Naruto Shippuden Movie 2: Bonds - Reviews

This is the fifth Naruto movie, made after the initial high spirited continuation was saturated and the show entered a state of slow pacing and full of fillers phase. Once again the excitement was over and the audience started to drop it for the second time. Even the directors seemed to have lost their will to make something exciting and just created this as basic as possible. The budget is still quite high but there was no work given on making interesting battle choreographies, while all the characters act rather bored and distant from the viewer.

I must admit though that this movie has a very different feel from the previous ones. There are no henchmen that need to be defeated fro example, just generic faceless mooks with fancy technology. And the main villain’s motives were left hidden for the most part, making the main objective of the film to be hidden from the audience. So in this regard the movie was much closer to a war drama or a mystery adventure than a bunch of teenagers kicking the crap out of each other. This made it feel more mature as an overall. The problem here is that Naruto was never mature and the target audience never expected it to be. They just wanted to see cool magical ninjas doing lots of exciting stuff and instead got a rather uneventful movie with some anti-war messages and a blurry sinister plan towards the end.

There was a major hook for the fans to see the movie though. The trailers mentioned that it will feature the return of Gaysuke, the real protagonist that is, who was absent since the first movie. They even tried to tie the events with the main series in a very subtle way by making Orochimaru to be in need of a scroll some doctor in this film has. It seemed like a good marketing trick and normally it should have worked. Yet to the most part it didn’t. Why?

EVERYONE IS SO WEAK AND STUPID! Seriously, all the elite super powerful ninjas you were watching for so many years doing all sorts of epic stuff, in this movie they feel like they are average people who can’t even move fast or fight properly.
- The invading ninjas are not using ninjutsu to the most part. They are using technology, which is so off with the rest of the setting. We are so used to see magic hand seals, gained after years of training or after a horrible experiment was done on them, that this is just stupid. They all look like mass-produced robots instead of specially trained stealth spies or assassins. Not that the evil underlings in the other movies were any better in terms of personality but at least they had a face and each one of them had a unique style of fighting. But these guys? They all look the same and fight the same and don’t even have a face. Hell, even the villains of the second film had faces and unique abilities, despite NOT being ninjas and STILL using technology. Thus they are completely generic and booooring from the first second.
- Konoha is invaded so easily by the aforementioned ninjas that is plain stupid. I mean you have this huge organization of spies, scattered throughout the world and NOBODY could see and inform the village that a dozen huge battleships are heading their way? In the previous movie for example a soldier informed the others with a messenger pigeon. They also have hounds, frogs, and a thousand other scouting animals that can even be summoned from afar. Hell, they have a magic barrier that senses the tiniest person entering and informs the rest of what has happened in seconds. So seeing Konoha being trashed so easily is not only lame but also contradicts what we have seen so far in terms of security.
- Seeing Konoha getting trashed stopped being dramatic after the tenth time they did it in a filler arc. It was dramatic when it was done in-story during the Chuunin exam or when Pain invaded but they used the same hook in so many fillers that it lost its dramatic tension. So what if thousands died from the attack? So did ten times so far and nobody seems to mind at all. Konoha must have a population of over one billion to excuse all the casualties going unnoticed.
- So our heroes go to the offense and go on a mission to find the enemy’s base and destroy it. Which is a reasonable thing to do… if they were doing it right. Instead of jumping from tree to tree, which is a trademark of the show and which allows them to cross huge distances in a matter of hours, they WALK towards the enemy or use riverboats. THIS IS COMPLETELY BS! Where are all the cool stuff they could do before?
- Another case of how weak and useless everybody is, is the scene where Naruto is poisoned by the bite of a fish. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE? He has a mountain worth of chakra inside him that heals him in an instant and all of a sudden he can’t recover from a simple bite? Not only that but Hinata who can see and control chakra regulation, as well as Sakura who is a professional healer could do absolutely NOTHING to help him. THIS IS COMPLETE BS!
- And then a trap is triggered and someone gets killed with them standing right next to him. COMPLETE BS! We had seen them a hundred times having lightening-fast fast reflexes and saving people in a fraction of a second but now they can’t even run fast before it is too late.

What is even worse is when they really ARE using superpowers. It still looks completely crock.
- Although Sai’s fight with the flying ninjas was very cool, the way their ships were eventually defeated was completely anti-climactic. Somehow Shino’s bugs infiltrated them and destroyed them in a few seconds. LAAAAME!
- Gaysuke’s plan to defeat the main villain was also anti-climactic. All he did was throwing a few tiny sparks to cut his chakra circulation. LAAAAME!
- Then Naruto falls from a very high altitude and is saved by Jiraya who placed a frog to work as a trampoline that would stop him from crashing. Which would be cool if he was present in the film from the beginning and had foreseen and planned it to be as such. HE JUST CAME OUT OF NOWHERE!

