The Last: Naruto the Movie—Its Canonical and Apocalyptic

Love hurts, especially for a ninja. Getting your chakra ripped out also kind of stings. Poor Naruto Uzumaki will just have to go through these things as a rite of passage (although he maybe could have skipped the latter). In fact, he is a bit older and perhaps fractionally wiser in the canonical capstone anime feature The Last: Naruto the Movie (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in select cities.

For fans of the Naruto franchise, The Last pays off in a major way. This is no mere one-off shoehorned between the 72 volumes (or 700 chapters of manga), six hundred some television episodes, and ten feature films. It explains the manga’s final epilogue that was generally well received by fans, but came as a bit of a surprise nonetheless. What transpires in The Last will have a direct bearing on the course of Uzumaki’s life, but if that were not enough, the stakes are also apocalyptically high.

As the film opens, Uzumaki basks in his newfound popularity resulting from his heroic war service. Girls are finally talking to him—they are even getting pushy competing for his attention. This rather distresses the shy Hirata Hyuga, who has long carried a torch for the oblivious Uzumaki. Yet, when Hyuga’s younger sister Hanabi is kidnapped, she and Uzumaki are thrown together in the rescue party.

It seems her abduction is related to a doomsday plot launched by Toneri Otsutsuki the last descendent of one of the great ancient clan leaders of the series’ intricate mythology. He intends to crash the moon into the Earth with the help of the Hyuga clan’s superhumanly enhanced eyes. Obviously, Uzumaki is super-motivated to stop Otsutsuki, especially when he realizes he is falling for his former classmate, Hyuga.

Unlike the previous Naruto film, The Road to Ninja, there is no jetting off to an alternate reality and back before anyone is the wiser. Everything counts this time around in a big way. It fills a major remaining gap in Naruto’s saga, wrapping it up in a way that keeps faith with the characters and their fans. For longtime readers and viewers, The Last is more closely akin to the MASH’s emotional sign-off than the wimpering final episode of Seinfeld.

There is considerable character development in The Last (especially by series shōnen anime standards) and a good deal of action. However, the old school hand-to-hand combat always looks far better on screen than the big fiery cosmic clashes, which all sort of blend together after a while. Nonetheless, the focus in The Last is particularly personal, freezing out many long-term supporting players in favor of Uzumaki and Hyuga.

Surely, the Naruto team can go back to the well for plenty more canonical adventures, but The Last would be a very satisfying place to definitively end it. It is a relatively self-contained story arc, so new arrivals should be able to follow and enjoy it well enough, but it really pays dividends to those who have invested in the series—and that’s actually pretty cool to see. A must-see for Naruto loyalists and a strong feature for shōnen enthusiasts in general, The Last: Naruto the Movie opens in select markets beginning this Friday (2/20), with a number of screenings scheduled in New York at the Village East starting this Saturday (2/21).

Road to Ninja, the New Naruto Movie

Naruto Uzumaki is a lot like your classic adolescent fantasy protagonist, but the trappings are ninja-related rather than the stuff of sorcery and knight errantry. Growing up as an orphan, he is rash on the outside and sensitive on the inside. Even though fans know his creation story quite well, it will be revisited in detail and perhaps even altered when the junior ninja finds himself whisked into an alternate world in Hayato Date’s Road to Ninja: Naruto the Movie (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in New York.

Uzumaki’s father and mother bravely sacrificed their lives defending Konohagakure from the rampaging Nine-Tailed Demon Fox. Even though his parents are immortalized on the village’s Rushmore-like monument, Naruto is often shunned because they were forced to mystically seal the demon within him. Naruto is usually a pretty plucky kid, but he is going through a rough patch, making the absence of his family particularly acute. In contrast, his crush-rival Sakura Haruno is feeling especially embarrassed of her intrusive, ultra-square parents.

However, before you can “alternate Star Trek universe,” the malevolent Tobi traps them in the Tsukuyomi world, based largely on their deepest subconscious desires. Much to their surprise, Haruno is now the celebrated orphan of the village heroes, while Uzumaki’s parents are alive and well. Instead of martyrs, they are workaday ninjas and loving parents (who insist on calling him Memna rather than Naruto). Everything looks the same, but most of their friends have reversed their primary character traits. In a way, this makes Road an easy series entry point, since most of the backstory no longer applies.

The Naruto franchise is classified as Shōnen manga, which usually means a lot of fighting. Road is no exception, but its themes of sacrifice and parental love give it more Capra-esque sentiment than you might expect. Since it was plotted out by series creator Masashi Kishimoto, you know it is legit. It is a rather self-contained story arc, but it arguably offers fans greater character development. Frustratingly though, like many anime features, the big showdown relies on a lot of flash-and-dazzle spectacle that largely becomes a blur of fireballs and fix-demons. It would be more effective to bring things down to a more personal level, like Mel Gibson and Gary Busey duking it out on Danny Glover’s front lawn.

Under Kishimoto’s watchful eye, Date and company maintain the franchise’s quality control. In fact, there are some great images of Konohagakure and its environs, evoking Edo-era Japan and Tolkien-like fantasyscapes in equal measure. There is more heart to Road than you usually find in well established warhorse properties, which might be why it is the Japanese box-office’s top performing Naruto feature thus far. Nevertheless, it requires a predisposition to teenaged ninjas and all the angst and combat they face. Solidly executed but probably not crossing over from the fan zone, Road to Ninja: Naruto the Movie screens this coming Sunday (8/31) and Monday (Labor Day, 9/1) in New York at the Village East. For a complete list of cities and dates, check the Eleven Arts website here.