@hayattan-sonra I hope you don't mind me responding to you in this format. Turns out I had a lot to say. ^_^
I think as much as it’s frustrating to see sasuke give up his ideals at the end I think it’s pretty realistic, think about it he doesn’t see the third point of view of things we see and only relies on his own intuition and after a while of fighting tooth and nail, everyone telling him how wrong he is...it’s highly plausible he just accepts it at the end. I think even if it destroyed what he stood for (which personally i am very sad) imo that was realistically good written
I love this reply because it actually works as a perfect illustration of why out-universe analysis is valuable to me. Everything you are saying here works when we are thinking of Sasuke as a Real Person who let go of his fight as some Real People do in our world. This is a purely in-universe reading. But the importance of out-universe analysis is that since we, by default, create and experience stories from outside of their construction, an aspect of our analysis has to account for that fact.
Sasuke's arc is not the life of a real person, it is the totality of building blocks constructed with intentionality to make up the whole of his story. Which means analysis needs to account for both layers. Internal coherency (does it make sense in-universe i.e., properly motivated, believable development that is consistent with characterization, sign-posted progression etc.) that all needs to work together to transform him into a "believably real person" and out-universe analysis that covers both layers and sees the whole package (themes, framing, politics, intertextuality, etc.). The ending fails on both fronts. For example, Internally, there is no connecting tissue from a Sasuke who just declared his loss and conceded to not revolutionize the world his way, to actively preserving the secret of the state sanctioned genocide. There is a whole gulf of missing blocks between those two things. Making the characterization not believable.
When I say that they ending is a betrayal, I mean that the building blocks and the final top piece are incompatible. It doesn't make a coherent whole. So much of Sasuke's arc is tied up in the core central themes of the whole narrative. The systemic issues that we have been slowly unraveling and complicating since establishing them as the underlying issue facing all of them in the very first arc of the story. That is the author making a promise to the audience that these are the things that I want to talk about. These are the ideas that I want you and the characters to be grappling with. When you hammer home this theme so bloody consistently and then just dismiss it out of hand at the end, bad writing is the only thing I can call that.
Now, if the end was a tragic ending where Sasuke, like some real people do, is beaten down enough to stop striving for justice because the system proved itself to be too powerful, too intrenched, to ever be toppled by even one of the two most powerful beings in the world, then that would be the presentation of it, wouldn't it? That would be the realistic bitter ending. But that is not how it's framed. Instead, the ending simply drops those themes and abandons Sasuke's arc.
And him thinking he’s wrong for ever disobeying konaha/his teammates may seem ooc like it did to me at first but he’s a lone survivor in a place full of extreme nationalists and most people irl who voices their displeasure for injustices for government are shut down (i see it happen so many times in my country) or made feel guilty, so as much as it saddens me I can’t call it ‘bad writing’ in the end because that kind of tragedy feels very raw in its hopelessness
Your description of our good guys as "extreme nationalists", is that how the story frames them? Is that how the narrative itself characterizes them? I'd argue no. For me the raw hopelessness is in the dissonance of seeing an utterly tragic hopeless ending packaged as a triumphant hopeful ending. This ending is not the tragedy of Sasuke finally succumbing, it's the happy ending of him finally being enlightened. That is the ending we got. And no amount of limiting our scope of analysis to just the in-universe layer saves that writing, even if all the blocks actually connected, because the framing of the story won't allow it either.
The ending is not a tragic realistic reflection on the themes of the show and of our real world in all its ugliness, but a dismissal of them altogether. "The system is the problem. the tragedies of our world are not natural occurrences, they are products of the system. And every major villain is someone who recognizes that and seeks change in whatever broken way they see as necessary" -> -> -> -> -> -> -> "Naruto is the Hokage now. The system doesn't need to change because a Good Person sits at the top of the power structure. Old injustices don't need to be answered for because Naruto is the Hokage. The system doesn't need to change. Sasuke was wrong to want a revolution. But he has been saved from the darkness and understands that now. Don't think about this too much. Just rejoice in Naruto's triumph."
To me, the best way I know to categorize the ending as is bad writing because no matter how narrow or wide the scope of analysis, it all still doesn't connect. There is no connecting the dots coherently in either layer. It just falls apart under the slightest scrutiny.
I am so sorry this ballooned so much beyond what I anticipated! I'm just rambling AT you at this point. 24hrs. after my initial post and I am still extremely sleep-deprived so I don't even know if this makes much sense. Hope you can manage to decipher this word salad. (^_^").
germansingergirl
areudirty
theartofmadeline
jacobvanloon
turnnoffyourmind
