Narutohas a legendary cast of characters, but some of them would have seriously benefited from more care. Much ofNarutocenters around Team 7—Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura. However, there are several interesting characters in the show who, because of this overwhelming focus on a small central group, are unfortunately sidelined.
This wasn’t such a huge problemearly on inNaruto.In fact, the first half of the manga before the timeskip (and theNarutoanime which adapts it) does a fairly solid job of balancing the stories of the many characters it introduces. After the timeskip, though, heading into the territory ofNaruto: Shippuden,Naruto’s lens becomes far more constrained, leaving some of the personalities driving it out of the action almost entirely.
10Ino
Team Asuma Is Full of Bright Spots, but Ino Is Sadly Forgotten
Ino has, flat out,one of the most broken jutsu in all ofNaruto. The sheer psychological dominance her jutsu affords is on clear display inNaruto’s filler, especially. Her Mind Transfer jutsu has unbelievable combat potential, and the fact she so rarely actually appears in combat is a shame.
Narutodoes something even worse with her, though: it establishes a rivalry between her and Sakura over Sasuke’s affections.While neither’s infatuation makes total sense—there’sa lot about Sasuke and Sakura that just totally falls flat—Ino’s infatuation only appears from time-to-time as a joke. Her sudden affection for Sai is all the more confusing, and her ultimate pairing with him is one ofNaruto’s stranger moves after the Fourth Great Ninja War.
9Tenten
Team Guy’s Most Underestimated Shinobi Deserved Much More Attention
Tenten’s Infinite Tsukuyomi in the finale ofShippudenshows just how much of a character shecouldhave been.It rubs salt in the wound, in fact. She’s drastically underutilized, and her personality is poorly developed.Narutodoesn’t have the best track record with its female characters. Tenten is a strangely egalitarian counterexample: she’s just as flatly written as some of Konoha’s most lacking male characters. That isn’t a good thing.
I’ll Admit It: Naruto’s Ending is One of the Greatest Finales Weekly Shonen Jump Ever Delivered to Fans
Naruto’s ending is divisive, but fans always miss one massively important argument for why it’s among Weekly Shonen Jump’s best finales ever.
Tenten falls into the background of Team Guy, but her combat-buffing jutsu made her a perfect in-between of the taijutsu-dominant fighting style of Rock Lee and the ninjutsu genius of Neji. As things stand, she’s underwhelming, andher narrative hardly provides anything memorable. That doesn’t speak to what she could have been with just a bit more care, though.
8Kiba
Loyal Like a Dog, Kiba Fails to Live Up to His Potential
Kiba has an incredibly endearing relationship with Akamaru, his dog, and his rivalry with Naruto provides some interesting foundations for some compelling characterization. Unfortunately, as the story goes on, Kiba falls ever more to the wayside, and by the timeShippudencomes around, he’s severely lacking.Konoha has a lot of leaders—Shikamaru and Neji, for example—and Kiba struggles to make his mark among them.
This is unfortunately worsened by the fact thatKiba has the potential to outshine both of them. He’s clearly a good strategist, and his personality primes him to become a fan favorite. Nonetheless, especially moving forward inShippuden, he becomes remarkably one-dimensional.
7Shino
With One of Naruto’s More Unique Jutsu, Shino Could Have Done Much More
Shino has one ofNaruto’s most interesting jutsu: the ability to tactically deploy insects in myriad different ways.Because of his reserved and unbothered personality, he mostly falls intoNaruto’s background—but it didn’t have to be that way.
Characters like Konan and Sasori show that such unique jutsu often have profound, deeply interesting motivations lying behind them.
Shino’s backstory could have been extremely compelling, particularly ifgrowing up with such a unique jutsu were further explored. What’s more, characters like Konan and Sasori show that such unique jutsu often have profound, deeply interesting motivations lying behind them—a better understanding of how this applies to Shino could have provided an opportunity to elaborate on the personal nature of jutsu as a whole.
6Hidan
One of the Most Interesting Members of Akatsuki
Alongside Kakuzu, Hidan makes up one ofAkatsuki’s best duos.The dynamic between the two is interesting, and it establishes early on the plurality of motivations that can drive people to join Akatsuki. With Kakuzu’s singular focus on money, Hidan’s overwhelming emphasis on religious devotion is incredibly interesting.
Sorry, Naruto, Akatsuki Was Right: the Shinobi World Is Horrible
Akatsuki was an iconic group of outlaw ninja who were against everything Naruto and his friends stood for — and, uncomfortably, they had a point.
What’s especially potent here is the opportunity todraw a parallel between religious devotion and the ideological devotion of figures like Nagato or Madara. Hidan feels compelled to slaughter as a religious rite and duty, but the exact nature of this is obscure. BothNaruto’s world and Hidan himself would have benefited significantly from a deeper inquest into his motivations and backstory. On his own, and especially at the time he comes intoNaruto’s story, Hidan feels like his purpose is to establish the sheer brutality of which Akatsuki is capable—but to himself, Hidan is so much more, andNarutodid a disservice to him by failing to explore that.