What is even worse than even that is how all other characters besides Naruto (who is needed to provide his shallow idealism and final Rasengan on the enemy EVERY SINGLE TIME) are completely useless to the plot. They were useless before of course but now they CAN’T EVEN DO THE BASICS! They don’t even fight. They don’t even have a place in this whole mess.
- What is Sakura and Hinata doing in this film? They did absolutely nothing! They didn’t fight, they didn’t heal, they didn’t even offer some sort of service other than the tired jokes of Sakura hitting Naruto and Hinata blushing.
- What is Gaysuke doing in this film? Yes, he is looking for a scroll but was he important to the story? Hell no, he was there as fan service. Naruto did all the work as usual and Sasuke only managed to ruin the final battle with his cheap tricks.
- The main villain was a completely boring idiot and his plans made no sense at all.
- Zero-tails? Seriously? ZERO-TAILS? Not only it looks goddamn lame but it was so easy to defeat as well.
- That tomboy chick was also useless. Not to the story but because she felt like a sexualized and boring imitation of all the other emo kids Naruto was aiding in previous movies.

So in a few words the whole movie is anti-climactic and makes everybody to feel useless and stupid. It is completely unlikable and one of the worst additions to the franchise.

Contains some SPOILERS

This Naruto movie was probably one of the few I enjoyed quite a bit more than the others. The plot was a bit different than others though there were things that just made zero sense but I guess with all the movies it's always like that. The soundtrack was amazing as always, I honestly love the Naruto soundtracks. The team up between Sasuke and Naruto was enjoyable as well since we never really get much of that in the entire Naruto series. But also on that note, it's so random as well and as if Naruto would just let Sasuke go just like that, even though he had that monster thing to destroy. But since this isn't canon I'll let it go. Also I liked how the plot wasn't based on talk no jutsu like with a lot of the other films. It's a refreshing change.

The two new characters Shinnon and Amura (I forgot their names even though I just watched it lol) were okay.. Like first of all why is the young kid inlove with the old man? Super weird. Secondly, it was totally random how the old dude, Shinnon, suddenly became the bad guy and even though he did all this terrible crap the young kid, Amura still wants to listen to his ninja way or whatever. Like he's bad, why you tryna live up to his expectations? And another thing that bugs me with all the films are the highy superpowered villains. Like this dude can open the eight inner gates and have no damage.. how is current Naruto supposed to even beat that? There were some other weird inconsistencies but as this isn't canon I'll ignore it and just enjoy the film as a standalone.

But apart from that, I thought it was a pretty good film still and as always, just more Naruto content. I'd recommend only watching all the movies after watching the entire series.

the worst thing about this movie is that it gets pretty boring in the final battle. it gets borig becuase the fight is mega long its like 20-30 minutes. story is a 2 becuase it is very weird some random ninjas the sky ninjas attack the leaf village then naruto meets a doctor with very good mediscalskills he then meets his apprentience. Later naruto,hinata,sakura,the doctor and the apprectencie go to the apprectencies village. animaton is a 6 becuase it is pretty good but could be better. sound is a 5 its a little bit worse then animation. characters is a 3 becuase there is not so many deep feelings and such in the characters the only new character who has backstory is the red haired girl all of the other new characters dosent have backstory. overall i give this movie a 3.5. the movie is ok i dont really reccomend this one becuase it is nothing special compared to the other naruto movies i have watched. 

Naruto Shippuden is one of my favorite shows, but the various Naruto movies never seem to exceed the quality of a filler arc. The second Naruto Shippuden movie is no exception.

 

Story-

Based on the title of the movie ("kizuna" means bonds) and the various advertisements showing only Sasuke and Naruto, one might expect some sort of badass fight between the two main characters. This is sadly not the case. Sasuke actually plays a relatively minor role in the plot, showing up briefly in the beginning and for about twenty minutes in the end. He is somewhat friendly in this installment (by his standards, anyway).

The plot actually revolves around a group of evil ninja that attack the Leaf Village, from the "Land of Sky." It seems that the powers of the enemy ninja get stranger and stranger with each passing movie. This bunch has a couple of aircraft carriers, machine-kunai guns, and little kite things that let them fly like fighter planes. The grunts aren't impressive by any means, and their guns couldn't hit the broad side of a barn.

