Yeah not such a great joke that you need to use bold and enlarge it even while repeating it. ~_~
I was using the format it was originally written in to point out that refering to "the question" I was asking about was a poorly thought out, as the ENTIRE first post was composed of questions (nine or so) and ignoring the both larger-sized AND bolded one would recieve a very unexpected answer.
Regarding my amount of "funny", I personally thought it was hilarious. A word to the wise, never SAY a joke isn't funny. Either you're wrong and haven't understood it, or you're right and have just pointed out something the source of the joke probably already knew in a way that makes you seem like a total douche. At the very least to the person you just "helped".
Supporting characters better our understanding of the main character and the circumstances of s/he finds themself in, whether long-term or short-term. Tsunade is a supporting character for the story of Naruto. Dan is part of her story- he was used to give more than one dimension to the character of Tsunade and to give us a reason for Tsunade's absence from the village and her behaviour prior to coming back and taking charge of Konoha as she was in for the long term. Dan does not play any role in Naruto's life and wasn't needed to be detailed. He was used again (just before, what looks like at the moment, Tusnade's end in the story and) to add a softening touch to one of the most gruesome scene in the manga so far.
If I EVER say that supporting characters as a whole are unneccesary or meaningless, then I am WRONG. Possibly due to higher-than-average chances of early-onset dementia. But that wasn't what I said.
Dan serves little to no purpose. His death gives a reason for Tsunade's abandonment of Konoha, but not a good one. She has more, and better ones, even if she'd never met him. He accomplishes little during the war. He essentially blocks Tsunade's character development between his death and Jiraiya's arrival in Tanzaku Gai with Naruto in tow.
Nawaki's death was a tragedy. Cut down before his reaching adulthood, or even beyond the merest beginnings of adolescense, he never got to experience HALF of what he should have. His early death was wholly unexpected, and as an older sibling I can say I would be absolutely DEVASTATED at the death of a younger brother or sister.
Dan's death was, ever so slightly, less of one. Shinobi die. It's what they do. Dan was a hardened killer, not an inexperienced child. Tsunade's reaction at his death may be understandable, but the sheer SCALE of it is incomprehensible.
Tsunade, at this point, is not inexperienced with death. She has lost her brother and quite possibly her parents, as we've never heard anything of them and with a pedigree as prestigious as (one of them) had, it's practically a given he or she was a legend in the making. Unless that parent was killed before their time. Her grandfather died in battle. Her grandfather's brother died in battle. It's practically certain that not one but SEVERAL of her aquaintances, friends and family died in the War that claimed her brother and lover, and even before it began.
Tsunade has killed people herself, with her bare hands. And often, if her moniker as a "Legendary Sannin" is at all deserved. But she has not killed children, another reason for her reaction to Nawaki's death. Dan has killed people too, if his ambition of becoming Hokage is at all realistic, and what little we have seen of his abilities suggests it was. He is a ninja, she is a ninja, they are not inexperienced with death, even on a personal level. So why would Dan dying send Tsunade into a destructive spiral of gambling and alcohol?
Dan's "softening touch" to a brutal scene? Don't even get me started.
watching dan and tsunade in the afterlife, is just eternally cockblocked
