Madara Uchiha (うちはマダラ, Uchiha Madara) is a legendary shinobi who led the Uchiha clan prior to, and after the formation of Konohagakure. After allying with his rival, Hashirama Senju and the Senju clan, he and his clan helped in the founding of Konoha.[3] He eventually came to an impasse with Hashirama, and defected from the village. He was later seemingly killed by his rival at the battle at the Valley of the End, but in fact went into hiding to begin his decades-long plot, known as the Eye of the Moon Plan, which was continued by Obito Uchiha who later joined him. Madara was eventually reincarnated by Kabuto Yakushi during the Fourth Shinobi World War, and later revived as a living person by Obito. He is one of the main antagonists of the series. Upon his revival, Madara is one of the last three living Uchiha.

Contents[show]
Background
Hashirama and Madara as kids
Madara meeting Hashirama.
Before the era of ninja villages, Madara was one of five brothers born to Tajima Uchiha. However, three of Madara's brothers died at the hands of the Senju, leaving him and his younger brother Izuna. Madara was considered one of the most gifted members of the Uchiha clan alongside Izuna. Madara often competed with Izuna as training.[4] Even by his clan's standards, Madara's chakra was especially strong.[5] As a child, Madara met Hashirama Senju for the first time and became rivals at skipping stones. With their first meeting cut short after discovering the body of a member of the Hagoromo clan, the two would later meet again and Madara questioned Hashirama revealed that his brother had been killed in battle. Telling Hashirama that he himself once had four brothers, the pair discussed the prospect of peace for the world. It was here that Madara was finally able to skip his rock to the other side of the river.[6] As they grew older, Madara's rivalry with Hashirama increased,[7] and the two would meet by the riverbank, where they would spar and talk about changing the future. On one such occasion, Hashirama brought up the prospect of creating a village where children would not be sent to war and could grow up to be strong warriors.[8]

Madara awakens his sharingan
Madara awakens his Sharingan.
These meetings were not to last, however, as Madara's father Tajima soon found out about the two boys meeting and planned an ambush. However, the two boys warned one another in time, and as they fled, their fathers and brothers confront one another.[9] After the initial scuffle, Madara and Hashirama intervened, getting between their respective families. Madara, realising that he had to chose between Hashirama and their dream or his family, regretfully decided to end his friendship with the young Senju, determined to protect his brother Izuna. Hashirama tried to make Madara reconsider, but Madara refused to let go of his anger for the Senju. He announced his full name to Hashirama, awakening his Sharingan.[10]

Hashirama and madara clash
Madara and Hashirama clash on the battlefield.
From then on, Madara would constantly battle Hashirama with the intent of erasing him from his past.[11] Eventually, he and Izuna awakened the Mangekyō Sharingan. With their newly obtained power, the two brothers became the head of the clan, with Madara becoming its leader.[12] Sometime afterwards, Madara and Izuna fought Hashirama and Tobirama, where Izuna was mortally wounded by Tobirama. Madara retreated and Izuna died from his wounds but left Madara his eyes, granting him the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan.[13] Madara later confronted Hashirama again with his new found ocular prowess, but nonetheless, after a day-long battle, he was finally defeated. Noting that he could not trust them any more, Madara told Hashirama that the only way to regain this trust was to either kill himself or his brother.[13] When Hashirama resolved to kill himself, Madara stopped him, noting his courage and accepted the truce.[14]

UchihaSenjuTruce
Konohagakure is formed.
The Senju, the Uchiha, and all the clans they had conquered came together to form the ninja village Madara and Hashirama once dreamed of together.[15] Ultimately, it was Madara who named the village Konohagakure. Madara's relationship with Hashirama steadily became much like from their childhood, sharing their ideas and hopes. When Hashirama told Madara about the plans for the village leader, who would be known as the Hokage, he wished to give the title of Hokage to Madara. Tobirama, however, noted that this should be a democratic decision and not a unilateral one, citing that in any case, the villagers would never accept Madara as such.[16] Madara, who was spying on the Senju siblings, began to grow uneasy from this lack of trust, doubting the worth of this village.[17] During the time he was a shinobi of Konohagakure, Madara approached Mū and Ōnoki where he informed them that despite the alliance that Iwagakure had made with Konoha, his village was to remain the dominant power and that from that point on, they would obey Konoha.[18] Afterwards, Madara fought and defeated them when they engaged him in battle.[19]

