open/close all folders
Main Duo
Rally Vincent
Irene "Rally" Vincent
The more focal member of the duo and the one that usually gets the most focus. Part-bounty hunter and part-gunsmith, her gunslingin' and gunsmithin' skills are next to none.
- Adaptational Jerkass: Rally mocks ATF Agent Bill Collins coming into her store almost immediately (though, to be fair, he was shifty-looking), complains about the ATF (especially when it turns out her collection is basically illegal as all hell), and attempts to kick Bill out when she learns he's not going to pay up for a favor, which is at least somewhat understandable. Odd, given that she shares a neutral view on Federal agencies (well enough to work with, and speak well about the FBI) and tries her damnedest to keep up with licenses in the manga. They're also more curse-prone than in the manga, though they aren't exactly Miss Clean there, either.
- Ambiguously Bi: It's all over the place whether or not she's more interested in women or men.
- Artificial Limbs: Rally's signature move tends to have catastrophic consequences for the recipient. A Mythology Gag appears early in the anime where one arms dealer shows off weaponized artificial arms and legs to Rally, which were the signature weapons of Gray and Bonnie.
- Badass Driver: During a car chase, a little girl ran into the street after her ball. Rally yelled 'Coming through!', threw the car into a sideways slide, opened the drivers' door and picked the girl up, handed her off to her passenger, who opened her door and set the girl down on the street as Rally straightened out the slide and took off with no loss of momentum.
- Big Damn Heroes: Sonoda isn't afraid of the dramatic just-in-the-nick rescues. Everyone gets their chance to do it at some point... Rally, May, Bean, Riff-Raff, practically everyone but the pure villains.
- Blasting It Out of Their Hands: This trope is present, but it's shown to require multiple shots; firearms don't deliver enough force to knock stuff around because Reality Is Unrealistic. Rally finds it simpler to simply shoot off the weapon's hammer. Or its safety. Or the shooter's fingers.
- Bounty Hunter: Technically, Rally's a gunsmith, enabling Sonada to geek about guns. He knows that most people prefer car chases and gunfights to this, so bounty hunting is actually her side job.
- But Not Too Foreign: Rally is an unusual case in that she's half English and half East Indian, though whether her father was from Pakistan or India itself was never made clear. This actually makes her a Token Twofer in Japan But Not Too Foreign in Chicago where the series is actually set. AND they significantly lightened her skin tone for the anime.
- Career-Ending Injury: The last arc of Burst has her suffer significant damage to her hands that make her unable to shoot firearms as accurately as she did before, so she decides to retire from bounty hunting.
- Celibate Hero: Much to the dismay of Misty.
- Close-Call Haircut: Rally gets a goodly portion of her hair slashed off by Gray and it takes a few chapters for it to be back to normal.
- Cool Car: Rally drives a Shelby Cobra GT-500, which is not only cool but rare as hell. When it finally bites the big one in Burst, Rally is very reluctant to purchase a Mustang II as a replacement, even thinking of it as The Alleged Car, until the seller points out the multiple post-market modifications that have been added to it.
- Crippling the Competition: Rally has a habit of shooting the hands (specifically the trigger fingers) of opposing gunmen. Some have come back looking for revenge because of their crippled hands.
- Embarrassing First Name: Rally's real name is Irene. Only her mother is shown using it, in a Flashback. It's used a lot more when Rally's father is around. Later, Roy uses it on Rally.
- Even the Girls Want Her: Goldie Musou will stop at NOTHING to obtain her.
- Fingore: One of Rally's favorite methods of incapacitating someone firing at her is to blast the shooter's trigger or cocking finger off.
- Gender-Blender Name: Irene "Rally" Vincent. Rally says she picked the name so nobody would know they were hiring a female bounty hunter. She might want to return to Irene now that she's an established hunter, but people respect Rally Vincent, and she doesn't want to lose the reputation.
