Naruto is a gateway anime of the worst kind. It's a bad series, a clusterfuck of story and characterization that isn't very well done by any aspect, but which attempts to compensate for its weaknesses by adding in excessive shipping faggotry and DARKNESS. The normal anon can see this as the shit it is, and may enjoy it, hate it or be indifferent to it, but all the while recognizing that the series itself, regardless of their opinion, is plain bad.
 
However, these very aspects that try to smear over the shit of its core make it a breeding ground for aspie, unsociable underageb& faggots who engage in every kind of faggotry both online and in the real world. The superpowered characters all trying their hardest to look cool, the jutsus, peculiar, colorful clothes, the whole ninja faggotry and everything about the Naruto world fuels their escapist fantasies, while the pity-party character backgrounds, emphasis on revenge, and overall preachiness of the series make it fit just right with the mary-sueish drives of your average preteen and his sense of unwarranted self-importance towards the world. Exactly the kind of shit that makes little kiddies and underageb& retards eat this shit right the fuck up.
 
Naruto is basically THE series to attract the most hated anime fanbase known to /a/, which is why, regardless of individual opinions, it is the responsibility of every anon to troll the fuck out of this show and everyone who likes it, and ensure that no Naruto threads ever encourage the newfriends to show their faces here.

The ninja war is basically a shitty checkers game between Kabuto+his revived puppets (i.e. 99% of every character who ever died in the series) and irrelevant/secondary/tertiary characters no one cares about. It in no way resembles a real war at all and is a collection of completely unrelated, irrelevant and filler-ish engagements.

Chakra basically ripped off Hunter x Hunter's nen, but in the process transformed it in one of the worst systems of "superpower" that shonen has yet come up with. No conservation of mass or momentum, basically there are NO rules (despite the bullshit ones given in the manga) when it comes to ninja techniques, except that it must look cool to Kishimoto. Ninja can just spit out a whole lake of water, grow a forest, or make a hundred thousand clones with just "chakra". It's pretty lame and one wonders how ninja can make hand seals that take over 10 seconds to perform in the middle of a battle with enemies who are equipped with throwing knives and swords. Regardless of that, Sharingan, Rinnegan and Tailed Beasts make all elemental techniques essentially useless.

Ah yes, the "themes" in Naruto. Hard work vs Genius is actually Power acquired by hard work vs inherited Power. That shit just got flushed down the toiled in part 2. Emofaggotry is taken to its max even if the series deals with angsty teens. Mass resurrections came into play not once but TWICE, for the asspull Pain arc and the shitty zombie war arc. 'Illusions' are basically shoehorned into more than half the fights, as a way to try to make them seem complex when you're really just being forcefed retroactive misdirections, and how much Kishi relies on them are a staple of a writer who hasn't been able to write anything creative for a long, long time.

The thing is Naruto is a magnet for idiots who don't even know how to discuss something properly nor did they watch a lot of series to have a better taste. Why is Gaia considered shit? Because most of their threads are about Naruto or Twilight. Sure I wouldn't care if it was a one thread with normal posts and spelling but most threads are something like:"sasuke is uber kawaii i am going to cosplay naruto at school gambatte" Having more Naruto threads here lures those kind of people who know about 4chan because of "funny images and jokes" and they usually ignore global rule about being underage. Do you see Japanese 2chan anime board having endless discussions and fanwanking about Naruto? No. Why? Because they think its a silly show for children.

It's stupid, it's full of plotholes, it's littered with characters that are just plain HORRIBLE, the fanbase is on par with the twilight and avatar one, atrocious fanshippers who watch the stuff only to see which girl will the protagonist that is irrefutably gay fuck first, extremely undeveloped characters and a utterly ridiculous anti hero who's lifeline is deus ex machina, actually, 98% of characters rely on that because Kishimoto can't write above anything what a caveman with a club lodged up his prehistoric anus could.

Also did i mention it's very yaoi'ish, thus attracting fujoshi and white knights who follow them, mouthbreathers and faggots? It also it attracts ADHD children, which, no matter how much your mother told you to respect the sick, are not wanted on /a/ and should just die off like the waste of resources they are.

The fanbase is angry, retarded and gay, all Narutards have low power level most of them have watched probably less than 7 series like Dragon ball or bleach, most narutards are normalfags (don't have waifus, fetishes, etc), everyone who's seen at least one narutard knows they are 4chan's biggest enemy and cancer, they use words like moeshit, loldeep, they are underage, they can't have an intelligent discussion with other anons, all they do is say "umad", "naruto is great, have u read naruto?" "but why do u hate it?", they SPAM multiple naruto threads at the same time, etc, etc, etc.

Naruto faggots openly admit to shitting up the rest of the board. They randomly blame arbitrary shows for their own problems. Shit like the accelerator spam happened because Naruto faggots are infesting the board. If we let these dumb underage faggots run wild in this place, they will bring more retarded underage faggots with them to /a/.

There are many threads about bad shows on /a/, and I don't mind. But when it comes to Naruto, I DO mind. This fanbase is the worst fanbase of them all. They really are. You want to know why? Because grass grows, birds fly, sun shines, and you're a fucking headband-wearing faggot with too few braincells.

1. Started off ripping off Hunter x Hunter. Zabuza was a tolerable arc and things went well until the Chuunin Exams. Shit went downhill FAST. Part I was generic shounen, and I've seen this better elsewhere, but still had a few sparse good moments, part II is a total mess. Battle manga does not go well with bad characters, emofaggotry and plot armor.

2. Kishi can't draw for shit. Every female and DAT MANFACE.

3. Narutards

4. Naruto is a fucking retard. The chick with the big rack says she loves him, he brushes her off. The DFC he's been lusting after from the beginning says she loves him, he brushes her off. A black-haired whiny emo faggot tries to kill him time and time and time again, he runs after him time and time and time again.

5. Sasuke is the worst thing to happen to this series. He goes emo about his brother killing his family, he kills his brother for revenge, he finds out his brother had a damn good reason for killing his family and loved Konoha, so in respect of all that he swears to destroy Konoha COMPLETELY GOING AGAINST HIS BELOVED BROTHER'S FINAL WISH.

The DARKNESS is indeed a sign of bad writing. Teen angst is normal but taking it overboard is pretty lazy writing. Add to that the fact that all three hundred "rescue Sasuke" chapters fit the generic "damsel in distress" put it into a ninja costume.

Naruto's speeches are supposed to be about overcoming self-pity by talking to others about his own miserable experiences, but he comes off as rather dependent and clingy. Sai is a very badly written character who we don't really need to talk about. Naruto's lines are some of the worst written in Shonen, that is true. He essentially just asks for people to believe in him without any good reason at all. His obsession with Sasuke is also extremely frustrating.

The motivations did seem rather pretentious. Characters are generally badly written and Kishimoto seems to be focusing on quantity rather than quality in terms of characters so the audience can choose a variety of really flat shitty characters to identify with.
Power escalation is obviously a bad attribute of DBZ, and fights in Naruto might not last 50 episodes but every single one of them ends in asspulls, plotholes and retcons - Kishimoto is light years behind Togashi.