by Gristle McThornbody

Is she typecast?

*John Wayne voice* Well, pilgrim, I’d like to talk about typecasting. She may not be yet, but if you have heard a good swath of her work as Madame President in Golden Boy or as Asuka in Evangelion, you will notice that despite the different spectrum of subject matter, one common thread exists: they’re both bitchy. Extremely over-the-top, without-a-doubt bitchy. And what could ever be behind this vocal tsunami of channelled womanly anger? Tiffany Grant.

Perhaps saying that she had been typecast is a bit strong. One need not look further than her role in Gunsmith Cats: Becky Farrah, the money-grubbing contact to the underworld of the main protagonists. Was she blunt? Yes. Was she no-nonsense? Yes. Was she bitchy …? No. At least, based on my limited knowledge of the Tiffany Grant anime library, one can argue that she was not typecast in the bitchy role, but rather she can be used in any direct, get-business-done type of woman that appears.

By now, you, the reader, are wondering how the word bitchy is used. Some would argue that Asuka, Madame President, and Becky Farrah were all what could be designated as strong women, for which bitchy could easily be applied – mainly by men or other jealous females. Others would apply bitchy to whiny, loud women who blow more hot air than a turbojet.

Look deeper into the characters. Consider Asuka, who seemingly yelled a lot at Shinji, as well as whined quite a bit about just about everything. One could easily append the moniker bitchy. Madame President was of a similar vein, however in the scenario provided in Golden Boy her ire was focused on Kintro, the perverted temp who seemed to screw up most things he was assigned to do. Such anger was deserved, and it did indeed make Madame President’s top pop (not in a fan service way, either -_^ ), and it destabilized an otherwise seemingly stable, strong woman. Lastly, one can look at Becky Farrah. Here, we have someone who has to deal with the scum of the underworld and still come out relatively unscathed. It would need a credulity stretching leap of faith to believe that, at the very least, she would need to be a tad bit rough on the edges to get what needs to get done, done.

So is Tiffany Grant typecasted as bitchy female characters? If you watch the anime I listed in the order that they are listed (Golden Boy, Evangelion, and Gunsmith Cats), you can easily say, “Perhaps…” But this is just a small sample of her work, and even an op-ed piece on the three animu that just happen to feature Ms. Grant being blunt. But hell, three different anime produced at the same time can’t be that big of a coincidence, right?