Naruto Anime Analysis

Season 3: Episode 105

Source: Wikipedia,
"A Fierce Battle of Rolling Thunder!"

"Fukusuke continues to celebrate with women and food when Aoi warns him that he might be celebrating prematurely. Naruto Uzumaki, carrying Idate, ascends the long flight of stairs to the Modoroki Shrine. Idate grabs the orb and heads out on his own two feet, but they are soon confronted by Aoi, waiting with Tobirama's sword of Raijin that he had Idate steal for him. Both Naruto's Rasengan and Sasuke's Chidori are repelled by the sword, though the latter can crack it slightly."

Analysis

Fukusuke continues to celebrate with women and food when Aoi warns him that he might be celebrating prematurely. Fukusuke is the other opponent from the Wagarashi clan who is participating in the race. Thanks to Aoi's warning, Fukusuke prepares for the race. The music then starts playing in the background.

Naruto Uzumaki, carrying Idate, ascends the long flight of stairs to the Modoroki Shrine. From this quotation, the setting takes place at the Modoroki shrine. There is visual imagery of the stairs, which Idate has called "The Spirit Breaker." So when they arrived, Naruto was still carrying Idati on his back as he started to run up the stairs. Therefore, when it comes to a challenge, Naruto always finds the energy to do it. It's one of the reasons why he's a unique ninja. Moreover, when the villagers from the Wasabi clan heard that Idate was back in the race, they informed Jirocho. After hearing about this, Jirocho maintained his faith in his student that he would win the race, which shows that he is a good master towards Idate. Therefore, it means that, from the part where Fusuke starts preparing for the race until Jirocho maintains his faith in Idate, the entire episode serves as the introduction. It gave the audience a glimpse of what was going to happen later in the episode.

There is another important piece of information to consider. In the episode, Idate has a flashback about the Chunin exam, where his brother Ibiki was the facilitator. Before the flashback takes place, Idate asks Naruto if he ever got the 10th question during the Chunin exams. However, it is different from the one Naruto had. In the flashback, the tenth question was about Genin, who had to compete with their teammates. Whoever gets the lowest mark fails. Moreover, the one who fails will never participate in the chunin exams again; the person will remain a genius for life. Therefore, this was a difficult decision to make, and it got even more difficult. For instance, if one of the members of the team quits, all team members are disqualified. Moreover, if they all quit, they would be able to take the Chunin exam again. So some asked one of their teammates to remain behind because the ninja with the lowest grade would never be allowed to be a ninja again. However, despite making the decision, the test proved to be complicated, to the extent that there was a twist in Ibiki's exam. The ones who chose to remain behind (the ones with lower grades) have failed the exam because being a ninja is all about looking after your teammates no matter what. The fact that they even considered sacrificing one of their teammates goes against everything about being a ninja. From my perspective, Ibiki used this tactic because, to become a ninja, you have to analyze deeply into someone's bluff; otherwise, they could be taken advantage of, just like Idate when Aoi tricked him into stealing from the Hidden Leaf Village.

Meanwhile, in the flashback, Idate asked his brother why he failed. In response, Ibiki said that he would never be a ninja, and Idate had to figure out why he was not good enough. The way it seems, Idate still doesn't know what Ibiki meant, which might be revealed later in various episodes.

Idate is now back in reality, and he decides to win the race on his own after Naruto has helped him climb the stairs to the Modoroki Shrine.

Idate grabs the orb and heads out on his own two feet, but they are soon confronted by Aoi, waiting with Tobirama's sword of Raijin that he had Idate steal for him. A lot has happened in this quotation. In this quotation, dramatic music starts playing in the background. There is a shift in scenes. For instance, the scenes have changed from the Modoroki Shrine to the bridge, where Fukusuke is starting to prepare for the race. Aoi arrives to stop Idate from passing through the bridge. So when Idate arrives, he is stopped by Aoi, who uses Tobirama's sword of Raijin. The sword is also known as the blade of the thunder spirit. It is important to take note that Tobirama is the second Hokage who came up with the idea of this sword hence Tobirama in a way played a part in this episode.