5Shisui
Eclipsed by Itachi Both Within and Without Naruto’s Narrative
Fans might easily forget Shisui, the ANBU Uchiha who grew up alongside Itachi. His dynamics with Danzo and Itachi, his ideals, and his possession of the Mangekyo Sharingan provide a lot of fodder and intrigue that could have carried beyond the flashbacks within which he primarily existed. His suicide was devastating, andhe was a loyal and kind-hearted character whose relationships should have been expanded on.
In so doing, his role as the person who would eventually make way for Itachi’s driving role inNarutowould become much more impactful. More than that, it would have given even more depth to the Uchiha clan, who don’t have enough representation inNaruto’s story outside the obvious picks.
4Karin
A Fatally Underexplored Uzumaki
It’s often bemoaned howNaruto’s Uzumaki clanis poorly elaborated, and Karin is one of the primary examples. Alongside Nagato, Karin is living proof that Naruto is far from the last of his clan. What’s more, she and Nagato show that the Uzumaki clan has a frayed history that could benefit from exploration.
Overall, Karin is underdeveloped. Her Tsukuyomi is strangely touching, featuring her overwhelming desire for Sasuke’s final validation.
However,it also perfectly demonstrates one of the fatal flaws of her characterization: she hardly functions beyond acting as a comic relief accessory to Sasuke. A more thorough investigation of her origins and identity could have gone a long way, and providing her greater depth would have benefited the series as a whole.
3Temari
A Ninja Who Is Never Quite Compelling
Overshadowed by her siblings, Gaara and Kankuro, Temari isnonetheless a genius shinobi and expert tactician. Unfortunately, in fan memory, she’s more-or-less remembered as either the eldest Sand Sibling or as Shikamaru’s eventual pairing.Narutocould have gotten quite a lot from exploring her role in the Sand Village’s diplomacy, especially in navigating her relationship with Gaara, who becomes the fifth Kazekage leading the Hidden Sand Village.
Particularly later inShippuden, where Konoha’s relationship with the Sand Village becomes especially important, Temari could have played a much more important role.When shewasgiven screen time, she was shown to have a fascinating, domineering, and driven personality that surely must have played a significant role in her home village. Nonetheless, her true home would become the sidelines.
2Sai
Stoic and still-faced, Sai’s introduction toNarutowas unexpected and exciting. His arc sees him learning to understand and connect with others, as well as restoring the emotions he had lost as part of his ANBU Root training. It’s a really compelling premise that shows how ruthless the ninja world can really be. On top of that, his ink techniques are artistically some of the most vivid, beautiful parts of all ofShippuden.
He also slightly elucidates the role of ANBU inNaruto’s overarching narrative, but in that respect, he’s only a supporting pillar.
Nonetheless, Sai fails to ever feel fully fleshed out. Like many characters,Narutofails to fully commit to elaborating his narrative, and Sai is often relegated to the role of either fishing other “more important” characters out of bad situations or of being sudden comic relief in tense situations. He also slightly elucidates the role of ANBU inNaruto’s overarching narrative, but in that respect, he’s only a supporting pillar.Seeing him warm up to the other shinobi is rewarding and heartwarming, so it’s a true shame that viewers didn’t get to actually spend more time with him. At the very least, it could give more weight to his eventual pairing with Ino.
1Rock Lee
The Personification of Underrated
Rock Lee is a beloved character, and for very good reason. Nonetheless,he’s never actually used to his full potential. His backstory is insufficiently explored, and he’s tragically forgotten as the story moves past the time skip markingNaruto: Shippuden’s beginning.
Rock Lee is arguablyNaruto’s truest example of an underdog, and the series should have done more to set him apart from the other underdog characters in the story like Sasuke and, obviously, Naruto.What’s more, it should have donesomethingto show how Rock Lee and Naruto are a representation ofNaruto’s core themes, just in different ways.
The developments inNaruto’s second half, especially,almost make Rock Lee feel like the true representative ofNaruto’s early themes of effort and perseverance. In the end, Rock Lee’s role in the story remains little more than a tease. Making matters worse, spin-offs likeRock Lee and His Ninja Palsmainly serve to infantilize him and minimize the genuine perseverance he shows in light of his hopeless position in the shinobi world. Rock Lee could have been a serious investigation of the implications ofNaruto’s universe, but time and time again, he’s diluted into comic relief.
Naruto
Naruto is a franchise spawned from the manga series penned by Masashi Kishimoto that began in 1999. Generating several tv series, games, movies, and more, Naruto follows the exploits of a young outcast ninja harboring the spirit of a demon fox who seeks to become the Hokage, the leader of his ninja village, to break the stigma against him. Upon the conclusion of the initial series, Naruto expanded into Boruto, following many series protagonists' children and returning faces.
