A perfect increase in variety and a fine ending for the fillers would have been an arc in which Konoha had attacked an another hidden village, and Naruto & company's mission would have been to decimate the defenders, loot their treasures, and burn the place to the ground. An arc like that would have allowed Shikamaru and Neji to regain their leadership believability, and the rest just have hard fights against multiple and different opponents. Would have also raised a bit different moral issues, since the morality of various actions is often so strongly under inspection in Naruto.