Kenichi Sonoda revealed that her pseudonym was supposed to be "Larry" - not merely androgynous but outright masculine. "Rally" came from the difficulty in translating "L" and "R" sounds from Japanese. - Girls with Guns: She's probably one of the quintessential examples.
- Guns Akimbo: Discussed. Rally says that firing two guns at once isn't practical because it decreases aiming accuracy.
- Hero Insurance: Averted. Because of her tendency for destructive high speed chases, Rally "The Wrecker" (As she is known to insurance companies) can't get collision insurance anymore.
- IKEA Weaponry: Rally Vincent's first gun, given to her by her father, was a AR-7, a small .22LR rifle that can be disassembled and the components stored inside the buttstock. She keeps this in the trunk of her car and still uses it from time to time.
- Improbable Aiming Skills: Rally can hit anything with a handgun. Anything.
- She's hit an oncoming RPG dead-center to detonate it before it reached her.
- She's put a hole clean through a target's hand from a neighboring rooftop (although that was with a precision sniper rifle).
- She's on more than one occasion she has fired her gun in order to hit someone with the ejected bullet casings — in the eyes.
- Oh, and she's obviously skilled enough to go around Blasting It Out of Their Hands, but rarely does it; the one time she did so, her license had been suspended and she didn't want the cops to find someone(even a maniac who fired full-auto rifles on the highway) she'd shot. That case also demonstrated why she does it so rarely; a bullet doesn't carry enough kinetic energy to send a gun flying out of a strong man's grip, so she had to hit the gun multiple times — and the psycho managed to snatch it out of the air with his other hand. Where other shooters would shoot guns out of people's hands, she regularly shoots off the weapon's hammer, or even its safety. She has also on occasion somehow managed to do this without the person holding the gun noticing until they try firing the disabled weapon.
- One particularly notable incident occurred when her aiming skills were off due to cracked ribs and a broken arm in a cast — her dominant arm. She just plain missed — multiple times — and had tried to reload by sticking her pistol in her armpit behind the cast, only for her target to reload his Sawn-Off Shotgun and prepare to blow her away. So she dropped the magazine, let it fall on her foot, whereupon she kicked it back into place and shot her assailant (who was understandably dumbstruck at the maneuver).
- The manga does go through a bit of work pointing out that Rally's sharpshooting depends partly on the kind of gun she's using—one chapter sees Rally limited by the short range of a Saturday Night Special.
- Improbably Cool Car: A Shelby GT500 is very rare and expensive car for a teenage orphan to own. Sonoda said that he chose it solely on the basis of its specifications without considering how rare it was. Note that after the Shelby gets destroyed in Burst Rally can't get another one and replaces it with a much more realistic Mustang II Cobra. Still a collectible muscle car but not a certified exotic. Even before that point Rally had been running out of replacement parts for the Shelby, getting forced to use parts designed for other cars in repairs whenever the Shelby got damaged.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: She takes offense to being called 'old'.
- It Works Better with Bullets: Rally ends up running out of ammo often, or forced to reload. At least a couple of times, she gets back at the villains regardless because they forget semi-autos keep one bullet "in the pipe".
- Lingerie Scene:
- When their shop is burglarized in the middle of the night, Rally and Minnie May get out of bed, sneak up on the thieves, and capture them. There's no time to get dressed, so throughout the scene Minnie May is in a very short nightshirt and Rally is in her underwear.
- During a climactic fight with the bad guys, Rally suffers Clothing Damage and has her shirt completely ripped off. She fights on wearing just a bra and skirt.
- Lovely Angels: A strange example, in that Rally is the clear-headed, celibate one despite being, better built, a year older and a far better combatant, and May is the irresponsible sex kitten who often has to be rescued despite being a Mad Bomber who looks like a pre-teen.
- Only the Leads Get a Happy Ending: Inverted. She seemingly gets the bigger downers in the Bittersweet Ending of Burst, and considering that one of the "sweet" parts of said ending is Goldie getting all she wants because Rally can't do anything about it, they only get worse.
