Itachi Is More Special Than You. In Fact, The Whole Uchiha Clan Is More Special Than You

[redbrunja]

But first...

I found places to direct download all the naruto episodes, and I'm wondering which are worth watching. I'm planning on Temari rescuing Shikamaru, the episode with their conversation in the hospital (135), the Sasuke vs Naruto fight, and then in Shippuden, the Sakura versus puppeteer fight.

What else would you recommend?

I'd be interested in the episodes with Kiba/Hinata, Hinata in general, Anko (I was so disappointed she was only in the manga for two seconds and we never find out how she came to fight for Konoha), Sakura getting to be awesome, as always, Kakashi, and really, any episodes that is, either because it's funny, well animated, or has something my inner shipper would squeal over, worth the 20 minutes.

Now, on to something that is bugging me about the retcon. The morning after my Naruto bing, I woke up, and like, some poor hungover girl only now realizing who it was she brought home last night, went 'WTF, this makes even less sense than it did at 2 am!'

Okay, so, assuming that the Uchiha clan clan was treated as second class citizens (which I will, for simplicity) you have, in Itachi's youth:

Three OLD people who mistrust the Uchiha.

A sympathetic Hokage who will presumably hire a sympathetic successor.

A position in Konoha of REAL POWER. (Because no one is saying they weren't doing their job as military police.)

And you're telling me that the MAJORITY of the Uchiha clan decided that with those circumstances, ARMED RESISTANCE is the best choice?

Instead of oh, waiting for the opposition to die of old age?

I'm not going to go into Itachi being a lovely, loyal son with morals and then deciding everyone had to die, because it makes no sense. I truly think that if you kill your entire family, it doesn't matter who tells you to do so - you were just waiting for that excuse.

Comments

[solace-adrift.livejournal.com]

Technically speaking, isn’t it more of a Dramatic twist then retcon? It’s a rather awkward Dramatic twist, and obviously one he didn’t think up till about halfway through the manga, but I don’t think it actually contradicts anything that’s already been mentioned in cannon.

We don’t really know how many elders there are total. It could very well be that three is a majority. And if Danzo had enough political backing to resist an order from the Hokage, obviously quite a bit were at the least sympathetic to him.

Uchiha were second class citizens, by pretty much any standard. They were segregated, cut off from the rest of the village. They were watched by black ops. I doubt they really had much of an option of whether to join the police force or not. The police force was as much a prison as any kind of role of power. It would be quite easy for the elders to slowly begin taking away power from it, especially with Root and black ops around.

Not to mention that if the majority of the public, or even a majority of leaf nin, suspected that the Uchiha had unleashed the Kyuubi, then the Uchiha would have faced quite a bit of anger on a daily basis that would have isolated them further from the rest of the village.

So, utterly alone, suspected for mass murder, watched by black ops, and having only one ally on their side, what would the Uchiha do? They had once been the strongest Ninja clan; would they cower or would they fight?

For the record, those old people are still quite alive seven or eight years later, and if the Hokage could have had one sympathetic successor, what are the odds each of them couldn’t have found their own? Especially with the brain washing in Root (as evidenced by Sai) gives out there could be a small of army of shinobi in Konoha ready to fight the Uchiha at the slightest provocation. And thinking about, there’s really no evidence that the previous Hokage gets to choose the new one. Especially considering that those elders are the ones that chose Tsunade (or technically, Jirayai), they obviously wield a lot of political power.

The Uchiha was probably wasn’t that begin a clan to begin with. There’s really no way to tell for sure, but I’d guess they weren’t more than fifty strong, or six or seven main families. With a group that small it’d be pretty easy for one (Sasuke’s dad) or two strong personality to more or less persuade everyone else to their way of thinking, and considering they were once a single clan to begin with, they still probably had those vestiges of pride left. Combine that with their treatment now, and you have an explosive atmosphere which probably didn’t need much convincing.

Oh, I definitely think the whole ‘Itachi loved peace and serenity’ crap that Madara spewed was bullshit. He simply knew it would make Sasuke hate Konoha more, because then he would have an outlet for his anger, and his killing of his brother was sorta not his fault anymore. I tend to think that while Itachi’s goal may have been to subdue the bloodshed, at some point before the massacre he cracked from the pressure (remember he killed his best friend for the Mangeyakou) and that crack only widened after the massacre.

Wow, I do ramble on, don’t I?

I’d make sure to catch at least the last of half of the Sakura/Chiyo vs Sasori fight, because while the first half is slow as hell the last eleven minutes are beautifully animated. The episode where they try and take off Kakashi’s mask is also funny.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Well, I call retconning because we, the audience, have been beaten over and over the head with the story Sasuke knows and shown Itachi as... distasteful of his sibling and rather bloodless in his interactions.

I actually like the idea that something in rotten in Konoha, because just from the way Naruto was treated, as well as the whole ninja lifestyle (Iruka and Kakashi's snipping at each other pre-Chuunin exams springs to mind) exists strikes me as something that is ripe for storytelling.

But.. I don't know, I really have a hard time, with the way Sasuke was treated, what we were told before, etc, believing that in a clan full of (we presume) smart, skilled ninja, an uprising against a FUCKTON of other smart, skilled ninja was the best choice.

We don't have the details of there plan, but I just think that there would be a massive amount of things they could do covertly that wouldn't cause the kind of death tolls that it seems like the original Uchiha was talking about.

Oh, I definitely think the whole ‘Itachi loved peace and serenity’ crap that Madara spewed was bullshit.

Oh, so much.

I really need to do so rereading to get it all straight in my head, but on the whole, this felt super slap-dash and like everyone's i.q. needed to drop for it to work, which I hate.

[solace-adrift.livejournal.com]

It bears thinking that all those things are from Sasuke’s viewpoint. None of them are said to be fact. And Itachi was specifically trying to deceive him. But yeah, it’s hardly like this was planned far in advance by Kishimoto. He definitely had it planned by part two, but earlier than that? I doubt it.

Yeah, I really like any time an author tries to add some moral greyness to the story. And not just the bad guys had a weepy past or something, but that the good guys aren’t entirely perfect. That’s what I really like about the Senju Uchiha dynamic: it’s equally neither and both of their faults.

Unless they had complete surprise on their side, I doubt the Uchiha uprising would actually have worked. It’s a combination of the fact that even if they could gain control of the government, it’d be ridiculously hard to hold it against once the rest of the village woke up. Though it is possible, just highly unlikely.

All that really matters though is whether they thought they could accomplish it, which is quite a bit more believable. It’s hardly like they’re the only ninja clan which has had the idea of starting a coup. Kimamaru’s clan tried, as well as the seven swordsman of mist. Even in real life there are quite a few examples of countries who have absolutely no chance of winning, fighting much larger countries. The South during the American civil war comes to mind, as well as Germany during WWII. Both were ridiculously outmatched, but still made a bid for power.

By the point of the massacre it had been seven years since the Kyuubi attack. The Uchiha had probably already tried every other option by that point. What other choice did they have? The Uchiha still carry the pride for the position they used to have. They’re a warrior clan. They’d probably rather die than admit they’re no longer the strongest. Which they did.