Board Thread:Episode Discussions/@comment-26037879-20151015162122/@comment-1458758-20151016101002

As always, I think people are getting too bent out of shape over what are ultimately harmless episodes.

As it stands this arc, Road to Tenten was good because it was Tenten rejecting the reality put in front of her until, when being praised as a great ninja (Like she always wanted) she succumb to the spell.

Rappuden was great cause it's exactly the type of insane shit I expect from Bee, where he's a hero in his own head, and the Jinchuriki are free to be themselves and be heroes.

Karin's dream was... Depressing as shit. As most of it was memory and the bit in the present is basically her getting attacked, used and wishing to see Sasuke smile as she lay dying!!! I mean seriously, I know Karin's a weirdo, but how depressed do you need to be where your ideal world is you dying to see some asshole smile?

Then we have Tsunade's dream, which is odd from the start as it is her reading a book within her dream and then the majority of the story is the book, written in Jiraiya like fashion, which is great and forgivable, I mean Tenten beating Hanzo is wishful thinking on her part, but this is literally anything goes as Tsunade is dreaming about what possible thing Jiraiya could have written.

As it stands over all though, I can't bring myself to like these episodes as they fit into the scenario as such. Tenten and Bee's are fine, but as Obito proclaimed it, the Infinite Tsukiyomi is a dream world where you're happy, where the dead can come back to life, so surely a dream world for Karin should be one where she's married to Sasuke with her mother at the wedding or whatever and we've seen Tsunade's, it should be much more idealised basically, where as what we're getting here, Karin's happiness involves her dying and Tsunade's seems to have Jiraiya still dead, but hey, he got his book finished.

Now really, that could easily be an angle to play off of, the idea that even Obito's ideal, this escape from the pain of reality in his ideal fantasy isn't all it's cracked up to be because it can only go as far as one could delude themselves into beleiving. Tsunade and Karin are both realistic enough to know that their loved ones are dead and that Karin is so depressingly sad to beleive that the only way Sasuke would ever smile at her is on her deathbed, but honestly, I don't think this is the angle the animation team is going for, and that makes me sad.