Naruto's Controversial New Anime Is Secretly Genius

One recent Naruto announcement has caught a lot of flak from Western fanbases, but it's much smarter than it seems. The air around Naruto's 2026 panel at New York Comic Con was unusually tense—both in-person and in the chat of the live-streamed event, fans were coming in with myriad expectations. The event took place on October 10th, after all: Naruto's canonical birthday.

Many Naruto projects are apparently on the horizon, but fans have been thirsty for major developments about two key ambitions: the Naruto live-action, and Naruto's long-awaited anniversary episodes. Shortly into the Naruto panel, they received the Naruto x Ninku four-episode crossover teaser, putting the question of what those four episodes will entail officially to rest.

This was presented as a highlight of Naruto's panel, alongside a brief update from the director of Naruto's live-action adaptation and Naruto's new manga from Kishimoto himself, Shadow Rising. But Naruto's new anime has so far drawn a mixed reaction, likely because Ninku has never been a major force in the Western anime sphere. That's precisely what makes Naruto's crossover so genius: under the surface, it's a return to Naruto's roots in a way Western fans never would have expected.

What To Expect From Naruto's Ninku Crossover

The first question to really consider with Naruto x Ninku is what it will actually look like. The premise of the crossover is clearly explained on Naruto's official website: Team 7 is sent on a mission by Kakashi, who is unable to attend and names Naruto as team leader in his absence; Team 7 falls into another world, where they meet a "boy with a face resembling a frog's, named Fuusuke." The teaser text leaves off with a simple question of what might await them in this strange world.

This sudden Naruto isekai might feel bizarre, but in context, it makes sense. Ninku, written by Kouji Kiriyama, debuted in Weekly Shonen Jump back in 1993. There, it would run for nine volumes until 1995. Ninku covers the story of a boy named Fuusuke, a powerful Ninku warrior. Ninku is a martial art—literally a combination of "ninja" and "kung fu"—and its story contains twelve ninku masters, one for each animal of the Chinese zodiac.

Within that structure, Fuusuke represents the rat. He's the former captain of the first Ninku corps, searching for other Ninku masters after a devastating war where the Empire vilified and sought to exterminate the Ninku corps and masters. Alongside his penguin Hiroyuki, Fuusuke's journey embodies a lighthearted action-adventure comedy that makes for an easy connection to Naruto per se.

For the curious, the first five episodes of Ninku's anime are available on Studio Pierrot's YouTube channel, mentioned during the Naruto NYCC panel as a primer for fans wishing to acquaint themselves with the series. (Interestingly, Studio Pierrot was the same studio to adapt Naruto years later, not to mention modern battle shōnen classics like Bleach and Black Clover.) It's worth noting, however, that the story of Ninku's anime diverges somewhat from its manga content.

At any rate, it should be perfectly clear that Ninku's crossover with Naruto is far from a cash-grab or a way to reuse old animation rights. In fact, if the question is whether this Naruto x Ninku crossover will retain the spirit of Naruto itself, the goofy and lighthearted action-adventure nature of Ninku gives plenty of reason to believe they'll mesh well. After all, Kishimoto himself has long been on record defining and defending the relationship between the two series.

How Ninku Actually Influenced Naruto

Although there are surface level connections between Naruto and Ninku that could drive a crossover, the actual rationale behind it becomes far more interesting. On the aforementioned official Naruto website announcement, Kishimoto says the following about the project:

I created NARUTO because I personally wanted to see the continuation of NINKŪ. I think many of you have already noticed, but NARUTO was immensely influenced by NINKŪ.

Without NINKŪ, NARUTO would not exist. Simply put, Fūsuke is Naruto’s secret mentor. Eventually, I began dreaming of bringing this master-and-student relationship out of the shadows, and into an actual storyline.

Sensei, who is as much a mentor to me as Fūsuke is to Naruto, graciously agreed to my selfish request.

By meeting with me in person and with his extensive cooperation, he helped make my long-standing dream a reality.

I was finally able to create a continuation of NINKŪ in the truest sense. It consists of 4 episodes in total, and I hope you enjoy it to the very end!

At a base level, this might just feel like lip service to justify an unexpected crossover. But the connection between Naruto and Ninku goes far deeper. For example, in a 2008 profile by the Los Angeles Times, Ninku is listed as a series Kishimoto carefully studied early in his career as a mangaka, alongside better-known properties in the West like Dragon Ball, Akira, and Ghost in the Shell.

