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Josie Rizal (ジョシー・リサール Joshī Risāru?) is a character in the Tekken series who is introduced in Tekken 7 as one of the new playable characters. Josie is a young fighter who strives to overcome her lack of confidence and hopes to join Tekken Force, an organization that helped her country in a time of need.

Biography

Ever since she was very young, Josie had a reputation for being a crybaby. Josie's parents, who were big fans of martial arts, insisted that she begin training. Despite her reluctance at first, Josie was eager to live up to her parents' expectations, and became a top-notch kick-boxer - however, her fighting prowess did not rid her of her sensitive disposition.

Josie made a living through modeling and kickboxing, but, one day, a large typhoon hit the Philippines and left widespread damage in its wake. The Mishima Zaibatsu's Tekken Force quickly arrived to provide aid to the stricken country. Josie admired the devoted work of the Tekken Force, and is looking to participate in the recruitment exam to become a member of the organization herself.[2]

One day, while out running on her usual training course, Josie came across a bear and had to overcome her fear in order to confront the animal.[3]

Personality

Josie is bright, cheerful, and quite energetic, though she cries easily because of something that happened in her past.[4] From a young age, she was easily brought to tears and frightened by many things, and was encouraged by her parents to take up martial arts to boost her confidence. Although more confident now, she still scares and cries easily, as shown in her confrontation with Kuma, where she fled in tears from him, and fainted when he tried to interrogate her. She seems to be trying to be brave, however, and wants to help people, as shown by her desire to join Tekken Force after seeing the typhoon relief they provided to The Philippines.

Appearance

Josie is a slight young woman with short, dark brown hair and and brown eyes.

Outfits

Main article: Josie Rizal/Outfits

Story

Tekken 7

TEKKEN_7_-_Josie_Rizal_Ending_&_Intro_(TEKKEN_7_Character_Endings)

TEKKEN 7 - Josie Rizal Ending & Intro (TEKKEN 7 Character Endings)

Official Website Profile (English) & Prologue
Josie Rizal tried her best to support her family by balancing two jobs—one as a model, and one as a professional kickboxer. One day, while she was out running on her usual training course along the mountain roads, she was suddenly confronted by an enormous, hairy creature!

Josie screamed, and then fled half in tears, but the creature remained hot on her heels. Realizing she had little chance of escape, Josie abruptly came to a halt, then turned trembling, to face her feral foe...[5]

Official Website Profile (Japanese)
Josie Rizal was born to parents who were enthusiastic fans of various martial arts. Josie’s parents insisted that she learn martial arts, as she had been a crybaby from childhood. Reluctantly trying to live up to her parents' expectations, a brave Josie began learning martial arts, eventually becoming a first class kickboxer. However, the underlying problem of being a crybaby had not been cured…

Josie made a living by working as a model and a kickboxer, and in this way was able to help out her family’s income. One day, when work was finally starting to get on track, a huge typhoon hit The Philippines, causing catastrophic damage in various places. Lifelines were cut off and helping hands were unable to cross during the typhoon. The first to rush to the disaster area was the Mishima Zaibatsu's special forces, the Tekken Force.

Josie came to admire the dedication of the Tekken Force. She is going to participate in a recruitment exam herself in order to become a member of Tekken Force.[6]

Ending Description
Josie defeats Kuma and drops to her knees in tears, telling Kuma that he scared her. Kuma weakly raises his paw to Josie, and she sees that he is holding her missing earring. Josie realizes that Kuma was only chasing her to return her earring. Before she can thank Kuma, he collapses back to the ground. Josie begins shaking him, telling him, "Stay with me!"[7]

Gameplay

Fundamentally, Josie plays very similarly to Bruce, sharing some of his assets, such as his Cyclone Kick (3+4), Ducking Low Kick (f,N,d,df+3), Shotshell (3,2~F), Pasart Stance and Dteh Kao Pa Jong (uf+3+4) (Respectively the Spinning Scythe, Slide-in Low Kick, Hollow Point to Slide In, Switch Stance and Rapid Double Knee in her Move List), but with some new assets as well, namely her Intercept Kick (3,3), Intercept Cannon (3,f+3) and Lexias Chain (db+4,2,3). She also resolves Bruce's weakness of not having a ground hitting middle attack by having Full Blast Kick (d+3+4), effectively making her better than Bruce when it comes to ground game. For veteran Bruce users, Josie is the character that best emulates him in his absence in Tekken 7 because of these similarities.

She is also a very easy character to pick up and play with for first time users, being a very agile and fast character with an overall high damage output. One thing to note, however is that unlike most female characters in the series (i.e., Nina, Lili, Asuka/Jun or Master Raven) she is incapable of performing a Back Handspring (ub,b) so it is advised to Back Dash Cancel (b,b,db) if one wishes to give themselves space while being pressured by their opponent.

