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Marisa Kirisame

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霧雨 (きりさめ)  魔理沙 (まりさ)
Marisa Kirisame
kʲiɽʲisame maɽʲisa (♫)
Marisa Kirisame
Marisa Kirisame in Ten Desires
Ordinary Magician
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Species Human
Abilities Using magic (Specialized in light and heat magic)
Age A child in PC-98 canon; about the same age as Reimu in Windows canon [1]
Occupation Magician, Kirisame Magic Shop owner, burglar, part-time youkai hunter
Location The Kirisame household in the Forest of Magic
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Marisa Kirisame (霧雨 魔理沙 Kirisame Marisa) is an ordinary human magician who specializes in light and heat magic and currently resides in the Forest of Magic. Her motto is "danmaku's all about firepower" and she has a compulsive mania for collecting things.

Contents

General Information

Name

Her full name is Marisa Kirisame (霧雨 魔理沙). The kanji for Kirisame literally mean "drizzle" or "misty rain". Marisa doesn't make much sense though in the literal sense, where the characters translate to "magic", "logic/reason", and "sand" respectively; rather, it is likely that the kanji are used to transliterate a foreign name. Transliteration using kanji was common in pre-modern Japan; for example, the original rendering of "America" is 亜米利加 amerika. There is large amount of speculation on the extremely controversial theory that Marisa is, in fact a given name with possible origins in the romantic language family. However, the Western name theory does have a lot of logical backing, as Marisa herself is a mix of Eastern and Western culture, plus Western names aren't unheard of in Japan.

Furthermore, only in Story of Eastern Wonderland gameplay was her name written as , but since in Story of Eastern Wonderland's attached text files and bad endings it was written as 魔理沙, and since afterwards it was uniformly 魔理沙, this 魔梨沙 is probably simply a typo. Also, the "魔理沙 of Story of Eastern Wonderland" has also been used.

Appearance

Appearance in the PC-98 canon

In Story of Eastern Wonderland, Marisa is depicted as having red eyes and red hair, and wearing typical witch clothes, which are purple, along with a white bow on her hat. Her appearance however quickly changes in Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream. Marisa is now depicted as having golden/yellow eyes and yellow hair, these characteristics remain with her for the entire series. Later on, in Mystic Square, her witch attire changes from purple to black, which also stays with her for the rest of the series, it is also to be noted that her hat gains faint pink frills.

Appearance in the Windows canon

In Embodiment of Scarlet Devil and onwards, she is always depicted wearing a faint pink apron on top of her clothes. In Perfect Cherry Blossom, she gains a faint pink shirt under her apron. In every later iteration of her design, Marisa gets minor alterations, such as a change in her hat bow's colour, or a change in hair style.

In most of the games, she carries a broom with her; according to her, it is essential for a magician.

As of Ten Desires, Marisa has her usual attire. This time, hat's bow is purple, a purple ribbon is attached to the left side of her hair, her shoes are maroon coloured with small purple ribbons on them, and a red ribbon is tied to her neck.

Story

Attention: This section is a stub and it needs expanding with more information related to the section's topic. If you can add to it in any way, please do so.
Story of Eastern Wonderland

She made her first appearance as a minion of Mima, to prevent Reimu from reaching her, but was defeated.

Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream

Marisa followed Mima and found Reimu at some old ruins. The ruins promise a fantastic prize for whoever enters and a battle with 6 others for the right ensues!

Lotus Land Story

Marisa senses a great magic power and wishes to make it hers. So she heads towards to the lake without Reimu's knowledge, for she wasn't about to let anyone stand in her quest for power!

Mystic Square

Marisa watches Reimu ram into a gate and decides to follow behind her, her primary motivation being boredom.

Embodiment of the Scarlet Devil

Marisa is flying through the sky and notices she wasn't able to see the lake. Thinking that something must be happening, she swoops in to check it out.

Perfect Cherry Blossom

Some petals land inside Marisa's house and notices that the petals belong to spring while the month was May. She follows the petals in search of spring.

Immaterial and Missing Power

A strange feast has Marisa curious and goes to look for clues.

Imperishable Night

Alice is perturbed about the Moon and decides to bribe Marisa to come along with her to find out who is the cause the fake Moon.

