The live-action Naruto movie may have just tipped its hand. Casting listings for Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura surfaced this week, and they fill in one detail that last week's big worldwide-casting announcement left out: how old is this version of Team 7. All three characters are written at 16.
These are REPORTED casting listings and have NOT been confirmed by Lionsgate. Take every detail here with a grain of salt and subject to change until the studio releases something official.
The listings first made the rounds through the @BorutoOricon account on X and were quickly picked up by ComicBook.com. The specs are the same for all three leads: the production wants actors "16 to 20 to play 16," "Asian or Mixed Race Asian," and fluent English speakers. Filming is listed for the UK, running January through August 2027.
That's a very different Team 7 than the one fans met when the anime premiered back in 2002!
ScreenRant's breakdown of the listings adds a little personality to the paperwork. Naruto is described as "lean, athletic, energetic," Sasuke as "sharp, cool, intense," and Sakura as "athletic, toned, strong-willed." That's three for three if you ask me!
The big story here is the character's age. Part 1 of Naruto follows Team 7 at 12 and 13 years old. Naruto: Shippuden picks up after a two-and-a-half-year time jump with the trio around 15 and 16. Older, stronger, and carrying much heavier storylines. Write these characters at 16 and the early arcs are pretty much off the table. That lands the characters squarely in Shippuden territory.
That's my take. The listings never use the word Shippuden. Lionsgate could just as easily age everyone up and still start the story at the beginning, Chunin Exams and all.
What IS confirmed is the search itself. Lionsgate opened a worldwide casting call on July 9th for the three Team 7 roles through the official site, with additional characters to be cast down the line - we covered the announcement right here when it dropped. No Kakashi in this first wave, so if the Shippuden timeline holds, that eventual list gets interesting.
Destin Daniel Cretton is directing from a script he wrote with Tasha Huo, with Arad Productions and Jeremy Latcham among the producers. Cretton's calendar lines up, too: his Spider-Man: Brand New Day hits theaters July 31st, and a January start in the UK would put Naruto right at the front of his schedule once the webs are wrapped.
Masashi Kishimoto sounded like the happiest man in the industry when the announcement went out: "Right now, miracles are happening to me, one after another. My work, Naruto, is truly, truly becoming a Hollywood movie!"
This project has been in the works for a long time. Warner Bros. had a live-action Naruto in development all the way back in 2006 that never got off the ground, and Lionsgate has been chasing its own version since 2015. Cretton signed on in early 2024, and this month the whole thing finally started moving for real.
Kishimoto's manga ran in Weekly Shonen Jump from 1999 to 2014 and stands as one of the best-selling manga of all time, with the original anime and Shippuden combining for more than 700 episodes.
The anime side of the franchise is headed the other direction this year: the long-delayed 20th-anniversary specials due later in 2026 are set BEFORE the time skip, kid Team 7 and all. One franchise, both eras, at the same time.
There's a practical angle to the aging-up. An eight-month UK shoot would be a brutal schedule for 12-year-old leads, and casting 16-to-20 actors buys the production real stunt work without child-actor hour limits. The fluent-English line also fits the official announcement's worldwide framing. They're looking worldwide for this one, and not limiting themselves to a single market.
Is an aged-up Shippuden-era Team 7 the right call? If the timeline holds, which arc do you want this movie opening with?
Sound off in the comments below!
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