English Dub Review: Boruto: Naruto Next Generations “Love and Potato Chips!”

The saltiest love story ever told.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

Boruto and Shikadai try to figure out what the chakra spirits are that have been causing all the trouble recently, but their efforts don’t get them very far. Meanwhile, Sarada, Sumire, and Chouchou enjoy a day on the town until they realize that some creepy individual is stalking them. Chouchou catches their stalker, and its revealed that the young man stalking them is in love with Sumire. Of course, they reject the misguided fool and continue about their day.

However, trouble follows them back to school. Through a series of creepy warnings, it becomes clear that Sumire’s stalker is still after her. Using his invisibility jutsu, he’s able to isolate Sumiru and kidnap her to the roof, where Boruto and friends find her. Boruto is able to see that the boy is being possessed by a chakra spirit. Boruto challenges the stalker to a fight for Sumire. The fight is close, with Boruto’s opponent making good use of his invisibility jutsu to ambush Boruto with kunai. In the end, though, its Chouchou who saves the day, by extending an honest and friendly hand to this boy who feels invisible to the world. Hearing Chouchou’s kind words, the stalker lays down his arms and passes out as the chakra spirit leaves his body.

Later that night, Mitsuki continues reporting his investigation of Boruto and the others to his snake messenger. All’s well that ends well, but it seems Mitsuki knows a lot more than he’s letting on.

Our Take:

It’s no secret that I’ve given Boruto quite a hard time since it first appeared on my radar. After all, I wasn’t down with the very concept of the show from its inception, thinking it little more than a cheap cash-grab to make a little extra money off a property who’s heyday was way back in my middle school days. And, for the most part, my suspicions have been proven right. This show hasn’t stood up to any metric of high quality and has stayed unremarkably average so far. Yet, I was more happy with what I got this week than I have for some time with the series. While it’s by no means perfect, or as quality as the conflicts in the original series, this week’s episode offers a compelling narrative filled with the pain and tragedy of being alone. It’s more substantial than anything we’ve seen so far, even if it has its own speed bumps that get in the way of an otherwise quality episode.

The main thing that makes me more satisfied with this week’s Boruto than any other its commitment to an actual sense of conflict and danger in the episode. Stalkers are frightening people, and I was surprised to see a milquetoast property like this portray the fear of being followed in such stark reality. Sumire feels legitimately terrified and her stalker’s anger is emotional enough that it captures the essence of that fear quite well. This, of course, adds an element of danger to the episode that usually isn’t anywhere near this show, so the fight this time is a lot more interesting as a result. Extra credit should be given for the animation quality as well, which took a serious jump higher during the fighting.

Of course, it’s not all fantastic. There’s still some pacing issues and a moral that’s a wee bit problematic with how the whole stalking situation gets resolved. There’s just something that feels a little bit bothersome about equivocating a stalker’s distortion of reality to an unloved flavor of potato chips. Its an over-simplification of things that shoots the narrative in the foot somewhat. Maybe another episode to flesh things out better would have been warranted. However, the emotion is sincere, the conflict tangible, and the empathy for our characters well-earned. If Boruto can make more episodes like this, then perhaps it can build a larger story with a little meat on it instead of the slice-of-life scraps the show has coasted on so far.

Score
7/10