Later, Hashirama would instead be elected as Hokage and at the Naka Shrine, Hashirama expressed his wish that Madara inherit the title of Second Hokage once the villagers started seeing him in another light, however, Madara noted that Tobirama would more than likely inherit that title, and that when he did, it would not bode well for the Uchiha.[20] Madara's breaking point, however, came after deciphering the tablet beneath the Naka Shrine and discovering the true origins of all shinobi, which left him greatly in despair upon realising mankind became cursed to repeat history.[21] Later meeting in the Naka Shrine, Madara told Hashirama his intent on leaving the village and he had a plan to make his dream become a reality while at the same time, falling victim to the Curse of Hatred once again.[22] Hashirama tried to convince Madara to let him help his childhood friend, but Madara scoffed at Hashirama's attempt to follow him, saying that no one can get behind him.[23]

Hashirama Senju VS Madara Uchiha
Madara with the Nine-Tails battling Hashirama
Abandoned by his clan, Madara left the village, sought out Kurama, and subdued it using his Sharingan.[24][25] He later returned in order to challenge Hashirama in battle, fighting at the site that would someday be called the Valley of the End.[26][27] The battle waged well into the night, leaving both shinobi battered and exhausted and Madara stripped of his control over Kurama.[28] With both of them too weak to use their strongest techniques anymore, they made one final clash, leaving Madara the one standing and looking down over Hashirama in victory.[29] However, due to not having enough chakra to access his Sharingan, Madara couldn't tell that the defeated Hashirama was actually a clone, and was shocked to find the real Hashirama standing behind him and stabbing him through the chest.[30] Quickly losing consciousness, Madara vowed that one day Konohagakure would be shrouded in darkness, and appeared to have died from his wound.[31]

In spite of this, Madara survived the stab wound given to him by Hashirama and went into hiding. He then used Hashirama's cells, which he had acquired on the battlefield, and transplanted them into his wounds.[32] Though he noted that nothing happened at first, when he was nearing the end of his natural lifespan, he awakened the Rinnegan.[32] He also acquired the Wood Release kekkei genkai,[33][34] and with both Senju and Uchiha DNA — the ability to summon the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path.[32] He later transplanted his Rinnegan eyes into Nagato without the young man knowing,[32] and replaced his left eye with a spare Sharingan.[35] Years later, Madara had been reduced to using the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path as a life support system, constantly being supplied chakra by it or else he would die immediately.[36] Also from the stolen cells of Hashirama, Madara used the statue to cultivate a living clone of Hashirama.[37][32]

Obito encounters Madara
An elderly Madara speaking with Obito.
During the Third Shinobi World War, he saved Obito Uchiha after the battle of Kannabi Bridge, using artificial mass to replace the destroyed half of Obito's body.[37] He told Obito that he would have to repay his debt to him slowly.[35] Madara then left White Zetsu and a spiral-patterned clone with the task of guarding Obito and helping him with his rehabilitation, so he could be useful to him by the time he woke up.[38] After Obito returned to him as he had predicted, Madara, now certain that Obito was sincere, carried him into a genjutsu and told him about the Sage of the Six Paths and the Ten-Tails.[39] He then explained how he had awakened the Rinnegan, gained access to the empty shell of the Ten-Tails, and cultivated Hashirama's cells.[40][41][42][43] He would go on to teach him among other things various kinjutsu, advanced Uchiha techniques, the Yin–Yang Release, and the power of the Rinnegan. Before passing, Madara also created Black Zetsu by pouring his will into White Zetsu and also left part of his will in the chakra receiver which extends from the statue's navel. With that, Madara disconnected himself from the statue and, with his dying breath, told Obito to go and, until the time he was revived, he was to act under his name.[44]

Fulfilling the legendary Uchiha's request, Obito, now known as "Tobi", began operating under his name while concealing his face. Due to his first-hand knowledge of Madara's actions and deeds, other shinobi were led to believe he was in fact the legendary ninja himself. However, thanks to researching the matter with Orochimaru, Kabuto Yakushi learned the truth behind Madara's time after the Valley of the End and actual death, reincarnating the ninja to blackmail Tobi into letting him aid him during the Fourth Great Shinobi World War where Kabuto partly exposed Tobi's deception.[45]

