Yeah Sakura got her moment! :D

Also, there's a lot of blood now. These fights are getting intense o_o

Key Takeaways:
-Blood runs thicker than water (another team from the leaf village helps Sakura from an ambush because one of the members were long-time friends)
-Stand up for your dream! (Sakura FINALLY fights back to protect her team [especially Sasuke]) ( )

"I'll protect you with my life!" ( )

Orochimaru's entrance. What a fantastically creepy villain, and what an awesome nostalgia moment for me.

We also get to see team 7's genin fail, stand back up, shine, and eventually fall again. I love these rough patches. When these guys shine, they really shine hard. Sasuke was good, Naruto was better, but when Sakura decides that she's had enough, my heart really soars.

Sakura is kinda weak and only a little funny in all the manga that came before, being technically good but low in spirit.

That changes here, and how beautiful it is. :) ( )

This was the last volume I had bought and read years back, before I started collecting again in the past month.

Acknowledgement of Sakura's draining presence on the team, and some character development for her. Still one of my least favorite characters, though, even if the fact that she's not much of a fighter and really only has her book smarts to go on makes her a more relatable character than many of the others.

Hinataaaa. ( )

This volume finds the series hitting full charge as we learn more about the main cast and their dispositions and natures. After catching a few episodes of the anime last year I put Naruto in the same category of Dragonball Z, a category not too much in polish in my eyes, but I found myself happily wrong and so far enjoying this series as I continue reading it. Naruto is action, it has comedy that catches you off guard when it appears, and it has originality. It also has a lead character that is not perfect in any way but no matter what is focused on his goals.

C. ( )