Phantasmagoria of Flower View

The flowers are out of season, but at first this didn't bother Marisa. She simply wants to find out who's responsible for it and to be the first to know why.

Mountain of Faith

Marisa sees that something is bothering Reimu and finds out that a rival shrine wants to take over. Marisa isn't going to sit back and let that happen, so if Reimu wasn't going to do something about it, she certainly was!

Scarlet Weather Rhapsody

Marisa is unable to dry her laundry because of the constant drizzle. Deducing something is wrong, she sets out to find the perpetrator.

Subterranean Animism

A geyser appears behind the shrine and Reimu is ecstatic about it. Marisa, however, is less than hopeful and Earth spirits begin to spew out of the earth. Patchouli and Yukari suspect it was an attempt to lure youkai into the geyser and decide to send Marisa instead to investigate.

Undefined Fantastic Object

A ship flies in the Sky and Marisa hopes to be able to plunder it for its riches.

Marisa is blown away at the ship in the sky. She wishes to get the treasure inside!

Touhou Hisoutensoku

A humanoid giant is trampling about Gensokyo. Three residents have a few theories on what that could be...

Marisa is enjoying the hot spring and Cirno appears and asks her if she saw a Daidarabotchi. Marisa decides to give her a hard time and fights her.

Taisui Xingjun has come disguised as Marisa but Meiling sees through this ruse and takes him on!

Fairy Wars

Marisa was just finished with her flower seeing while suddenly Cirno showed up and wanted to fight with her. She first wasn't fully convinced, but she accepted it but would back of a little by using her non-deadly lasers. Still, Cirno was a hard opponent for Marisa and she actually lost the battle. She then just headed home.

Ten Desires

Divine Spirits are going to block the flower viewing and Marisa wants to be the first to solve it!

Bohemian Archive in Japanese Red

Additional Information

  • Marisa is one of the most frequent characters to appear in the Touhou Project series, only second to Reimu after the release of Fairy Wars.
  • Marisa has six theme songs (excluding remixes), making her the character with the most theme songs.
  • Including spin-off games and Shuusou Gyoku, Marisa has appeared as an EX boss two times more than any other EX boss.
  • Marisa has appeared on the covers of Story of Eastern Wonderland, Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream, and Lotus Land Story.
  • According to Rinnosuke, Marisa was inspired to use star-themed magic after a meteor shower viewing party around 2001 to 2002. Marisa's strategy guide in Story of Eastern Wonderland's omake says her third attack uses star magic, although that is just one attack. However, by the time Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream takes place, many of her attacks use stars. Her apparent mentor Mima also had an astronomy theme in her attacks. Due to the PC-98/Windows canon split, there may be inconsistencies like this between them, although attempts could be made to fit them together (like saying that she trained under Mima after seeing the shooting stars).
  • It is unknown how Marisa got her home in the forest of magic, but she tells Tenshi Hinanawi that her "house wasn't built for earthquakes", and says in her Scarlet Weather Rhapsody ending that if her house is destroyed, she can always build a new one. So there doesn't seem to be anything particularly special about it, and Marisa was probably around when it was originally built. At the time of Curiosities of Lotus Asia Chapter 7, it was still new enough that Marisa referred to it as "my new house", at least in comparison to living with her parents.
  • It isn't directly stated how Marisa makes a living. She does state in Strange and Bright Nature Deity Chapter 9 that she regularly goes to the Hakurei shrine to take away Reimu's youkai extermination jobs and Perfect Memento in Strict Sense implies it as well, making it a likely source of income. She's also shown a desire to sell her book The Grimoire of Marisa. [2][3] The Three Fairies of Light were her first customers to her shop, but Perfect Memento in Strict Sense implies she's had other customers since then, albeit not many. She's also a well-known thief, but is only stated to steal books, so she may not be the type to steal money.
  • Marisa may be somewhat of a math genius; in Mountain of Faith she utters the line "I could recite all the digits in pi before I got there." However, considering that pi has a literally infinite number of digits which never end or repeat in any pattern (really, it's endless), it's likely just an expression to say "at this rate I'll never get there."
  • Marisa holds the distinction of being one of the very few characters in any Touhou game who is known to have a living family. They've never been mentioned by name, or even within any of the game dialogues, but it is implied in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense she is the only daughter. Also according to 19th chapter of Curiosities of Lotus Asia, her father, at least, is alive and is living at the Human Village.
  • In Imperishable Night, Marisa survives looking at the full moon, which should drive normal humans insane. When Alice asks if she is all right, she says that it's all right since she is insane to begin with. She might well be joking, since Reimu and Sakuya maintain their sanity looking at the full moon too. It could be that humans who are strong-willed enough can overcome that influence.
  • In both Mountain of Faith and Subterranean Animism, Marisa lacks her signature bomb move, Master Spark. She regains her Master Spark as a bomb in the following game Undefined Fantastic Object.
  • Marisa often refers to herself as "just an ordinary witch". This is often her character title in the games (i.e. Imperishable Night). Deneb the witch of the Ogre Battle games refers to herself in a similar, yet opposite manner: "I am a witch, but not just an ordinary witch!" She appears to make a reference to this in Perfect Cherry Blossom's third stage, when questioning whether or not Alice is an ordinary human.
  • In Touhou Hisoutensoku one of her alternative color palettes gives Marisa a blue attire and red hair similar to the purple attire she wore in the PC-98 era (the colors match specifically to her attire color and hair color in Story of Eastern Wonderland). Another alternate color resembles Ellen from Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream. There is also another palette that gives her a purple attire and purple hair, somewhat resembling Patchouli.
  • Excluding the fighting spin-offs, Double Spoiler, and Fairy Wars, Marisa's face has appeared on all of the Windows game icons so far. This includes Shoot the Bullet, in which she doesn't technically appear.
  • Marisa was first seen using a wand in Story of Eastern Wonderland, second time in Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream, and third time in Lotus Land Story. The fourth time seen with a wand was in Undefined Fantastic Object and so far the only windows game she is seen with one.
  • Marisa seems knowledgeable about species not native to the Japanese archipelago such as the beaver in Chapter 4 of Wild and Horned Hermit and the rafflesia in Chapter 14 of Oriental Sacred Place.
  • Along with Yumemi Okazaki and Soga no Tojiko, Marisa is one of the three Touhou characters to officially curse in-game.