- Pistol Pose: Used a lot on pin-up art throughout the series. Justified with Rally's love of guns.
- The Precious, Precious Car: Rally's GT-500 is not only a cool car, but rare as hell, expensive to fix (especially because Rally has been classified as a liability by all insurance companies) and gets damaged a lot, to Rally's unending despair. One of the early arcs of Burst kills off the Cobra for good via car bomb.
- Potty Emergency: In Chapter 37 of the manga, Rally finds herself in this situation while stowed away in Bean Bandit's car. She even considers allowing a Potty Failure, despite the fact that it'll give her away. Luckily, Bean stops at a diner, allowing Rally to visit the ladies's room.
- Race Lift: Rally in Riding Bean was a blonde, while in this series she's Ambiguously Brown. Later revealed to have an Indian or Pakistani father.
- Revolver Cylinder Spin: Rally Vincent demonstrates her incredible skill with guns in an early chapter by timing the spin of a revolver to do the typical "scare the bad guy by playing Russian Roulette with him so he will give information" gag. While the goon she's doing it to is Genre Savvy enough to know the gag, he unfortunately is unable to expect Rally being good enough to get the gun to click empty five times in a row, which she demonstrates rapid-fire. Rally then says her personal record doing this is twelve times and asks the goon if he wants to help her beat that record... the man provides the info on the second attempt.
- Sean Connery Is About to Shoot You: Pops up occasionally on the manga cover art.
- Ship Tease: The biggest tease for Rally/May is actually in the first volume of the manga, starting in the first chapter, and then the teasing mostly trails off afterward.
- There's also Rally/Misty, which is highlighted by Misty actively pursuing Rally.
- There's also some Rally/Bean chemistry, but with personalities like theirs, neither would even be willing to try to actually initiate anything.
- One of Rally's gambits involves being declared dead on an underground info network. Bean gets upset, and later states that he's completing the job for her.
- Bean outright asks her to become his partner as a third option after complimenting Rally's driving skills. Rally's reaction is rather cute.
- Small Girl, Big Gun: Usually averted, unless your threshold for "big gun" is pretty low. Rally several times points out that guns, stocks, and grips need to be chosen with the size of their user in mind, and her preferred pistol isn't a particularly large one.
- Trademark Favorite Food: According to the anime, Rally and May's diet consists almost entirely of pizza (When it's Rally's turn to get dinner) and Chinese (When it's May's turn). In the manga, Rally has a fondness for kebabs.
- Unorthodox Reload: When Rally has a broken arm, she reloads during a firefight by dropping the magazine on to her foot and then kicking it up into her pistol.
- Wall of Weapons: Rally's closet.
- Wrench Wench: Rally is a gunsmith after all, and she's shown teaching May in the manga. She's never shown working on her own cars though, though she does wank over its capabilities at times. Not literally... at least not on page.
Minnie May Hopkins
"Minnie" May Hopkins
Voiced by: Kae Araki (Japanese), Kimberly Yates (English) Other voice actors
Rally's partner, an Older Than They Look Mad Bomber and usually serves as the demolitionist of the duo with her countless grenades and other explosives. Usually acts as support for Ralyl on whatever adventures they get thrown into.
- Ambiguously Bi: She and Rally are quite close but she also has a boyfriend.
- Babies Ever After: She and Ken get offspring by the end of Burst.
- Big Damn Heroes: Sonoda isn't afraid of the dramatic just-in-the-nick rescues. Everyone gets their chance to do it at some point... Rally, May, Bean, Riff-Raff, practically everyone but the pure villains.
- Caught with Your Pants Down: Minnie May is masturbating to a photo of her missing boyfriend when Becky walks in on her.
- Cool Car: May's Fiat was never actually sold in America.
- Fake in the Hole: In the "Misfire" arc, Minnie May tosses a dummy grenade at Gray to force him to back away from the fallen Rally.
