Art of War: An old tale reinvented
Fights in media are always thrilling to watch. But what differentiates a good fight scene from a bad one? Is it only about the spectacle of violence, or is more behind it? What aspects all belong to a fight? These questions I try to answer in this new series “Art of War”, in which I’ll study some of the fight scenes I enjoy and try to deduce, why they are that great. For a start I turn to my favourite Anime, Naruto. And for the second installment of the series, after the Lee vs. Gaara fight, we turn to Naruto vs. Pain.
The Context
The Pain fight is probably the finest hour of Naruto Shippuden. It is set up since the beginning of the series. Even in the original, the first two members of the Akatsuki are revealed. The Akatsuki are a terrorist organisation consisting of some of the finest and most ruthless shinobi. At this point we already met them and defeated most of them, but each put on a fight that proved their power. Some of them even killed off some of our “good” characters. Pain is the boss of this group of extraordinary ninjas. He has hidden himself in the shadows for the longest time. When he finally steps into action, he is revealed to be six people at once, indestructible and he kills Jiraiya a legendary ninja and the closest Naruto had to a father figure. We learn that Jiraiya, in his past was actually also a teacher to Pain. When Pain decides to attack Konoha, Naruto’s hometown, he successfully does so, killing many more characters, even Kakashi, Naruto’s sensei, and razes the whole village to the ground with one attack. We, the watchers have learned to fear Pain. We are in desperation because of Pain. We know Pain.
Naruto, meanwhile, was out of the village, in a hidden mountain to overcome his … of his mentor and friend by training a powerful new technique. With his new toad master, he has to learn to meditate and gather nature energy. A difficult thing to do for the hyperactive and unconcentrated Naruto. Between his training he reads Jiraiya’s book about his dream of world peace.
When he teleports to the village, just one moment too late after Pain razed it, after we witnessed the desperation, after Sakura screamed for his help, we knew that the saviour arrived. I still get chills down my spine, simple writing about it.
The Structure
It’s a rather long fight, and thus it follows multiple stages. I shall refer to them as the Smart stage, the Might stage, (a Smart interlude) and the Words stage.
Naruto arrives with a small army of frogs and faces the Six paths of Pain. One after another, he figures out their powers and a way to defeat them. Not without struggling of course. The battle is exciting to watch. We get to see Naruto’s new nature power, and all his abilities he had acquired over the course of the series. With creative problem-solving skills he managed to defeat all but one. The last one paralyses Naruto and holds his infamous speech. He defeats Naruto’s moral argument, that he is right to fight him because he avenges his loved ones, with his idea of the cycle of hatred. He, Pain, also has come to avenge his loved ones, and should Naruto manage to kill him, the remaining loved ones will once come to avenge him. Naruto doesn’t know any answer how to break this cycle, and thus seems to be defeated. This concludes the Smart Stage.
Out of all the people in the village, Hinata comes to Naruto’s rescue and she confesses her love to him. Another huge moment with a long term set up and sadly zero consequences. Unfortunately, she is no match to Pain and he kills her. This, however, awakens the fox within Naruto and he completely gives in to his powers. The nine tailed fox, a curse in Naruto that has been teased from the very first episode of the original show, and was never fully seen, finally made his striking appearance in the show. The Might stage is a fight between a force of nature and a self-proclaimed god. Too immensely powerful beings with a long term set up having at it. This is probably the most rewarding fight for the Naruto watchers. Sadly, some got disappointed by a weird choice of animation. I get the criticism, but personally I find that particular episode amazing for its depiction of the speed the two of them are moving.
Pain captures the almost fully grown fox in a comet, but it escapes and continues to return fully to life. Only a Deus Ex Machina could save Naruto anymore. His father, he never got to know appeared within him and helps him in his battle against the Fox. Another huge moment!
Afterwards comes a short interlude of Naruto outsmarting Tendo Pain without the help of the Fox’ power.
The Words stage comes after this when Naruto finds and confronts the seventh man, the one that moved the other six bodies like puppets. Instead of fighting anymore, they battle with their words over peace. It ends with Naruto abstaining from revenge for his fallen friends and letting Nagato live, breaking the cycle of hatred. Nagato, moved by Naruto’s words (talk-no-jutsu) sacrifices his live in turn to revive all those he had killed at this day.
The impact
The Pain fight is obviously the climax of everything that had happened before as it provides the payoff to multiple strings of set ups. It has a huge impact onto the world, since Naruto’s hometown got fully destroyed, although it doesn’t have much impact on the rest of the story. The war that follows, is set up by another, more minor fight and the romance it sets up between Naruto and Hinata won’t be pursued until the very end of the series. It does, however change Naruto, all be it in subtle ways. I think after this point in the series, he becomes a tad bit more serious, and takes on more responsibility. Of course, he finally gained the respect he has always been out to get. With that achieved, his goals have to shift. Bringing back Sasuke is still one of them, but also through learning Jiraiya’s and Pain’s philosophy Naruto starts to realize that the world has to be changed and that he may be destined to do so.
Reading between the Punches
In this fight, Naruto becomes a buddha. The story told on a metaphorical level is, in my opinion the most interesting aspect of this particular fight.
The Six Paths of Pain, represent the six realms of rebirth in Buddhist belief – Samsara. There is the technology Pain representing humanity, the summoner Pain, representing the realm of animals, the Pain that absorbs chakra represents the hungry spirits. The Pain that is able to revive fallen Pains represents hell, while the mindreading and judging Pain represents the demi-gods. Tendo Pain, who attracts and repulses forces, finally represents the realm of gods.
In Buddhist belief these realms is where one is being rebirthed to, depending on the karma one accumulated. But the goal is not entering the realm of gods, which although a wonderful stay, is a dead end because no good karma can be gathered there, but escaping the samsara and attain Buddhahood. The human realm is the only realm where one can achieve such a thing, since there, existence is suffering, but one possesses the preconditions to react properly to it. One can react either with hatred or with forgiveness. Pain himself reacts with hatred, and wants everyone else to suffer as he did. The Ninetails within Naruto always has stood for hatred and anger. His outbreak during the fight stands metaphorically, for Naruto following the same path as Pain. But since Naruto manages to overcome it and finally doesn’t enact revenge on Nagato, he breaks the cycle of pain, the Samsara and attains Buddhahood. For this reading also speaks Naruto’s new ability, the Sage Mode, which he attains by meditating and becoming one with nature. The Pain fight is impactful, emotionally investing and intricately thought out. With different stages it provides variety to stay exciting. It includes a battle of wits and a battle of might and stands in for an interesting philosophical discussion. The thing that elevates this fight from fun to watch to a great piece of storytelling, in my opinion, is that it excellently uses abilities not only to create an interesting battle of tactics, but to tell the story of Naruto’s ascension to Buddhahood on one level, and the clash of philosophies on another level. Of course, the theme fits into Naruto’s overall theme of peace, which might be worth a discussion in another post.