Naruto is filled with some of the best villains in anime, and Pain is easily the best of them all. He’s not the strongest, the most ambitious, or the most devious, but he has a different quality that cements his status as one of the best. Even Masashi Kishimoto, the creator of Naruto, admitted that Pain is different from the rest of the villains in the series.
Pain’s story is a highlight of Naruto: Shippuden. From the first moment he’s shown on-screen, he has a commanding presence befitting of his status. He’s the leader of the Akatsuki, the wielder of the Rinnegan, and one of the most brutal characters around.
Pain will go down in history as one of the best villains around, joining Frieza, Johann Liebert, and Makima in the top-tier of the art form. His story is also a big reason why he’s in a league of his own, and even Kishimoto knew it when he was writing it.
Naruto Is Filled with Great Villains
Madara Uchiha, Kabuto Yakushi, and More
Madara Uchiha faces off against the tailed beasts in the Fourth Great Ninja War
Shōnen series are nothing without great villains. If a series is built on great fights, the protagonists need great antagonists to go against. Without characters like Madara, Kabuto, and Itachi, the main cast of characters would never grow, nor would they need a reason to.
Characters like Madara Uchiha specifically add to the series their in immensely. Madara is one of the most exciting characters around: he’s a force of nature, one of the strongest characters in Naruto, and the best part of the final arc of Shippuden. His fight against the Allied Shinobi Forces will go down in history as one of the best fights in anime as well.
Out of every villain in the series, however, there isn’t an antagonist that is more beautifully complex than Pain.
Pain Is The Best in the Series
There’s No Villain More Complete Than Pain
A collage of the six forms of Pain from Naruto
Pain is easily the best villain in Naruto, and there’s a decent case to be made that he’s the best villain in anime. He’s one of the few major villains in anime that actually manages to accomplish most of his goals, and he even challenges Naruto’s ideology during their fight against each other.
Pain levels the Hidden Leaf Village, kills several key characters (including Kakashi), and captures a few of the Tailed Beasts. His rampage is historic, and the panel of Pain floating over the Hidden Leaf Village before he destroys it is one of the most gorgeous in manga.
Kishimoto Had a Hard Time Creating the Pain Arc
Pain’s Ideology Is Complex in the Best Way Possible
Screenshot from Naruto Shippuden anime shows the Six Paths of Pain arriving at the end of their fight against Jirayia.
Most villains have tragic backstories. Without them, it can be hard to understand why they became villains in the first place. In Naruto, Kishimoto does a great job of giving villains believable backstories so that their future actions make some sense.
Itachi Uchiha was never meant to be a villain, but he played the role to save his village. Gaara was a monster because his village treated him as such, and Obito Uchiha wanted to create a world in which his friends didn’t have to feel the pain that he once felt.
Pain has an equally brutal backstory. Before he was Pain, he was Nagato, a kid who watched his civilian parents get murdered by Hidden Leaf ninja during a war. He was also betrayed by Hanzō of the Salamander, forced to watch his best friend Yahiko sacrifice himself to the warlord.
At his core, Pain wants others to feel his pain. He’s been betrayed constantly, subject to the brutality of the world, and he just wants others to understand what he’s gone through. The only way he knows to relate his deep, unquenchable pain to others is to subject them to the same pain he was subjected to.
His desire to be understood is entirely reasonable, but he takes it to terrible lengths. He kills Jiraiya, destroys the Leaf Village, and slaughters everyone in the Village Hidden by Rain who was connected to Hanzō.
There May Never Be Another Villain like Pain
He’s Ruthless, Relentless, and, Somehow, Relatable
Naruto in Sage Mode, about to fight against Pain.
Kishimoto said that he had the hardest time creating the Pain Arc out of all the arcs in Naruto because he didn’t know how to end it. He said that both Naruto and Pain were technically right in their ideals. Pain wanted to share his pain with the world, and he became a villain because he didn’t care how he shared that pain so long as it was felt by others.
Naruto, on the other hand, never wanted anyone else to feel his pain. While he was never subjected to the same evils as Nagato, he was mistreated by the Hidden Leaf for most of his life, but he never took that anger out on his fellow villagers. That’s where Naruto and Nagato differ: they have both felt pain, but they express it differently.
There may never be another villain as wonderfully complicated as Pain. He’s inarguably a villain, but his desire to be understood is so inherently human that he can’t help but be relatable. While characters like Frieza just want to dominate, Pain just wants to be heard, and that’s why he’ll always be the best villain in Naruto.
Naruto (2002) TV Show Poster
First Episode Air Date
October 3, 2002
Cast
Junko Takeuchi, Maile Flanagan, Noriaki Sugiyama, Chie Nakamura, Kazuhiko Inoue, Nana Mizuki, Hideo Ishikawa, Yûko Sanpei