Kanji Tatsumi

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Kanji Tatsumi
Other Name(s)	The Bloodcurdling Beefcake EmperorPersona 4 Arena Persona 4 Arena Ultimax
Date of Birth	January 19, 1996
Age	15-16Persona 4 Persona 4 Golden Persona 4 Arena Persona 4 Arena Ultimax Persona 4: Dancing All Night Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth
Height	183 cm (6’0”)
Weight	65 kg (143 lbs)
Blood Type	A
Relative(s)	Unnamed mother Unnamed father†
School(s)	Yasogami High School
Occupation(s)	Tatsumi Textiles
Affiliation(s)	Investigation Team Yasogami High School
Arcana	Emperor
Persona(s)	Take-Mikazuchi Rokuten-Maoh Takeji-ZaitenPersona 4 Golden (Ultimate Persona)
Voice Actor(s)	Tomokazu Seki (JA) Troy BakerPersona 4 Persona 4 Golden Persona 4 Arena Persona 4 The Animation (EN) Matthew MercerPersona 4 Arena Ultimax Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth Persona 4: Dancing All Night Persona 4 The Animation (EN)
Live-Action Actor(s)	Youichirou OhmiVisualive Persona 4 Visualive Persona 4: The Evolution Eiji TakigawaPersona 4: The Ultimate in Mayonaka Arena Persona 4: The Ultimax Ultra Suplex Hold

Kanji Tatsumi is a major character in Persona 4. Kanji is a 1st year student at Yasogami High School and a member of the Investigation Team. He is also the son of the owner of Tatsumi Textiles.

Profile

Kanji is a 1st year student at Yasogami High School. He has a reputation around Inaba as a violent student delinquent after stories spread of him beating up an entire biker gang all by himself. He lives with his mother at Tatsumi Textiles in Inaba's Central Shopping District. The building serves as both the family's home and a storefront.

Personality-wise, Kanji is hot-blooded, loud and gets riled up easily, especially by Yosuke Hanamura. At one point, Kanji loses his temper after Yosuke calls him "strange", chasing him off and making threats in the process. Even if most people see him as a violent punk, Kanji is generally respectful towards other people, including his classmates, his mother, and the neighborhood children. He addresses the 2nd year students at his school, such as Yu Narukami, as senpai. He also speaks more casually towards Rise Kujikawa and is generally unphased by her status as an idol. He seems to have a close bond with Naoto Shirogane, and has also known Yukiko Amagi since he was younger.

Kanji's Shadow reveals his distance from people and his desire to be accepted. After his experience in the TV World, Kanji now wears his heart on his sleeve and speaks his mind instead of trying to conform to other people's image of him. Deep down, Kanji adores cute things, has a sweet tooth for foods like pudding, and is especially skilled at knitting and other textile crafts. He has other mannerisms that seem unbefitting to his appearance, such as eating a children's snack and wanting to find the rare shape. Kanji also appears to be a wrestling fan, evident by how he sometimes uses Japanese wrestling terminology.

Kanji has dyed hair and wears his Yasogami school jacket on his shoulders with a skull t-shirt underneath it. He accessorizes with rockabilly-inspired fashion, such as pointed shoes and a leather jacket. In the TV World, he wears a pair of tinted glasses. Kanji's finalized design intentionally looks over-the-top with elements like his skull T-shirt and the way he wears his school uniform jacket to hint at Kanji's rebelliousness being an act. In doing so, Soejima made Kanji look like something of a silly caricature of someone trying to look "manly" without knowing what that really means. Due to the rumors about Kanji, he also made his eyes look intimidating, as if people would be able to believe all of the made up things about him based purely on his appearance.

Early in development, Kanji was supposed to be older than the main cast rather than younger. Shigenori Soejima had an image in his head of Kanji being like an outlaw. But Kanji was also a school student, and Soejima thought an "outlaw student" would be someone who plays music. Additionally, for Persona 4 he had decided on a retro look to fit the outdated countryside image of Inaba. Combining music and retro together, Soejima came up with the idea of Kanji's design being American 1950s rockabilly style.

Gameplay

For complete gameplay information, see Gameplay:Kanji Tatsumi.

Kanji is the Emperor Social Link. He becomes a playable party member in June with the Persona Take-Mikazuchi.

