Naruto Vol. 33
- ISBN
- 9781421520018
- Publisher
- Viz Media
- English release
- Pages
- 192
- Chapters
- 290–299
- Anime
- Season 2: 遥かなる再会の章 (Long-Awaited Reunion) ep. 33–53
The book where Naruto's own power stops being the solution: three of its ten chapters are titled after a number that keeps climbing. Chapters 290 to 299 begin at the meeting the previous volume left unfinished, with Orochimaru standing in it, and run into a fight nobody present planned. The contents page gives the shape away by itself: 'The Third Tail...!!', 'Rampage...!!', 'The Fourth Tail...!!', 'Toward Nine Tails...!!'. What arrives is not a character but a condition, and the series keeps coming back to it. The second half changes subject to Sai and the organization that placed him. Shippuden covers all ten chapters inside season 2, episodes 33 to 53. Viz lists 192 pages at $11.99 for ten chapters, one more than every volume since Part II began.
Spoilers — why this volume matters. Tap to reveal.
Kabuto was never Sasori's spy in any useful sense: he destroys the Sasori shell Yamato was wearing to keep the appointment and leaves him exposed, Orochimaru takes the meeting over, and the fight that follows pushes Naruto past the point the story had previously allowed. The chapter titles count it out, third tail to fourth, and what is wearing Naruto by then does not distinguish between targets. Sakura is injured by him rather than by the enemy, and the book makes him learn that afterward. Yamato's appointment in the previous volume pays off inside these chapters: his abilities are what put the Nine Tails back down, and the reader finds out what the team is actually for. What debuts here is a failure mode rather than a villain: the protagonist as the most dangerous thing in the scene. Sai defects to Orochimaru on the Foundation's orders in the closing chapters, and Team Kakashi follows him instead of stopping him, which is the setup the next volume spends.
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