Jay's Toy Shelf : S.H. Figuarts

One thing that was very absent from the first part of the Naruto anime was: Where in the world are his parents?!? Basically, no one talked about it, including Naruto. Based on inference, the audience deduces that Naruto was somewhat raised and provided for as a baby by the Third Hokage (See Kakashi post for what that means), but by the time he's 12ish he's basically completely on his own, down to living in a studio apartment and using mission money to buy food and the like. At that point, we only knew that his parents both sacrificed themselves to seal the Nine-tails Demon Fox inside him. Naruto grows up not knowing the identity of his parents, with the (somewhat weak) explanation that no one is allowed to talk about that particular time given how many died fighting off the attack. In a pretty clear instance of dramatic irony, we definitely know that Minato Namikaze, the Fourth Hokage, is his father. The Shippuden series later clears up a lot of details of that attack, and how Minato died.

The Shippuden series also put him in several other flashbacks and episodes. We find out that not only was Minato the Fourth Hokage and Naruto's father, but he was also the team leader for Team Minato which included Obito Uchiha, Rin Nohara and...Kakashi! To his enemies, he was known as the Yellow Flash, due to the use of his teleportation ability that allowed him to instantly blink across short distances. Despite being dead he does pop back up into anime in some interesting ways (no I'm not telling you! Go watch the show!).

The figure for Minato is great in so many ways, with maybe one major gripe. The sculpt and paint is dead-on to what he looks like in the anime. He includes some great accessories like his smiling closed-eyed face, his Flying Thunder God technique kunai, Rasengan and many extra hands.
One grip is his Fourth Hokage cloak. It's got great paint and form, but it's a really hard plastic, so doesn't give to allow a ton of movement. If this figure had been made by the same company today, they would've definitely given the option as they are doing with Naruto Sage Mode of allowing the jacket to be removed and the arms popped back on. Live and learn!

Sculpt/Paint: 4/5 Really well done, he even has a bit of shading on his pants and jacket! More of it on his skin tones would've been nice too. I don't really have much aside that to complain about. The characters, Yondaime Hokage, on the back are well done!

Articulation: 4/5 (34 PoA) Also very good at face value, but really limited by the cape. He's got all the good stuff: drop-down hinge hips with a swivel built in, double joints, toe joint, butterfly shoulders and double ball peg neck. The collar is stiff, so that limits his head movement while the jacket limits his leg and hip movement.

Price/Availability: 4/5 Good. He's still available online in a few places and pretty reasonably on Amazon of all places.

Accessories: 5/5 Aside have a GIANT Kurama/Nine-tailed Fox (Statue releasing in Dec. 2018), he has everything he needs! Special kunai, Rasengan, hands, and alternate faces. His kunai has amazing little detail in Kanji that reads "The Sword of Endurance" or something like it. Like I said previously, it'd be awesome if they had made the clock removable in some way like they are doing with Sage Mode Naruto.

Fun Factor: 4/5 He's a top 10, but not top 5. The restrictions are most of what put him one under
since once you try to pose his torso down, it's very hard to balance him. There are fewer dynamic poses and crouching poses, but he's still pretty awesome and given how much he is in the actual show, I'm happy they even made this figure!

Verdict: 21/25 Great! He's an awesome figure for the Naruto line, and there are lots of good options putting him alongside Naruto, Kakashi, and Jiraiya.