Like skin cancer, Naruto just keeps coming back.
As if TWO Big Three-length animated series weren’t enough, the people at Naruto decided that they could rake in even more cash by churning out movies like a Marvel studio. There’s a chronological order to watch these films, but we won’t be covering that today. No, today we be journeying to the Village Hidden in Critical Opinions and throwing those opinions out like kunai knives.
There are ELEVEN Naruto movies in total. And whenever you get ELEVEN of something, you can be sure that it’s gonna be a pretty mixed bag. Eleven songs on an album? One or two of them will be skips. Eleven chocolates in a box? Three or four of them will have gross fruit flavors. Eleven movies in a series? You might as well throw out half of them.
So here it goes, brutal as a cutthroat ninja battle, we will be ranking the worst to best Naruto movies ever made.
11. The Will of Fire
Whoever made The Will of Fire WILL get FIRED. This movie is confusing and oftentimes contradictory to the very lore that the series tried so hard to establish! The plot is this: a bunch of ninjas with powerful hereditary abilities (called kekkei genkai) disappear from the Lands of Lightning, Wind, and Earth. Naruto’s home country, The Land of Fire, suspiciously remains untouched. Naturally, the ninjas of the other Lands begin to get suspicious, resulting in a confusing whodunnit mystery where Naruto and friends have to rescue their sensei Kakashi.
10. The Lost Tower
The writers of The Lost Tower got a little lost themselves. When a rogue ninja named Mukade opens up an ancient and powerful chakra reservoir, he ends up blasting himself and Naruto back into the past. Naruto then has to team up with his dad Minato in order to protect the past and save the future. A father-son team-up sounds AWESOME in theory, but in reality, Naruto’s dad Minato feels somewhat rushed and underdeveloped. If only the writers could go back to the past and rework the script.
9. Guardians of the Crescent Moon Kingdom
Guardians of the Crescent Moon Kingdom immediately gets points off for being a Naruto movie as opposed to a Naruto: Shippuden flick. What I mean is that teenage Naruto is tolerable, but tweenage Naruto is generally insufferable. Team Seven is contracted to protect a young prince named Hikaru Tsuki from the prosperous Land of the Moon, and this kid Hikaru actually gives Naruto a run for his money in the Annoying Olympics. Hikaru is a spoiled brat, and you spend half the film wishing this kid WOULD just get merc’d by the bad guys so we can call it a day.
8. Legend of the Stone of Gelel
Wondering what the hell “Gelel” is? Gelel me about it. The Legend of the Stone of Gelel immediately gets points for starting the film with ninja-badass Gaara locked in combat, then it loses them for sending Naruto and friends on a search for a missing ferret. Then it GAINS THEM BACK after introducing a giant Howl’s Moving Castle-lookin’-ass walking cathedral where a shadowy group of ninjas are implanting human souls into the bodies of stone warriors and soon find themselves embroiled in a battle to find the powerful Stone of Gelel. Unlike the “protect this person” plots of the majority of these films, Stone of Gelel actually attempts a more original story.
7. Blood Prison
For a series about ninjas, they hardly ever do any, you know, ninja stuff? It’s a lot of open-air battles with two people telling each other about their backstories, but there’s not a lot of sneaking around. The thing ninjas are supposed to do. All that changes in Blood Prison. After Naruto is falsely imprisoned in a magic prison for a crime that he did not commit, he has to use his sneaky ninja skills to break out again.
6. Bonds
The will-they-won’t-they romantic angst bond between Naruto and his rival Sasuke can never be severed, and Bonds is the proof. The plot is this: a group of ninjas from the Land of Sky carry out an attack against The Land of Fire (Naruto’s country) as retribution for the Land of Fire’s attack on the Sky Country during the Second Shinobi War. Naruto and the gang are sent to a faraway village that has fallen victim to the Sky Ninja’s attacks, and while they’re there they find Sasuke working to do the bidding of his evil master Orochimaru. Naturally, tempers flare.
5. Naruto Shippuden the Movie
The intro to Naruto Shippuden the Movie is the best part. In the first five minutes, we see Naruto in battle with a giant monster. He then loses that battle and gets impaled and dies. Metal. A few days earlier, a man named Yomi attacked a mystical shrine in order to resurrect a powerful demon named Mōryō. Mōryō warns Yomi that the only person capable of banishing it is a priestess named Shion. Meanwhile, Naruto and friends are contracted to protect the young priestess, who gives Naruto a vision of his own death. But can fate be changed? Odds are, probably.
4. Ninja Clash In The Land of Snow
Ninja Clash in the Land of Snow was the very first film released in the Naruto series, and just so happens to be one of the best. Naruto and the gang are contracted to protect an actor named Yukie Fujikaze, who is set to appear in an upcoming film called Princess Gale as the titular protagonist. What the gang soon finds out is that Yukie is ACTUALLY a princess herself who is on the run from her father’s murderer! The film features some seriously awesome battles, along with an interesting original character in Yukie.
3. Road to Ninja
After Naruto and Sakura are transported to an alternate world after a battle with a high-ranking Akatsuki member, they soon discover that things are a little different in the Road To Ninja universe. For one, Naruto’s parents are STILL ALIVE. Unlike The Lost Tower, Naruto’s father and mother are given ample screen time and character development, allowing us to, God forbid, feel something for the poor little orphaned ninja boy. Now the question is: how do they get back to their own universe? And does Naruto even want to?
2. Boruto: Naruto the Movie
After becoming The Greatest Hokage, Naruto settles down with his ninja-wife Hinata and decides to have children. His son Boruto is just as rambunctious and hot-headed as Naruto was in his youth, but with his newfound Hokage duties, Naruto is often too busy to spend quality time with his son. Boruto runs off to train with the gloriously emo-as-ever Sasuke, but after Naruto sacrifices his life to save the village, Boruto has to figure out a way to save his father’s spirit. Boruto shines for its jaw-dropping action sequences that feature Sasuke and Naruto at the height of their power, and for its sweet portrayal of the love between father and son.
1. The Last
If Boruto is about Naruto and Boruto as father and son, The Last is about how Boruto got made in the first place. At its core, this film is a romance between Naruto and his longtime ninja-crush Hinata. After a rogue ninja named Toneri Otsutsuki kidnaps Hinata’s sister and threatens to destroy the moon (yes, THE MOON) Naruto and Hinata have to team up in order to stop him. And in doing so they uncover their romantic feelings for one another. Watching Naruto and Hinata’s love blossom throughout the film is frankly adorable, and the gorgeously animated action sequences serve as icing on the wedding cake.
(featured image: Toho)
