Itachi Uchiha: How Fans Misunderstand Stories
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 ก.ย. 2024
- April Fool's! This time it's that I actually didn't upload a joke. It's more meta, I guess.
I was still recovering while recording this but needed to get something out before I felt like I wasn't doing anything, so pardon the different sounding voice.
The "curse of hatred" is a conspiracy theory against the Uchihas popularized by Tobirama. Kishimoto failed to present or resolve the problems of the Konoha Will of Fire.
Honestly I don’t mind the whole Indra thing, I think the main issue is how they handle it. Present day konaha still shows that the Ashura/senju line is still the rulers of the hidden leaf village. There’s quite literally no retribution for the uchiha clan in the end
Wrong:
0:57 Naruto's parents' identity was a secret since Koshina got pregnant and after they died too to protect him from Minato's enemies. Also, Killer Bee completely controlled his tailed beast, nobody knew it was because he befriended him.
1:07 People of Konoha had a renewed hate for Kurama after the attack on Konoha the day Naruto was born.
1:35 the Uchiha did not have a magically evil blood. They inherented certain traits like intelligence and the sharingan from Indra as well as the type of character for the most part, individualistic, emotionally inflammable and stuff. The point of the entire show was that nobody understood them and decided they were just evil except for Naruto.
4:55 The previous three Hokage were all responsible for the ostracisation of the uchiha in variant ways, Hashirama by making the Senjo dominate the Uchiha in positions of power -he nominated his brother as Hokage after him who was extremely prejudice against the Uchiha, and the third had the massacre happening for his bad judgment and cabinet.
6:57 The third Hokage was obviously too late to stop the Uchiha's attempt to coup. This is shown in the story over and over again. Itatchi realizing what the third didn't is not him sabotaging peace plans.
7:03 This is in retrospect. We should analyze actions from the prospective of the actor to judge him. Itatchi thought a great ninja war would happen if he didn't act.
7:19 Danzo was not the reason for why they had to act fast, it was the Uchiha.
8:06 He did feed them so much information. Who do you think told Jiraya about the Akatsuke plan to take Naruto? Why did Itachi run away from him without taking Naruto? Who told him where pain's location is and that he is preparing to take Naruto? Who told Danzo that Madara was the leader of the Uchiha?
I think this is enough.
@afh7380 1. Yeah, and it’s ridiculous that they kept his parentage a secret. Remember, this is an explanation to excuse a retcon, but there is no reason to keep who his parents are a secret from him himself. And Killer B being able to control the Tailed Beast would’ve at the very least let other villages know Tailed Beasts could be managed, and yet nobody tried that with Kurama.
2. That doesn’t explain why they would hate on Naruto somehow without Naruto even knowing why they hated him.
3. Yeah, I recognize the blood isn’t actually evil, I was being hyperbolic. But even the traits you mention are not heritable, but depicted as such, which I consider to weaken the story.
4. I don’t believe I argued otherwise.
5. This is not shown in the story over and over again.
6. Perspective is merely one aspect we use to analyze actions. We also analyze the context, the outcomes, and the lead up to the actions.
7. Okay, fair enough.
8. Itachi ran away from Jiraiya because he would’ve killed him and Kisame. Jiraiya knowing some things is not an argument for Itachi feeding him information as it is not confirmed to be from Itachi. Otherwise, why did Itachi leave out such vital information like Hidan’s immortality, Pein’s six paths, Infinite Tsukiyomi, etc.
I'll ask one question that will call the supposed retcon into question for being truly a retcon. If he was always meant to be evil, why did he only kill Uchiha members and no one else during his attack? If he wanted to harm the village because he went nuts then surely he would have done more. Even in his first appearance he could have killed Asuma, Kurenai and Kakashi and walked away after. Chose to prolong until they were forced to retreat gaining nothing overall.
