English Dub Review: Naruto Shippuden “The Bridge to Peace”

The fight between Konan and Madara heats up! But is Madara just toying with her?

 

See what I mean about Madara toying with Konan? I will give Konan credit here because her ability to trap Madara inside her canal of paper bombs was ingenious, and to keep them exploding for 10 minutes was even more so. Unfortunately, the Paper Ocean jutsu really took a lot out of Konan, so it was slim pickings for Madara. The operatic music here gives Madara the rightful feel of omnipotence he deserves. Hell, Madara even used Izanagi.

The omnipotence of Madara even allows him to give Konan a lesson on the Sage of the Six Paths. That lesson centered around how the Sage was able to use Izanagi to avoid death and use the light and darkness of the physical and mental powers the Sage had to create the nine tailed beasts. I am really digging Madara through this segment, and the transition from Tobi to Madara has come the complete 180. Finally, let’s take a second on how Madara, with his seemingly limitless amount of jutsu, just straight chokes out Konan.

To be completely honest, I’m glad that “The Bridge to Peace” brought an end to the Amegakure trio. Konan saying she is either the pillar to Nagato or Naruto’s dream got to be very grating to my nerves. To be a pillar, you have to be strong, and it’s very debatable to call Konan strong. I couldn’t see it, but she was the last to survive. This scene ends with a single piece of paper turning red, and floating away.

I’m not entirely sure, but I love these flashbacks with Jiraiya, Nagato, Yahiko, and Konan. This is doubly so when they’re all in the frog costumes. The symbolism of that piece of paper turning red is shown here, and it’s rather symbolic. She left, and that paper turned red. That’s pretty much the gist of it, without getting into too much of the sentimentality of the episode. Jiraiya is rather smart in this as well, because he really thought of everything when training these three.

I read the manga a few years ago, and I am really glad how the transition from manga to animation turned out. One of the moments I was looking forward to was when the paper made it back to the old Akatsuki hideout. Call me sentimental, but I am a fan of good character development. This made the circle complete. Konan, Yahiko, and Nagato started out as innocent kids who needed a way to defend themselves, to becoming part of the biggest criminal group in Naruto. And in the end, Konan died believing in someone again, and that someone was Naruto Uzumaki.

We’re finally making some headway to the war, with Madara getting a new mask, and his arm grew back. Kabuto is readying his resurrection bait, and Zetsu got the intelligence from Kisame before he died. This is gearing up to be one huge fight!

Overall, I think “The Bridge to Peace” was a decent episode. there were parts that I think could have gone smoother, like the end of the Konan and Madara encounter, and the flashback to Jiraiya training Konan, Yahiko, and Nagato. This saga ended almost a hundred episodes ago, and I am glad to see it go. However, the episode overall was very  I am very excited where the series goes past “The Bridge to Peace.” This has been one of the very few bright spots of the weekend, and I am glad to actually have this to look forward to every week.