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In Jump Festa 2023, a global popularity poll named Narutop99 was announced in celebration of Naruto's 20th Anniversary. Under this, the character with the maximum number of votes is set to receive their own manga series illustrated by the series' mangaka, Masashi Kishimoto.
Voting for the global popularity poll concluded on January 31, 2023. It started from December 17, 2022, and ended on January 31, 2023. During this time, fans have been voting every day for their favorite character in hopes of making them the winner. Now, with the poll having concluded, it is time for fans to wait for the results to be announced.
Narutop99 results will be declared in April
Narutop99 is the first ever voting poll for the series that was conducted worlwide. There were over 450 unique characters for the audience to choose from. Fans got to vote everyday from December 17, 2022 to January 31, 2023 for their favourite character in the series. Now, with everything over, fans will have to wait until April to find out who finally wins.
The entire duration of the poll was being covered by the official Naruto Twitter account NARUTO OFFICIAL aka @NARUTO_info_en. They provide fans with all the latest info from Shueisha's editorial team and keep them updated on the latest news involving the series. The account covered the poll pretty closely, and even shared a Midterm Report that was unveiled by Narutop99.
This report showed that Minato Namikaze was winning the Worldwide Character Popularity Poll with the maximum number of votes. He was followed by Itachi Uchiha and Sakura Haruno in the second and third positions, the latter of which came as a shock to many Naruto fans.
Sakura was the fastest to move up the ranks from the ninth place in the previous poll update to the third in the midterm report.
One reason for this could be that fans were really trying hard for their favorite character to win and get their own spin-off series. The top 20 characters in the poll are all set to be personally illustrated by Masashi Kishimoto. Thus, voters went the extra mile to eke out the number one spot for their favorite character so they could get the added benefits as well.
Narutop99 was promoted by Kishimoto using a special illustration that signified both his passion for the project and his love for the Naruto franchise.
He wrote this accompanying message to encourage all Naruto fans to take part in voting regularly during the poll:
"NARUTO has done many character popularity surveys in Japan's Shōnen Jump magazine, but this is our first time doing a vote on a global scale, so I'm excited to see which characters will make it to the top ranks! I'm eagerly awaiting lots of votes from fans around the world!!"
Final Thoughts
Naruto fans have been eagerly waiting for new content for a long time and they were overjoyed with the release of the Sasuke Retsuden light novel. The success of this spin-off series opened the gates for characters to have their own self-contained stories. With Narutop99, fans have clearly shown interest in the idea of a spin-off series, with millions of votes coming in everday.
There is a high chance that Minato Namikaze will be the final victor of Narutop99, which is honestly the best outcome fans can hope for. His life is full of interesting events like the Third Great Ninja War, S rank missions he took, and other extraordinary things he did during his childhood. Kishimoto can really flesh out his character and make him even more formidable if he ends up winning the poll.
