Originally posted by: masamuneehs
Naruto = DBZ with time jumps. Well, the first time jump is coming up... but its not that big of a jump.
Actually, Dragonball had a time jump of about 3 years. I wouldn't be suprised if that's where Kishimoto got the idea. Anyway, enough of the DBZ parallels...

**EDIT** In addition, during the episode when Naruto and Sasuke fight (Sasuke actually tries to kill Naruto, and Naruto uses the Nine-Tailed Fox's powers), did anyone else notice a change in animation from one episode to the next (I forget the specific episode numbers), but the faces and animation kind of change in style slightly (kinda a weird change...)
Strider is right, there have been many episodes done by this guy:Norio Matsumoto. These are personally my favorite episodes.