Now that the series is behind us, does anybody else think that not having Jiraiya brought back as an Edo Tensei zombie during the 4th Ninja War was a missed opportunity? Naruto would have probably ROFLstomped him, but it'd have been a great character moment imo for the sensei to see how his student has really surpassed him.
I'd have to disagree.
While I do think Jiraiya should have been brought back (he was one of the greatest ninja of all time) from a Character Development Stand Point, he wasn't needed. Especially when you taking into account the variety of fights that already followed that particular theme: Gaara vs Rasa, Kankuro vs Chiyo, Kakashi vs Zabuza, Shikamaru, Ino and Chouji vs Asuma... Not as emotionally impactful, but there was also Oonoki vs the 2nd Tsuchikage and Darui vs the 3rd Raikage. With Naruto and Bee forced to sit out the early parts of the war, Jiraiya wasn't needed for that psychological factor except to, perhaps, shake up Tsunade, who hadn't taken to the field until the Real Madara showed up.
Naruto's fight with Ay was to showcase that Naruto was, if not the 4th Hokage's equal, damned close to being so and thus had already surpassed Jiraiya (really, the Pein fight showed this as well) and, regardless, was already the most powerful shinobi in the world (or pretty damn close to being so). Naruto and Bee confronting Tobi and the Edo Tensei Jinchuriki, not to mention meeting his resurrected father, put paid to him being the absolute best. As much as I like Jiraiya, he would have been superfluous at that point. Besides, in order to use Edo Tensei, you'd need a sample of the person's DNA. Considering where Jiraiya died, it was unlikely that Zetsu would have been able to recover any of his DNA. Likewise, a resurrected Konan didn't appear because of the way she died.