- Fanservice: Occasionally it borders on out-and-out porn, in May's case. Who, you know, is a prostitute. She even gives someone a (barely-censored) blowjob early in the manga.
- Fetish: May is an ekrixiphiliac — she's literally turned on by explosions and the scent of gunpowder.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: She takes offense to being called 'old'.
- Lingerie Scene: When their shop is burglarized in the middle of the night, Rally and Minnie May get out of bed, sneak up on the thieves, and capture them. There's no time to get dressed, so throughout the scene Minnie May is in a very short nightshirt and Rally is in her underwear.
- Lovely Angels: A strange example, in that Rally is the clear-headed, celibate one despite being, better built, a year older and a far better combatant, and May is the irresponsible sex kitten who often has to be rescued despite being a Mad Bomber who looks like a pre-teen.
- Mad Bomber: A tiny bit. She's obsessed with explosives to the point of having a grenade-themed condiment set (Rally snarks about the "pineapple" dressing) - not to mention the countless real ones scattered about the gunshop/home.
- May–December Romance: Minnie-May Hopkins is about 17 to 18. Her boyfriend, Ken Takizawa, is in his thirties. Rally and other characters have pointed out the problems inherent to this.
- Older Than They Look: While she's supposed to be a 17/18-year-old teen, May looks just as short as the 13-year-old pre-teen she was when she ran away from her home. This is due to her taking growth-stunting herbal drugs in order for her to try and stay attractive for her boyfriend, Ken Takizawa.
- Ship Tease: The biggest tease for Rally/May is actually in the first volume of the manga, starting in the first chapter, and then the teasing mostly trails off afterward.
- There's also Rally/Misty, which is highlighted by Misty actively pursuing Rally.
- Skinship Grope: In chapter 1, Minnie-May gropes Rally after her regular target practice while commenting on how stiff her nipples were. Rally returns the favor after Minnie May lets one of her custom-made grenades fly and take out Bonnie's car. She even comments on how they feel like "tiny pebbles".
- Throw Down the Bomblet: She has a slight tendency to use home-made concussion grenades in inappropriate situations... usually clusters of them, in the OVA. However, she's every bit as skilled in their use as Rally is with handguns. A single one will just leave a couple of gang members stunned for a minute or so. She can use three to blow out a pursuing car's drive shaft. And when she's really pissed off, she'll set off a dozen of them at once, causing extensive damage to whatever building she's in (typically shown with a Discretion Shot of the outside of the building with all the windows breaking and billowing out smoke).
- Trademark Favorite Food: According to the anime, Rally and May's diet consists almost entirely of pizza (When it's Rally's turn to get dinner) and Chinese (When it's May's turn).
- Tricked-Out Shoes: Minnie-May keeps a small explosive kit in the heel of her shoe.
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Once, in an early chapter of the manga, when May gets (appropriately) carsick.
Allies and Friends
Becky Farrah
Becky Farrah
The duo's informant and usually the one they turn to when they need info or someone with brains to help them out.
- Deception Non-Compliance: Rally knows something's wrong when Becky (who is being held at gunpoint) doesn't end the call by reminding Rally she still owes her for past information.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: She takes offense to being called "old".
- Pet the Dog: Sort of inverted. Becky is frequently shown to be a bit difficult when it comes to helping Rally without payment. She is later shown dealing with another client, giving him false information and letting him know that she knows where he lives before upping her price when he fails to make a payment, which illustrates just how much she lets Rally get away with.
- Wingding Eyes: A Spirals variation of this is used in the OVA, while Becky is being driven in Rally's car, and acting particularly terrified.
Ken Takizawa
Ken Takizawa
May's boyfriend.
- Babies Ever After: At the end of Burst, he and May decided to finally have kids.
- Fetish: He is apparently into lolicon, apparently.note
- May–December Romance: Minnie-May Hopkins is about 17 to 18. Her boyfriend, Ken Takizawa, is in his thirties. Rally and other characters have pointed out the problems inherent to this.
