Boruto: Naruto upcoming young Generations having force dramatic

In an apocalyptic future, Boruto Uzumaki, son of Seventh Hokage Naruto and Hinata, battles the tattooed Kawaki above the ruins of the Hidden Leaf Village. After Kawaki declares that the age of the ninja is over, the story flashes back several years to the eve of Boruto's entrance into the Ninja Academy in a rapidly modernizing Hidden Leaf Village. When Boruto spies a boy his age being bullied and steps in to help out, that boy turns out to be Denki, the son of a CEO, who's being forced by his father to join Ninja Academy in order to be strong enough inherit the family business. Boruto encourages Denki to stand up to his father, but later notices an evil aura radiating from him. Boruto is bound to make a dramatic arrival to his first day at the Academy! Boruto: Naruto Next Generations is based on a manga and can be found streaming on Crunchyroll and Hulu,

Boruto embraces this spirit of change, much to its benefit. It's inherently thrilling to see the Hidden Leaf Village adopt a variety of faux-modern changes (Naruto has always embraced a pretty loose technological moment), and fun to see what all the old leads have been up to. As a love letter to existing fans, Boruto shines - but even on its own merits, this is a strong premiere.

For one thing, the show looks great. Long-running adaptations have a tendency to fall apart visually over time, but Boruto at least opens with stellar animation and great overall art design. Watching Boruto parkour over the pipes and pillars of his hometown takes great advantage of Masashi Kishimoto's detail-heavy architectural design sense, making the mere act of exploring this town into an adventure. The backgrounds of the Hidden Leaf Village are awash in detail and color, and strong animation is applied with equal effectiveness to acrobatic feats and small details of character acting. Even the opening sequence is full of dynamic colors and creative typography.

Story-wise this is all pretty routine material, but the episode has a sharp sense of pacing and a clear thematic center. Essentially everything in this episode gestures to either the passage of time or the relationships between parents and their children, from larger shifts like the technological changes to the course of the story itself. I winced a little when Boruto outright declared “staying on the tracks isn't for us” at the end (symbolism!), but other than that, this was a focused first step in a story that will presumably take a larger, multi-generational approach to its drama. Overall, Boruto's first episode is a rousing introduction to the next chapter in the Naruto saga.