Fanon Culture

Despite her self-indulgent personality and lack of concern for others (or more likely because of these things), Marisa happens to be one of the most popular characters within fanbase, winning the Touhou popularity contests of 2004 and 2005.

Popularity with females

Marisa has a large number of fan pairings as there are cases where she would seduce many females. She's most commonly being with Reimu Hakurei, Alice Margatroid, Nitori Kawashiro, Flandre Scarlet, Sakuya Izayoi and even Rinnosuke Morichika is also popular. Sometimes, it becomes a harem, or a scene of fights. Of course, this is nothing canon that would suggest this, and it has even caused some dislike for Marisa in the fanbase. Since in canon, things like "being an annoyance wherever she is" and "she does not like youkai who use magic" have been stated, there is also a tendency for her to be treated as an intrusion in fanon. However, it has also been stated that it is "enjoyable to be with her." (see also: Relationshipping)

At the time when the video Marisa Stole the Precious Thing became popular as a Marisa and Alice pairing meme, many related videos were made, and among that, severe memes that go towards performing perverted actions. However, due to adverse reactions and the passage of time, this has somewhat decreased in popularity.

Stealing anything, anywhere, anytime

Due to her burglary in canon, Marisa is depicted to be one often in many fanworks. Apart from stealing books from the library of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, she would also steal Alice Margatroid's dolls, the Hakurei Shrine's offertory box, Kourindou's goods, the kappa's tools etc. Without waiting or turning back, she would use a wide Master Spark to blow apart the door, saying "I'll borrow till death ze!" while taking things away right from in front of the person, with the image of threatening violence when detected. While her burglary is canon, for her to be bothersome to this extreme is not. In Subterranean Animism, she backed down from the thought of doing house-searching when challenged by Satori Komeiji.

Jojo association

Because of Marisa's large affinity with stars, fans sometimes parody her by crossing over with Jotaro Kujo of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, although to a much lesser extent than that of Youmu or Sakuya. This seems to be a result of Jotaro's stand being called "Star Platinum", along with ZUN's rather heavy amount of references to that series already. Marisa, in some works, even quotes Jotaro's catchphrase "Yare yare da ze".