Personality
Madara Rage
The initial dynamics between Madara and Hashirama when they were children.
As a child, Madara was very kind, temperamental, highly competitive, and wanted to perfect everything he did.[46] Despite this, he was apologetic and highly sensitive to his surroundings, as revealed when he comically stated that he wasn't able to urinate with others standing behind him, and when he constantly tried to comfort Hashirama when he thought he hurt his feelings. Madara was also prone to angry outbursts when he got annoyed, as referenced when Hashirama would tease him about not being able to skip a rock to the other edge of a river when they were boys. According to a young Hashirama Senju, Madara Uchiha had a god complex, even as a child.[47] Due to the harsh nature of the times they lived in, Madara believed that the only way to survive in the shinobi world was to make allies with your enemies, an ideal shared by his rival, whom eventually became his close friend and ally.[48] Madara and Hashirama came to care about each other over their own clans going as far as to purposely leak information to each other about a trap their respective clans laid out.[49][50] For a brief time as an adult, Madara tried to believe in the old ideals, this was seen when he initially felt guilt and remorse as he stopped Hashirama from killing himself, which lead to Madara acknowledging and admitting to Hashirama's resolve, this lead to him accepting Hashirama's truce, that then lead to Konoha being founded; as he and Hashirama rekindled their friendship, even reacting with the same mannerisms he used to have.[51] Relating to this, he also lamented what he thought it was all his fault that he failed to his protect his siblings as a result he felt deep grief and remorse, for what he thought was inability to protect his loved ones lives, despite him having been a child at that time; when learning about their deaths a bit too late.[52]

Madara also possessed tremendous love for his younger brother Izuna, which according to Hashirama, was far greater than Itachi Uchiha's love for Sasuke.[53] As his other three brothers died in battle with the Senju clan, Madara became extremely father-like, compassionate, and protective of Izuna and swore that he would never let him die.[54] He was also very competitive with Izuna as they honed their skills by training together, but was nonetheless close with him.[4]He was so close to Izuna, that Izuna even gave him his eyes as a means of better protecting their clan's future.[13] However, after the constant battles between the Uchiha and Senju clans, which eventually resulted in Izuna's death, Madara became bitter and vengeful toward the Senju, causing him to embrace his own clan's Curse of Hatred and beginning his descent into darkness.[55]

Madara's corruption damaged his relationship with Hashirama, leading him to oppose the truce offered to him by Hashirama because his rival still had a sibling while Madara had lost all of his. Additionally, when Hashirama was selected to be Hokage instead of Madara, the latter defected from Konoha and attempted to attack the village after failing to replace him.[56][57] Despite repairing and rekindling his friendship with Hashirama during his clash with Mū and Ōnoki, Madara still had a sense of rivalry and hatred towards Hashirama, going as far as to forbid Ōnoki from mentioning that name in front of him ever again.[18] He also became angry when Hashirama mentioned the words "our brothers" during their battle.[58] Despite the fact Hashirama meant the entire Senju and Uchiha clans and the villagers of Konoha, Madara became offended as it reminded him of Izuna.[58] Nevertheless, Madara possesses a high level of respect and admiration for Hashirama as well as the Senju name as seen during the Fourth Shinobi World War where he would praise and curse Hashirama or other members of the clan in the same breath.[59] Conversely, he lamented that he would have taught Hashirama how to resurrect himself if he had known how much weaker the modern day shinobi would be compared to them.[60] Madara also acknowledged Hashirama's superior combat skills as he openly admitted during his battle with the five Kage that only Hashirama is capable of stopping him, despite his various enhancements and additional abilities provided by Kabuto's modifications.[61]

Madara's arrogance
Madara showing his disdain for his opponents.
As he grew older, Madara became very self-confident, disciplined, and spiteful, witnessed in his belittlement of Ōnoki both after his reincarnation and in the past,[18] his berating of Mei Terumī's technique[62] and his degradation of Tsunade while comparing her to her grandfather, after saying he would kill her first out of the five Kage because she was a Senju.[63] He is also quick to reprimand others for recklessness or stupidity, as he berated Tsunade for attacking him without thinking of how the other Kage would be treated if she was killed,[64] the five Kage as a group for worrying too much about the flowers in his technique and not watching their backs,[65] and Obito for trying to use Ten-Tails' Tailed Beast Ball against the Allied Shinobi Forces, which could have possibly injured the beast itself.[66] He also has a habit of referring to fighting as 'dancing'.[67] However, Madara is an honest individual and isn't above praising the abilities of others as he openly called both Mei and A's abilities an impressive offence,[68] and Gaara and Ōnoki's manoeuvre an impressive defence,[69] as well as commending the two for being able to stop his first meteorite,[70] and later Naruto for countering his Wood Release attack.[71] Having respect for Naruto, Madara tried to reason with him that the Eye of the Moon Plan was for the good of mankind.[72] He is also willing to admit when he is wrong as after Tsunade tag-teamed him with A, he admitted she was not weak at all.[73] Despite his pride and confidence in his immense power, Madara is shown to be highly vigilant, regardless of the situation, as he created a wood clone of himself at some point when the five Kage lost sight of him, in order to lessen the chances that they would catch him off guard.[74][75][76] Madara also had no remorse forcing Obito to use the Samsara of Heavenly Life Technique despite the fact it would result in the latter's death; while only lamenting that he did not get the chance to face Hashirama Senju one last time, before becoming the Ten-Tails' jinchūriki.[77]