- Wire Dilemma: Ken Takizawa deliberately uses these in his bombs because, "Hey, everyone makes mistakes, huh? And I like living!" In other words, if he screws up while building the bomb (which was increasingly likely due to multiple sclerosis), he has a few minutes to correct the mistake before it kills him.
Misty Brown
Misty Brown
- Agony of the Feet: In Chapter 37, an extremely heavy jacket falls on and breaks Misty's foot. Cue the Symbol Swearing Angrish.
- Brainwashed: One of Goldie's specialties — and it's debatable whether Misty is brainwashed or not towards the end of Burst
- Face–Heel Turn: Misty towards the end of Burst. She decides to associate herself with Goldie and become her lover, because both of them want a Replacement Goldfish for Rally.
- Happiness in Slavery: Misty accepts becoming Goldie's lover in the epilogue of Burst. Rally is not completely sure that there wasn't some coercing involved.
- Hurt Foot Hop: In Chapter 37, Bean Bandit's heavy, armored jacket falls on and breaks poor Misty's foot. Cue Symbol Swearing Angrish while hopping.
- Intimate Hair Brushing: Subverted after Misty is kidnapped, no bonding or closeness happens when Misty gets her hair brushed. She is looking distinctly uncomfortable as one of the female kidnappers is brushing her hair. In contrast, the kidnapper is smiling happily, and even her fellow abductors seem weirded out by this.
- Replacement Goldfish: Misty is replacing Rally in Goldie's eyes — and Goldie is replacing Rally in Misty's eyes.
Roy Coleman
Roy Coleman
Voiced by: Ikuya Sawaki (Japanese), Guil Lunde (English) Other voice actors
- Friend on the Force: A good examination in that the relationship gets him into lots of trouble despite Rally's most honest efforts; hanging around a trouble magnet isn't really good for one's career, and he ultimately ends up transferring away from Chicago due to the damage to his reputation.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: He quits the Chicago Police Department and moves to the suburb of Rosemont, Illinois at the end of Burst, because being involved in Rally's antics has demolished his reputation quite a lot.
Riff-Raff
Riff-Raff
- '80s Hair: Riff-Raff, of the "punk" variety. Of course, like her spiritual sibling Lufy from Gall Force, Riff-Raff is basically double-dipped in eighties style.
- Big Damn Heroes: Sonoda isn't afraid of the dramatic just-in-the-nick rescues. Everyone gets their chance to do it at some point... Rally, May, Bean, Riff-Raff, practically everyone but the pure villains.
- Expy: Riff-Raff is pretty much an update of Lufy from Gall Force.
Bean Bandit
Bean Bandit
Voiced by: Hideyuki Tanaka (Japanese), J. Patrick Lawlor (English)
The protagonist of his own OVA. Bean returns (albeit with some obvious differences) in Burst as a recurring member of the cast.
- Alliterative Name: Bean Bandit
- Armor of Invincibility: Bean's bullet-proof jacket is completely impervious to handgun rounds, and it's allowed him to survive salvos of nearly everything from shotgun slugs to armor-piercing rifle fire. Of course, it has chainmail underweave, kevlar lamination and ceramic plating in it and probably qualifies for the mythic class V of body armor. He can only wear it because he has Super-Strength ; Misty could barely lift it, and the jacket was heavy enough to break her foot when she dropped it.
- Badass Driver: Rally later says that Bean Bandit is a much better driver than she is. Bean for his part thinks she's damned good herself, even offering to take her as his partner, saying it'd be fun. The streets of Chicago would never have been the same if she took him up on it.
- Big Damn Heroes: Sonoda isn't afraid of the dramatic just-in-the-nick rescues. Everyone gets their chance to do it at some point... Rally, May, Bean, Riff-Raff, practically everyone but the pure villains.
- Blade Enthusiast: He's very fond of blades, even having a Wall of Weapons comprised mostly of bladed weapons.
