SK appreciation #4; the war and how good it’s been to us
Can we take a moment to appreciate just how much positive SasuKarin Kishi has managed to sneak in through the course of the war even though:
- Sasuke and Karin were missing for a good chunk of it.
- He is trying to keep Sasuke as mysterious as possible, which means trying to keep his interactions with others ambiguous.
- The focus of the war so far has been on something else entirely (From Obito to Madara to Team 7 to Naruto-and-Sasuke so on so forth)
- In that light: they’ve hardly interacted.
So that despite all that we still got:
a) Both ends of the bond being brought up in their absence and confirmation that they’re seen as a unit within Taka
b) A reminder of Karin being still pissed at him first thing when she showed up
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c) Sasuke had merely been around for a couple of chapters and Karin (and Taka) were already being brought up to him
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d) Karin returning to him the moment he got his shit together while screaming bloody murder at him
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e) Sasuke actually sweating aka reacting with more than indifference
f) His first ever apology to anybody post-massacre
(the rest is under the cut to not clutter anybody’s dash!!)
g) MORE third-party commentary left and right and every single one reasserting Karin’s feelings and portraying them in a positive light
h) Kishi even taking the time to add some SasuKarin skinship when there was absolutely no need for it
i) ^ Sasuke actually losing his cool and showing the funniest expression he has shown throughout the entire part II
j) The canonization of one of our favorite head-canons
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k) Karin being more open than ever and her feelings for Sasuke being put into words for the first time
l) Karin being tsun and often bringing up what Sasuke did to her even after tagging along
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m) Light and humorous moments
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n) Serious moments
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o) Karin losing her cool like this for the first time ever and it is due to Sasuke (I’m sensing a pattern here on the war alone)
p) Karin awakening her dormant Uzumaki powers because of her love for Sasuke thus tying SasuKarin - again - to Haku’s words.
q) Karin moving heaven and earth to get to Sasuke and being the one character whose reaction to Sasuke’s death Kishi focused on
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r) This panel right here
s) A parallel with the crush of the guy who is the yang to Sasuke’s yin
… To name a few. And I’m leaving out details like their respective returns to the manga being literally one after the other (573 closed with Sasuke, 574 opened with Karin), the reader finding out about her Uzumaki legacy only when Sasuke does and Sasuke’s reaction to it, etc.
In just a handful of chapters alone Kishi managed to: reintroduce SasuKarin, remind us all of the traits that form their bond, and begin to move it past its status quo. All this while portraying it in a decidedly positive light. So I’d say the war has definitely been pretty good to us so far.
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AND there’s still everything we have to look forward to. Like Sasuke hearing about Karin’s feelings for him, finding out what she means to him, their shared backstory and how Suigetsu knows so much about them and all the good stuff that’s going to come once it’s finally time for Sasuke’s actual “character-development, Nakama-accepting arc”.
