History Naruto / TropesLToZ

Naruto/TropesAToK ([[BerserkButton/{{Naruto}} Berserk Button]], [[BigBrotherInstinct/{{Naruto}} Big Brother Instinct]], [[Bowdlerise/{{Naruto}} Bowdlerise]], [[BrokenAesop/{{Naruto}} Broken Aesop]], [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass/{{Naruto}} Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass]], [[FamousLastWords/{{Naruto}} Famous Last Words]], [[Hypocrite/{{Naruto}} Hypocrite]], [[Jerkass/{{Naruto}} Jerkass]], [[JerkassHasAPoint/{{Naruto}} Jerkass Has a Point]]) | '''Tropes L to Z''' ([[NiceGuy/{{Naruto}} Nice Guy]], [[ShipTease/{{Naruto}} Ship Tease]], [[ShoutOut/{{Naruto}} Shout-Out]], [[TookALevelInKindness/{{Naruto}} Took a Level in Kindness]], [[WhamEpisode/{{Naruto}} Wham Episode]], [[WhamLine/{{Naruto}} Wham Line]]) | Naruto/AnimeAndOthers]]]]-]

* NotSoDifferent: Naruto has many foils throughout the series, and often he finds out that he's more like them than he thought:
** Gaara is what Naruto would have become if Iruka hadn't acknowledged him. They share the traumatic isolation of being hosts to tailed beasts. This is made all the more poignant by the fact that we are introduced to Gaara as a completely AxCrazy monster hungry for blood and only find out that he and Naruto are NotSoDifferent after several {{Establishing Character Moment}}s of Gaara's that involve plenty of murder. What's more, they were both entrusted to the care of someone whose loved ones they'd inadvertently killed. Where their paths diverged, and for us the story begins, is Iruka not succumbing to pressure and manipulation to become another face lost in the jeering, uncaring masses.
** Naruto realizes at some point that his own anger from Konoha's hatred towards him means he could've been the threat to Konoha and Sasuke the one defending it. The panel shows Naruto using chidori and Sasuke using Rasengan to drive it home.
** For all of the godlike destruction Pain wreaks, it is eventually shown that he started out very similar to Naruto, and his ideals never really wavered; it was only the "goody-good" methods he despaired of.
** {{Inverted|Trope}} with Obito -- when he is finally introduced properly as a villain, the ''first'' thing we learn is how similar his beginnings were to Naruto's; it is only later revealed how radically different their choices and conclusions had been.

* {{Retcon}}: Though Gaara is [[NotSoDifferent a SIMILAR character to Naruto thanks to the monsters sealed within them]], Shukaku is openly stated at first to be a completely different manner of being to the Nine-Tailed Fox (an incarnation of sand, living spirit of a Sunagakure priest stored in a kettle), let alone them both being members of a "series" of tailed beasts. This can be explained because Shukaku was inspired by the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunbuku_Chagama Japanese folktale Bunbuku Chagama]].

* SupernaturalSealing: Fūinjutsu in ''Franchise/{{Naruto}}'' is a brand of jutsu that can be used to seal objects, living beings, chakra, or a wide variety of other things within another object. Some notable examples include the sealing techniques that seal Tailed Beasts within Jinchūriki (as was the case with Kurama and Naruto), the Dead Demon Consuming Seal[[note]]Which is used to seal away the target's soul within the reaper's stomach (or parts of the soul if the user is unable to pull it out), at the cost of the user's life and their soul being sealed with the target.[[/note]], or the Six Paths Chibaku Tensei (which was used to seal away the Ten Tails's chakra deprived body within the spherical prison that would become the moon). The titular character's clan, the Uzumaki Clan, were well known for their use of Fūinjutsu.

[[WMG:[[center:[-'''Tropes for ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'''''\\
Naruto/TropesAToK ([[BerserkButton/{{Naruto}} Berserk Button]], [[BrokenAesop/{{Naruto}} Broken Aesop]], [[FamousLastWords/{{Naruto}} Famous Last Words]], [[Hypocrite/{{Naruto}} Hypocrite]]) | '''Tropes L to Z''' ([[ShipTease/{{Naruto}} Ship Tease]], [[ShoutOut/{{Naruto}} Shout-Out]], [[WhamEpisode/{{Naruto}} Wham Episode]]) | Naruto/AnimeAndOthers]]]]-]

* SeriesContinuityError: The most powerful techniques used by an Uchiha depend on the state of their eyes -- when Sasuke was going blind due to over-using his Mangyeko techniques, those techniques deteriorated and vanished as a result. However, in the end of the series, [[BigBad Madara]] continues to use these same techniques despite having no eyeballs whatsoever, frustrating fans who were hoping that this character would get some comeuppance.

