Why Is Gaara Amazing?

Naruto is a series in which we see a category of people called the Jinchuriki, the ones with tailed beasts sealed within them, usually as babies, or before birth. The effect of this sealing is very tough on the kids. We see Naruto, Gaara, and Sora, until the first few episodes of Shippuden. The thing is, none of them asked to be sealed with beasts inside them. The people, however, treat them as monsters. It’s true that the beasts have destructive power and ended many lives during their rampage. But that’s no reason to treat the kids any different from the way you would treat your own kids. It was never their fault. If anything, they are doing the villages good by being the instruments containing the beasts within themselves and protecting the villages.

While Naruto contains the Nine-Tailed Fox, his counterpart in the sand village Suna, is Gaara. While the wife of the Kazekage of the sand village was pregnant, he sealed the One-Tailed Beast, Shukaku inside the unborn baby… I mean, how cruel can you be, and how can you call yourself a father after doing that to your own kid?

If you look at baby Gaara, and Gaara as a kid, you’d never think that such a cute kid had a monster sealed within him. But since the people of the village knew about the Shukaku, they kept themselves away from the poor kid. His father put him in isolation after an unfortunate accident and that was the last straw. A little kid, who was so sweet (and all that he wanted was to be accepted and treated as a normal person), became isolated within himself.We see the effects in the Chunin selection exam. The destructive power of Shukaku gets unleashed and Naruto does all he can and somehow defeats Gaara.

The fight and the conversation between shots make Gaara realize the value of friends. He resolves to let people into his life and grow as a person, because, if Naruto did it, he can too. This is an amazing turning point in his life, as we see later in Shippuden. When the leaf village is in dire need of help to fight the forces of Orochimaru during the pursuit to retrieve Sasuke, it is Gaara and his siblings Temari and Kankuro who come to the aid of the Sasuke Retrieval force. And when Gaara becomes the Kazekage of Suna, we see people respecting him for the amazing person he is, and Gaara showing the ultimate strength, putting his village before himself. But when the Akatsuki defeat him and take him away, the leaf village shinobi come to help the sand village get their leader back.

Time and time again, Gaara and Naruto show the level of friendship that keeps getting stronger, irrespective of what goes on in either of the villages. Personally, I like the fact that Sasuke and Naruto are best friends. But I think, subconsciously, Naruto is closer to Gaara than Sasuke.