SAKURA KINIMOTO - TITLE ROLE&MAIN CHARACTER OF CARDCAPTOR SAKURA

Sakura Kinomoto (木之本 桜, Kinomoto Sakura?) is a fictional character, the heroine of Clamp's anime and manga series Cardcaptor Sakura. She is known as Sakura Avalon in the English anime adaptation Cardcaptors. For all Japanese-language productions of the anime (including movies, audio CDs, and video games), Sakura is voiced by Sakura Tange. For English-language productions, she is voiced by Carly McKillip through Cardcaptors and the first movie. She is voiced in the second movie by Kari Wahlgren.
Sakura is also a main character in Clamp's later work, Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle. In its anime adaptation, she is voiced by Yui Makino in Japanese and Monica Rial in English.
She is also mentioned in another Clamp title ×××HOLiC.

Name
Sakura's given name (桜) means cherry blossom. Her surname, Kinomoto (木之本), literally means the origin of wood.
In Cardcaptors, Sakura was originally going to be called "Nikki," but Nelvana kept her given name because of fan demand and the difficulty and expense of editing out numerous appearances of her name in rōmaji in the series. Her family name was changed to "Avalon." The pronunciation of her given name changed, as stress is put on the middle syllable ku, while in Japanese, the accent is on Sa. Nelvana purposefully changed the pronunciation of the name since many English names have stress on the middle syllable.

Character
At the start of the series, Sakura is ten years old and living in a fictional town called Tomoeda in Japan. On the afternoon after her first day of fourth grade at Tomoeda Elementary School (Reedington Elementary School in Cardcaptors), Sakura hears a mysterious sound coming from her father's library in the basement. She, nervously armed with her cheerleading baton, goes downstairs and finds a mysterious book named The Clow. She opens the book to find the Clow Cards, a set of fifty-two cards that contain powerful magic. Picking up the top card, Sakura reads its name aloud, "Windy." This activates the Card, summoning a large wind that blows the remaining Cards out of the house and into the distance. The guardian of the Cards, Keroberos, then emerges from the book and recruits Sakura to become the Cardcaptor to retrieve the Cards. In return, she gains the right to use the Cards' power herself. It is later revealed that Keroberos also refers to Sakura as his appointed Candidate, as he is also searching for a new Master of the Clow Cards.
Sakura is an extremely energetic and cheerful character. She is very athletic, being a member of her school's cheerleading squad and an excellent runner. Her "invincible spell", "Everything will surely be all right." (「ぜったいだいじょうぶだよ。」, "Zettai daijōbu da yo."?), has carried her through innumerable trials and obstacles as she masters her magical skills. She often comes across as naïve, clumsy, and clueless, but she has her perceptive moments on occasion.
Sakura's optimistic and trustworthy character allows her to befriend virtually everybody, and the series focuses on the friendships she creates with people, whether strangers, loose acquaintances, or rivals.
Sakura lives with her older brother, Toya Kinomoto (Tori Avalon), and her father, Fujitaka Kinomoto (Aiden Avalon). The three help manage their home together, often rotating cooking and cleaning chores. Sakura's mother, Nadeshiko Kinomoto (Natasha Avalon), died when Sakura was three years old. Sakura and her family moved to Tomoeda about three years before the start of the series, when Toya was in eighth grade and Sakura was in first grade.
Sakura's character designs for the manga were originally developed by Mokona of Clamp. She was designed to capture the image of Mokona's then two-year-old niece Kawaji. Kawaji wore short hair in pigtails much like Sakura does in the anime and manga.

Magic
Throughout the series, Sakura's magical powers get progressively stronger. This is mostly verified by Cerberus at random points in the series, as Sakura would otherwise appear to have equal expertise in each episode when she summons Clow Cards. Through the first two seasons, Cerberus's comments seem to imply that Sakura's magic grows as she battles and captures more Cards. In the third season, Sakura's inexperience is noted in Yue's criticism and Sakura's weariness after a single Card transformation. However, as she grows progressively proficient in transforming Clow Cards into Sakura Cards, she becomes less tired and more aware of Clow Reed's presence. She also remembers more details about her prophetic dreams. During the last of Eriol's trials, she is able to transform several cards at once.

to be continued...

cr: Wikipedia