Masashi Kishimoto
In September 1999, the serialized version of "Naruto" premiered in "Weekly Shōnen Jump 1999 No. 43" and quickly became a hit. "Naruto" ended on November 10, 2014 after more than 15 years of serialization, with a total of 700 chapters collected in 72 volumes. Sales have exceeded 113 million copies in Japan and over 95 million copies in the US, followed by over 93 million copies worldwide (outside Japan and United States) as of volume 36. Making total sales for the series approximately 301 million copies. Kishimoto was also the winner of "Rookie of the Year" for the series in the Agency for Cultural Affairs. It was adapted into two successful anime series, "Naruto" and "Naruto Shippuden". Kishimoto requested that Tetsuya Nishio oversee the character designs of "Naruto" when the manga was adapted into an anime series. The "Naruto" manga series became one of Viz Media's top properties, accounting for nearly 10% of all manga sales in the US in 2006. The seventh volume of Viz's release became the first manga to ever win a Quill Award when it claimed the award for "Best Graphic Novel" in 2006. Responding to "Naruto"'s success, Kishimoto said in "Naruto Collector Winter 2007/2008" that he was "very glad that the American audience has accepted and understood ninja. It shows that the American audience has good taste... because it means they can accept something previously unfamiliar to them." While writing the manga, Kishimoto met Eiichiro Oda, author of "One Piece" who he considered his rival. When "Naruto" ended, Oda left a message in the series' final volume acknowledging him as a rival. According to Kishimoto "That felt so gratifying." Additionally, before the anime adaptation's premiere of "My Hero Academia", he praised Kōhei Horikoshi's work, believing it would be a success overseas. Additionally, Kishimoto referred to Yoshihiro Togashi as one of his favorite artists.
Sakura Haruno
Although Sakura Haruno is the most recurring female character in "Naruto", Masashi Kishimoto did not originally intend for Sakura to be the heroine of the series. Kishimoto attributed this to him being unable to draw good heroine characters and fashioned Sakura as a girl who could not understand men, the best example of a heroine he could come up with. Sakura's creation is a result of Kishimoto's desire to make a somewhat irritating character who was well-intentioned. Despite these elements, Kishimoto is fond of Sakura, as he feels that many of her personality traits are common among all people, thus giving her a sense of real humanity. When asked in an interview if there was something about Sakura's background that had not been revealed, Kishimoto explained that he had never thought of that as Sakura is a "normal girl". Kishimoto has often been asked by readers about why he did not show Sakura's parents until the film "". In response, he said this would not be entertaining as Sakura did not belong to any clan unlike other characters so her parents were civilians.
When designing Sakura, Kishimoto focused on her silhouette and created a costume as simple as possible. This is a divergence from the other main characters of the series, whose costumes are very detailed. The leggings are the most notable aspect of her design, as they are meant to show that she is very active. At the start of the series, her leggings extended below her knees and closely resembled trousers. As Part I progressed, the leggings became increasingly shorter and tighter. Similar to his inexperience in drawing heroines, Kishimoto lacked the experience needed to make Sakura "cute" when he first began drawing her; although he implied that her appearance had become cuter since then, Kishimoto and much of the "Naruto" manga staff agreed that Sakura had been "far from cute" at the start of the series. In retrospective, he found Sakura one of the hardest characters to draw, alongside Sasuke Uchiha. Kishimoto first planned Sasuke and Sakura's romance in the early production of "Naruto". In regards to Sakura's feelings for Sasuke, Kishimoto tried to write them as realistic as possible but ended up getting complaints from young girls about her.