Of course, the Leaf ninja must deal with this new threat and a four-man team is sent out to pursue their aircraft carriers. This team, consisting of Kakashi, Shikamaru, Shino, and Sai, is essentially extraneous to the plot despite the few scenes they receive. Naruto, Sakura, and Hinata end up following a child named Amaru and her master, Doctor Shino, as they travel to an endangered village. Things move quickly from there and we are introduced to an odd creature called the "Zero Tails," that possesses dark chakra. The villain wishes to use this dark chakra to take over the world. Of course.

The plot is very clichéd and not up to par with the rest of the series. We end up with a giant floating fortress that is driven by weird, light-emitting magnets and a villain that looks like he went Super Saiyan. I couldn't help but nod when Sasuke said, "This is painful to watch." And when Naruto said "I know I'm going to sound a little cheesy here, but..." and proceeded to babble about the power of love, I had to agree with his first statement. The only real interaction between Naruto and Sasuke is some one-or-two line exchanges near the end of the film.

Animation-

Since this a movie, the animation is naturally better than the normal series. The Land of Sky's battleships are a delightful mixture of metallic faces and odd projections. I found the character's faces to be much more expressive here, particularly Sakura's.

While the Land of Sky's grunts are quite generic, I liked the character designs of the Zero Tails, Amaru, and Doctor Shino. The Zero Tails reminded me a bit of No Face from Spirited Away, though less cool. The animators must have overlooked the fact that it does indeed have a tail. Amaru and Doctor Shino, meanwhile, looked rather exotic in appearance--and any differentiating feature is good in this sort of movie.

Sound-

Though I normally watch Naruto Shippuden in Japanese, I was forced to view this film in English. It seems as though Naruto always sounds more idiotic in English. Much of what the characters said sounded cheesy, but I had to admire Doctor Shino's voice actor. His voice is satisfyingly deep and emotive.

The music consists of generic electric guitar with an Oriental feel, standard for the series. It failed to grab me.

Characters-

One of the advantages of a shounen like Naruto is the vast number of episodes we get for character development. Fans of the series have probably already watched dozens of hours of Naruto's antics before reaching this movie. Unfortunately, this means that the new characters introduced here get a pittance for character development.

Everything about these new characters seems rushed. The villain--while I can't quite say he is one-sided--degenerates as the film goes on and ends up as an uninspired lump of evil. Amaru, the child, goes through a similarly rushed transformation.

Poor Hinata gets barely any screen time at all.

Overall (4.5--meh...)-

If you are looking for something to fill your time while waiting for a better series to arrive, go ahead and watch this movie. If you have more episodes of the regular Naruto Shippuden series to watch, though, I would say to skip this movie and view those instead.

Okay so I'm not a Naruto fanboy nor am I a Naruto hater so it was with that mindset that I approached this Naruto film in the same way that I approach all things Naruto with an open mind set.  And I have to say that this was one of the more disappointing Naruto films I have ever seen.

The story a group of ninja from Sky country come and attack Konoha.  During which Naruto meets a Doctor and pupil Amaru.  From there a small band of four ninja follow their attackers to where there ships are located so that they can destory their base.  At this same time for Naruto, Sakura, and Hinata go with the doctor and Amaru to Amaru's village.  From there things follow a pretty predictable set of events though I will say that I found the story to be rather weak as a whole.  I mean I know that it's not part of the manga and they created the story from pretty much nothing, but still it seemed that the four man group didn't really have anything to do with the core plot.  Once the base was destoryed it didn't really even seem like they mattered at all and all things considered the base they set out to destory didn't if seem all that important when everything else is taken into consideration.  Furthermore it didn't seem like Sasuke actually had to be in the story.  I mean sure he did play a part in bringing down the main bad guy, but still I'm sure that if they wanted to they could have easily left Sasuke out and only had to end up changing a few small things within the story.  Then the ending personally it seemed that they were trying to make it more dramatic than it needed to be.  Personally speaking I thought the story had a lot of problems with it and didn't really enjoy it.

As for the animation you get what you'd expect from a Naruto film.  Slightly better quality than that of the tv series but still pretty average when compared to other films.  So enjoy it for what it is but I wouldn't expect anything visually stunning.

The sound again you get what you'd expect from a Naruto film.  The voice actors were all the same from the tv series and they do as good of a job as they do in the tv series.  As for the soundtrack it blended well with the scenes.  Which is to say that it was enough to add something to the scenes but rarely ever stood out and wasn't very impressionable.

The characters were mostly all the same from the tv series.  So you know the ones you like and the ones you hate and the only new ones are the sky ninjas, the doctor, and Amaru.  I would go into more detail here to go into to much would end up spoiling the story.

Overall I was quite disappointed with this film.  Though probably the only real reason I was disappointed with the film was because of the story.  If it had been done a bit better I probably would have enjoyed it more.  In terms of Naruto films it would probably be the one that I least liked.