@marikasdaughter6263 Sorry my point wasn’t clear enough: I wasn’t saying Kishimoto never planned the reveal. I call it a retcon as it is new information contradicting what we have been told. Retcon often means nowadays that the writer changed their mind, but in its original definition, it just means new media retroactively changing the continuity.
The explanation we originally get is that it’s for power. That killing the Uchia was to test his strength and awaken the Mangekyo. This is back tracked with the retcon after his death
I think the itachi story was a clunky one, and to me most people liked him because of the mystery behind his person, the interesting abilities he had and how he used them, even by the end i could never truly say i understood the character.
i remember a discussion that was popular in the community some months back about what could have happened if itachi sided with his clan.
i call it the konoha royale, a konoha vs uchiha battle,
now i believe konoha would most definitely win but they would not come out unscathed, and considering in a few years orichimaru and the sand would attack and much later pain would attack, this civil war would have doomed konoha to its destruction, especially if the other villages take notice.
add to the fact that months prior someone suspected to be from the uchiha clan had caused the 9 tails rampage, the tensions where inevitably high.
( note: how tobi kept this information from sasuke when he told him about itachi. )
there is no need for moral justification of genocide, but that evil action definitely saved konoha. but i do wander if there was a way to resolve the situation peacefully.
1:20 i remember danzo saying something about using sasuke's sharingan to control the 9 tails in naruto, im sure he explored options. as for the rest of konoha, how many civilians would be willing to let their children play with child who had a 9tails inside him, like that thing didnt kill of some of their family and friends years back, that wound would still be fresh.
1:30 i dont see how that is a retcon, the pain and suffering the clans have caused to each other is why they hate each other, i dont see how the existence of the so called magically evil blood takes away from story. that blood is the source of power behind both clans, it doesn't excuse their actions to one another. the only characters affected by some form of predestination are the actual reincarnations themselves hashirama and madara.
in the end the 2 clans where able to make peace between themselves though for a short while.
Is Sasuke ever stated to forgive Itachi ?
cause he doesn't need to forgive him to want to change the system as a whole, if that's where you get the idea from.
the only people that saw praise itachi as a shinobi as some the most questionable ones themselves, tobirama, danzo and tobi.
7:09 i don't think that movie is trying to explore anything related to the uchiha masacre.
i dont know about the other stories you are referring to here.
i do very much like that your suggestion, considers what kishimoto might have been trying to achieve with the character rather than a full deviation that would impact a lot of the other aspects of the story.
Excellent Video.
It's good to have you back!
Even if it's a short return.
very glad i discovered your channel (: 💜!!
1:20 there’s a difference though, because kurama destroyed the village while the 8 tails didn’t
@Justin-zx9rn That’s true, but I bring up Bee fighting Minato to a standstill because even after Minato himself sees Tailed Beasts can work with humans, he doesn’t seem to seek out that option with his wife, even though that’s before Obito used Kurama to attack Konoha.
Danzo is the reason the village hated Naruto. Danzo was telling the villagers that Naruto is the jinchuriki of the nine tails. The villagers saw Naruto as the nine tails and thus they hated him.
Also there are small hints in the part 1 manga about Itachi’s truth
@okayspectre The inclusion of Danzo is itself another retcon. Which moments exactly would you say hinted towards Itachi’s status as a double agent?
I really like you're videos.
:) 👍
Thanks! I really appreciate it.
I feel like a lot of itachi also comes from Shisui. If Shisui did not die, the massacre would not have occurred
That’s probably true. Shisui feels like even more of an addition that doesn’t make complete sense, since the two of theme together should’ve been able to do something.
Me watching a Naruto analysis video in 2024? It's more likely than you think.
No, but seriously, I haven't been a Naruto fan in over a decade but I always found Itachi's heel face turn extremely internally inconsistent and a jumping the shark moment for the story. It's long overdue but it is fun to see the reasons why laid out in a video.
