10 Second Anime - Naruto Shippuuden - Episode 452

Itachi Filler Shippuuden continues. Itachi's genius is recognized at an early age as he ponders what life and death mean as a ninja.

Episode 452 - "Itachi's Story: Light and Darkness - The Genius"

Heh.

Thankfully, we quickly got through the umpteenth time we've seen the 9-Tails attack the village. Since it was from Itachi's perspective, we didn't see much, but we saw enough to know how protective he always was of Sasuke and there was some forgettable Uchiha girl who showed an interest in him.

I wonder if there'll be a scene later on where he had to kill her during the Uchiha clan massacre. That might be rough if we get some decent character development for this Izumi girl.

There was a lot of recycled footage, which was jarring compared to the C-Team quality animation we're getting so far in this filler of young Itachi. The woodcut style of the 9-Tails' rampage always looks great. Last episode, we saw A-Team quality animation in that short battle scene of the end of the 3rd Great Ninja War, so I'm pretty sure we'll see that again with grown-up Itachi.

That was an odd scene at the funeral with infant Naruto in front of the main cemetery memorial. It was like they were offering an oblate to the ninja gods. I guess that really did happen, in a sense.

Sasuke was born emo.

Actually, I think this is supposed to be a distrustful look. Like he's asking, "who's this person and is she going to take away my big brother?"

And Sasuke never liked girls either.

Well, let's just say he liked Itachi better than some strange girl who's totally crushing on HIS big brother.

I find it hilarious that people kept asking if baby Sasuke was a girl. No wonder he had issues...

Itachi may have been just as awkward around girls as Sasuke was, though. What an impolite, yet almost endearing thing to say that he was glad Izumi didn't die. Izumi definitely saw that as establishing some kind of distance between them.

An interesting detail on the Uchiha clan after the 9-Tails' attack was that they were moved far away from the city center. I had believed they were always on the outskirts because that's how the 2nd Hokage arranged things after Madara was expelled from the village, but this action showed a renewed distrust of the Uchiha originating from Danzo. Some other clans were moved too, but they had actually made those requests earlier. The paranoid tendencies of the insular Uchiha clan definitely festered after this and their feelings were partly justified.

Aw. Even at this early age, Itachi started using the "Sorry Sasuke, some other time," phrase. I hope the scene where Itachi incorporates the forehead poke has some emotional impact.

Huh. I didn't know that Shisui was older than Itachi. It looks like they were always great friends and training partners.

So, Itachi had the female fan club before Sasuke did. But Itachi also had male admirers, who quickly made him their gang leader. They went from -kun, to -san to -sama lightning fast!

The animation team is definitely subpar, or maybe the editor is. The fireball scene with his father was marred by having two fireballs come out of Itachi. I wonder if he was originally supposed to have a small one and his dad blew out another big one, or if they just recycled the original fireball animation. Something got screwed up there.

I liked how Itachi wasn't playing hooky with Shisui because he had a shadow clone going to class. No wonder Itachi always had a soft spot for Naruto. Who taught Itachi that Restricted Jutsu? His dad? Naruto stole the scroll describing it from the Hokage's office, which was pretty cool in itself. Very shinobi-like. I'd like to know how Itachi got that knowledge.

Next time, Itachi goes on genin class missions. You know, where they catch lost cats and such. I doubt he has Obito's network of old people, but you know filler is going to have a fun time showing us how Itachi does his work.