With ep. 167 airing just hours ago, I can hardly wait to watch it. Yes, I'm waiting for it to come up on Crunchyroll for all members to see. It's been more than two years since I saw ep. 133 on Cartoon Network and I think I can afford to wait one more week for more Atsushi Wakabayashi/Norio Matsumoto goodness (yes, he's back).
That said, ep. 166 isn't any to scoff at. While it's not on the same level of brilliance as ep. 82, it still manages to take the source material and improve on it. My main complaint with the Naruto manga after the timeskip has been that it's been way too eager to fly by interesting material and Kishimoto not getting the most out of the situations he comes up with. No worries, though. Akitoshi Yokoyama expanded on the Jiraiya vs. Pain fight and made the final payoff that more bittersweet and Toshiyuki Tsuru dealt with one of the most interesting characters in Naruto's cast biggest hurdle in a way that's hard to match with ep. 82. Actually, that's probably the only detraction from watching ep. 166, it isn't good enough as 82, even though it's a solid episode.
It's been almost a full year since the last episode from the Tsuru/Suzuki duo and this fares better than their last one (123). It focus on Hinata's backstory and her feelings towards Naruto. Kishimoto decided to put her in the Naruto vs. Pain fight and while it might have been touching in the manga, it's yet another example of my previously mentioned complaint of rushing through things way too quickly. Here, Tsuru goes a bit slower and is not afraid to come up with his own spin on things, building towards the climax and the confession that you already know is coming. Manga purists might decry this as "filler", but that couldn't be farther from the truth. Tsuru's being with the Naruto franchise since the very first episode doing a ton of the OPs/EDs, some episodes and a movie with Suzuki as his AD every time. So he's obviously very familiar with the characters and the world of Naruto, so I consider his stuff to be as "canon" as anything in that manga.
On the animation side, Suzuki is credited as doing the 1st key animation and Tokuyuki (listed incorrectly sometimes as Noriyuki) Matsutake is the first key animator listed. Matsutake been in tons of stuff over the years and he was also involved in ep. 133 (see here at 2:35); I guess he's had a hand in the Hinata vs. Pain hand-to-hand fight and probably more than that, but it's hard to tell.
Hirofumi Suzuki has been right there with Tsuru every step of the way on Naruto and the work he put into this episode is evident. The consistent high quality of the drawings (just look at those facial expressions), the lip-sync that you barely see in anime, and the sheer number of key animators and 2nd key animators must mean that he had dedicate tons of time to make sure that everything came out the way it did by correcting the drawings from so many people.
Also, the way some of the character's eyes were drawn is interesting, particularly Hinata.... I've learned that Suzuki has tried this kind of style before. From ep. 151 of the first series:
From ep. 166 of Shippuden
Okay, so they're not exactly the same, but I think that's Suzuki's evolving style is something to note. Take the episodes he did in the first series and compare those to the ones he's done for Shippuden. The way that Suzuki has took the character designs and atmosphere and made them his own has been a delight to see. The acting and attention to detail in Shippuden is clearly a step above, but those early episodes still have their moments (Zabuza's suicide, him laying right next to Haku, etc.).
The main credits are listed below, but I won't list the 2nd key animators since I couldn't find a reading for a good number of them.
Screenplay, Storyboard, Episode Director: Toshiyuki Tsuru (under the pen name Yasuaki Kurotsu)
Screenplay Collaboration: Masahiro Hikokubo
Animation Director, 1st Key Animation: Hirofumi Suzuki
Key Animation:
Tokuyuki Matsutake, Masayuki Kouda, Yasuyuki Ebara, Yoshihiro Maeda
Takahiro Fujii (sp?), Yukiko Ban, Keichi Ishida, Hisashi Samejima
It's been almost a full year since the last episode from the Tsuru/Suzuki duo and this fares better than their last one (123). It focus on Hinata's backstory and her feelings towards Naruto. Kishimoto decided to put her in the Naruto vs. Pain fight and while it might have been touching in the manga, it's yet another example of my previously mentioned complaint of rushing through things way too quickly. Here, Tsuru goes a bit slower and is not afraid to come up with his own spin on things, building towards the climax and the confession that you already know is coming. Manga purists might decry this as "filler", but that couldn't be farther from the truth. Tsuru's being with the Naruto franchise since the very first episode doing a ton of the OPs/EDs, some episodes and a movie with Suzuki as his AD every time. So he's obviously very familiar with the characters and the world of Naruto, so I consider his stuff to be as "canon" as anything in that manga.
On the animation side, Suzuki is credited as doing the 1st key animation and Tokuyuki (listed incorrectly sometimes as Noriyuki) Matsutake is the first key animator listed. Matsutake been in tons of stuff over the years and he was also involved in ep. 133 (see here at 2:35); I guess he's had a hand in the Hinata vs. Pain hand-to-hand fight and probably more than that, but it's hard to tell.
Hirofumi Suzuki has been right there with Tsuru every step of the way on Naruto and the work he put into this episode is evident. The consistent high quality of the drawings (just look at those facial expressions), the lip-sync that you barely see in anime, and the sheer number of key animators and 2nd key animators must mean that he had dedicate tons of time to make sure that everything came out the way it did by correcting the drawings from so many people.
Also, the way some of the character's eyes were drawn is interesting, particularly Hinata.... I've learned that Suzuki has tried this kind of style before. From ep. 151 of the first series:
From ep. 166 of Shippuden
Okay, so they're not exactly the same, but I think that's Suzuki's evolving style is something to note. Take the episodes he did in the first series and compare those to the ones he's done for Shippuden. The way that Suzuki has took the character designs and atmosphere and made them his own has been a delight to see. The acting and attention to detail in Shippuden is clearly a step above, but those early episodes still have their moments (Zabuza's suicide, him laying right next to Haku, etc.).
The main credits are listed below, but I won't list the 2nd key animators since I couldn't find a reading for a good number of them.
Screenplay, Storyboard, Episode Director: Toshiyuki Tsuru (under the pen name Yasuaki Kurotsu)
Screenplay Collaboration: Masahiro Hikokubo
Animation Director, 1st Key Animation: Hirofumi Suzuki
Key Animation:
Tokuyuki Matsutake, Masayuki Kouda, Yasuyuki Ebara, Yoshihiro Maeda
Takahiro Fujii (sp?), Yukiko Ban, Keichi Ishida, Hisashi Samejima
Rinako Nishihara, Tatsuya Koyanagi, 朱暁 (sorry, got nothing for this guy), Hiromi Taniguchi
Atsuko Nakajima