I have a lot of thought on this and have debated this quite a bit in the past. Warning, this is kind of long. I see Itachi as partially justified because he was essentially forced to make "an impossible choice" as Obito put it. Despite contradictory messages at times, the series does seem to label extremists like Tobirama and Danzo as largely responsible for the escalation of the Uchiha discrimination. It's really only Tobirama that would call them "a clan possessed by evil" and that crap. He is just racist and I don't think the show hides that with Orocjimaru outright blaming him and his policies for the massacre to his face. I think the Leaf village was very much framed as the "bad guys" with Sasuke's revenge against the Leaf being "understandable" as Naruto put it.
I see Itachi as a victim of Danzo above all else. Danzo was blatantly threatening Itachi by saying he only had two options. Die with his clan in the coup, or erase his clan and save Sasuke. Danzo was clearly manipulative of Itachi. I would argue that Itachi was implied to have done everything he could to try to convince his father to not go through with the coup, even if we were not explicitly shown all of that. Danzo insists that there is no time left and is essentially saying "kill your clan, or I will kill them". Peace was completely off the table because Danzo had forced war. Danzo also stole Shisui's eyes and basically took every action possible it seemed to prevent peace from being an option. I see Danzo as the main perpetrator overall, with Tobirama as the origin of the systematic dicrimination.
So you may say "Itachi was way stronger than Danzo, why doesn't he just kill Danzo and try to buy more time for peaceful mediation and talks?". I think the reason he would not do that is because he saw it as too risky. Danzo is an awful human being, but he may have been right that the Coup was imminent and unavoidable by that point. In which case peace was not an option. Or, you could say peace was an option but killing Danzo would ignite the Coup even further and make the Leaf hostile to the Uchiha. In other words, either Danzo was just correct and it was unavoidable or Danzo forced Itachi's hand. Either way I don't see Itachi as overly responsible. We have to assume that there _would_ be a potential world war between villages that would erupt if the Coup was not stopped. That line of logic makes sense to me, anyway. I think an enemy nation would 100% invade during a civil war, (or just back a certain side). That seems like basic strategy.
Also, I think there is some truth to the fact that despite the Uchiha clan being discriminated against horribly, their decision to launch a Coup was selfish and rash as Itachi says. I side with the Uchiha completely and think the village was completely at fault for their mistreatement, but the issue is there would never have been a good end result for them with the Coup. It was always going to end in mass death, and likely their own partial or complete annihilation. There was still plenty of hope for peace talks as long as Hiruzen was Hokage. Even if there weren't, I am going to have to agree with the show that mass death in war is worse than discrimination if there is no other option left. I do not see this as saying "genocide is a good soloution". It's a horrible solution, but the "geneocide soloution" was crafted by Danzo not Itachi. Danzo created the circumstances that forced Itachi's into that impossible decision.
Itachi is not perfect and contrary to what you said I don't think the series treats him as perfect. You get the impression that Itachi did no wrong from Obito, but that is because Obito was manipulating Sasuke. He wanted to make Sasuke sympathize with Itachi completely to fuel him to attack the Leaf and make his hatred grow. This goes back to media literacy, but I think many fans see Obito's speech and think "wow, Itachi was perfect" when in reality that is directly contradicted later on by none other than Itachi himself. As you say, no one ever says anything like "this was a good solution" or anything either. Despite being evil, I think the fanbase generally agreed with Sasuke's disgust towards the way the village treated the Uchiha and Itachi. Itachi is seen as a hero by the fanbase because he allegedly prevented a huge string of potential wars and he dealt with the situation in the best way he could think of. Even if he thinks like a Hokage, no amount of maturity can be a substitute for life experience. That's why he even regrets his actions.
I was surprised you didn't touch on this more, but when Itachi is revived he expresses intense regret at his own actions and considers himself a failure. He blames himself for hiding the truth from Sasuke, fueling his hatred, and turning him into a criminal. Then he even says that if he had been open with Sasuke before the coup, that maybe Sasuke himself could have helped him to change their Father's mind and prevent the coup from happening.