- Blown Across the Room: The author goes to great extent to point out the internal damage bullets can do even with armor. A close-range shotgun blast leaves Bean helpless despite his armor, as it was basically like taking a sledgehammer to the torso.
- Bulletproof Vest: His leather jacket is made up of several kinds of armors that make it almost impervious to any and all bullets, although this comes at the cost of it weighing way more than the average person can handle.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: Bean possesses strength way more than the average person, even his bullet proof jacket is enough to show how strong he is.
- Cool Car: Bean's car, the Buff, is a car he had custom built for a million dollars and with good reason. It's built with all sorts of gadgets that would blow any car enthusiast's minds.
- Consummate Professional: Bean Bandit has a fantastic reputation for this. Both he and Rally make mention of unwritten rules that they follow regarding their work and the lives they lead. It becomes a very important plot point later on.
- Courier: Bean "Road Buster" Bandit is the best driver around - whether it's a delivery or a getaway you need. Rally getting him to stop doing drug runs is a major plot point. He even seems happy about it.
- Heroic Build: Bean's built like a 90's action hero and has the strength to match it.
- Hitman with a Heart: Despite being a deliveryman for 'packages' that frequently involve drugs, Bean has a soft spot for kids and doesn't hesitate to drop drugs taken from a young thief and the adult drug dealer after the drugs and the kid down a manhole. Rally points this out and Bean offers her a bet with the reward being an oath that he'll never deliver drugs again just because this 'seems to piss her off so much'.
- I Gave My Word: Rally trusts Bean without knowing him that well because she suspects him of this. He delivers.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: He takes offense to being called 'old'.
- Made of Iron: Just like in the OVA, Bean is one tough son of a gun and can take a lot of punishment. Although he still has his limits.
- Male Frontal Nudity: While searching Bean's apartment, Rally realizes he's coming out of the shower and hides in the closet... only for Bean's cell phone to start ringing. From his shirt pocket. In the closet. Right next to her. Bean walks out of the bathroom, opens the closet door, and answers his phone, completely unaware that Rally is crouching at his feet, eyes level with his crotch. While the reader doesn't see anything, Rally gets an eyeful as Bean chats away. For several minutes. And given her internalized shrieking, she's... intimidated by what she sees.
- Only in It for the Money: What Bean says is his main motivation - that, and because he has a car he wants to build. It's likely that he also does it because he loves to drive and enjoys the thrill of the chase.
- Ship Tease: There's also some Rally/Bean chemistry, but with personalities like theirs, neither would even be willing to try to actually initiate anything.
- One of Rally's gambits involves being declared dead on an underground info network. Bean gets upset, and later states that he's completing the job for her.
- Bean outright asks her to become his partner as a third option after complimenting Rally's driving skills. Rally's reaction is rather cute.
- Think Nothing of It - Bean uses this excuse a couple of times after saving the girls, along with I Was Just Passing Through . It crosses over into Suspiciously Specific Denial when Rally insists on thanking him more than once. Bean actually sounds rather embarrassed about it till Rally relents.
- Transplant: Bean Bandit, who was originally the main character Riding Bean, is now a recurring character.
- Wall of Weapons: Bean Bandit's armory full of bladed weapons.
Antagonists
Bonnie and Clyde
Bonnie and Clyde
- Arm Cannon: Bonnie, after her first run-in with Rally and May.
- Armed Legs: Bonnie replaces her lost leg with a prosthesis outfitted with a shotgun (and her other foot, also lost, with a prosthesis that holds a "Bouncing Betty"). The 3 part OVA gives a Continuity Nod to this when one of the two exotic weapons Washington offers to Rally ends up as this (the other one is Grey's machette prosthesis from later stories).
- Leg Cannon: Bonnie's first encounter with the Gunsmith Cats went badly for her: Rally shot her thumb off and one of May's grenades blew off her legs below the knee. When she returned for revenge her new prosthetic replacements included a shotgun in one leg (with a bomb in that foot) and a thumb that included a garrotte.
