Hold your horses before you haul your donkies! (Donkeys?)
I am not saying that he is the only soulful character to have existed or even the most soulful among them. I am simply saying that he is the last of them.
But before that question can be answered, I must explain what I mean by "soulful". (See, with thoroughly subjective terms like this, one can never derive a standard of measuring anything without first explaining their own, subjective, meaning and understanding of them. Even with their meaning explained, such terms still apply themselves subjectively.)
There is being spirited and there is being soulful. Being spirited is about having any motivation or driving factor, especially one that gives you energy to get and keep going. Such motivations can be anything. Love, money, hatred, hunger or any such thing. Being soulful is about working on a motivation that is valuable and virtuous in its own right. As per the definition of a soul, soulfulness works in a manner that properly balances out various factors of reality, namely yourself with your environment. Simply being moved by passion makes you spirited, but working into and deriving from your environment your passions makes you soulful, because you balance yourself with your environment. It can be said that being spirited means you have a value that you work for but being soulful means your value adds value to other things.
With mortal limitations, these concepts hardly apply outside of context. This is also why these two concepts are never inherently superior to each other unless context is given that favours one over the other.
So what is the context here? That would be the world of Naruto and the fighting styles of it. This should be easily understood since it has so many characters with so much in terms of virtue in all different ways. The world of Naruto was given to us as one where fighting styles and the basic mortality of characters were key factors. Now I do not agree with the notion that the introduction of practical super powers in the latter stages, particularly the 4th War, did away with them. This is because they were properly explained as exceptions to the norm, such that Killer B with just his energy cloak was supposed to one of only 2 people in all of Naruto world history to have properly controlled his beast powers. But I would not say that they simply applied the same concept at a higher level because said level still takes away from the second concept of basic mortality. While.I acknowledge this and go on to work with it, I must say that I do not fault the series for it because this was done in an honourable manner. We did not have some slight and gradual shift to immortal combat, but were explicitly and directly told about it (such as with Akatsuki and Beast Hosts) and were also given reasons for it that work with the principles of the world of Naruto (people merging themselves with primordial energy beasts, which no normal person could even handle a literal mouthful of).
So it is not that the series abandoned its own principles, but rather that it simply changed its perspective towards a context where said principles applied to a very diminished extent. Perhaps it can be faulted for this change, since any introduction into a world carries an implied promise to always work with that part of the world that was initially presented to us.
On account of the latter idea, soulfulness in Naruto is derived from sticking to these basic principles.
(With that attended to, it can now be noted that these principles combine to make things such as knowledge, tactics and teamwork very important, such that supreme soulfulness would be that which also exalts these factors as well.)
Due to the nature of progress and movement, most characters in the series started out as very soulful. Kakashi, even with his mastery of a thousand techniques, simply exemplified the importance of styles and counters. His stamina issues restricting the closest thing to a superpower that he had exemplified the mortality of characters, especially when combined with his title as the strongest Jonin. Naruto had a superpower inside him, but at the cost of disrupting his energy control. Even the potential of it to become an overpowered threat was clearly noted as an exception for which he paid the price of social shunning. With Sasuke and Kimimaro we have it that those who threaten to break these principles of styles and mortality are dealt with by the whole world using teamwork.
However, as these characters progressed to higher levels, firstly mortality and then style was diminished. Energy cloaks used by beast hosts and energy armour used by those with eye powers basically rendered characters immune to attacks of all but a few types. Haxxed abilities such as flight, material bodies and teleportation also worked to nullify all but specific attacks. Now with immortality amounting to it that even a loss in style was covered by the ability to return for a second round against a mortal foe also meaning that styles weren't as important as before, it can be said that styles diminished simultaneously. Not completely, though, because specific attacks could.still get through. Styles were properly put away with the powers of the SoSP, becoming a ten tails host and wielding the Rinnegan, which simply could not be handled if you couldn't access NE properly. This rendered almost the whole world as useless. Someone with these powers could.genuinely defeat the whole world in direct combat, with the Void Path and the TSBs allowing for endless combat ability.
So while the series did justify itself, it is definitely the case that by the end, the relevant characters were largely soulless in combat. Characters right now are either literal machines, energy freaks or aliens that embody philosophical concepts instead of people with nice abilities. The closest one gets to a question of styles is what category a character falls into and not their specific powers and unique usage of said powers.
There is an exception, though, in Kankuro. His style was always based on specific setups and relied heavily on simple tricks and knowledge of the opponent. And even now, we have not been given reason to believe he has been morphed into yet another machine, even though his fighting style literally introduced that idea with Sasori.
