Gaara, Kankuro, and Kamiki’s team travels to Konoha by train to take the Chunin Exams. Maki couldn’t wait to see the three of them win and believed that their opponents would be no match for them. Gaara told them to relax. Iron Lee is studying in his room. Sasuke teaches Boruto the art of shuriken and how to use his own shuriken’s deflection to hit the target. At home, Boruto remembers Katasuke’s comment about small hands. Shikamaru and Saizu administered the first test, which included true or false questions from the books. When both answers are incorrect, each group is placed in a space. The team that manages to avoid being trapped will pass. Shikamaru tells Naruto that Boruto and his team passed and says he congratulates Boruto. Naruto sent him an email and Boruto laughed at him. Boruto was unimpressed by Sasuke’s comments about the shuriken jutsu, complaining that it was Sarada’s specialty as an Uchiha. To prevent this from happening, Sasuke created many shadow clones, which was Naruto’s specialty. Boruto can only create four clones. In the second round, each team must defend its own flag while holding its opponent’s flag. Team Motegi, Yuri, and Shinki pass by. Boruto stayed behind to protect his flag while Sarada and Mitsuki continued on their way. Boruto and his clones fight Kiri’s team of three, but the trio, who also have access to shadow clones, outmaneuver him. Mitsuki turned to help Boruto. As the triplets are about to win the flag, Boruto remembers Naruto’s happy email and uses Kote, Water Release, and Lightning Release to defeat the triplets. Sarada uses her Sharingan to find the true genjutsu flag and ensure her team wins. Kosuke, one of Katasuke’s subordinates, told him that Boruto had small hands, which was also recorded on film.
In the third episode, Boruto steps away from the spotlight and the focus becomes his classmates Shikadai and Iron Lee. As the title suggests, the bulk of the episode is devoted to Steel, but the two characters soon gain some importance thanks to a few meaningful scenes filled with charm. With lots of different scenes and welcome fun, this episode is a huge improvement over the second time around and helps Boruto get back on the right foot.
The episode begins with another lesson about learning, this time about shuriken. Some students seemed to understand this, but none better than Meta Lee, who hit both targets with ease. He hit the third ball but was disappointed to see his friends watching him. As the plot progresses, this indifference causes more problems for Metal and his classmates, leading to a situation where Shikadai blames Metal for not being able to control his ways. Demir walked away to hold back his tears and Shikadai scratched his head in confusion.
The scenes are short but I was amazed by the work they did to flesh out these characters. The show shows the full onslaught of Metal in several acts, without unnecessary repetition of the second act. Shikadai’s criticism is reminiscent of his father’s generosity and callousness despite his good intentions. In the following scene, Shikamaru explains that getting into trouble is part of being a strong ninja, showing the deep bond between father and son, but sister Temari steals the scene with her own parenting style: weakly distracting them all and pushing them away.
The next day, Shikadai wants to apologize, but Metal is not satisfied with these words and quickly attacks Shikadai. Boruto and Inojin come to Shikadai’s aid, and Boruto’s eye energy quickly reveals the same dark aura that possessed Denki in the first episode. Realizing something suspicious, our team manages to take down Metal, combining their powers in a fun battle that ends with Metal being overworked but ultimately freed from his cursed state. In the end, everyone can be forgiven, but thanks to the development of a very good character, the solution becomes more believable this time. This section is useful after the second disappointment. It gives us some insight into the support we have been given as the future points to something bigger. It also brings back some of the funniest things that were important to Naruto in the early days. Almost every detail is an improvement over the previous installment, which makes me confident that Boruto can prove to be a worthy heir to Naruto’s throne.
I think the whole school is here, at least until the anime moves beyond the Boruto movies and starts creating new manga content. Who knows how long this will last. I digress…I’ll try to be unbiased in these reviews, so let’s get to it. This event is a combination of the previous two weeks. There’s still too much high school drama for me, but this episode is relevant; including the first episode’s slow reveal of details such as the dark chakra and Byakugan, and Boruto’s anger towards his father. Aside from his obvious features, Iron Lee is very similar to Rock Lee from the beginning of Naruto. It is not revealed if Iron has ninjutsu abilities or if he takes after his father, but if so, this would help awaken him. In this episode, we see different elements of the Boruto movie. Boruto has never been a team player; as shown by how he rushes into battle during the game and refuses to team up to defeat Metal Lee. As I said above, we see Boruto’s disgust for his father. It will be interesting to see if the anime will build on this so that when we watch the movie, viewers will know more about Boruto’s feelings for his father.
