From heroine to hate figure: Why Naruto fans turned on Sakura

I believe that Sakura from Naruto might be one of the most hated female anime characters in all of anime history. Her character started with a lot of promise as she was part of Team 7 with Sasuke and Naruto, so it was expected of her to stand as an equal with her team. But somewhere along the way, that promise unraveled.

And by the time Naruto: Shippuden started airing, I noticed a lot of the fandom started turning on her altogether. It did not take long for Sakura to become a central topic of memes and face harsh critiques. Interestingly, this was not one of those issues when fans hate all female characters in the series; others like Hinata or Tsunade are still loved and respected.

So I started researching her because, for a lead character, how did things go so wrong for her? In many ways, Sakura was supposed to be the emotional and intellectual balance between the two boys. And to achieve this, she was also supposed to grow into her own strengths and have a unique identity.

But that growth stalled very early, and it took far too long for the narrative to give her any meaningful progress. On top of that, one of the most infuriating actions noticed by fans was how boy crazy she became. I get a schoolgirl crush in a coming-of-age story is not new. But Sakura’s feelings for Sasuke went beyond infatuation.

Sakura could have been a strong kunoichi like Tsunade, but instead, she spent most of her time chasing after a boy who was dealing with his own trauma. Suddenly, she stopped working on herself, and to make things worse, her attitude towards Naruto, an orphaned child, was a bit insensitive.

Maybe because she was more privileged than Naruto or Sasuke, she didn’t know where to draw the line. Even if I look past her personality and focus on her combat performance, she didn’t fare any better.

Also, during the Pain Arc, it was as if Sakura was reduced to staying in the shadows. It was Hinata who stepped up. During the Fourth Great Ninja War, she contributed mostly to healing and was rarely allowed to shine on the frontlines.

Why the hate toward Sakura in Naruto may be overblown—and how the internet amplified it

What makes all of this even sadder is that it’s not really Sakura’s fault. Over time, I saw that her poor portrayal caused my frustration. Masashi Kishimoto said that he found it hard to write women in his stories. This is clear in the finished product. Some of the dislike for Sakura in Naruto is too much. Fans forget that she was a teenager, like the other characters. She was just trying to find her way in a chaotic world.

And part of the reason the hate spiraled so much, I think, has a lot to do with the internet. Meme culture made it fashionable to call her useless, even if that wasn’t entirely true. Clips were taken out of context. Although her fake confession to Naruto to stop him chasing Sasuke also did not help her case. While she did make mistakes, they were not the worst ones in the history of Naruto.

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In conclusion, if Sakura was given a chance to live up to her potential, maybe all the hate she has gotten till now would not have existed. In the end, the tragedy of Sakura Haruno isn’t just that fans turned on her. It’s that she never got the story she deserved. She had strength, intelligence, and potential. But instead of becoming the heroine of her own journey, she was written into someone else’s.

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