* SharedSignatureMove: The Rasengan has famously been Naruto's signature technique; a swirling ball of pure chakra that can land a devastating blast on whatever its aimed at. He also has other variations like "Rasenshuriken", a projectile variant, and "Big-Ball Rasengan", an even bigger and stronger ball of chakra. Unbeknownst to him at first though, this technique was actually invented by his, father Minato, who would then teach it to his master, Jiraiya, and his student/Naruto's teacher, Kakashi. Naruto's close friend, Konohamaru, later copied it after seeing it used multiple times, and then years later he'd teach it to Naruto's son, Boruto, who would iterate on it by turning the base Rasengan into an improvised projectile.

** Early in the series, Naruto is poisoned in battle. The poison is spreading slowly from his hand and Sakura surmises that the best course to take would be to use a surgical incision to drain the poisoned blood. Since the team would have to go back to the village and abandon their mission to do that properly Naruto violently [[CuttingTheKnot stabs]] [[CrazyAwesome his hand]] with a kunai to quickly drain the blood (and also as a dramatic gesture in a vow to never again be paralyzed with fear like he was during the fight)... [[HilarityEnsues and then goes into a panic attack when Kakashi points out that he's probably gonna bleed to death from a wound like that]]. Fortunately the tailed beast within him easily healed the wound.

** The premise of the series revolves around the fact that the title character, Naruto, is [[AllTheOtherReindeer hated and shunned]] by the rest of Konohagure because they believe him to be the [[{{Kaiju}} Nine-Tailed Fox]] that destroyed their village and killed several villages--including the [[OneHundredPercentAdorationRating beloved Fourth Hokage]]. It's revealed that Naruto is ''not'' the fox, but an innocent child that was chosen to contain the fox, and also, Naruto is the son of both the beloved Fourth Hokage as well as a member of the esteemed and respected Uzumaki family... who ''for generations'' have acted as the vessel for the fox to protect the people. This raises the question of why ''no one'', including members of the Konohagure leadership who should know better, told the people who Naruto's parents were. The reason is {{Hand Wave}}d as "because the Hokage's enemies would have targeted Naruto", but this still makes little sense because Naruto himself came very close multiple times to going down the same path as many of the series' villains due to the treatment he received. Further, ''every'' clan in Naruto has enemies, and if people knew who Naruto was, they would have more inclination to protect him.

** Gaara's mom loved him so much that she named him "Demon who loves only himself." Awww, so sweet. What, the sand powers that came from being a host? Nope, mom's love.

[[WMG:[[center: [- '''Tropes for ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'''''\\

* ThemeNaming: Not the characters, but rather the land - every country is named "Land of <some object or material>". Land of Fire, Land of Wind, Land of Sand, Land of Tea, Land of ''Candy''...

** GeodesicCast: The team 7's [[TwoGuysAndAGirl structure]] "''Two males that are [[RedOniBlueOni of contrasting personality]], [[TheSmurfettePrinciple one female]]''" [[PowerTrio group]], repeated again and again. As the manga progresses it seems to slowly drift away from this gimmick. Justified for Team 7. It's explicitly stated Sasuke and Naruto were both assigned to Team 7 because Sasuke was first-ranked in their Academy class and Naruto was last, and it's tradition to put first and last on the same team to balance out its capabilities.
**

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: which leads to...
** CastHerd: The huge cast is conveniently organized in teams of 3 or 4 members, while antagonists are almost always organized by pairs (Zabuza/Haku, Orochimaru/Kabuto, and of course Akatsuki members), the sole exceptions being the Sound Five and arguably Konan and Pain.

** According to the [[http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Special:BrowseData/Characters Naruto wiki]], there are at least 930 characters from all the various media.

