Does Naruto Have A Brother? (Confusion Explained)
Andrew Patterson Some Naruto fans think the legendary manga and anime character isn’t an only child, but does he really have a brother? Here’s the confusion explained.
Some Naruto fans believe that the legendary manga and anime character isn’t an only child after all, but does he really have a brother? Masashi Kishimoto’s epic shonen manga Naruto (and its Studio Pierrot anime adaptation) tells the tale of its titular protagonist Naruto Uzumaki. He’s a young ninja-in-training who is an outcast in his village but nevertheless dreams of earning the respect of his peers and elders by becoming Hokage – the leader and strongest ninja of the community.
Naruto's father Minato Namikaze was once the Hokage of Konoha but died alongside his wife Kushina when their son was just a newborn. The pair passed away while defending Konoha from an attack by the Nine-Tailed Fox (AKA Kurama) and sealed the fearsome beast inside Naruto in the process, which is the reason why he was shunned by his fellow villagers. According to Naruto lore, Minato and Kushina only had one child, but some corners of the show's dedicated audience insist that its protagonist has a male sibling too. So, who is Naruto’s brother – or rather, his supposed brother?
Much of the confusion over Naruto maybe having a brother stems from the feature-length anime Road To Ninja: Naruto The Movie which was produced by Studio Pierrot and released back in 2012. In the film, Naruto and his friend/love interest Sakura Haruno are transported to an alternate universe by the villainous Tobi and set about investigating the world in hopes of making their way back home to their own timeline. Naruto discovers that not only are his parents alive in Road To Ninja but that people also refer to him as “Menma” in the film’s parallel reality.
The main villain in Road To Ninja: The Naruto Movie is a mysterious masked man who is eventually revealed to be the real Menma – or Menma Uzumaki, to call him by his full name. Menma is the son of Minato and Kushina in the film’s parallel timeline and therefore the alternate version of Naruto, hence why they look suspiciously alike and share similar powers. Menma’s existence is what led some viewers to assume that Naruto (who is a tad overpowered) had a brother, but in reality, he’s more a mirror world version of Naruto rather than a sibling.
At the end of the day, however, Naruto is in fact an only child and has no brother (or a sister either). Instead, he’s built a makeshift family of his own since he was orphaned early on in the proper Naruto timeline – from his mentor and surrogate father figure Jiraiya to the friends like Shikamaru Nara and Sasuke Uchiha that became almost like siblings to Naruto.