And in a 2013 interview published in Naruto: Meigenshū Kizuna, Kishimoto specifically cited his desire to differentiate Naruto from Ninku at a time when ninja and samurai concepts were quite popular. Ninku was presented as a challenge to Kishimoto, who at the time was looking among Japanese themes and saw Ninku's fusion of ninja arts with karate as something to build upon (and away from).

Fan discussions about Ninku and Naruto in the West generally focus on Ninku's impact on Naruto's renowned Rasengan technique—which isn't unfair at all, since Fuusuke's Fuatsho ("wind pressure palm") is functionally very similar to a Rasengan, as noted by many Western Naruto fans who played the Nintendo DS game Jump Ultimate Stars and were exposed to the power.

And while it might be compelling to point toward series like Hunter x Hunter or YuYu Hakusho for their foundational influence on Naruto and Sasuke's dynamic and respective personalities, it's worth making clear that Ninku's influence runs much deeper. Naruto, much like Fuusuke, represents the ideal of a hungry and lonely child—in Ninku's manga, an orphan—who harbors great power in the name of protecting their respective peoples from broader existential threats.

Why Naruto's Unexpected Crossover Is Genius

What lies in place is a complex cobweb of literary connections for Kishimoto where alongside Ninku are properties Western fans are more familiar with: Dragon Ball, Hunter x Hunter, and even Ghost in the Shell. What makes the Ninku crossover move particularly smart isn't just that Ninku is sentimental to Kishimoto (which certainly plays a part), nor that it's particularly important to Japanese manga fans (which is also true—Ninku is perceived as a pillar of '90s Weekly Shōnen Jump alongside Dragon Ball and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.)

Instead, it's precisely the opposite: all the aforementioned names are familiar except for Ninku specifically. There isn't much reason for Western fans to be familiar with it: the English dub of Ninku never aired on television and is today considered lost media. Meanwhile, its manga never received an official English translation.

And yet, Ninku still forms a core part of Naruto's history. Naruto's lineage is often seen in terms of creators like Toriyama (Dragon Ball), Togashi (YuYu Hakusho, Hunter x Hunter), or even Oda (One Piece), since Naruto's infamous rivalry with One Piece was a major fuel for either's development. Although all these pieces are relevant, they don't paint the whole picture; Ninku is a missing part. Many fans are left wondering why this announcement was given at NYCC rather than Jump Festa, but that very question is part of why Ninku's introduction at a Western panel is so important.

In an environment where the anime market is globalizing and the borders between perceptions of the industry are slowly disappearing, Ninku's presentation to a Western audience through a widely-anticipated vehicle—the four new Naruto episodes—can bring a freshness to a series like Ninku that has long sat on the wayside for Western audiences. One hope is that this might be a motivation for a more unified history of anime and manga, rather than one segmented by their respective audiences.

The Naruto x Ninku crossover certainly came as a surprise to many, but Naruto's anniversary episodes were always intended as a way of celebrating the series itself. Reflecting on the humble beginnings and mundane inspirations of a series which has fundamentally changed modern shōnen anime makes perfect sense. That doesn't mean it will be perfect, but Naruto fans will be able to clearly see why it will be meaningful, at least.

It's important to remember that just as Ninku comes from the outside right now, many Western readers can remember when, once upon a time, Naruto came from the outside—and perhaps with that spirit, it's possible to fully embrace Naruto's controversial new crossover anime for what it is: an ingeniously unexpected celebration of Naruto's origins.

Video Game(s)

Naruto: Clash Of Ninja Revolution 3, Naruto: Ultimate Ninja (2003), Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations, Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2, Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3, Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 4, Naruto: Rise Of A Ninja, Naruto: The Broken Bond, Naruto to Boruto: Shinobi Striker, Naruto Shippuden Dragon Blade Chronicles, Naruto: Path Of The Ninja, Naruto x Boruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm Connections

Cast

Junko Takeuchi, Maile Flanagan, Noriaki Sugiyama, Chie Nakamura, Kazuhiko Inoue, Nana Mizuki, Hideo Ishikawa, Yûko Sanpei

Latest Film

Boruto: Naruto the Movie