Ai Asato (麻里 愛, Asato Ai) is one of the characters from the Japanese manga and anime series Kochikame by Osamu Akimoto. She is a patrol officer from the Transport Department of the Katsushika Police Headquarters. She is most often addressed as 'Maria', which is an alternative reading of her name as a whole (ma, ri, a(i), 麻-里-愛). In the manga, her name Maria is typeset in the katakana alphabet (マリア) the most often.
Maria is best known for the fact that she was a genderswapped character. In the manga, she became a female via a magical wish. In the anime however, she does not utilize any magical element.
Appearance[]
'Maria' has a very long, lush and straight bout of dark brown hair (depicted as black in manga illustrations) with very straightly-cut bangs just past eyebrow level, and hair ends cut in the same fashion around her hip area. While her eyes are an amber shade in colored manga illustrations, they are shown as a darker shade of brown in the anime.
She wears a lilac-colored rendition of the female police officer uniform, both prior to and post transition, which very much resembles the type worn by Reiko. It includes a long-sleeved coat with lapels, white undershirt with dark blue tie, a short skirt (above knee length) and matching lilac shoes plus official hat. Her summer uniform has T-shirt style sleeves instead of long sleeves.
The fact that Maria is a boy in the anime series is not picked up by various characters, due in part to his convincing physique, facial features, and choice of clothing, as well as feminine mannerisms and way of speaking. It is only in circumstances where a male character is accidentally or forcefully made to make contact with his nether regions, whereupon they discover his pre-operative genital status. In his introductory anime appearance, he reveals to Ryotsu that his breasts are in fact implants.
In the manga and the anime, Maria is referred to by feminine or neutral pronouns even before her magical genderswap, indicating that she is possibly a trans woman.She refers to herself using "Watashi" (私) who, even if neutral, is mostly used by women.
Personality[]
Maria possesses an extremely feminine and caring personality that, paired with his looks, captivate many men in his presence. She is compassionate among other characters, and is especially fond of Ryotsu, treating him with a more loving and affectionate demeanor compared to other men he encounters. Other things of his interest are cute items,
Before she decided to transition, Maria was previously a number-one kickboxer champion who was serious and diligent in his training with his coach. His skills from this era are still present in Maria, and are most commonly seen where Maria is in self-defense or expressing anger towards another character.
She is easily jealous of women who show interest in Ryotsu, and is always seen hugging him on a frequent basis, making him seem possessive to an extent.
Relationships[]
Family[]
Kyoko Asato[]
Kyouko is the mother of Ai Asato. Maria's physical appearance, save for hairstyle, matches most to her looks.
Ban Asato[]
Ban, alternatively known as 'Hondara-ken' in the series, is the father of Ai Asato. His hair color and hairstyle is almost identical to Maria's own, albeit being shorter at shoulder-length.
Rin Asato[]
Rin is the younger twin sister of Ai Asato. They both share identical appearances and mannerisms, which makes it easy to confuse one of the siblings for the other.
Police Box colleagues[]
Kankichi Ryotsu[]
Maria is especially notorious for his unyielding displays of affection for Ryotsu, based primarily on the fact that he most resembles the likeliness of his previous kickboxing coach. He can often be seen hugging him -to his displeasure- and vowing to help him out in any way, depending on the situation at hand. He always addresses Ryotsu as Ryo-sama, the -sama affixation only used towards those deemed of a higher or more important status, which in turn displays the extent to which he finds Ryotsu significant to him.
Scenes in both the manga and anime which show Maria's flatting room always depict a multitude of items ranging from pin-up posters and plush dolls to carpets and bathroom toys which are of Ryotsu, indicating that he shows a highly obsessive interest in him.
Maria's debut anime episode is the only anime episode in which Ryotsu is completely fooled by his feminine appearance, to the extent of considering him as a marriage partner (based on marriage-related conversation he has with Bucho at the beginning of the episode) up until the end of the episode, where he 'realizes' his true gender.
Reiko Katherine Akimoto[]
Reiko and Maria appear to be very good friends with one another, and are especially portrayed as being the main beauties of the Kochikame storyline. The two share mutual skills and interests with respect to activities involving cooking, sewing, handicrafts, sports, fashion and modeling. It could be suggested that Maria is an 'alternative' male counterpart to her, much like how Nakagawa is portrayed as Reiko's male counterpart, because of their highly similar looks and interests.
Many illustrations of the pair have been featured on manga volume designs, title pages and promotional images. The two seem to work as contrasts, given their attributes; Reiko's blonde-hair blue-eyes and 'foreign' appearance juxtaposes with Maria's brown-hair brown-eyes and more 'local' Japanese look. The two are similar in body physique, i.e. both are busty, tall and have the longest lengths of hair compared to other characters.
Trivia[]
- Maria's birthday was slated to either be on 14th April (in the anime) or 5th May (in the manga).
- Her bust-hip-waist sizes are 93.5-58-88 centimeters respectively.
- Maria has actually undergone two gender changes in the manga series; in Volume 75, he is changed to a woman by the Old Man of Heaven and his assistant Rika Hanayama, but is reverted back into a man later on. His permanent gender change from male to female occurred in Volume 111 by use of magic, when he is faced with a new character and potential love rival Haya Isowashi, wishing to compete against him and some female characters for Ryotsu's affections.