- Razor Floss: Used by Bonnie for a last ditch attempt to kill Rally. It slices her CZ-75, at least.
Gray
Gray
Hey, Vincent, love ya, baby! Let's party sometime!
- Axe-Crazy: Lunatical enough that not even a straitjacket nor a pair of handcuffs would hold him.
- Hate Sink: Given he's an absolute homicidal dirtbag in the manga, it's pretty satisfying to see his end at the end of Return of Gray.
- I Have You Now, My Pretty: Gray doesn't just want to kill Rally for ruining his arm, he wants to rape her first.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Before Gray is about to rape and murder Rally, she finally shoots him to death. Pretty cathartic to see, given how much of a terrible person he is.
- Might as Well Not Be in Prison at All: Gray is able to keep control of his gang and even orchestrate his own escape from inside prison.
Goldie Musou
Goldie Musou
- Amazon Chaser: Part of the reason that Goldie pursues Rally.
- Artistic License – Chemistry: A key element of Goldie Musou's plot arc is her basically being the Einstein of pharmaceuticals, having created the recreational chemical equivalent of the atomic bomb; "Kerasonin Citrasine" AKA "Kerasine" is basically an excuse for one woman to come out of absolutely nowhere to dominate organized crime in Chicago;
- It's as cheap to make as methamphetamines - though possibly requiring expensive equipment as Bean is sent halfway across the country to New York for a shipment - so Goldie can undercut all her rivals.
- Goldie expects her rivals to take several years to reverse engineer it, making it basically a license to print money.
- It replicates the effects of three entirely different and distinct drugs - a small amount is a stimulant like cocaine, a larger amount is a euphoric similar to heroin, and the entire contents of a vial combines both with a powerful hallucinogenic effect like phencyclidine or lysergic acid diethylamide. She thus takes customers from three existing groups and keeps them, especially as...
- It has very low toxicity, as in no-one in-story - even in the background - ever overdoses on it. Long-term users don't even seem debilitated in any perceivable way. The resulting Functional Addicts just buy and buy and buy. This eventually gives Goldie Vetinari Job Security once she abandons her obsession with Rally, as the city can either have Kerasine addicts and her as its sole overboss or their previous morass of crackheads and the constant war between the gangs and numerous crime syndicates.
- It does have one exactly one downside; It puts users in a hypnotic state, enabling them to be used as catspaws. She gets a lot of mileage out of this, tearing through the few rivals she can't buy out by simply subverting their forces. One person she suborns such is Rally's father. This doesn't diminish its customer base, as junkies aren't exactly rational or forward-thinking.
- Break the Cutie: Surprisingly, Goldie had a bout of this when she was younger.
- Even Evil Has Standards: One of the few things Goldie won't do is harming animals. In her Start of Darkness story, after becoming a mob boss and inventing an early version of her brainwashing drugs, the family dog (Which had adored her when she was just a Mafia Princess with no direct involvement in the family business) attacked her. Her subordinates tried to put it down, but she insisted that the dog be spared.
- Of course, literally hurting animals is the one thing she has standards for. Any other evil act that would fall under the definition of Kick the Dog—including sending brainwashed people to kill everything you love or turning you into a sex slave (or brainwashing you and sending you to kill everything you love)—she has absolutely no problem with.
- Expy: Goldie is an expy of Semmerling, one of the villains from the original Riding Bean OVA.
- Karma Houdini: Burst ends with Goldie, despite all the horrors she's caused and atrocities she's committed, becoming the new kingpin of the Chicago underworld with the safety that as long as she alone has the knowledge of how to produce Kerasine she has virtual Vetinari Job Security and only a very vague word that she's become "better" (from Misty) to assure Rally that this is a good idea. And she gets to walk off into the sunset with Misty (who may or may not be brainwashed, to boot)!
- Lady Looks Like a Dude: Downplayed. She is sometimes depicted with a masculine looking face.
