Priscilla S. Asagiri
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Priscilla "Priss" S. Asagiri is a fictional character from the Japanese anime series Bubblegum Crisis and its spin offs.
[edit] Background
Priss is a member of the Knight Sabers, fighting boomers with a passion in her predominantly dark blue hard suit, which features a rail gun in the fist in the original series and knuckle bombs in the 2040 series. She is a rock 'n roll singer in both versions as well as a motorcyclist with a love/hate relationship with AD Policeman Leon McNichol. Priss' band in the anime was Priss and the Replicants a reference to the movie Blade Runner and an homage to the movie Streets of Fire. She was reportedly named after the Replicant Pris, played by Daryl Hannah, in Blade Runner. Her family name means "morning mist", but interviews with the creators of the series have proven fruitless in determining the meaning of her middle initial, "S".
According to the B-Club special, Priss lost her parents in the great Kanto earthquake in 2025 and was raised in an orphanage. However, she soon ran away and teamed up with a biker gang. When her boyfriend, the gang leader, was murdered and his death declared an accident by the police, she intended to hunt down the killers by herself, but was discovered and taken in by Sylia as the Knight Saber's assault specialist, as shown in the music video "Asu E Touchdown".
According to the Bubblegum Crash! based PC-Engine game, "Crime Wave!", Priss had the following statistics:
- Height: 168cm
- Age: 20
Priss' voice actress in the original OVA, Kinuko Oomori is, in real life, a singer in the rock band which performed much of the music for Bubblegum Crisis. Originally, because her contract did not allow her to participate in the series for too long, her character Priss was slated to die in episode six, Red Eyes, and be replaced by the character Vision (Reika Chang) who appears in episode seven, Double Vision. However, Priss was saved by fan and staff complaints.
[edit] Original Series
In the original series Priss is noted for her hair cut with a distinct cowlick and her fiery personality. She has an extremely bad temper and hates virtually all authority figures, namely the AD Police, in addition to boomers. Priss's bad temper often led her into trouble when someone, usually above her social status, offended her and she inevitably lashed out at them, with the offender often turning out to be a boomer. Much to her frustration and annoyance, AD Policeman Leon McNichol would like to win her heart, but she grows to tolerate him as the series goes on. She sang lead for a band called the Replicants. The origin of her anger towards the AD Police was that her boyfriend was killed by corporate agents and the ADP closed the investigation as an accident. Sylia found her when she started her revenge campaign and recruited her as a Knight Saber after that.
At the time, Priss was far and away the most popular character of the BGC anime, in part perhaps because of her voice actress, Kinuko Oomori. When Oomori was unavailable to reprise the part for Bubblegum Crash, BGC lost much of its staying power. Priss was originally slated to die in the sixth episode, Red Eyes, and to be replaced by another character, Reika Chang, AKA: Vision, but a fan backlash changed this to keep Priss alive.
[edit] 2040 Series
The Priss of 2040 is the polar opposite of her OAV counterpart. No longer rash and over emotional, the 2040 Priss is stoic and cold, with only subtle signs of a passionate temper brewing beneath her icy and distrustful exterior. She is easily identified by her mostly leather biker gear, pale skin, and long, ratty, stringy brown hair, and cat like eyes. Much more of a mercenary than in the original series, she still functions as a Knight Saber combatant, a much more hardened and focused one. She sings for a band called Sekira. Initially, Priss appears to be romantically interested in Nigel Kirkland, the stoic, sullen mechanic who tends the hard suits, only to discover towards the end of the series that he is already involved with Sylia.
This new, mostly unemotional Priss is the polar opposite of her four teammates, the elegant Sylia, the idealistic Linna and the naive Nene. Sylia sometimes teased Priss about her unattractive appearance and advises, mostly in jest, that she should clean herself up more often and dress in a manner that would be more flattering and complimentary to her, which Priss often ignores.
Priss's unattractive appearance does not seem to bother her fans or her ardent admirer, the hulking, Herculean AD Policeman Leon McNichol, but her relationship with him is developed more here than in the original series; they do end up romantically involved, and even then Priss is the one who "wears the pants" in the relationship. While she does eventually warm up to her fellow Knight Sabers (she appears to be closer with Sylia than either Nene or Linna), she still prefers to distance herself from them, and is very protective of her privacy. She more or less saves the world in the final episode from Galatea.
| Bubblegum Crisis | |
| Bubblegum Crisis - Bubblegum Crash - Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040 | |
| AD Police | Similar setting |
|---|---|
| AD Police Files - AD Police: To Serve and Protect | Parasite Dolls |
| Characters | |
| Knight Sabers: Sylia Stingray - Priss Asagiri - Linna Yamazaki - Nene Romanova | |
| AD Police: Leon McNichol - Daley Wong - Chief Todo - Jeena Malso | GENOM: Brian J. Mason - Quincy Rosencroitz |
| Other characters: Mackie Stingray - Fargo - Nigel Kirkland - Galatea - Boomers | |
