Naruto Shippuden became extremely popular due to its plot and theme focused on ninjas and special abilities, making Masashi Kishimoto's work one of the most successful to date.

Featuring several different characters with unique abilities, Naruto has always proved to be quite interesting to follow but let's face it, taking care of a work with such complexity is not easy and unfortunately, some characters were not used as much as they should.

In today's post, we brought up 5 characters that didn't get the attention they so deserved in Naruto Shippuden.

Attention! The paragraphs below contain spoilers for Naruto Shippuden.

1 – Shino Aburame

Shino Aburame was one of the strongest characters in Classic Naruto. Not only was he able to use his insects to attack enemies, extract information, and spy, but the ninja was also extremely intelligent.

It's a real pity that a character with so much potential ended up being so poorly used, almost disappearing. Currently in Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, Shino became a teacher at the Ninja Academy and was defeated by a group of genins.

2 – Kiba Inuzuka

Kiba Inuzuka was another interesting character with a lot of potential that could be explored, but Inuzuka was also completely sidelined over time.

Kiba was one of the strongest genin in Classic Naruto and even Sasuke acknowledged that, but in Naruto Shippuden Kiba was swept under the rug and kind of just served as a joke that he wanted to be the Hokage and to make matters worse, he didn't even appear in Boruto: Naruto Next Generations.

3 – Yamato

Yamato is one of the only characters in all of Naruto who can use Wood Release. The character even had a certain prominence for some time and served as a great replacement for Kakashi during several episodes.

However, after Naruto learned about the nature of chakras from him and Kakashi, Yamato fell out of favor. He was seen with Naruto for some time when he was learning to control the Nine-Tails thanks to Killer B's help and then was captured and completely sidelined during the Fourth Great Ninja War, an arc of Naruto Shippuden that gave a lot of prominence to characters that had already died, rather than characters who still had potential, like Yamato.

4 - Leave

Sai was an extremely boring guy and was hated by everyone the moment he first showed up. He was Danzo's servant and was eventually placed on Team 7 under Yamato's tutelage, as a sort of replacement for Sasuke.

Obviously, fans weren't happy with this change, and the artist ended up becoming super unpopular, which explains why the character appeared less and less in Naruto Shippuden, and why he practically doesn't appear in Boruto: Naruto Next Generations.

5 – Rock Lee

Rock Lee represented what was supposed to be the moral of the Naruto story, that hard work pays off and effort equals natural talent. He starred in some of the best fights in Classic Naruto. The character managed to recover from practically incurable injuries with Tsunade's help and returned with everything to help Naruto and the others to bring Sasuke back.

Lee was easily one of the strongest genins in Classic Naruto and had everything to continue having the prominence that all fans expected in Naruto Shippuden, but unfortunately, this never happened.

Naruto Shippuden was shown between the years 2007 and 2017, counting the second phase of the anime. In it, Naruto returns after two years of training with the mission to fight Akatsuki and rescue Sasuke from the clutches of Orochimaru.

In all, the anime has 500 episodes, ending the story of Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, and Kakashi and preparing the ground for the direct continuation of the story.

The anime can be followed in full on  Crunchyroll, along with classic Naruto and Boruto: Naruto Next Generations, its direct sequel.