When Kankuro was brought forward, he wasn't! Gaara was the main figure, with his sister being the main personality. Kankuro simply stayed in the background. This is very fitting for a shinobi. He was simply a tool to an end, no need for spotlight.
As the story continued, he was shown to have a fighting style built upon not putting himself forward, to such an extent that he prepared his traps beforehand to trick opponents. As we had seen with the genius Kakashi, the talent Zabuza, the genetic inheritor Itachi and mastermind Kabuto, using faint trickery is the pinnacle of tactics.
The story went further with Kankuro finding a proper rival to fight in Shino. Here, he showcased how secret skills and tricks allowed him to match his worst counter. This secret knowledge has been shown to be the bread and butter of the main villains, with Obito not only leading a major organisation in secret but even triggering a war through his secret identity.
As part 2 of the story came on and we had ended part 1 with freaks of nature (and science) properly described as "beyond human" and were now seeing freaks of physics and biology through the Akatsuki, Kankuro was shown to have not had any major changes besides a superior usage of the same tricks and tools from part 1. While this led to his quick dispatching by Sasori, it maintained his character as a solid shinobi.
As we reached the end game of the story and everyone, including the very peers of Kankuro, had acquired abilities that took them beyond human. Even by the flow of the story itself, the characters had ceased to be shinobi (tools) and had now become heroes (personalities and embodiments of ideals). Samurai was the supporter who never abandoned you (Sasuke), Sasuke was exploring hate, Naruto was the undying spirit, Team Asuma were the perfect team, Team Kurenai embodied normalcy and the quirks of personality, Team Gai embodied hard work through pure styles, Gaara and Temari were elemental masters and others carried their own virtues boosted by unnatural powers. Kankuro, however, stayed largely the same. When the likes of Sai were using literal Nakama Power to take down two Akatsuki and Tenten was given divine tools to complete her 'sword saint' growth curve, Kankuro was still using the same puppets he had used against the Sound Four to trap immortals and setup his allies for the finish. Not only was his character the same, he was exalting the basic principles of soulfulness in Naruto by showing them working against literal immortals!
And even when Kankuro got his spotlight fight, his major improvement was the embodiment of the soul of his senpai! And his victory came through an outpouring that expressed the core value of his style, instead of simply having any unattached moral value which he simply justified through his superpowers.
So as everything in Naruto changed, Kankuro stayed the same, embodying the very qualities that so greatly differentiate this series from other popular titles (DBZ). He sustained what made us fall towards it, whether in Love or hate.
And what makes this all the more impactful is the touch of irony about it. The Puppet Style dismisses the basic principles of styles and mortality. By taking the actual combatant out of the direct clash, mortality is rendered irrelevant unless the opponent can get through. By using tools which have both range and close control (basically, super tools) and are made out of superior materials to basic elements and thus have no usage restriction (as 'human shields' or 'tantrum barrage' weapons), styles are rendered meaningless unless truly overpowered (Particle Style) themselves. The usage of them as traps (by Kankuro, specifically) allows luck to be a factor as an unknowing opponent can step on the wrong place, mocking basic intelligence and tactics. The reworking of Puppet Style into String Style by Chiyo and Sasori even allows for Nakama Power applications (strings). So by style, Kankuro is probably the most justified character for getting the superpowers of the latter stages.
And it's not just style justification. The introduction of elaborate puppets hunted at the eventual introduction of super puppets (as seen in one of the movies) with the same applications as the energy armours and seals seen in the series. The Puppet Style literally introduced the possibility of turning oneself into a literal machine. In fact, the YGO game classifies wooden puppets as machines. Kankuro could have worn wooden armour with spring traps in it. And from the most basic element of growth in jrpgs, he could have improved his standing puppets by making them out of superior materials like metals and crystals and what not. Honestly, he could have integrated any of these ideas without even losing any soulfulness or becoming a superhero.
Yet he didn't. His character was used to represent the proper soul of the series. He remained a, and probably remains as the only, soulful combatant in the series.
Now it could be said that I am simply glorifying being irrelevant and weak. I acknowledge that the two concepts are very closely related through the factors they associate with, but both arguements I have against this (the true meaning of weakness and individuality in an interconnected reality) ultimately lead to it that I am simply showing that everything is of good quality in the right context for it. This is very fitting because the Puppet Style is one born of weakness and working upon it to become arguably the strongest, pound for pound.
