Naruto's Kakashi Hakate is everything anyone would want out of a 2000s-era bishōnen. He
checks all the boxes of the "beautiful boy" character type: he's tall and mysterious,
has spiky white hair, and is hyper-competent and stylized in battle. Being mysterious and
aloof are the foremost elements that make Kakashi so compelling, and nothing highlights
his mystery more than the omnipresent mask obscuring the lower half of his face. Many
other ninjas in Naruto have costumes that obscure part or all of their face, but the
mystique around Kakashi's reached a level of interest to which no other character can
compare.
"What are you hiding under that mask… “
“What? You want to know what’s behind my mask?”
"Yeah."
A prevailing Naruto fan theory links the compulsory need for Kakashi to mask his face back to
his father, Sakumo, also known as the White Fang of Konoha. The Hatake clan are a historically
significant one in the ninja village, and Sakumo was a legend in his own right, which
meant his son Kakashi had a lot to live up to.
After a mission gone wrong when Kakashi was a child, however, Sakumo opted to abandon
the objective and pull his team members out before their lives could be lost. For this
act, he was vilified as a coward by the people of Konoha in the aftermath. The rejection
by his people drove Sakumo to depression and ultimately death.
Naruto fans like to believe that the dual pressures of his father's once-illustrious
legacy and his subsequent downfall drive Kakashi to obscure his face, since he looks just like
his father and may want to dampen the possibility of immediate recognition.
Naruto creator Masashi Kishimoto has in the past explained some of his rationale in masking
Kakashi's face, and it's not quite that exciting. Kishimoto has explained that, since ninjas
are inherently mysterious people, he thought giving them masks would amp up that enigmatic
quality. However, Kishimoto realized that masking everyone would make illustrating expressions
difficult, so the general concept was abandoned and Kakashi became unique.
Whatever Kishimoto's original intent, it's safe to say that Kakashi's masked face is
now a running gag, and denying the audience and fellow characters a look at his face is
the punchline. Everyone wants to know what's underneath the mask. How does Kakashi eat?
Does he sleep with it on? Why is it there?
These are all questions posed by characters on the series, and such inquisition actually
became the focus of episode 101 of the anime; in English, it's called "Gotta See! Gotta
Know! Kakashi-sensei's True Face!". Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura spend the entirety of the
episode scheming to catch Kakashi without his mask on. Kakashi, however, is immediately
wise to the stalking and deliberately fakes them out at every turn. At the end of the
episode, Naruto, true to form, explodes and simply demands to know what Kakashi has under
his mask. Kakashi finally lets him in on the secret.
"Behind this mask… is another mask! Pretty cool, huh?"
That's it — that's the episode.
Over a decade later, another flashback episode revisits the team's eternal struggle to know
what's beneath Kakashi's mask. The episode has Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke still wondering
what their teacher looks like when they're approached by a local photographer named Sukea.
He, too, is very interested in getting pictures of Kakashi without his mask on — it would
be the biggest scoop of his journalism career in Konoha, after all.
After more convoluted misadventures, the kids fail once again in their task and give up.
However, Sukea has been Kakashi in a wig and makeup the whole time. It's the Clark Kent
Twist: nobody recognizes him with the mask off. The kids never learn the truth, and Kakashi
says he wants to mess with them more before fessing up, but at last we know what he looks
like. There's no big shock to it: he looks perfectly normal, but he might be a little
shy about the mole you can see on his jaw. There's no need for him to feel embarrassed.
The mark is distinctive and adds character. What's a little beauty mark in the grand scheme?
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