Board Thread:Naruto Discussions/@comment-4271790-20141106113847/@comment-1514283-20141114224918

I think it'd be disingenuous to say NaruHina and SasuSaku were "obvious" considering how NaruSaku got the lion's share of development all throughout the manga, from characters acting as intermediaries for their feelings for another (Yamato for Sakura and Sai for Naruto), to data books hinting at Sakura's supposedly confusing feelings for Naruto, and, the most obvious, parallels to Minato/Kushina, Jiraiya/Tsunade and Obito/Rin. Hinata was hardly given any panel time after they held hands. The focus was mostly on Sakura when it came to insight on Naruto; most of her panel time was spent on her worrying and thinking about him in one way or another. The whole "find someone like your mother" thing came full circle 130 chapters after it was brought in with Minato identifying Sakura as the one that reminded him of his wife, and then we had that whole CPR thing and whatnot.

The fact these two never had their closure and the promise, while fulfilled, was never touched upon again despite being mentioned in 693 and the latest data book, as well as Karin's sudden disappearance all lead me to believe the endgame pairings weren't decided until after Road to Ninja.

Given the comparatively enormous development of NaruSaku to other couples, especially the ones that were canonised, I'm not convinced Kishimoto didn't change his mind or capitulated to editorial pressure because SS was already more popular Japan, and NH was of a similar size to NS, whilst SK was pretty small.

I'm not too fussed with NaruHina becoming canon since that pairing, albeit underdeveloped, is healthy.

SasuSaku sends all the wrong messages though. That shit can burn in a fire. I don't understand how anyone can find it appealing, what with Sasuke treating Sakura like shit and trying to kill her and her loved ones and destroy her home. It's just a terrible pairing.