i had a few thoughts on this arc first off: chapters 172 to 182 are golden
i read the entire arc starting from there yesterday and i remeber thinking to myself that some of the surprizes of this arc should have been obvious if i remember those issues
which leads me to believe a few things:
1)chouji and neji are diffinatley dead...chouji more so then neji...some time was spent into developing chouji and shikamarus relationship
and i saw some scence in these build up chapters as forshadowing to his death
on top of that the butterfly scence flying past shikamaru was symbolization for his death
the same goes for neji...it was said that neji isnt dead because the seal was still on his forehead...well...
the last scene of neji shows him falling on his forehead...the a feather falls into his hand sybolizing that the bird is free from the cage
therefore neji is free from the seal
besides with neji in the story that leaves little room for hinatas growth potential...she will always be overshadowed by neji
2)sasuke IS NOT coming back to the leaf...any of you that think that narutos classic speech will bring him back are kidding yourselves
sasuke has already crossed the point of no return...imagine what life in the leaf would be like for sasuke now
there were so many reference between how he similar to orchimaru and even what kakashi said about his relationship with naruto being like orochimarus to jiraiya
which leads me to believe:
3)jiraiya is stronger then orochimaru...the relation sasuke was with naruto is an inferiority complex...jiraiya forced itachi into a situation where he had no choice but to escape
orochimaru is deathly afriad of itachi
4)shikamarus gonna fall for temari...i dont want to get too far into this one...but look at all the conversations he has with his father about women
5)i dont know why i feel this way...but it seems the story is set up for a time jump...and it may happen really soon