Boruto Meets Ao in One of its Most Intense Scenes Yet

Boruto came face to face with Ao in one of the most intense scenes yet! Boruto: Naruto Next Generations is now making its way through the Vessel arc of the series adapting material from the original manga, and it has brought one of the key characters in the Kawaki saga to the anime in full. After reintroducing Ao to the sequel series in a previous episode reflecting on his role in the Fourth Great Ninja War, the series has brought him back to the anime with the newest episode revealing some of his dark connections to Kara.

Not only was it revealed that Ao is one of the Outers working for Kara, but it turns out that he had a shadowy reason for visiting the Hidden Leaf Village in the first place. But before the anime confirmed these dark connections, the episode raised the tension when it seemed like Ao would actually kill Boruto without a second thought. Considering what we know about him now, this scene is even more threatening in retrospect too:

Episode 182 tasks Boruto and Team 7 with escorting Katasuke to a lab to work on Naruto’s new prosthetic arm, and when they get on a train Boruto and the others meet Ao for the first time. Although he and Katasuke have a past connection, their eventual conversation sparks a debate about Boruto’s distaste of ninja tools in general. So to prove his point, Ao goes for an extreme example.

Raising a screwdriver to Boruto’s neck, Ao says he could have killed the young shinobi with it. As a way to prove that it wasn’t an inherently evil tool but is made into a weapon by those to use it, he wanted to teach Boruto this lesson. But when we find out his connections to Kara, it makes it all the more intense looking back as it’s clear that Ao would have killed Boruto in a different circumstance.

At the end of the episode, we see Ao has been tasked with retrieving Kara’s mysterious vessel and thus he’s now on a direct path with Konomaharu and Mugino. This also means he’ll eventually be put on a new path toward Boruto and the others as well, so this first confrontation is a tense first impression. What did you think of Ao’s screwdriver moment? Let us know your thoughts in the comments or you can even reach out to me directly about all things animated and other cool stuff @Valdezology on Twitter!