As for his time in the Akatsuki, Itachi had a pact with Obito that forbade the Akatsuki from attacking Konoha. He was there to also monitor them, he was like a deterrent rather than a spy. In exchange it seems he helped them capture Jinchuriki, which could be seen as morally questionable and counterproductive to protecting his village and Sasuke. I'm not sure exactly what his plan was to mitigate that, and I admit that part is hard to justify and is the biggest writing flaw that I see with him. I agree that it should have shown him gaining critical intel, because that intel could justify what he did to help further their goals.
For being overly cruel to Sasuke, Itachi admits he screwed up there after he was revived. I don't justify it, but I understand it and could forgive it. I think he _did_ achieve what he wanted to by making Sasuke powerful through hatred, though. It makes sense in a way. The sharingan's growth is fueled by hatred, so he made Sasuke hate. As a result, Sasuke was so powerful that even an Akatsuki member like Deidara lost to him which showed it had results and "protected" Sasuke. It just went farther than Itachi had planned when Sasuke learned the truth from Obito. It would be interesting to see an AU where Obito didn' tell him the truth, cause I think there was a possibility he would have returned to the village as Itachi intended. Itachi is potentially made to look way worse with the end result because Obito derailed his original plan completely.
I think Itachi is meant to be seen as a flawed but forgivable character. I won't blame Itachi because I view him as a victim of Danzo and the village's discriminatory practices, and I truly think Danzo left him with no choice. If Itachi wanted to forge peace, I think it really was too late at that point. I'm sure part of him was banking on Shisui's eyes and Danzo ruiend that himself. The only thing he self admittedly said he could have done differently was get Sasuke involved, so I guess that is the AU where everything is resolved peacefully in theory. I think you mention AU's where the clan didn't need to die, but IIRC they are either non canon or they had specific circumstances that led to peace being more viable as an option.
TLDR; It's Danzo, Tobirama, and the Elders' fault not Itachi. Itachi is a victim of the circumstance they created and was forced to make an impossible choice. The choice he made was said to have prevented a massive war, it was better than doing nothing by a long shot. Itachi admits the coup may have been avoidable had he gotten Sasuke involved, but I won't blame a 13 yr old for lacking the experience needed to know that in the moment. He did his best. Itachi should not be seen as perfect, but I think calling him a hero and forgivable is more than fair. I think Itachi himself and perhaps others should have been shown with more criticism of the village, but that is really my only major complaint. Itachi in particular was oddly oppositional to the Uchiha clan's decision while never talking about the village's obvious crimes and responsibility for the massacre. I assume he did blame them and just didn't dwell on that which he could not change, but that's my headcanon.
Nice comment very introspective
@@jamessavage5275 thx!
In general, for me Naruto ended with the Pain Arc.
After that, it's basically FanFic.
I think the KEY to the ītáchí magick is how all the stuff that we Could
Oh man this got a laugh at the magical eyeball stuff… I thought I was the only person saying that stuff when talking about Nárūtō…
I think what makes so much of it FEEL forgiveable is considering the perspective of peoples who have relatives that might have done things for their nations that still disgust themselves when they learn how and why they were asked to kill whatever folks somewhere…
It makes it feel like “well my 3rd cousin says they had to do really sketchy stuff in that war 40 years ago and then some military intelligence people said they do stuff to family if they didn’t and some stuff still happened to people despite their reluctant compliance… but I still love them for who they are and can’t imagine the position they were in!” & how does the world frame some peoples elders’ actions overall?!
It makes this kid the one person whose actions feel both Out of His Own Control whilst he Appears Capable of saving the world with stuff he does whilst giving thoughtful kind advice even to people he’s being forced to try to kill until reprogrammed by dead best friends’ magical eyeballs powers somehow letting his Èdō Tènséī get overwritten without more complex interference being attempted to undo this…
Why’s it take ízànámí to get kábūtō to release the jūtsū though? That felt a bit much… guess he knew it wouldn’t ruin his Actual Physical former eyeballs of his Real Body because it’d only ruin his spirit’s abilities with those eyeballs or something?