Madara has a macabre sense of humour, as shown when he created multiple wood clones and surrounded each of the five Kage with five clones — thereby reversing the original five vs. one situation — and asked if they preferred the clones to use Susanoo or not.[78] He also referred to incinerating the forest as "creating coal" after knocking the five Kage into it,[79] and when asked by Naruto what had happened to the Kage, he stated that they were "not doing so well.",[80] as well as describing the Ten-Tails' enormous and destructive attack as a form of fun.[81] He has a very jaded and emotionless approach towards the tragedies of war, to the point of light-heartedly joking about them, as seen from his cheer at having "destroyed the alliance's mind", which further demonstrates his knack for reversing the situations he finds himself in.[82] Madara is also something of an enormous show off, as shown in his use of extremely powerful techniques in rapid succession, all the while, expressing satisfaction to having done it. He even commented to the five Kage, after being interrupted from killing them with his final Susanoo, that using such powerful techniques more than once in a battle would be disgraceful.[83] He also purposely let himself get hit by Ōnoki's attack in order to show Hashirama's face on his chest to lower the morale of the Kage, but he was also very disappointed that it had the exact opposite effect.[84]

Insane Madara
Madara's reaction after sensing Hashirama's presence.
Madara is treacherous by nature as, after the alliance with Iwagakure was made, he immediately betrayed Mū and Ōnoki, expecting them to follow Konohagakure's lead from then on, displaying a sense of loyalty to his village in his own way.[18] He also embedded chakra receivers into Obito's artificial body as a fail safe to have himself revived.[85] The Uchiha also believed Madara stole Izuna's eyes by force in order to escape blindness.[86] He is also a battle-loving and battle-hungry individual, commenting that he had not enjoyed this view in a long time while surveying the battlefield during the Fourth Shinobi World War as well as in his not using more power than he has to in order to drag on fights.[87] Relating to this, Madara enjoys a challenging fight and said that anything less than the five Kage against him would be inadequate; and in stopping Hashirama Senju from intervening with trying to defeat Obito Uchiha as the Ten-Tails jinchūriki from completing the Eye of the Moon Plan; simply to satisfy his love for battle.[88][89][90] Madara is also very fearless when it comes to battle, shown in his ready assault of an entire platoon of shinobi upon being attacked, despite being severely outnumbered[91] and in his ready to assault Hashirama's Sage Art: Wood Release: True Several Thousand Hands despite it being several times larger than his own weapon.[92] Due to the times he lived in, Madara believes it is natural for shinobi to spend their entire lives in battle.[93] Despite his love of battle, Madara never loses his composure to excitement or fear in any of his battle situations with the exceptions being his excitement upon sensing Hashirama's chakra, showing a malicious smile with an bloodthirsty look on his face as well as in his resurrection, expressing excitement with the same bloodthirsty expression on his face.[94][95] Madara was also shown to act somewhat like a child when Hashirama showed up to the battlefield briefly, suggesting Hashirama has somewhat of a positive impact on Madara's personality despite Madara's cruel and sadistic nature.[96] Madara is also shown to have a superiority complex as shown in his disgust when being forced to fight a battle he has become bored of, despite his overall love for battle.[97]

