Is Naruto wasted on Naruto?

[Midnight Commander]

It seems I have some unexpected spare time for a small rant, so I'll spill a few thoughts here after reading this weeks (pretty boring) chapter:

To answer the question, do I feel as though the Naruto manga is wasted on the characte Naruto? Absolutely. To quote a member who seems to have quit visiting the forums for this very reason, it is quite frustrating to see such a waste. I think this manga would have been far better if the story wasn't so focused on Naruto, but more spread around the ninja world in general, the way Game of Thrones' focus is spread between houses of the 7 kingdoms of Westeros. Imagine if we were deprived of all the intriguing characters, plots and schemes in Game of Thrones just to focus mostly on Robb Stark --as good a character as Robb Stark is, that would be quite a shame, considering the other characters have so much to contribute to the story.

There are several characters (just in Konoha, let alone other villages) in the manga with so much story potential, yet most of the camera time, powerups, and fan-service go to this one character, Naruto, who travels around defeating enemies in obviously contrived ways, when his enemies are superior to him in intelligence, skill, power, and experience. He also receives ridiculous power-ups while the rest of the characters are essentially wasted –or even degraded just to deliver more Naruto fan-service.

Now, I can't say that I really have anything against Naruto the character. He's as loyal as you can get, and pretty much has nothing but good intentions in his heart. However, I really don't understand the insane fanaticism some people seem to have for him around here(to the point of even distorting/misconstruing facts). And, to focus this story on him is an enormous waste imho, as there are far more interesting characters we could have been reading about instead of watching Naruto squint his eyes in confusion during yet another one of his annoying training arcs.

[itachi-san314]

^it's interesting you feel that way. i feel like we do get semi-long story arcs to flesh out other characters. we just had a segment and flashback in the manga that had nothing to do with naruto for quite a long time. sasuke takes over for long arcs at a time. shikamaru did for a while. i dont see how naruto is in the limelight too much at all. especially considering the story is about him. i've seen enough of the side characters to be satisfied. how much shikamaru or gaara do you need? and the minor characters like tenten, shino, etc... just arent taht interesting. an arc about them is basically filler and it would suck like filler.

that said, i do agree that naruto should have been getting less powerups while others got more. it gets boring when only a handful of ninja can even compete anymore in a world full of ninja who have almost all been reduced to fodder. this war would have been MUCH better if it was ninja vs ninja. and lots of other ninjas were fleshed out and powered up

[Midnight Commander]

Originally Posted by itachi-san314

^it's interesting you feel that way. i feel like we do get semi-long story arcs to flesh out other characters. we just had a segment and flashback in the manga that had nothing to do with naruto for quite a long time.

We did. The story does take some breaks from Naruto at times, yet he is still given all the best perks; indeed it is his manga. What I'm talking about is if the manga didn't "belong" to him alone, and instead focused more characters in a balanced way (and especially regarding power distribution). To me, there is alot more that could be done with this story's interesting premise than giving most of the glory to Naruto.

i dont see how naruto is in the limelight too much at all. especially considering the story is about him. i've seen enough of the side characters to be satisfied. how much shikamaru or gaara do you need? and the minor characters like tenten, shino, etc... just arent taht interesting. an arc about them is basically filler and it would suck like filler.

I guess its just a matter of preference. What I've seen from the "side characters" doesn't seem as developed as Naruto imo, again, it is his story. When I mentioned Game of Thrones the series(I don't know if you watch it) and compared it to Naruto, I was implying that the most of the "side characters" in Naruto wouldn't be side characters in my ideal version.

[Maxtro]

While I'm an anime only viewer, I do strongly believe that the manga/anime was wasted on Naruto.

This story has a great cast of characters but too much focus is given to the number one loudmouth. I would have loved to see events and major enemies defeated without depending on Naruto.

IMO it would have been better off if the show was just called Konoha, or leaf ninjas, whatever.

One storyline/arc I'd love to see is Jiraiya, Tsunade and Orochimaru as teenagers with Hiruzen as squad leader.

[Haloid]

I don't feel like it is wasted on Naruto but there is most definitely a larger story to be told. I would like to know more about the ninja world in Naruto rather than focusing on Naruto's various powers ups, relationship, and etc.

[Casshern]

Originally Posted by Maxtro

One storyline/arc I'd love to see is Jiraiya, Tsunade and Orochimaru as teenagers with Hiruzen as squad leader.

Can't see how it could be anything but identical to team 7 tbh.

[SerpentKing]

well in my opinion I think that Naruto still needs to actually graduate to at least Jonin since he failed the Chuunin Exams the writing part although they ignored it and let him go on...However he does have the potential of becoming Hokage. Bu not to be a spoiler Sasuke also wants to be Hokage if anyone has read the latest manga so I think they might pick naruto over sasuke though despite what Itachi told naruto

[Gintokifan22]

Its not just Naruto the series is wasted on, Kishi has forgotten how to be a good writer, every ones being wasted on by this series in my opinion.