I do appreciate hearing arguments against the relatively casually overlooked and underfocused genocide in one of the most popular narrative to feature in their young boys jump magazine…hmm…
But some of the magic and depth of this tragedy is even wilder when you bring in ideas from the lightnovel where I often consider the reason he’s basically an old man in a young boys body whose probably got many decades reduced off his life by the time he’s killing his parents is his use of tsukuyomi in the light novel where he creates some 60something years of life for the girl he loves when he has to kill her… which Man we’d all watch a show about him using tsukuyomi to experience all these alternate timelines of Just killing Dánzō where he’s got estimations that probably overlook many aspects of other humans cause he’s only been alive 14 years of developing when he’s murdering everyone… or is it 12 I guess? I hear different numbers different places different days hehe
But it’s messy and heavy & id much rather see young Itachi’s ideal better world as he’d imagined it for Izumi… (man I keep mixing up Izumi and izuna’s names… hehe no the legend was not dating madara’s brother… he Is madara’s brother but not younger this time… how odd… I do like the self sacrifice to make his brother a hero motivated by self hatred etc which then zombie mode even apologises and helps save his bro and the world? I mean his brother not Needing to be dramatically selfish and evil for narrative’s sake is a bit of a loss to the drama but a lot of things here feel crazy regardless it is fantasy fiction about magical ninjas until all this alien gods stealing names from potential magical eyeball abilities is a bit sad but at least some of them have new magical eyeball powers so… I guess that creates more videogame fight nonsense? Yeah; all problems solved, right? : D
Love the character because we usually don’t hear the full true story in spy novels regardless and I don’t think he was trying to Be the Hero… & the big issue is trying to explore the depth of such complex actions which Might be the Most sketchy proper ninja style stuff that even happens in the story, arguably!
The lack of Kènjūtsū feels a bit heavy but he’s clearly trying to avoid getting compared with countless samurai stories which are a bit heavy for shonen jump… unless you’re doing that wátsūkí samurai action with shojo style writing thing… but then that won’t age well because of just wátsūkí & whoever all stuffed there belongings at his place for the bust or something…. Stuff I don’t wanna think about cause it taints my positive views on most of the whole kènshin narrative style and art…
Man I’m just seeing jokes about tobirama and dánzō in comments of course… though I couldn’t ever argue anyon Actually endorses Pro Dánzō arguments that arent just “well Maybe some of that could’ve been right in a closed minded way from whatever ancient military intel practises may be…” cause I only see people jokingly saying stuff about certain characters like that…
Like the tobirama trump meme nonsense etc. Trump would never be an expert in all those things from water style to tandem paper bomb èdō tènséī shenanigans… it’s too overcomplicated… : D he’d be way more direct with his ninjutsu Now I need the next debate to be questioning their opinions on various fictional ninja combat methodologies and which he and Biden most Identify with! Oh man this could be gold… imagine he has a prepped answer or a joke how his opponent’s edō Tènséī caster is not talented enough and how he could’ve fixed it with Very Good People. or something… excuse the accidental lulz… I didn’t mean to… I bet people have already made debates and memes out of ideas like that somewhere in a subreddit or 4chan…. Not gonna look for any of it though cause I’d wind up shocked by irrelevant distracting things first… of course.
I think a lot is lost in translation on this one potentially… or how much of this is meant to be interpreted…
Question whether anyone claiming something is the Right way to interpret has Ever been more than illusions of personal overconfidence in regards to one’s perspective & perception… & then the additional aspects that I’d equate to being vague because you Aren’t Mesnt to Know about all the intel he’s passed about anything cause then he’d be viewed as incompetent in his work as a spy in a complex terror group with exceptionally dangerous characters… he’s too busy in that role to do everything whilst staying alive in the process… all to give his brother his eyes… which is why he says all that stuff in somewhat hypnotic ways whilst Sásūké’s expecting way scarier stuff & he Quickens Tsukuyomi with his brother instead of elongating it which I imagine there’s a lot more cost when Just temporarily disabling people in a way which Forces them to find Tsūnádé which I find fascinating… like he only did that cause jīraîÿà was right there…
There’s so much to speculate on with the character, & he has MORE Mángèkïō Shárīngán abilities than anyone in the story!
