I recently finished rewatching Naruto — the entire thing, from the academy days to the Fourth Shinobi War. And man, it hit completely different this time around.
The First Watch: Just a Kid Chasing Action
When I first watched Naruto, I was around 13. It was my tenth anime, and easily the biggest one I'd tackled at that time. I was absolutely addicted. I'd wake up, watch a few episodes before school, come home and binge more until I lost track of time. It wasn't just a show — it was this whole world that pulled me in completely.
Back then, my English was honestly terrible. I didn't enjoy watching things in English at all, and reading subtitles? Forget it. I found it exhausting. But anime changed that — especially Naruto. I had no choice. If I wanted to follow the story, I had to listen, read, and slowly piece together what was happening.
Looking back, Naruto taught me English more than any classroom ever did. Every episode was practice. Every dialogue was a lesson. I didn't realize it then, but I was learning a language just because I desperately wanted to know what happened next.
But here's the thing — even though I was watching it, I wasn't really understanding it. Sure, I loved the fights. The Chunin Exams? Incredible. Naruto vs Sasuke at the Valley of the End? Legendary. Rock Lee dropping his weights against Gaara? Goosebumps every time. But the deeper meaning? The philosophy behind each character's pain? I missed most of it. I was just there for the action, the energy, the cool jutsu.
The Rewatch: Meeting an Old Friend Again
Rewatching it now, after all these years, was like meeting an old friend and finally understanding what they were trying to tell you all along.
This time, I caught everything. The dialogues. The emotions. The weight behind every decision. Sometimes I cringed at the old animation or pacing. Sometimes I laughed at moments I'd forgotten. But most of the time? I just felt everything — deeply.
Even though I already knew what was going to happen, it still gave me goosebumps. Especially the war arc. That part always gets me. Watching Naruto and Sasuke finally fight together as partners, seeing all the previous Kage come back, hearing Itachi's final words to Sasuke before disappearing again — the emotions are waiting there every time, ready to hit just as hard as the first watch.
What Makes Naruto Special: Every Character Matters
What I love most about Naruto is how every character has their own story, their own pain, their own growth. It's not just about the main character getting stronger. It's about how everyone — heroes and villains — are shaped by their past, their choices, and the world around them.
Sasuke: The Mirror, Not the Rival
Take Sasuke, for example. Naruto's rival. The last Uchiha. Lost in revenge and darkness.
When we first meet Sasuke, he's this cool, talented kid who seems to have it all together. But underneath? He's broken. His entire clan was slaughtered by his own brother. He watched Itachi kill their parents through a genjutsu, over and over again. That kind of trauma doesn't just go away. It festers.
Sasuke's journey is all about duality. He's caught between love and hate. Between connection and isolation. Between the light Naruto represents and the darkness Orochimaru offers. His mind is sharp, analytical, always thinking three steps ahead. But his heart? It's buried under layers of pain, rage, and an obsession with revenge that consumes everything.
What makes Sasuke's arc so powerful is that it's not a simple redemption story. He doesn't just "get better" because Naruto talks to him. No — he sinks deeper. He kills Itachi and feels empty. He learns the truth about Itachi's sacrifice and feels rage at the village. He decides to destroy everything, even his bonds with Team 7. He chooses darkness again and again, because that's all he knows.
But here's the thing Sasuke realizes at the end, after their final battle: Naruto was never truly his rival. Naruto was his mirror. Both of them were alone. Both of them suffered. The difference? Naruto chose to turn his pain into connection. Sasuke turned his into isolation.
That jealousy Sasuke felt? It wasn't just about strength. It was about how Naruto could smile despite everything. How Naruto could trust despite being betrayed. How Naruto could love despite being hated. Sasuke envied that light because he'd lost his own.
Their final fight at the Valley of the End isn't just about who's stronger. It's about two different philosophies clashing. Sasuke believes he has to carry everything alone — that's what it means to be strong. Naruto believes true strength comes from bonds, from carrying each other's pain together.
And when they're both lying there, arms blown off, bleeding out — Sasuke finally understands. Naruto never gave up on him not because he was naive, but because he saw himself in Sasuke. That persistence, that refusal to let go, slowly pulls Sasuke back from the edge.
Itachi: The Burden of Perfection
Then there's Itachi. Oh man, don't even get me started.
Itachi became one of my absolute favorite characters after this rewatch. The more I understood his choices, the more I respected him — and the more it hurt.
Here's a kid who was a genius from birth. ANBU at 11. Understood the meaning of life and death at 7 because he witnessed the Third Shinobi War. But that intelligence, that awareness, became his curse.
Itachi saw everything. He understood the brewing civil war between the Uchiha and Konoha. He knew that if the coup happened, thousands would die. Other villages would attack during the chaos. Everything his ancestors built would crumble. So he made an impossible choice: sacrifice his clan to save the village. Bear the hatred alone. Become the villain so his little brother could be the hero.
Think about that for a second. He killed his own parents. They let him, because they understood. His father's last words weren't curses — they were pride. "You are a gentle child," Fugaku says as Itachi's blade ends his life. That scene still destroys me.
And then Itachi had to live with it. Alone. Hated by the one person he loved most — Sasuke. He joined the Akatsuki as a spy, dying slowly from illness, all while making sure Sasuke would survive and become strong enough to kill him.
The philosophy behind Itachi's character is this: what do you do when there are no good choices? When every path leads to suffering? Itachi chose to become the darkness so others could stay in the light. He accepted being the villain in everyone's story, even his brother's, because that was the only way to protect what he loved.