* RealityEnsues: In an intense social setting like this, there's bound to be this:
** One of the main reasons the Fourth Hokage [[TheAce Minato Namikaze]] was so deadly; due to his speed he made speech NOT a free action.
** [[LadyOfWar Konan]] prepares to give a rant on how Naruto is the bridge of peace near the end of a battle (albeit after essentially being defeated herself). Tobi doesn't even let her finish her sentence.
** A relatively subtle example shows up with Sakura and Naruto's contrasting shortcomings early on. Sakura gets good grades in class, and is the only one able to ''actually'' answer the seemingly impossible questions in the first stage of the Chunin Exam, and loves to look down on Naruto, the "dead-last" in their grade. But in the Forest of Death, Sakura's lesser combat ability proves a problem when Naruto and Sasuke are incapacitated. Similarly, while Naruto's very good at fighting despite being BookDumb, some of the things he failed to learn in the academy come back to haunt him in his training; he regrets not paying more attention in class when trying to learn how to focus his chakra for his Rasengan training.
** Early in the series, Naruto is poisoned in battle. The poison is spreading slowly from his hand and Sakura surmises that the best course to take would be to use a surgical incision to drain the poisoned blood. Since the team would have to go back to the village and abandon their mission to do that properly Naruto violently [[CuttingTheKnot stabs]] [[CrazyAwesome his hand]] with a kunai to quickly drain the blood (and also as a dramatic gesture in a vow to never again be paralyzed with fear like he was during the fight)... [[HilarityEnsues and then goes into a panic attack when Kakashi points out that he's probably gonna bleed to death from a wound like that]]. Fortunately the tailed beast within him easily healed the wound.
** Naruto's Rasen-shuriken is not fully perfected when he first uses it in the battle against Kakuzu. Nor does he have any actual experience using it prior to this. Sure enough, the first one he uses fails and it takes a second attempt to land a hit.
** Post-Pain Arc, Naruto has been running himself ragged with him unable to talk to his adopted "grandmother" Tsunade due to her coma in the ensuing invasion. He learns Sasuke has become a criminal and attacked a fellow jinchūriki ''for'' Akatsuki. He learns that his friends, even Sakura, whom Naruto ''knows'' is [[SingleTargetSexuality still in love with Sasuke]], have given up on bringing Sasuke back to Konoha. Then when he's told there will be ''War'' on top of everything... he can't take it anymore and passes out. A realistic depiction of a {{Determinator}} when pushed to the limit, especially when he seems less likely than ever to accomplish the goal he'd been working towards for three years.
** What killed (or crippled him for the rest of his life) [[spoiler:the legendary Madara Uchiha during his battle with Hashirama]]? An epic ninjutsu clash? Nope... a stab through the back.
*** Similarly, [[spoiler:after he was revived, Madara managed to become fully human, while this gave him full autonomy over his Rinnegan and made him a deity in power, a stab to the back from Zetsu injures him once more, allowing the GreaterScopeVillain to reincarnate from his body.]]
*** To a lesser extent, Naruto and Sasuke become increasingly exhausted over the course of the series' FinalBattle, and while they come at each other with their strongest techniques, causing massive devastation, by the end, they're using relatively basic jutsus until they pool the last of their energy into one final clash.
** ''Anime/TheLastNarutoTheMovie'', a canonical {{Interquel}} between the last two chapters of the manga, revealed that [[WhatIsThisThingYouCallLove Naruto does not completely understand the concept of romantic love]], thinking that Hinata's love for him was like his love of ramen. When you consider the fact that Naruto never had the unconditional affection that most people had with their families due to being both an orphan and the village pariah for most of his childhood, [[FridgeBrilliance it actually makes a lot of sense]]. Naruto would be starved for any sort of affection, and would have a hard time differentiating them and takes a great amount of time, love and patience to heal. Luckily, [[OneTrueLove Hinata]] has that in spades for Naruto.
** In one of the ''Shippuden'' endings, Naruto uses Konohamaru's scarf to pull him while fighting, instead of ignoring it.
** While Naruto has the whole SadClown outsider going on for him to cope with being alone and uncared about, being starved of any kind of affection until the series proper, Gaara is initially a more realistic take on treating someone like an outsider and threat all their life, he is a complete psycho with little to no real regard for anything outside his own existence due to his treatment, being isolated and treated with comptempt and hatred broke Gaara mentally, having little to no moral compass, His inital introduction actually seems like a really good metaphor for someone with a really violent mental illness.
** Sasuke, the cool, stoic, lone wolf type, driven by revenge, is not a healthy mindset, which is something characters constantly try to shake him from, and it ends up biting him in the ass multiple times throughout the series, but the series shows that he really is just an angry kid who has no idea about the scope of the plots he is messing around in, in his quest for revenge, [[spoiler: even when it turns out he shouldn't actually be seeking revenge in the first place.]]

