The Start of Uzumaki Naruto

Naruto is a complex and delightful story of a difficult child who wants to be the greatest Ninja ever. Like many of the anime that were derived from their manga, it has developed a great and loyal following, not merely because of the complexity, but the intense emotions and deep motivations. Uzumaki Naruto is a child that many children his age can identify with. It is a story of heroes and challenges, with just the right amount of silliness, humor, and budding romance.

In the beginning, Naruto is a noisy, arrogant, troublesome child, who performs disrespectful pranks around his village. He thinks he is going to be the greatest ninja ever, yet when he is tested, cannot perform even the simplest of techniques which all the other students have mastered. Alone, without any parents to look after him, he is identified with by his teacher, Iruka-sensei, who has also been alone since he was a child. It is known to everyone in the village, but not to Naruto, that he has a monster nine-tailed fox sealed inside of him. Twelve years earlier, the demon fox had attacked the village, destroying it, and killing Iruka's parents. But the village recovered, and the demon fox was neutralized by sealing it inside the newly-born child, Uzumaki Naruto. It was forbidden for anyone in the village to ever reveal the truth to others, especially to the child himself.

Alone, unrecognized and despised by everybody, Naruto performs his pranks to try to gain attention. In the end, when another final exam comes by, all the students are given the chance to demonstrate their developing ninja powers. Everyone passes, except Naruto, who attempts to create a replication of himself, but only succeeds in creating an absurd, weak, useless replication. Iruka, his teacher, has no choice but to fail him. Naruto is depressed, seeing everyone else graduate and acquire the symbol of graduation, a metal plate with the village symbol that they wear as a forehead protector.

Fate and an evil force conspire to give Naruto a second chance. A sly and untrustworthy teacher, Mizuki-sensei, befriends Naruto and convinces him that he can graduate if he steals the Scroll of Sealing and uses its immense and dangerous powers to learn impressive techniques that will allow him to pass. Secretly, Mizuki manipulates Naruto for his own ambition to steal the scroll. He is prepared to kill Naruto in the process.

Naruto steals the scroll and learns one primary and powerful technique. The head of the village, the Hokage-sama is angry by the theft, and sends the village ninjas out to find the childish thief. They are angry, saying that this was no mere prank, but a very dangerous act. Even Hokage-sama realizes that Naruto can cause great damage, and may even be able to unwittingly unseal the demon fox within him.

When Iruka has found Naruto, the boy is confused and exhausted. He has practised over and over one of the forbidden techniques. The teacher and student are set upon by Mizuki. The traitorous sensei injures and disables Iruka, ready to take the next step and steal the scroll and kill both witnesses. Iruka protects Naruto, who runs away, scampering off on all fours just like a fox. Mizuki pursues and catches up, but Iruka appears and is able to protect his student once more. When Naruto finds out the truth about the demon fox sealed inside of him, he realizes that Iruka is a loyal teacher and friend, who has only ever tried to help him. Mizuki attacks, but Naruto, still just a boy, unleashes his newly-developed technique of multiple shadow replication. The astonished Mizuki is beaten up by the hundreds of Naruto duplicates. Iruka is impressed, deciding then to graduate the boy. He gives Naruto his metal forehead protector as a symbol, and the boy is pleased and proud. But the wise Iruka-sensei warns the boy that the path of the ninja is just beginning and it will be a lot harder from here-on. Episode one ends on a note that is upbeat and with the anticipation of many adventures and lessons to come.

Cartoons - Bugs Bunny

Cartoons may or may not have been made just for kids, but one thing is for certain. Cartoons have made an everlasting impression on all people both young and old. Some cartoons fade into obscurity quickly while others stand the test of time. We're going to be starting a series of some of the most famous and arguably most important cartoons of all time.

Bugs Bunny has been a cartoon character seen not only on the cartoons but in commercials for a number of products. Bugs has become a household name and an American institution.

Bugs Bunny was originally created in 1939, but it wasn't until 1940 when he took on a new voice in the person of Mel Blanc that Bugs became the character that we have grown to love. The truth is, nobody really knows who created Bugs Bunny. Speculation is that he was created by a number of people. Bugs did go on to become the first Warner Brothers cartoon and to this day, still the most popular. Speculation is that the character of Bugs Bunny was created to mimic the real life person of Groucho Marx. This may or may not be true, but there is a definite similarity between the two.

Bugs was a rather devilish character. He'd always manage to get everyone around him into all kinds of trouble while avoiding the same. He was the cartoon character's con man and escape artist. No matter how tough a spot he was in he always found a way out of it. Kind of like a Superman without the super powers.

And oh, the targets of his conniving. Bugs had a host of characters to play off, all of which were just as important in cementing the Bugs Bunny legacy as Bugs himself.

Probably the most famous and the one who Bugs got the best of was Elmer Fudd. Poor Elmer. All this man wanted to do was hunt, as he would say, "wabbits". Mel Blanc brought such wonderful life to this character with his garbled speech and dumb sound. Fudd was indeed what we call "bumfuzzled" or simply confused. No matter what trap he set for Bugs, the rascally rabbit was always able to weasel his way out of it.

Then there was Daffy Duck. Daffy was the wise guy kid and class clown who you both hated and loved in high school. Poor Daffy was also many times the victim of Bugs' schemes. In one very memorable cartoon, Fudd was hunting rabbits and while Bugs and Daffy were together, Bugs managed to convince poor old Elmer that it was duck season. So instead of shooting Bugs, he'd shoot Daffy. And of course the head would go spinning around until he was looking behind him. A real person would have been dead. But these characters just kept coming back again and again.

Not all of the Bugs Bunny, or what was known as the Loony Toons cartoons, revolved around Bugs. There of course was the classic matchups of Tweety and Sylvester, and Road Runner and Wyle E. Coyote. To see each of these duos try to out fox each other alone was worth the price of admission.

Books could be written about these and so many other Bugs Bunny characters. If you haven't seen the cartoons then do yourself a favor and pick up a DVD from Amazon or wherever you can get a hold of one. The resulting hours of laughter will be more than worth the price.