But here's my one complaint: the anime didn't include enough from Itachi Shinden. That light novel adds so much depth to who he was before everything fell apart. His friendship with Shisui. His internal struggle. The moments where he was just a kid trying to understand an impossible world. The anime gives us glimpses, but not the full weight of it. I wish they'd adapted more of that story — it would've made his arc even more devastating and beautiful.
I've been thinking of re-reading Itachi Shinden soon, just to revisit that pain and brilliance. To remember that Itachi wasn't just a tragic hero — he was a child forced to make adult decisions in a broken system.
The Side Characters: Everyone Has a Purpose
What separates Naruto from a lot of other shonen is that side characters actually matter. They're not just there to make the main character look good. They have their own arcs, their own philosophies, their own moments to shine.
Gaara starts as this terrifying villain — a kid so traumatized and isolated that he became a monster. His father tried to have him assassinated multiple times. The one person who showed him love, his uncle Yashamaru, was ordered to kill him and told him he was hated before dying. Imagine being a child and learning that. No wonder Gaara thought love meant pain.
But then Naruto fights him. And Naruto, who experienced similar loneliness, shows Gaara that there's another way. That you can be strong and connected. That you don't have to be alone. Watching Gaara become the Kazekage, someone who protects his village with everything he has, is one of the most satisfying arcs in the series.
Kakashi carries the weight of losing everyone he loved. His father. Obito. Rin. Minato and Kushina. He's introduced as this lazy, aloof teacher, but underneath he's drowning in survivor's guilt. His entire philosophy — "those who break the rules are scum, but those who abandon their friends are worse than scum" — comes from Obito's last words. Every time Kakashi risks his life to protect Team 7, he's honoring his dead best friend.
Jiraiya is the goofy pervert who writes terrible novels, but he's also the man who never gave up on prophecy, who believed in his students even when they betrayed him, who died believing Naruto would bring peace. His death scene, where he writes that final message in code before sinking into the ocean, still makes me tear up. "The Tale of Naruto Uzumaki" — he knew Naruto's story would change the world.
Neji starts believing that fate is absolute, that you can't escape what you're born into. Then Naruto punches that belief out of him, literally and figuratively. Watching Neji go from a bitter, fatalistic genius to someone who chooses to protect his friends and die for Naruto's dream? That's growth.
Even the villains have depth. Pain genuinely believes he's bringing peace through fear, and you can understand why after seeing his past. Obito broke because he lost Rin and couldn't handle a world that cruel. They're not evil for the sake of being evil — they're people who suffered, made choices, and ended up on the wrong path.
The Philosophy: Pain, Bonds, and Understanding
At its core, Naruto is about one question: how do you break the cycle of hatred?
Every generation suffers. Every generation hurts the next. Pain leads to revenge. Revenge leads to more pain. The shinobi world has been stuck in this cycle for centuries.
Naruto's answer isn't naive. He doesn't say "just forgive and forget." No — he says, "I'll carry your pain with you." He acknowledges the suffering, shares it, and refuses to respond with more hatred. That's what Talk no Jutsu really is. It's not magic words that brainwash people. It's Naruto showing others that he understands their pain because he's lived it too, and that there's another way forward.
When Naruto talks to Pain, he doesn't have an answer for how to end the cycle. He admits he doesn't know. But he says he'll keep trying, keep believing in Jiraiya's dream, keep pushing forward. And that honesty, that refusal to give up even without a clear solution, is what changes Pain's mind.
The entire story is about choices and their consequences. Itachi chose sacrifice. Sasuke chose revenge. Naruto chose bonds. Obito chose to reject reality. Every character is shaped by what they choose in their darkest moments.
The War Arc: When Everything Comes Together
I know some people complain about the war arc being too long, but man, rewatching it was incredible.
Seeing all the previous generation come back through Edo Tensei gave us closure on so many stories. Watching the previous Kage fight together. Seeing Minato and Kushina protect Naruto one last time. Itachi releasing the Edo Tensei and trusting Sasuke to make his own choices. Neji sacrificing himself. Obito finally understanding he was wrong.
And that scene where Naruto shares his chakra with the entire Allied Shinobi Forces? Where everyone gets a glimpse of his memories, his pain, his determination? That's when the whole world finally understands him. The kid everyone hated and feared becomes the person everyone believes in.
The fight between Naruto and Sasuke at the end isn't just epic because of the animation or the jutsu. It's epic because we've spent hundreds of episodes watching these two grow, suffer, separate, and come back together. Every punch carries years of emotion. Every word carries weight.
When they finally reconcile, when Sasuke finally admits he lost, it's not about power. It's about Sasuke accepting that Naruto's way — the way of bonds and trust — is what true strength looks like.
Why This Rewatch Mattered
Rewatching Naruto reminded me why I fell in love with it in the first place. But it also showed me how much I've grown since then.
Back when I was 13, I watched a show about ninjas fighting. Now, I see a story about broken people trying to heal in a broken world. About how pain can destroy you or define you. About how the bonds we form are what make us human.
It's wild how a story can stay the same but mean something completely different depending on when you experience it. That's the magic of rewatching something you love. You're not just seeing the story again — you're seeing it through new eyes, with new understanding, with a lifetime of experiences that change how you interpret everything.
Naruto will always be special to me. Not just because it taught me English, or because it was one of my first anime, but because it taught me something deeper: that everyone's fighting a battle you can't see, and that understanding and compassion can break cycles that hatred never could.
If you haven't rewatched it in a while, I highly recommend it. You might be surprised at what you find. And if you're curious about Itachi's full story, definitely check out Itachi Shinden — the light novels give you so much more context and pain. Beautiful, devastating pain.
Believe it. 🍥