Madara has been described as being hostile and aggressive by nature as well as being very ambitious, the latter of which was seen during his rise to the position of clan leader[12][98][99] as well as his desire to make his clan superior out of what Tobi claimed was Madara's great love for them.[86] Madara had a sense of honour as, prior to their betrayal of him, he wanted to protect the Uchiha clan from the possibility of oppression by the Senju after failing to rally support.[100] Madara also views the tailed beasts as nothing more than masses of energy and tools too lacking in intelligence and sapience to think for themselves and as such, need to be "guided" by the Uchiha to learn their purpose and believes that they are but slaves to those with blessed eyes.[25] Madara also believes power is something tangible that can be passed down through generations and that the will of a dead person cannot be inherited, as it is not tangible.[101] He also thinks that humanity can't change from what it was in the past and believes that as such, mankind would be better served sleeping peacefully in an Infinite Tsukuyomi.[93] Despite his aggressiveness, Madara has shown himself to be capable of showing mercy, as he refused to fight against severely wounded opponents[102] and those he views as "children", such as Ōnoki.[103] He is also somewhat of a perfectionist as, despite Obito claiming that the Ten-Tails' revival does not have to be perfect to advance the Eye of the Moon Plan,[104] Madara noted this, along with his revival being different from the original plan, as acts of impatience and proceeded to correct the mistake and in his refusal to fight Hashirama's wood clone and preferred to wait until he can fight the real one.[105][106] Madara was also shown to not be the type to hold a grudge as shown when the reincarnated Hokage joined the battle, Madara didn't say anything to Tobirama for killing Izuna nor did he mention this to Tobirama after Konoha's founding and not showing anger or disdain for Hashirama when the latter was reincarnated; showing that Madara didn't hold a grudge on his rival for defeating him.[107][108][109] Madara is also shown to be very collected as he simply brushed off the fact that he failed to revive himself and prepared to use his next trump card.[110]

After using his Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan to further decipher the Uchiha Stone Monument, Madara felt helpless, because he came to believe humans were cursed to fight each other.[111] After learning this Madara claimed that he set in motion the Eye of the Moon Plan in order to save humanity from its curse.[112] Whether the Curse of Hatred had any influence in Madara making this decision is currently unknown.

As an old man, Madara seemed to be very bitter and disillusioned about the current reality, which he regards as worthless, noticing that in this world someone always must be the "loser" for there to be a "winner", likely referring to his constant streak of failures against Hashirama. This is what motivated him to wish to change the world via the Eye of the Moon Plan, and he would pass on this mindset to Obito. After his reincarnation, Madara noted that Obito had become much like him,[113] in both actions and attitude — something which Madara seemed pleased about.[114]

Appearance
Madara enfant
Madara as a child.
Madara was a fair-skinned man with spiky, black hair that had a slight, blue tint to it. In his younger days, his hair was shoulder-length and he wore the standard Uchiha clan outfit: a high collared black shirt with the clan's crest on its back, which Madara tended to leave slightly open, and blue pants with bandages around his shins. Around his waist, he had a sash that held a sack, presumably containing his ninja tools.[4] During later years, his sash was replaced by a belt, adorned with pouches and various weapons. He also wore another sash strapped across his shoulders which he used to hold his numerous swords.[115]

Madara Uchiha
Madara as he appeared during Konoha's founding.
By adulthood, Madara's black hair had grown to waist-length with shoulder-length bangs framing the sides of his face, covering most of his right eye. Although still relatively young, more prominent creases had developed under each of his eyes. Prior to his accepting Hashirama's truce, Madara's attire consisted of the Uchiha clan's traditional outfit without an armour. After accepting the truce, his attire took the form of the standard shinobi dress of his era, consisting of bright red armour constructed from numerous metal plates, formed into multiple protective guards along his body, in particular: chest, waist, shoulders and thighs. This clothing was accompanied by a indigo long-sleeved shirt, boots and gloves, as well as his village's indigo forehead protector after the truce with the Senju and founding of Konohagakure,[116][117][18][118][119] but this was discarded upon his defection.[120][121][122][123] During battle, he often carried an orange-brown war fan which had a long black chain running up it, in addition to having white bandages wrapped around the handle on his back that had a black mitsudomoe pattern, coloured bright red, in both of the top corners. Prior to his departure from Konoha, he switched back to his traditional clan attire with the Uchiha crest on the back, in addition to regaining his blue armoured chest plate and still sported the standard blue forehead protector briefly. The anime also shows him wearing a metal belt, as well as a brown leather sash to hold some of his other weapons, and a pair of belt sashes to hold two of his swords.

In his old age, Madara became extremely worn and emaciated, with his black hair from his youth turned thin and white. He wore a simple black outfit, and had three thick chords running from his spine, to the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path to sustain his life. He was also missing a right eye, and used his kama as a makeshift cane.[124][125] When Madara was reincarnated during the Fourth Shinobi World War, in addition to the generic effect of gaining grey sclerae and minor cracks about his being, his body's youth was restored with the addition of a pale replica of Hashirama's face on the Uchiha's left pectoral region.[126] After truly reviving himself through Obito, Madara's cracks disappeared, showing his complete restoration.[127]