

Throughout Naruto and a lot of Naruto Shippuden you can clearly see that
Naruto has a lot of affection towards Sakura. Various times he tries to ask
her out and the like but it never goes very well for him. We do eventually
learn later in "Naruto:the Last" that Naruto's feelings for Sakura were
another way for him to compete with Sasuke, but his feelings cannot be simply
denied.

My question is: has Sakura ever shown signs of love, not friendship, towards
Naruto throughout the series? When?


CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-07-12T15:05:37.507
41336
2019-05-14T19:34:01.050
34558
question
naruto
Has Sakura expressed signs of love towards Naruto?


I don't agree with the answer above or any answer on the Internet for that
matter. I watched _Naruto Shippuden_ dubbed and subbed and to my
understanding, Sakura did develop feelings for Naruto (and people usually skip
those episodes because they are fillers).

After defeating Pain, Sakura recalls her days with Naruto (not Sasuke) and
realizes that she has developed feelings for him. Later (in canon episodes),
she decides to get rid of Sasuke herself because she felt responsible for it
somehow. Sometimes, fillers are made to tune the main story and you should not
skip these fillers if you like watching this show.

Every answer I saw described the situation poorly, so I decided to pen down
the real story, in my belief.

Sakura did like Naruto, but the problem is that she was not mature enough and
believed herself "deserving" for Naruto, as he was a hero, unlike Sasuke. She
risked sabotaging Naruto and Hinata's story for her reasons. On the plus side,
Naruto knew Sakura was not meant for her so he downright says her "No" on
episode 206 (Sakura's feelings).

Later in series, she realized her "true" feelings towards Sasuke as he helped
Naruto defeating Kaguya and got what she deserved (abandoned and knocked by
her dear loverboy, whose thorns she desperately needed for 6 years)

**Update:** I rewatched the entire Shippuden again, and my new conclusions
somehow contradict this (my old answer). So here it is:

Sakura loves Naruto, but only platonic. She shares sympathy with him and they
are good friends. She cares about him and that's why she confessed her love.
There are two side-effects in the cannon because of this: 1\. Naruto realizes
that Sakura can never be together with him (the same episode Sakura proposes
to Naruto). He realizes that he actually never loved Sakura himself. And that
was the moment he knew Sakura and Sasuke belongs together. Writer stitches the
story beautifully there. And because of this, his _self-righteous_ self forces
him to sacrifice himself to bring back Sasuke. He just couldn't let Sakura
suffer anymore. As he owes that to Sasuke. 2\. Sakura gained some real heat
after this scene from fans, as she seemed to neglect Hinata. But for me, this
scene was pure satisfaction, her being rejected by our hero.

Sakura belonged to Sasuke. Naruto knew this. That was a pivoting moment of the
plot. If Sakura had never confessed her love, Naruto probably went for a kill
in the fight followed that episode. And we know he could easily swamp Sasuke
as he was tired from the Danzo fight. But again, probably Obito intervened
earlier, but in any case, the story would turn differently. So yeah, Sakura
loved Naruto. But not as much as she loved Sasuke. She had undying respect for
the former.


CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-07T16:42:39.143
46915
2019-05-14T19:34:01.050
2019-05-14T19:34:01.050
38083
38083
41336
answer