Interesting Discovery

[IjaTarI]

I don't know if someone found out about this already, but browsing old pictures I found something rather interesting. Jiraiya's Hermit mode is actually based on an incredible old design made by Kishimoto before Naruto was serialized. I don't know if the design was originally supposed to be Jiraiya, but the similarities with the Hermit Mode are uncanny. This picture is part of several roughdrafts he made quite a while ago, I believe for an interview or something like that. The picture has been sitting in my pc since september 2003, so you do the math. Anyway that's it-

[Black Knight]

You know, I always wondered if these guys make it up as they go along or if they have everything planned out from the beginning.

Pretty interesting

[Abdula]

Its not very surprising. Most mangakas have characters or character designs that they have previously drawn that they try to incorporate into a manga once its serialized.

[Sapphire]

I think the interesting part is the obvious (or not too obvious) fact that Kishi has been leaving loose strings in the manga to come back an answer years and years later, or has already known about some of the stuff happening now five years ago.

Of course there's the open ended type twists such as Itachi + Madera killing everyone except Itachi just killing everyone, and the types of twists that just seem to have been there all along (or at least 50 chapters or so) like Madera possibly being in Akatsuki or Yondaime being Naruto's dad. Yes, we all suspected this by like the 2nd chapter, but it's still awesome to find out all this additional info as well, such as Naruto being named after Jiraiya's book and prophecies and what not.

Though it's annoying frustrating, and amusing that Kishi might introduce something and ignore it for oh, 50, 100 chapters, it's amazing when you see something from so long ago mentioned, like Zabuza/Haku. (Practically got a nosebleed from this)