There are plenty of lovable characters in Naruto, but my favorite is one who rocks the series to its core. Naruto's prevailing themes are friendship, perseverance, and the power of peace over violence. In Naruto's world, the general sentiment is that anybody with a good heart and the will to push through struggles can become a legendary ninja. What this leaves out, though, is that the journeys of characters can be very different—and some will have it much harder than others.

There's one Konoha shinobi whose sheer effort and dedication makes the others pale in comparison: Rock Lee. Although essentially every character in Naruto faces some kind of hardship, Rock Lee overcomes unique difficulties that make him the most relatable. Despite this, he's always been underappreciated, and Rock Lee's role in Naruto is considered wasted potential by many fans.

Rock Lee Is The Underdog of Naruto's Underdogs

Naruto Has Many Underdogs, But Rock Lee Is Always Underappreciated

Naruto is, at its heart, an underdog story. Naruto is an underdog who wants to overcome his circumstances as an orphaned jinchuriki to become Hokage. Sasuke, the foil to Naruto, is in many ways an underdog himself; although he would become one of the strongest Uchiha ever, he does so by forging his own path and shirking social expectations altogether. Among these, Rock Lee sits occasionally popping into the spotlight, waiting for the story to give him his chance to shine: the underdog of the underdogs.

Rock Lee doesn't have full access to the same powers that most ninja do. The average shinobi is able to use at least one or two types of jutsu, but jutsu is ultimately just the manipulation of chakra. Rock Lee lacks chakra and isn't able to use ninjutsu or genjutsu at all. This is an isolating and heartbreaking situation, but Rock Lee never lets it show, remaining optimistic and cheering others on no matter what.

After expressing his interest in becoming a great ninja using only taijutsu, martial arts that usually don't require chakra, his teammate, Neji Hyuga, sneers at him. But Might Guy, his teacher, takes a special interest in him. Might Guy is another ninja without chakra who has adapted by becoming a master of taijutsu, and he's one of Naruto's best teachers. Both Itachi and Madara Uchiha remark on Might Guy's strength, and he es this strength on to Rock Lee, who becomes a loyal disciple.

After a lot of work, Might Guy finally became able to use ninjutsu and genjutsu. However, he still prefers not to do so.

Through the caring attention of his teacher and mentor, Rock Lee is able to grow into a very capable shinobi. By the end of the Naruto Shippuden, Rock Lee is powerful enough to cut Madara in half. Becoming strong enough to challenge Naruto's strongest villain is a feat in itself, but Rock Lee's determination, ingenuity, and dedication to overcoming his lack of chakra makes it extremely inspiring. It also shows how broken Naruto's power system is.

Rock Lee Shows The Unfairness Of Naruto's Power System

Rock Lee Undermines Naruto's Protagonist And Setting

From very early on in Naruto, power is associated with training. However, since Rock Lee doesn't have any chakra, he has to train much harder than others. This isn't to put down, for example, Naruto's own life-threatening efforts during his Sage Mode training. It's undeniable, though, that other characters seem to develop with ease compared to Rock Lee because they're propelled and empowered by their chakra. In order for Rock Lee to have even a quarter of the same progress, he must move mountains.

This is especially visible in Rock Lee's fan-favorite fight against Gaara during the Chunin Exam's preliminaries. Gaara, an orphan jinchuriki like Naruto, has a huge built-in chakra pool on top of his natural talent for jutsu. The resulting fight sees Rock Lee put up the best fight that he possibly can, opening up five of the Eight Gates which limit chakra flow.

Despite technically not being a kinjutsu (forbidden technique), the Eight Gates technique is prohibited because it causes massive bodily damage. Opening the eighth gate means almost certain death—as demonstrated by Might Guy against Madara during the Fourth Great Ninja War.

The fight ends up leaving Rock Lee unconscious with two of his limbs crushed. In a way, the fight is inspiring, but it also calls to mind the fact that for Rock Lee to stand a chance against a jinchuriki like Naruto, he has to risk his own life. The way he befriends Gaara afterward is honorable and irable, but it can't help but prompt one to wonder if the reason Rock Lee has to act so honorably is to be respected and taken seriously. Nonetheless, it's easy to argue that Rock Lee is the best representative of Naruto's themes.

Rock Lee Shines Regardless Of His Hardships

With Everything Stacked Against Him, Rock Lee Refuses To Give Up

I always found Rock Lee to be a weird, cool representation of disability. Many shows featuring disabled characters feel the need to do so in an obvious way that errs on the side of condescension. Rock Lee is an example of an accidental depiction of disability: a depiction which results from creators being unable to understand how insidious ableism is. When Kishimoto created a world where most people have chakra abilities in some way, creating a character who is impaired by that society's standards is without question writing a disabled character.

This analogy really struck me with Rock Lee's rivalry with Neji. Neji, born to the Hyuga clan and labeled a "genius", finds Rock Lee's desire to become a great ninja despite his chakra impairment to be ridiculous for much of the series. An analogy can be found in the K-drama Extraordinary Attorney Woo: the main character, Woo Young-Woo, is an autistic savant of the law wanting to work at a major Korean firm. Since her line of work requires speaking in front of people, irregular situations, and connecting with clients, she's constantly disregarded because of her autism.

Those few people who take her seriously and give her the time of day are the crucial factor in her path to success. Might Guy mirrors this for Rock Lee by being a representative of a great ninja with a similar impairment. Rock Lee and Woo Young-Woo both work incredibly hard to be great in their respective fields. Both are inherently positive about their own abilities, despite what others might have to say about them. In that kind of isolation, optimism becomes a weapon, anyway.

Slowly, more people start respecting them after showing that, in spite of their difficulties, they have unbreakable wills and are talented in their own ways. Likewise, Neji comes to respect Rock Lee and see him as an excellent ninja down the line, despite his initial prejudices. During the Gaara fight, as Rock Lee's unconscious body stands determined to keep fighting, Might Guy tears up and remarks how dedicated Lee is to finding his own "ninja way".

Yes, Rock Lee and Might Guy are inspiring illustrations of how hard work can put a disadvantaged person on the same level as others. But what does it say to have a power system where they feel the cost of "viability" is torturous discipline?

It's a lovely sentiment but raises important questions. Naruto Shippuden has an infamous power creep causing Konoha's shinobi to be forgotten. Characters like Rock Lee exaggerate this differential. Yes, Rock Lee and Might Guy are inspiring illustrations of how hard work can put a disadvantaged person on the same level as others. But what does it say to have a power system where they feel the cost of "viability" is torturous discipline? Especially when Rock Lee, the best example of Naruto's correlation of hard work to talent, never canonically wins a battle.

From this vantage, some ideas become especially grim: that to really stand a chance against Madara, Might Guy must be all but dead; to put up a fight against Gaara meant a hospital for Rock Lee. I feel conflicted, because I know that this reading of Naruto is an accident, counter to the intended reading of a character who, for Kishimoto, simply represents human weaknesses. The questions nonetheless remain on my tongue: when do character problems become accessibility problems, or problems of how the surrounding narrative and society perceives them and structures itself to exclude them?

In other words, why must Rock Lee feel so alienated, and what hand do we have in it by not being aware of the ableist subtext? I always feel incredibly inspired by Rock Lee's perseverance, efforts, and eventual success. At the same time, I can't help but think of what his character arc means because of the way Naruto's power system doesn't enact its themes; the correlation of hard work to power is limited—what matters above all seems to be luck.