Raises a Lot of questions!
He is the biggest Mystery character in the story and the more you tell, it either becomes worse or grows audience desire for more…
& he wanted to make adult versions have their kid ninjas fighting aliens and stuff… so things got kinda messy…
But arguments that these aspects are underdeveloped or seemingly ignored because “they’re friendly and helpful though” is totally fair!
But exploring way darker themes is probably something he knew Not to even attempt to explore deeper cause it’s arguably dangerous for themselves and others cause of how people may interpret it if he gives too many details!
How do we know they didn’t lose a magical eyeball clan to bombs? If we did could we call him the “American SuperFantasy-SuperNijja superspy who simply hypnotises all super Saiyan 3 kakarots into defeating themselves!” or whatever? …Maybe…
Definitely subbed now though hearing such interesting talking points & ideas! Cheers!
Good vid
before i continue, i think you are the one misunderstanding, itachi is looked as a good guy, when he is a genocide? yes, like all the heroes, they are all assassins, and you are watching things with the point of view of today, not a kinda medieval era, back then killing everyone just in case, was more common than you think, i saw a quote about reading stories that said something like this: we need to see things with the lenses of today, but with the mindset of the story. meaning yes we can objectively say itachi killed more than needed, but at the time that was the rule basically, or that he could have done more before the slaughter.
the argument about itachi being 13 makes complete sense, he is being manipulated by both side, getting pinned, with a trauma about war, almost all of the adults fall into manipulation even an specially mature and intelligent adult will fall for that, imagine a child, and to be fair, not only a child, a soldier child.
and about the making sasuke hate him, yes that was his worse mistake form his point of view, he just wanted sasuke to be recognized as a hero for killing him, but didnt notice he lead sasuke to a power hungry mindset that made sauske go off the rails and become a criminal too. but it comes from many places, first of all self-loathing, itachi didnt want to do it, but believed he had to, even if just to save sasuke.
also about itachi being a bad spy, i would agree, but there is a way you can look at it, and it is we never knew who were jiraiya's informants, so maybe one of them was itachi, but this is head canon, not a real canon event
@normanderi First of all, thank you for your comment. I appreciate you detailing your points in a respectful manner. Secondly, I agree that Itachi as the manipulated child soldier does make sense. My point in the video that I hoped to make clear was that I have seen fans take what I believe to be the wrong message from the story. I’ve seen fans claim Itachi did the right thing, not that he was manipulated into doing the wrong thing. That’s what I’m saying I disagree with, not that I disagree with the idea that he was manipulated. I think the manipulation could’ve been written a little neater, but that’s a light critique.
Thirdly, I do want to express that while the story is somewhat based in historical contexts, the framing still has modern morality. Yes, the characters are ninja, and ninja historically served as assassins, or in roles similar to assassins, in some parts of history. But we never see Naruto or Sakura assassinate anybody. Actions that may have been somewhat commonplace in the Warring States Period are framed as atrocities throughout the story. For example, we see how wrong it is for the Konoha Shinobi to kill Nagato’s parents, we see how wrong it is for the Hyuga main family to enslave the branch family, we see how wrong it is for Orochimaru to experiment on children. There are certainly medieval-era crimes committed throughout the series, but the framing includes modern perspectives on ethics. (I would also say that these ethics aren’t really specific to any time period: they were present back then, but of course were just less popular.)
But in sincerity, thank you for the comment, and you’ve given me some stuff to think about.
New Moth Video! Yeah!