Ann Takamaki
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Ann Takamaki | |
|---|---|
| Persona character | |
 | |
| First game | Persona 5 (2016) |
| Designed by | Shigenori Soejima |
| Voiced by | |
| Portrayed by | Yuki Odera |
| In-universe information | |
| Affiliation | Phantom Thieves of Hearts |
| Nationality | Japanese |
Ann Takamaki (高巻 杏, Takamaki An; IPA: [ta̠ka̠ma̠kʲi ã̠ɴ], Anne Takamaki in the Japanese version) is one of the main characters in the 2016 video game Persona 5. She is a Japanese teenage girl and a second-year student at the fictional Shujin Academy. She is also one of the founding members of the Phantom Thieves of Hearts, a group formed with the intention of stopping wrongdoers from hurting others.
She helps establish this group in part to get revenge on one of her teachers, Suguru Kamoshida, who had been sexually harassing her and drove her friend, Shiho Suzui, to attempt suicide. While in a world called the Metaverse, Takamaki gets supernatural powers which come from her Persona, Carmen, motivated by her vengeance towards Kamoshida for his vile actions, including towards Shiho. She then adopts the Phantom Thief nickname Panther (パンサー, Pansa).
Ann Takamaki was created for Persona 5 by Shigenori Soejima who uses the Phantom Thief nickname Panther to hide her identity.[1] Director Katsura Hashino discussed how she has a foreign air to her that gets attention, but also makes her unapproachable.[2] Ann's Phantom Thief alter ego was always intended to be feline-like. Her Phantom Thief outfit consists of a skin-tight red latex catsuit with a cleavage cutout and zippers, a matching red panther mask, pink gloves, and a clip-on tail on the back of her catsuit. For her footwear, she wears dark red thigh-high boots. Unlike the current red catsuit with a matching cat mask, she was originally going to have a black dress, goggles, a tail, and thigh-high socks. Her next design was more similar to her final design, still featuring goggles and wearing a black catsuit. She lacked a cleavage window in her catsuit and wielded a crossbow instead of a whip.[1] Ann initially gains the Persona Carmen, which eventually transforms into Hecate. The designers noted that the male characters' Personas were comparatively well-known versus female characters' Personas. They felt that if all of them were based on famous gods it would be lacking in depth, so some were made obscure, including Hecate. They still made a point of ensuring that Hecate was a good fit with Ann's personality, however.[3]
Ann is voiced by Nana Mizuki in Japanese and Erika Harlacher in English.[4][5] Harlacher was contacted to voice Ann for Persona 5, with the request that she give her a voice that was like a "high school girl that was nice but not too nice." In response, she sent a couple samples, which were accepted.[6] Harlacher was excited to play Ann, talking about how she likes how snarky and confident she can be, as well as her growth in the game.[7] When examining her roles, Harlacher noted that Ann was the role that was most similar to her, and that this makes it easier to get into character.[8] She described Ann's voice as being like her own, but a little higher and said that she had a very "forward" voice.[7] She is portrayed by Yuki Odera in Persona 5: The Stage.[9]
She is portrayed by motion capture actor Natsumi Uetake in Persona 5: Dancing Star Night, who scenario writer and choreographer Teppei Kobayashi felt had a similar personality to Ann. Kojiro Ishioka, a dancer for another character, called Ann "very human" and said that Uetake danced in a human way as well. Uetake's performance mostly went well, though Kobayashi noted that she had difficulty dancing at the Persona Show Case. Because Ann has long and slender arms, it made it more difficult to dance there due to Uetake wearing boots. He also noted that Ann's hair was not well-suited for dancing, though noted that she concentrated hard for the performance to avoid hurting the quality. This caused the performance to be significantly difference when compared to a motion-captured performance. Rather than use a wig, Uetake colored her hair to make the portrayal more accurate.[10] Designer Akane Kabayashi was tasked with designing her room in this game, which she made fashionable and straightforward. She felt this was easy due to her similar tastes, though said that since it was a Western-style room, she had to adjust it by adding an air conditioner and power strip to make it more Japanese.[11]