What say you?
I am not saying that he is the only soulful character to have existed or even the most soulful among them. I am simply saying that he is the last of them.
But before that question can be answered, I must explain what I mean by "soulful". (See, with thoroughly subjective terms like this, one can never derive a standard of measuring anything without first explaining their own, subjective, meaning and understanding of them. Even with their meaning explained, such terms still apply themselves subjectively.)
There is being spirited and there is being soulful. Being spirited is about having any motivation or driving factor, especially one that gives you energy to get and keep going. Such motivations can be anything. Love, money, hatred, hunger or any such thing. Being soulful is about working on a motivation that is valuable and virtuous in its own right. As per the definition of a soul, soulfulness works in a manner that properly balances out various factors of reality, namely yourself with your environment. Simply being moved by passion makes you spirited, but working into and deriving from your environment your passions makes you soulful, because you balance yourself with your environment. It can be said that being spirited means you have a value that you work for but being soulful means your value adds value to other things.
With mortal limitations, these concepts hardly apply outside of context. This is also why these two concepts are never inherently superior to each other unless context is given that favours one over the other.
So what is the context here? That would be the world of Naruto and the fighting styles of it. This should be easily understood since it has so many characters with so much in terms of virtue in all different ways. The world of Naruto was given to us as one where fighting styles and the basic mortality of characters were key factors. Now I do not agree with the notion that the introduction of practical super powers in the latter stages, particularly the 4th War, did away with them. This is because they were properly explained as exceptions to the norm, such that Killer B with just his energy cloak was supposed to one of only 2 people in all of Naruto world history to have properly controlled his beast powers. But I would not say that they simply applied the same concept at a higher level because said level still takes away from the second concept of basic mortality. While.I acknowledge this and go on to work with it, I must say that I do not fault the series for it because this was done in an honourable manner. We did not have some slight and gradual shift to immortal combat, but were explicitly and directly told about it (such as with Akatsuki and Beast Hosts) and were also given reasons for it that work with the principles of the world of Naruto (people merging themselves with primordial energy beasts, which no normal person could even handle a literal mouthful of).
So it is not that the series abandoned its own principles, but rather that it simply changed its perspective towards a context where said principles applied to a very diminished extent. Perhaps it can be faulted for this change, since any introduction into a world carries an implied promise to always work with that part of the world that was initially presented to us.
On account of the latter idea, soulfulness in Naruto is derived from sticking to these basic principles.
(With that attended to, it can now be noted that these principles combine to make things such as knowledge, tactics and teamwork very important, such that supreme soulfulness would be that which also exalts these factors as well.)
Due to the nature of progress and movement, most characters in the series started out as very soulful. Kakashi, even with his mastery of a thousand techniques, simply exemplified the importance of styles and counters. His stamina issues restricting the closest thing to a superpower that he had exemplified the mortality of characters, especially when combined with his title as the strongest Jonin. Naruto had a superpower inside him, but at the cost of disrupting his energy control. Even the potential of it to become an overpowered threat was clearly noted as an exception for which he paid the price of social shunning. With Sasuke and Kimimaro we have it that those who threaten to break these principles of styles and mortality are dealt with by the whole world using teamwork.
However, as these characters progressed to higher levels, firstly mortality and then style was diminished. Energy cloaks used by beast hosts and energy armour used by those with eye powers basically rendered characters immune to attacks of all but a few types. Haxxed abilities such as flight, material bodies and teleportation also worked to nullify all but specific attacks. Now with immortality amounting to it that even a loss in style was covered by the ability to return for a second round against a mortal foe also meaning that styles weren't as important as before, it can be said that styles diminished simultaneously. Not completely, though, because specific attacks could.still get through. Styles were properly put away with the powers of the SoSP, becoming a ten tails host and wielding the Rinnegan, which simply could not be handled if you couldn't access NE properly. This rendered almost the whole world as useless. Someone with these powers could.genuinely defeat the whole world in direct combat, with the Void Path and the TSBs allowing for endless combat ability.
So while the series did justify itself, it is definitely the case that by the end, the relevant characters were largely soulless in combat. Characters right now are either literal machines, energy freaks or aliens that embody philosophical concepts instead of people with nice abilities. The closest one gets to a question of styles is what category a character falls into and not their specific powers and unique usage of said powers.
There is an exception, though, in Kankuro. His style was always based on specific setups and relied heavily on simple tricks and knowledge of the opponent. And even now, we have not been given reason to believe he has been morphed into yet another machine, even though his fighting style literally introduced that idea with Sasori.
