On October 10, 2022, La Poste issued a stamp in its youth series featuring Naruto, the famous cartoon hero from the manga of the same name, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the animated series and the manga’s arrival in France.

The innovative Naruto stamp and sheet feature a variety of “material effects”: red hot stamping on the Kanji in Naruto’s hand, selective varnish on the Naruto logo on the stamp and sheet edge, and a movement-effect varnish on the stamp background.

The story of Naruto the little ninja…

For orphan Naruto, the road to becoming the greatest ninja and leader of his village is long and full of obstacles. From an early age, he was feared and ostracized by his peers because a destructive demon had been locked inside his body, in the form of a nine-tailed fox. Despite his tragic fate, the ninja academy’s most rambunctious rascal, always up for a good time, gradually earns the esteem of all, overcoming hardship with his bravery, perseverance and empathy.

Since its creation in 1999, Naruto has reigned unchallenged in the world of manga comics. Far beyond Japan, the little ninja has become a worldwide phenomenon (250 million copies sold). After arriving in France twenty years ago, the manga set an all-time record in our country, topping the best-seller charts for more than… ten years! Naruto’s 72-volume quest for initiation has kept young French fans on the edge of their seats, with 20 million copies sold in twenty years, and the broadcast of the animated version on TV channels has helped anchor the hero in their hearts (over 5 million DVDs purchased since 2006).

Japan devotes a number of its stamp issues to manga, and of course to Naruto. Yvert et Tellier references dozens of series devoted to animated films or TV series inspired by manga, amounting to several hundred specific stamps. These series of 5 to 10 stamps are mostly issued in sheets with illustrated margins referring to the mangas concerned. The number of “manga” characters or scenes seems unlimited, as these stamps are part of a policy of plethoric issues of a few …hundred stamps a year in Japan (since 2015, for example, between 5 and 600 stamps a year).