Manual

Manual Descriptions
Persona 4	A first-year student at Yasogami High. It's rumored that in middle school, he defeated an entire gang on his own; he's since garnered a reputation as a notorious punk.
Persona 4 Arena	A young man once feared as a violent punk. Despite his looks, he is goodhearted and a skilled knitter. He prefers fighting up close with powerful throws, and his Persona is the thunderous powerhouse Take-Mikazuchi.
Persona 4: Dancing All Night	A second-year high schooler, one year younger than Yu. Despite the way he looks and acts, he has a surprising softer side, and enjoys knitting and cooking. His powerful muscles and large frame lend themselves to a powerful dance style.

Game Appearances

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Persona 4

On May 13th, the protagonist watches a news special about biker gangs. One of the people they interview tells them to get lost. Ryotaro Dojima identifies him as Kanji Tatsumi. Kanji is not part of a biker gang himself but has been known to beat them up by himself after they kept his mother up late at night in middle school. On May 14th and 15th, the protagonist and the rest of the Investigation Team watch the Midnight Channel and see a new person. At first, they do not know who it is, but on the 16th, Chie assumes it must be Kanji. Yukiko mentions that she has known Kanji since he was younger since her family buys goods for the inn from Kanji's family's store, Tatsumi Textiles. Yukiko suggests they visit the store after school. At the textiles store, they run into a young detective. After talking to Kanji's Mother, the group leaves the store and sees Kanji talking with the detective. Kanji spots the Investigation Team and scares them off after asking why they keep staring at him.

The following day, the Investigation Team follows Kanji around. Yosuke spots him in the bathroom before leaving school and reports that he was fixing his hair and seemed nervous for some reason. Outside the school gates, Kanji meets up with the young detective from the previous day. Together, Yosuke and Chie follow Kanji around, but Kanji notices them following him and recognizes them from outside the store the other day. Chie says the word there's nothing strange going on, and this gets a reaction out of Kanji. Yosuke and Chie run off with Kanji chasing after them, saying there has been a misunderstanding. When Kanji returns home, he sees all four of the Investigation Team outside of Tatsumi Textiles. Yosuke asks him if something strange has happened to Kanji lately. Kanji interprets this as Yosuke calling him strange, and he starts chasing after the group again. That evening, Yukiko calls the protagonist and reports that she spoke to Kanji's mom, and Kanji didn't come home earlier. When the Midnight Channel airs, the protagonist sees a version of Kanji in a towel loincloth, talking about checking out gay spots around Inaba before entering the building behind him. The group realizes Kanji has been kidnapped and knows they need to rescue him next.

The protagonist seeks out the detective who met with Kanji and asks about what happened with Kanji. When the two spoke, the detective told Kanji he seemed strange, and Kanji's expression changed. Due to how, the detective deduced that Kanji's actions seemed off, like he was acting or forcing himself somehow. Thus, he might have a complex of sorts. With this clue, Teddie can locate Kanji in the TV World at the Steamy Bathhouse. The group finds him and Shadow Kanji together in bath #11. Shadow Kanji tells Kanji that he needs to drop the act. It starts ranting about girls and how they would always tell him disparaging things about how he paints and sews despite being a boy. The Shadow believes that men would never say things like that, thus, it prefers men. After hearing this, Kanji says there is no way the Shadow is him, causing his Shadow to transform and attack the Investigation Team. Even after the boss fight, Kanji continues to reject his Shadow while it begs for someone or anyone to accept it. Finally, Kanji lashes out and hits his Shadow, but admits it is a part of him. Deep down, Kanji is afraid of rejection, be it from a guy or a girl. He accepts his Shadow, and it turns into his own Persona, Take-Mikazuchi. Following this, the group brings Kanji out of the TV World. Chie tells him they will be waiting for him at school, and Yosuke takes him back home. During dinner that night, the protagonist hears from his uncle that Kanji has gone missing but recently returned home.

Kanji recovers and returns to school on June 6th. He starts speaking more politely to the Investigation Team since he was previously unaware that they are older than him. Chie asks him about the younger detective he was seen with. Kanji does not know the detective, but he had asked Kanji if something had happened recently. While spending time with him, Kanji began thinking he might like guys since he finds them more chill than girls and asked if he could see the detective again. But at the same time, Kanji rejected the idea that he was gay and began to confuse himself thinking about this. Since his family runs a textiles shop, he has been interested in making clothes since he was a kid, but girls picked on him for this, and he mystified the neighborhood. He realizes that he was never afraid of girls but people in general. Yosuke asks about when Kanji got kidnapped. However, Kanji doesn't remember much, but he thinks someone might have come to the house. He recalls a dark entrance, then when he woke up, he was in the Steamy Bathhouse. Since his mom filed a missing persons report to the police, Kanji had to talk to them after coming home. He told them the same thing he just told the Investigation Team, but they thought he was crazy. Kanji joins the team, and they take him to their secret base at Junes.