Fighting Style

Josie fights using Eskrima-based Kickboxing (エスクリマをベースとしたキックボクシング Esukurima wo Bēsu to shita Kikkubokushingu?). Eskrima is a style of combat that emphasizes on weapon-based combat that generally involves sticks and knives. Eskrima is officially called Arnis, the formalized umbrella name of the style in the Philippines, though this name and Kali are also used. Josie uses the unarmed variant of the style that focuses more on defensive techniques, grappling and weapon disarming as opposed to the more offensive armed variant.

Unarmed Eskrima focuses much more on reacting to and countering an attack rather than offensive striking. However, vicious strikes and kicks are still used. Her take of Eskrima with boxing makes her style more similar to a real-life Eskrima variant called Yaw-Yan also known as the Dance of Death or Sayaw ng Kamatayan in Filipino. She also uses various elbow and knee techniques along with various combinations that are reminiscent of Muay Thai.

Moves

Quotes

Character Relationships

  • Kuma II: Fought Josie in Tekken 7's story mode as her final challenge to gain admission to Tekken Force.
  • Ling Xiaoyu: Her classmate in Pachislot Tekken 5 (non-canon).
  • Alisa Bosconovitch: Her classmate in Pachislot Tekken 5 (non-canon).

Trivia

General:

  • Her name is inspired by the Filipino National hero, José Rizal.
    • Her surname Rizal is from the Spanish word "Ricial" meaning "the green of young growth" or "green fields."
  • Josie speaks English with a local Filipino accent instead of her native tongue of Tagalog.
    • This character trait is considered unusual among Tekken characters, as English is the secondary language of the Philippines and most other newcomer characters to Tekken 7 speak in their native language. To date, Josie has not spoken a single Filipino word yet in-game.
    • In the past, foreign languages TV shows are often dubbed into English when they are brought to Filipino TV, so this may have been the inspiration behind the choice to have Josie speak in English instead.
  • She was first seen as one of the four fighters (the other three being Jin Kazama, Devil Jin and the large red behemoth fighter named Gigas) whose in-game character models were leaked online in March 2015. She later became playable in the arcades' time release on April 21.
  • She is the first Filipino fighter in the Tekken series, but the second Filipino character to debut in a fighting game developed by Namco. She is predated by Talim of the Soul series, who was introduced in Soulcalibur II.
  • Her original Rage Art animation, especially the finisher, used to resemble Xiba's Critical Edge move from Soulcalibur V.[8][9] Her Rage Art was later altered in the release of Fated Retribution, although the beginning and finisher were kept the same.
  • The white flower designs on Josie's midriff is based on the "Sampaguita", the national flower of the Philippines.
  • Some of Josie's moves take their names from places in the Philippines such as Lingayen Stomp (リンガエンストンプ Ringaen Sutonpu), Iligan Switch (スイッチイリガン Suicchi Irigan), Ormoc Switch (スイッチオルモック Suicchi Orumokku), Sapu Switch, Subic Ring, Panquil Ring, Albay Ring, Triana Middle, Triana Low and Kawasan Falls.
    • Two moves are references to Philippine National symbols: Carabao Horn (カラバオホーン Karabao Hōn) and Reverse Sampaguita (リバース・サンパギータ Ribāsu Sanpagīta).
  • One of her moves, Papilio Combo is a direct reference to the Papilionidae, a family of butterflies in the Philippines.
  • In Josie's unveiling event, she was cosplayed by Yuriko Tiger[10], who is the official cosplayer of Bandai Namco (Tekken Series).[11]
  • Josie stands as "MUT" (" Muai Thai") in the game files.
  • After unveiling her playable debut, Josie's introduction to the game allegedly resulted in a controversy between the NCCA and the Philippine Government, mainly due to her name being a reference to the country's national hero, José Rizal. This led to rumors that her character was an affront to Philippine culture and would be ordered removed. NCCA legal counsel and former Press Secretary, Trixie Cruz-Angeles clarified that the agency had yet to issue any position on that matter stating that the NCCA was not asked to delete the character and have not taken by this issue or being issued an opinion. It was later learned that such petition was the result of a satire website article and a wrongly-interpreted news article.[12]
  • Josie can use her rage drive (f,n,d,d/f+3+4) after landing a Flying Elbow (f+1+2) or a counter hit with Slide-in Low Kick (f,n,d,d/f+3, but only in certain situations) to launch her opponent into an aerial combo. This makes her, Master Raven, Kuma and Panda the only characters who are able to launch off moves that would otherwise only give guaranteed ground hits when rage is active.
  • Josie’s Character Episode is based on a Japanese children’s song titled “Mori no Kuma-San” (Bear in the Woods) where a girl meets a bear, gets chased by it, and it turns out the bear only wants to return an earring she dropped.
  • During the REV Major 2019, a joke commercial featuring her called "Josiebee" was made featuring Filipino players, AK and Doujin eating hamburgers. This is a reference to the popular local fast-food chain, Jollibee. The parody greatly amused Katsuhiro Harada, the game producer, who was in the event.

Gallery

Main article: Josie Rizal/Gallery

References

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