When Kankuro was brought forward, he wasn't! Gaara was the main figure, with his sister being the main personality. Kankuro simply stayed in the background. This is very fitting for a shinobi. He was simply a tool to an end, no need for spotlight.
As the story continued, he was shown to have a fighting style built upon not putting himself forward, to such an extent that he prepared his traps beforehand to trick opponents. As we had seen with the genius Kakashi, the talent Zabuza, the genetic inheritor Itachi and mastermind Kabuto, using faint trickery is the pinnacle of tactics.
The story went further with Kankuro finding a proper rival to fight in Shino. Here, he showcased how secret skills and tricks allowed him to match his worst counter. This secret knowledge has been shown to be the bread and butter of the main villains, with Obito not only leading a major organisation in secret but even triggering a war through his secret identity.
As part 2 of the story came on and we had ended part 1 with freaks of nature (and science) properly described as "beyond human" and were now seeing freaks of physics and biology through the Akatsuki, Kankuro was shown to have not had any major changes besides a superior usage of the same tricks and tools from part 1. While this led to his quick dispatching by Sasori, it maintained his character as a solid shinobi.
As we reached the end game of the story and everyone, including the very peers of Kankuro, had acquired abilities that took them beyond human. Even by the flow of the story itself, the characters had ceased to be shinobi (tools) and had now become heroes (personalities and embodiments of ideals). Samurai was the supporter who never abandoned you (Sasuke), Sasuke was exploring hate, Naruto was the undying spirit, Team Asuma were the perfect team, Team Kurenai embodied normalcy and the quirks of personality, Team Gai embodied hard work through pure styles, Gaara and Temari were elemental masters and others carried their own virtues boosted by unnatural powers. Kankuro, however, stayed largely the same. When the likes of Sai were using literal Nakama Power to take down two Akatsuki and Tenten was given divine tools to complete her 'sword saint' growth curve, Kankuro was still using the same puppets he had used against the Sound Four to trap immortals and setup his allies for the finish. Not only was his character the same, he was exalting the basic principles of soulfulness in Naruto by showing them working against literal immortals!
And even when Kankuro got his spotlight fight, his major improvement was the embodiment of the soul of his senpai! And his victory came through an outpouring that expressed the core value of his style, instead of simply having any unattached moral value which he simply justified through his superpowers.
So as everything in Naruto changed, Kankuro stayed the same, embodying the very qualities that so greatly differentiate this series from other popular titles (DBZ). He sustained what made us fall towards it, whether in Love or hate.
And what makes this all the more impactful is the touch of irony about it. The Puppet Style dismisses the basic principles of styles and mortality. By taking the actual combatant out of the direct clash, mortality is rendered irrelevant unless the opponent can get through. By using tools which have both range and close control (basically, super tools) and are made out of superior materials to basic elements and thus have no usage restriction (as 'human shields' or 'tantrum barrage' weapons), styles are rendered meaningless unless truly overpowered (Particle Style) themselves. The usage of them as traps (by Kankuro, specifically) allows luck to be a factor as an unknowing opponent can step on the wrong place, mocking basic intelligence and tactics. The reworking of Puppet Style into String Style by Chiyo and Sasori even allows for Nakama Power applications (strings). So by style, Kankuro is probably the most justified character for getting the superpowers of the latter stages.
And it's not just style justification. The introduction of elaborate puppets hunted at the eventual introduction of super puppets (as seen in one of the movies) with the same applications as the energy armours and seals seen in the series. The Puppet Style literally introduced the possibility of turning oneself into a literal machine. In fact, the YGO game classifies wooden puppets as machines. Kankuro could have worn wooden armour with spring traps in it. And from the most basic element of growth in jrpgs, he could have improved his standing puppets by making them out of superior materials like metals and crystals and what not. Honestly, he could have integrated any of these ideas without even losing any soulfulness or becoming a superhero.
Yet he didn't. His character was used to represent the proper soul of the series. He remained a, and probably remains as the only, soulful combatant in the series.
Now it could be said that I am simply glorifying being irrelevant and weak. I acknowledge that the two concepts are very closely related through the factors they associate with, but both arguements I have against this (the true meaning of weakness and individuality in an interconnected reality) ultimately lead to it that I am simply showing that everything is of good quality in the right context for it. This is very fitting because the Puppet Style is one born of weakness and working upon it to become arguably the strongest, pound for pound.
What say you?