While eating steak, the group reviews what has happened so far. Kanji being targeted disproves their theory about the victims all being women. However, Kanji stole a sheet of paper from someone at school who had been asking about his and Yukiko's disappearances. When the protagonist looks at the paper, he sees a bunch of dates and reads them. Together, the group realizes that the people who were targeted, whether they died or were rescued, all appeared on the regular news before they appeared on the Midnight Channel. Chie assumes the killer is targeting people on TV. After, they take Kanji to meet Teddie. Kanji finds Teddie cute and wants to pet him, but Teddie vetoes this. Kanji tries to ask Yukiko if her Shadow exposed her too, but Yukiko assumes he is saying something dirty and slaps him. She apologizes and offers to be more gentle next time. Teddie gives Kanji a pair of glasses, but Yukiko insists on giving him the gag version (twice) before finally giving him a real pair of tinted lenses. Kanji vows to get them back for this one day.

Persona 4 Arena

In Persona 4 Arena, Kanji serves as the archetypal grappler character, with high damage output and defense, but low mobility. While his mobility tools and projectile options aren't as limited as similar characters like Potemkin from Guilty Gear or Iron Tager from BlazBlue, Kanji's playstyle and toolkit ultimately lends very well to fighting at close range.

Kanji's Story Mode

Kanji's story mode unlocks after completing one of the four initial story modes.

Other Characters

Kanji appears in the story modes for some of the other characters.

Anime Appearances

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Manga Appearances

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Audio Drama Appearances

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Novel Appearances

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Stage Play Appearances

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Appearances in Non-Megami Tensei Media

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CR Persona 4 The Pachinko

Kanji is one of the selectable avatars for the pachinko machine. When selected, his mini-portrait will appear on the player's stats screen, and he does the voice over for the machine's functions. He is the subject of some animated events, such as when he tries to make a stuffed animal, or when Rise stands on his back to get a One More out of a tree.

BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle

	For more information on this subject in BlazBlue, see Kanji Tatsumi on BlazBlue Wiki.

Trivia

• Some printings of Persona 4 Official Design Works mistakenly list Kanji's birth year as 1995, which would make a 2nd year student rather than a 1st year student at the start of Persona 4. This has since been fixed for the eBook and other prints. Books released later, such as Persona Club P4, also correctly list his birth year as 1996.
• In his Yasogami High social media profile in Persona Club P4, Kanji lists his favorite foods as OtotoAnimal crackers in the English localization and Homerun Bars.Topsicles in the English localization's dialogue, Homerun Bars in the Dojima family fridge His hobbies are sewing, knitting, and peeling wrappers off of Homerun Bars. The social groups he is part of are "Let's Sew!", "Knitting Cafe", "Delicious Shops in the Central Shopping District", and "Hawaiian Quilt Lovers". His greeting is, "I'm Inaba's runaway train". His ideal fight would be one without rules. In his inbox, he has a message from Yosuke, bragging about finding the rare Ototo submarine shape.Rare penguin animal cracker in the English localization Kanji's Arena Ultimax remastered profile lists his favorite things and things he is good at as sewing and knitting, adds that he is good at cooking and fighting, and he generally loves cute things.
• The developer Q&A about Kanji reveals some background information:
  • Kanji picked his silver necklace because he liked the design, not knowing it was a locket that can hold a photo until his mother pointed it out to him. When asked if he perhaps kept a photo of his late father in there, Atlus responds that Kanji is more likely to put cute cat photos in there to look at when he is feeling down.
  • Kanji doesn't want to join the craft club because he knows he would scare the other members, but he is oblivious to how him staring through the window into their club room already scares them.
• In Dancing, Kanji's initial LMB Stage Outfit has the numbers "1+3" on it. This can be read as 13 for the Death arcana, inspired by Kanji's shirt in Persona 4 having a skull and the skull being a symbol associated with death. Or it can be read as "1 + 3 = 4" for Kanji's Emperor arcana.

Nomenclature

Names in Other Languages

Language	Name	Meaning
Japanese	巽 完二	Tatsumi Kanji. The family name means "southeast trigram," and the given name means "perfect two."

Gallery

See Gallery