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Generally I have a very good opinion of the series. One thing that helped is that from the very beginning there was a definite goal Naruto was reaching for and a clear hierarchy Naruto would have to climb to reach that goal. Ok, Naruto officially never moved beyond genin on-screen, but in terms of raw power he's definitely at Kage level, and he definitely became very popular in-universe. Its part of what made up the happy ending, seeing Naruto fulfilling his dream and most of the cast happy too.
Being married to a fan-favorite character was nice too. Though personally I wouldn't have minded NaruSaku a few years ago, but knew it was unlikely after how the final arc went and Sasuke didn't die, I know SasuSaku was more likely. Personally I'm just happy there was a clear official couple, overall most shonen mangas are not good with romance (Naruto included) so I was half-expecting a vague, open-ended conclusion, so I don't mind the time-skip much. And Hinata's a great character too, so I don't mind NaruHina ending at all.
Some fights and the backstory dragged on a bit though after a while, especially after the war started. The whole 10-tails fight dragged on for a long, long time, Kaguya's introduction was sudden, Sasuke's idiocy got a bit much. And probably too many zombies too. I've lost track of Kaguya's backstory by now, and possibly a few too many redemptions after a few chats with Naruto, not to mention Nagato bringing a lot of people back to life, but Naruto is still overall an idealistic series, so I don't mind too much given the atmosphere.
Kishimoto's art was generally pretty good to very good, not super-detailed or memorable but generally enough cool poses and moments and mostly clear battles. After 15 years can't remember any absolutely awful chapters in terms of art, but then I've probably forgotten by now. Most of the later battles were suitably epic too. And its always been impressive just how many Narutos can show up on two pages when Naruto went all-out with the shadow clones.
Plenty of great characters, from an blond, blue-eyed orange clad ninja to his cool masked teacher Kakashi and the whole teacher-student relationship stretching back through the years (Naruto-Kakashi-Minato-Jiraiya-Sarutobi), though Jiraiya and Killer Bee were probably some of my favorites. Sakura, meh, her development got worse as the story went on unfortunately (and after having a pretty good fight at the beginning of Part 2), and Obito turned around a bit fast. Madara on the other hand was just crazy though even he had his motives too. But seeing Naruto pull off cunning moves in battle was always fun, a reminder that he's not the smartest but he's very tricky.
Its not a perfect manga, of course, but I'm just glad the series completed its main plot, though it didn't really become somewhat clear until Part II started (the struggle over the bijuus). Personally I'm even more happy random new enemies weren't introduced (such as DBZ), and most of the story ties together somewhat (from Hagoromo's time to the present).
I'm really going to miss this series, its never really been a ninja series (or at least not since the chuunin exam were there that much clever moments) but its been a great action shonen series. Naruto's been my favorite of the "big three" for a long time, so I'm happy to see it concluded mostly properly, but new Naruto chapters were always a highlight of my week, one that I'm miss dearly. Its been a great ride.
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