%%* SchoolSavedMyLife: Sakura plays it straight.

** Later, there was the written exam of the Chuunin Exam. The test consists of ten hard questions, with the final question being a secret until after the exam ends. During the first portion of the test, students have to attempt to stealthily cheat off of the others without being caught: if a student is caught cheating five times, they and their team will fail. The test's proctor explains before the final question is issued that if any student gets this question wrong, they and their team will fail the exam be default and be permanently barred from becoming a Chuunin. Any student may choose to leave before the question, however: doing so will cause their team to fail, but they will be permitted to retake the exam next year. In truth, all teams that choose to try to answer the final question pass automatically: the purpose of this question is to determine if they are willing to face the unknown for the sake of their teammates, as well as to weed out those who would betray their teammates for their own sake.

* LineOfSightName: [[ZigzaggingTrope It's hard to tell whether this is played straight, or subverted, or averted, or what]].

* MentorOccupationalHazard: Quite frequent (Hiruzen, Minato, Jiraiya, Asuma, and Chiyo can count as well), though Kakashi and Tsunade avert this. Of notice is that three of the mentors die by the hand of a former student turned evil.

*** DarkMessiah / EvilCounterpart: Obito Uchiha.

* NonhumansLackAttributes: Usually played straight (e.g., Kakashi's dogs). Averted with a certain armadillo. {{Squick}}. Also averted for Akamaru in the [[PottyHumor comical]] spin-off ''Rock Lee's Springtime of Youth''.

* PowerMakesYourHairGrow: The level 2 of the cursed seal. Averted for Juugo, even though he's the source of it. {{Inverted}} with Jiraiya's ''hari jizo'' attack, where your hair growing makes for power. Moreover, it ''is'' the Jutsu’s power.

** Naruto himself averts this, being now possibly the most powerful ninja in the village [[AlmightyJanitor but having one of the lowest ranks.]] Funnily, Sasuke is in the same situation, being a missing-nin.

* RightMakesMight: Nearly always {{Averted}}, and even {{Inverted}} often, which is surprising given the manga's position on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism. When a character with admirable spirits and ideals is pitted against some overpowered sociopathic bastard, the former stands a good chance of getting exactly what they figured was coming to them. (e.g., Naruto & Sasuke vs. Orochimaru; Sakura vs. Sound Trio; Konan vs. Tobi; Asuma vs. Hidan; every fight ever with Hinata or Rock Lee in it). Naruto himself merely averts this for the most part -- he relies on [[{{Determinator}} determination]], being MadeOfIron, and the element of surprise to come through, and only resorts to self-affirmation as a response to [[BreakThemByTalking psychological warfare]].

* SchoolSavedMyLife: Naruto averts it by learning everything through being a main character and training. Sakura plays it straight.

* ShutUpHannibal: Standard answer to [[BreakThemByTalking a lecturing antagonist]]. It's sometimes averted, though, and when the Break Them by Talking works the consequences are [[HeroicBSOD memorable]] and [[FreakOut not pretty]].

* TheSmurfettePrinciple: Most teams have a single token female member if they have any at all. Also applies to the Akatsuki, though Konan isn't really a member. Inverted with a three-man team of Cloud ninja that has two female ninja and one male ninja. Averted for the Five Kages: there are two female ones, Tsunade and the Fifth Mizukage.

** {{Averted|Trope}} in Part I. The first "big" villain Naruto and his friends encounter (Zabuza) is so powerful, they nearly exhaust themselves pulling out every possible trick they can think of just to get the guy to release a single technique. They spend the entirety of Part I, with all its god-knows-how-many plot arcs, {{Training Montage}}s and instances of TimeToUnlockMoreTruePotential, ''still'' not powerful enough to have defeated him (this can be inferred from the fact that at the end of Part I, Naruto exits stage left for 2.5 years of off-screen training, and when he's back he can ''barely'' manage against Kakashi, even with [[TookALevelInBadass Sakura]] as backup). The ''second'' "big" villain Naruto and his friends encounter is the HeroKiller BigBad who proceeds to wreak complete havoc on the plot for years and years, without even a properly equal BigGood to oppose him, and is only taken out of the picture way, way, ''way'' later. Meanwhile during all of this, plenty of lesser enemies come and go.
** Played more straight during Part II, where Naruto has to deal first with the Akatsuki, then with their [[AuthorityEqualsAsskicking godly-powerful leader Pain]], then eventually with Tobi, who was initially a moderate threat but accumulated power so rapidly that by the end of his arc he was even ''more'' godly-powerful than Pain, and was able to single-handedly be a match for every other living Ninja ''combined''. This pattern repeats itself with [[spoiler:Madara and Kaguya, who each come out of the woodworks in turn in increasing order of "what the fuck we cannot possibly handle someone this powerful"]].

