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On November 5, Naruto light novel author Jun Esaka revealed how she was being harassed online by someone for her original light novel works. While she was open to criticism and was willing to hear them out, people had seemingly gone too far lately. Thus, she decided to take action and gave her opinion on the same through her official X account.
Jun Esaka is the author of several Naruto light novels like Sasuke Retsuden. These novels focused a lot on Sasuke and his relationship with Sakura, which is what has seemingly enraged fans. In response to this, fans have pointed out several other Naruto staff members facing harassment online for their portrayal of Sakura.
Naruto creators reveal the extent of hate received by Sakura
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It is pretty well-known to anime fans that Naruto fans have a common dislike for Sakura Haruno. Hence, several fans hate the series' light novels as they seemingly force the plot in such a way that changes Sasuke Uchiha's personality.
Sasuke had tried killing Sakura in the anime numerous times. However, the light novels paint Sasuke in such a way that helps glorify his relationship with Sakura, making them look like a non-toxic couple.
This is why fans hate the light novels and criticize Jun Esaka for the same. However, after one fan emailed her 100 times, harassing her, she had to put a stop to it and addressed the same, asking fans to ignore her light novels' stories if they did not like them.
Unfortunately, Jun Esaka isn't the only creator affected by fans' hate for Sakura. The series mangaka Masashi Kishimoto himself has previously revealed how he did not try to elaborate on Sakura's background due to fans' criticisms of her. He seemingly liked drawing her beautifully; however, given fans' hate towards her, he had to refrain from working on her too much.
In addition, the Japanese, Korean, and German voice actresses also received a lot of hate for their work on Sakura Haruno. Many fans called Chie Nakamura (Japanese VA) weak and useless.
As for the Korean VA Yeo Min-jeong, she was so much affected by the backlash that she had trouble recording her voice. Meanwhile, Katharina von Keller (German VA) needed to be defended by Gaara's VA (Robert Kotulla) online.
How fans reacted after seeing all Jun Esaka's post
Immediately upon seeing all the revelations, fans started showing their support for Jun Esaka as they did not believe she deserved the hate she was receiving. While some fans did find things to criticize about her work, they did not believe she deserved to get harassed online.
One fan even pointed out that even her unborn child was getting mentioned, which was what might have caused Jun Esaka to address the online hate finally.
Meanwhile, other fans immediately started redirecting focus to other fandoms. Some fans were sure that it was not the entire Naruto fandom but just the community that stans Sasuke and Sakura's relationship. As for other fans, they took this opportunity to redirect the hate towards One Piece, which was worse. Lastly, Boruto fans tried to throw some shade at Naruto fans, claiming that they were more logical than them.
