Having an entire volume focus on Jiraiya was a smart move.

Jiraiya gets deeper into his mission as you get to see he might know who Pain and his buddies are. A little background you learn the great frog master trained Pain and his friends when they were kids. So get a little bit more background on both Jiraiya and Pain which was nice. I also think this battle is pretty brutal as Jiraiya is getting his ass handed to him and the ending is not a happy scene for our old pervy dude.

I will say the excessive amount of explanation here was killing the momentum though, especially in the actual fight. Sometimes I feel like just ignoring what they're saying as when they explain what they'll do they actually just DO it right after. So stop explaining it, please?

A 3.5 out of 5. I'll bump it to a 4.