** Memorably averted by Tobi before he kills Konan (at least in the manga).

* VengeanceFeelsEmpty: This is the main character trait of Sasuke and he experiences it in its full wonderful bitterness. After enacting his revenge against Itachi, he [[HeroicBSOD becomes]] [[EmptyShell apathetic]]. Tobi shakes it by revealing that [[WasItReallyWorthIt it was totally NOT worth it]], since Itachi's actions were driven by the village's politics. It makes Sasuke [[TranquilFury angrier than ever]]. He moves on to wanting to destroy the Hidden Leaf Village. But someone else has already done it. SoWhatDoWeDoNow Rather than move on and try to find another goal in his life, Sasuke decides to personally kill anyone who's lived in the Leaf, starting with the village elders. He strongly averts the trope after killing Danzo, declaring that he feels overjoyed, like the Uchiha name is being cleansed. Naruto later manages to reach the top of his personal hit list, for repeatedly getting in the way. In contrast, a number of other characters get their revenge and move on, or learn to forgive and forget.

** Fire-element techniques ''look'' powerful. In practice, what they do is create a SmokeShield for enemies to slowly and dramatically step out of [[ConvectionSchmonvection without a single burn on them]]. Played with when Sasuke's fire attack melts the layer of skin disguising Orochimaru in the Forest of Death but otherwise doesn't hurt him (and blows a hole through a tree without lighting it on fire), and averted once with Asuma's cloud of exploding smoke.

** Affects Orochimaru in Part II, and clumsily justified.
** Lee was also hyped to be extremely strong (by worfing Sasuke) and actually [[TheWorfEffect never wins a real fight]] (except against his doppelganger in the Rescue Gaara Arc) [[TheWorfEffect because he fights people even stronger]], even if he falls with honors.
** [[ZigZaggingTrope Cycling]] trope concerning Sasuke.
** Averted for Jiraiya. Itachi is extremely badass and powerful, but Jiraiya chases him off quickly. He loses to Pain, but not before killing half of Pain's bodies despite facing the Rinnegan.

* TakeAThirdOption: The whole point of the series. From the beginning, Naruto faces people urging him to follow the "ninja way", basically saying, "Give up X or be a failure." X being human feelings (Zabuza), the will to fight (Kabuto, Pain), Sasuke (Jiraiya, Itachi, Pain, Sasuke ''himself''), etc. Being a [[TheTrickster trickster]] possessing the "wisdom of the fools," Naruto always [[{{Ubermensch}} dismisses that dilemma]] saying, "I won't give up X and I won't be a failure." This leads him doing some things (namely, not killing [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds Nagato]] and never ever giving up saving Sasuke) which are highly controversial in the Fandom.

* LoopholeAbuse: By way of LampshadeHanging. TheStinger of the [[TournamentArc Chunin exam]] second stage's HiddenPurposeTest is that the evil mind games and intricate manipulations surrounding the exam were played up so much, you could theoretically pass the test without writing down a single word. Which [[TheTrickster Naruto]] [[TakeAThirdOption does]].

%%* WorldOfCardBoardSpeech: Naruto vs. Gaara, Tsunade vs. Orochimaru, Tsunade vs. Madara.

* SpitefulSpoiler: Weaponized, in-universe, when Naruto and Sakura retake Kakashi's bell test. Kakashi has to work much harder but still holds onto the bells -- until Naruto threatens to spoil the next ''Icha Icha'' book. He immediately covers his ears and shuts his MagicEye, since it automatically reads Naruto's lips.

* {{Spoiler}}: Weaponized, in-universe, when Naruto and Sakura retake Kakashi's bell test. Kakashi has to work much harder but still holds onto the bells -- until Naruto threatens to spoil the next ''Icha Icha'' book. He immediately covers his ears and shuts his MagicEye, since it automatically reads Naruto's lips.