Lux Crownguard reference

In the multiplayer game League of Legends that was made in the United States, there is a character named Lux Crownguard who has a number of possible references to Marisa. She has an ultimate spell called "Finales Funkeln" which roughly translates from German as "Final Sparkle". In the lore of the game, Lux is also known to have copied and used the spell "Dark Binding" from Morgana. She also has a skin that resembles a cross between Mima and Marisa. In one of her voice over lines she states "Light mage? I'm just an ordinary mage", which may also be a reference. Also, her designer, Shurelia, is known to be a big Touhou fan.

Miscellaneous
  • Handsomeness: Since she has a manly speaking style, she is often entrusted with the role of playing the male role, and is therefore often depicted as handsome in a male form. One example of Marisa been male is Cho Marisa (超魔理沙).
  • Super Marisa: Because of her love of mushrooms and the similarity in names, she has been compared to Mario from the Super Mario series. There are fanworks of Marisa putting on overalls, having hats with an "M" written on it and breaking blocks with her head.
  • Black-white: As Reimu is often referred to as red-white or "the red-white", fans frequently call Marisa black-white or white-black in parallel.
  • Jessica Ushiromiya cosplay: In the visual novel Umineko no Naku Koro Ni, Jessica Ushiromiya performs in a concert dressed as Marisa. In episode 6 of the anime, her friends are also shown, dressed as Sakuya, Aya and Alice.
  • TOUHOU HIJACK LOL: Marisa is the character pictured in the original "Touhou Hijack" image, used in a 4chan meme involving disrupting discussion in a thread by announcing a "hijack" with this image and then posting large amounts of Touhou fan-art.
  • ufufu...: Marisa's laugh "Ufu, ufu, ufufufufufufufu..." (うふ、うふ、うふふふふふふふ) from Phantasmagoria of Dim. Dream is a well-known laugh that Marisa has been portrayed to say all the time. This is usually used on her appearance with red hair from the PC-98 game Story of Eastern Wonderland.
  • Jealous of Reimu: In more serious fanworks, Marisa is often depicted as being secretly jealous of Reimu, frustrated that the miko wastes her full potential by not training and still manages to be stronger than Marisa herself, who needed to train heavily to have any power at all.
  • Possible speaking style origin: Since Chiyuri Kitashirakawa was one possible source of Marisa's speaking style (as mentioned earlier), there is a theory that Marisa fully picked it up from Chiyuri.

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Official Profiles

Story of Eastern Wonderland
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Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream - 夢時空.txt
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Lotus Land Story - 幻想郷.txt
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Mystic Square - 怪綺談.txt
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Shuusou Gyoku - 創曲幻想.txt
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Embodiment of Scarlet Devil - Manual
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Embodiment of Scarlet Devil - おまけ.txt
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Perfect Cherry Blossom - Manual
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Perfect Cherry Blossom - キャラ設定.txt
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Immaterial and Missing Power - 上海アリス通信.txt
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Imperishable Night - Manual
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Imperishable Night - キャラ設定.txt
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Phantasmagoria of Flower View - Manual
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Phantasmagoria of Flower View - キャラ設定.txt
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Mountain of Faith - Manual
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Scarlet Weather Rhapsody - chara.html
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Subterranean Animism - キャラ設定.txt
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Undefined Fantastic Object
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Fairy Wars
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Wild and Horned Hermit official website
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Ten Desires - キャラ設定とエキストラストーリー.txt
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Official Sources

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References

  1. Lotus Land Story: Manual — "She is very intelligent, and is looking for power, but is still a child." "She looks much more like a child than Reimu (though Reimu also looks like a child) but their ages are very close."
  2. The Grimoire of Marisa: Foreword — "Well, if it doesn't, I'll just name it something grandiose like the Illusion Danmaku Artifact Encyclopedia and palm it off to a library for a high price, so it'd be OK either way..."
  3. Touhou Hisoutensoku: Marisa's Script — "Speaking of which, I wrote a book too! It's bad of me to keep borrowing books, so I'll put my book here at the library this time! How much will you pay for it?"
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