during the Alabasta arc that the show was becoming too slow-paced for me. I made it through the Alabasta arc, skipped the filler, and set my sights on the Skypiea arc. It was really good, until they all got trapped in the Upper Yard. Once that happened it became BORING AS HELL. I was all hyped to see God Eneru and learn about his powers, and how he usurped Gan Fall, and the lore behind the Shandians, but there were a good 4 or 5 fights that had villains like Yama, Luffy just being lost and not getting any screen time, Chopper being dumb and asking a deadly villain to "please not damage the ship" and "please don't hurt me", and it was just too boring. "OH MY GOD PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!" I cried but to no answer. So I dropped it.

Art: 3/10
The art was pretty interesting, I didn't like it or dislike it, but the animation quality from the beginning to where I quit the show makes it a 5. It can still be impressive. The character design for main characters is great, but for side characters it isn't so fantastic. We have characters like Igaram, Yama, Satori, Hotori/Kotori, etc, which are just annoying to look it, it's like Eiichiro Oda thought "Hmm you know what? You know those people that watch my show? Fuck them, they can kill themselves," while proceeding to draw large circles, give them faces, and call it a night. I'm going to count that against this rating instead of the characters one though, so the art is a 3 for me.

Sound: 7/10
The sound was pretty good. It wasn't trash, they had a couple tracks that definitely added to the scenes, some that made everything on screen annoying. The openings and endings though were fucking FABULOUS. I always force myself to watch openings and endings all the way through, sometimes against my own will, but I never once wanted to skip a One Piece opening or ending. It's what I'll miss most about the show.

Character: 7/10
The characters were good. The backstories of the main characters were intricate and well-composed, not the "my parents died and I've been all alone" backstories you see in a lot of popular Shonen anime.

Enjoyment: 3/10
Like I said with the story, it is super good, like an 8 or a 9 until after the Alabasta arc. But unlike the story which immediately shoots down around 1/3 through Skypiea, the enjoyment slowly declines starting about halfway through Alabasta.

Overall: 5/10
That is what all of my scores average out to. If you are considering watching this show, watch it on Netflix, because Netflix has all the way up through the Alabasta arc, episode 130. It only stays good for a little bit after that.

No spoilers; read away and wage a keyboard war as you wish!

I have seen all of Naruto, Naruto Shippūden, and all of the manga canon episodes of Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, and even though it is my first and favorite anime, I'm going to give it a nuanced and unbiased review.

We'll start with my objective inferences, and pointing out that I am mainly a slice-of-life watcher, more than a Shonen action watcher.

I think it's fair to say that the Onbaa in the room is definitely filler. This is a review of the anime, not the manga, and yes, the filler definitely brings it down overall ... from a 9 to an 8 (that's being generous, too) for me, so I'll just get that out of the way now, so I don't have to keep bringing it up.

Story: Objectively, I think the story deserves a solid 7. It is a really good story, albeit a little bit cliché. But that doesn't mean it's bad. With the way all three shows go about presenting the plot events and building tensions, this show is insanely rewatchable. I would know because I've re-watched it almost three times now. I loved the Land of Waves Escort Mission arc. It did drag on a little long, but it was a great start, and they did have to do a lot of explaining of things like the Sharingan, chakra related things, etc. The Chūnin Exams? Cliché. I've only seen a couple Shonen action anime and I even I know it's cliché. It's definitely very captivating and entertaining though. The Konoha Crush arc was good, no complaints. Interesting techniques, and fights, with funny moments in there. The search for Tsunade was okay. Unlike most of the fanbase, I really don't care for Tsunade, I get that it's ha-ha funny that she has fucking Z-cup titties, but she doesn't do very well making me care about her. But the arc had some great fights, like the bouts with Itachi and the three-way deadlock was fabulous, followed by the Sasuke Retrieval Arc, which was a 9 and a half for me, I loved that arc, and how they built up tension for the Sasuke fight and in my opinion, totally delivered; the fight was heart-wrenching for me. I also LOVE how deep most of the lore runs, like the origins of the Dōjutsu, but that's more of a thing in Shippūden, so it doesn't contribute to my rating.

Art: an 8 in my opinion. It definitely wasn't bad. They had some moments where the characters looked a little bit questionable, but that falls under animation, and I don't know if animation counts as art, but the reason I give the art an 8 is that I love the color palette, the character design, and the Jutsu, and how it plays into the imagery. Each (main, and canon) character has a unique and intricate design, to the point where you can distinguish them based on their silhouettes, and everything is so brightly colored and sticks out in its own way, even the outfits represent their characters, like how Sasuke wears a neat and organized shirt with shorts, and Naruto wears a baggy, impractical jumpsuit. Also the great art makes the openings and endings so easy to watch, and along with the songs they use makes the openings/endings unrivaled compared to everything I've watched so far.

Sound: now the sound is my absolute favorite part of the series. It is definitely objectively a 10. I've already went over how the openings/endings have great art, but they have even greater songs in my opinion. Songs like Haruka Kanata by ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION, and Go!!! by FLOW perfectly encompass the spirit of Naruto, and go along with the art and sound to make 1 minute and 30 seconds of audio/visual greatness. And then there's the soundtrack. I just love every song of the soundtrack. For example the main theme. To me, as an American guitarist who is very hands-on with music, I love how it blends traditional Eastern Asian music elements like the Pentatonic scale, along with traditional Japanese instruments like the Shamisen with really distorted guitar, or the piano with Fue (bamboo flutes), and all of the music soundtracks do a really good job helping to set the mood and intensify the scenes. As well as the silly songs, the show has wonderful sound. I'm not sure if voice acting is a part of this, but it has excellent voice acting in both sub and dub, which is pretty rare in my experience. Zero complaints with the music whatsoever.

Characters: the characters are pretty good. I know at this point this probably seems like a typical Naruto Hypebeast's review but all of this is the things that stick out to me, I'm not just trying to gas the show up, and be annoying. I give the characters an 8 though. Each character has their own unique personality, and traits, and voice, and they all stick to them pretty well. The villains are nearly unrivaled (again this is more of a Shippūden observation, what with the Akatsuki and such) but Itachi, Orochimaru, and Zabuza & Haku are still mostly unrivaled in my experience and they make prevalent appearances. The character development is good, with some clichés, you know like the main character learning an overpowered technique really quickly (Rasengan), and things like that, but it didn't affect my opinion significantly.

Enjoyment: 6. Even though this review has mainly been hyping the show up, it is pretty hard to enjoy this show as a whole, you know because of the 80 or so filler episodes that appear as one big stretch spanning 41% of the show, immediately after one of the most heart-wrenching and serious moments in the show. If you're watching Canon only then yes, this is definitely an 8 or above, but this IS a review of the whole anime. Some filler is good, but filler is filler is filler, and none of it comes really close to competing with the actual canon material, which is why I opt to skip it most of the time, though I have seen all of the filler in this show.

Overall: I would say this show objectively deserves a 7.83, which is the average of all of my individual aspect ratings, which I'll round up to an 8. I have it rated as a 9 because that is my subjective opinion, and it's inflated because it is my first and favorite anime, and it helped me through some seriously rough times.

All in all, I'm not saying you should watch it, but I am saying you won't regret it. If you haven't started yet, make sure you bookmark https://www.animefillerlist.com/shows/naruto though. And if you want to watch filler, take your time with it, because I genuinely almost dropped the show trying to speed through the filler. And if you think it's overhyped, at least give it a genuine try before going and confronting people about liking it.