- The Mafia: Goldie Musou is the leader of the Illinois Mafia and Rally's Arch-Enemy.
- Mind Control: Goldie's weapon of choice. She's even loaded bullets with her own trademark drug so people she shoots are susceptible to suggestion.
- Psycho Lesbian: A big fat example, is a stone cold killer with short eyes and a harem she's gathered through brainwashing drugs.
- Vetinari Job Security: Goldie is allowed to get away with her crimes and get a happy ending with a brainwashed Misty because she ends up necessary to keep the Chicago underworld under control; she beat all her rivals, and now controls the drug trade in a non-lethal, non-debilitating product - meaning eliminating her would bring back the bad old days of gang wars and strung-out junkies. Well, that and remembering how Rally shot her in the head multiple times for being a psychotic bitch persuaded her to tone down the puppy-kicking or Rally might keep it up until she actually dies. It's also possible that the brain damage caused by Rally's bullets may have resulted in an actual personality shift, as Goldie seems much less psychotic afterwards.
OVA-only Characters
William Coleman
William "Bill" Coleman
- Anime Hair: While he has realistic brunette hair, the way it's fashioned makes him stand out quite a bit. Not only does he have a pony tail, but it also has a very large bang on the right side of his head.
- Badass Long Coat: Wouldn't be a proper detective-type character if he didn't wear a proper brown/khaki overcoat.
- Cowboy Cop: Despite being a member of the A.T.F., he frequently launches his own investigations when his superiors stonewall him. Considering one of his superiors is secretly a Dirty Cop, it's a very good thing he does.
- Shame If Something Happened: After being shown the door in his first encounter/attempt to enlist Rally to help him in his case, he gets leverage over her by casually threatening to destroy her weapons collection when the ATF catches wind of it courtesy of burglars breaking into her home.
George Black
George Black
Voiced by: Michihiro Ikemizu (Japanese), Rick Peeples (English) Other voice actors
- Dirty Cop: Despite being Bill Collins' superior in the A.T.F. Chicago office, George Black is, in fact, part of a gun-running operation which he co-ran with Edward Haints, an Illinois assemblyman running for mayor in Chicago under a gun-control platform.
- Et Tu, Brute?: He's surprised and scared for his life once Radinov murders him under Haines orders.
- He Knows Too Much: The reason why Haines orders Radinov to dispose of him as a loose end.
Natasha Radinov
Natasha Radinov
Voiced by: Yoko Soumi (Japanese), Marcy Rae (English) Other voice actors
- Armor of Invincibility: Radinov in the anime has a coat that at least as bulletproof as Bean's, and is also full of a ridiculous number of weapons. It weighs a ton; when she hangs it on a wooden coat rack, the coat rack breaks.
- Awesome, but Impractical: Lampshaded by some nameless mook when Radinov kills a Security Guard with her Ballistic Knife.Mook #1: What kind of a psycho uses a weapon you have to recover every time you use it?
Mook #2: Shut up, she'll hear you! - Axe Before Entering: She demonstrates she carries an ax under her coat by pulling a Jack Halloran on the door of the bathroom Washington tried to hide in.
- Axe-Crazy: Radinov just loves killing people, preferably with sharp, pointy objects.
- Badass Long Coat: Radinov's trenchcoat is almost like Bean's, it's almost bulletproof and carries an arsenal's worth of weapons inside making it weight to the point that a wall coat hook breaks the moment she rests the trenchcoat on it.
- Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: She carries a lot of automatic weapons, an ax and both a ballistic knife and a shooting knife (a knife with a .22 derringer concealed on the grip). They all scream "crazy assassin with no regard for collateral damage or leaving survivors".
- Canon Foreigner: Created exclusively for the OVA.
- Corrupted Character Copy: She's this in a way to Bean Bandit, she can even be considered an Evil Counterpart to him. Both are nearly unstoppable fighters, although Natasha prefers using guns (with some other sharp implements being used) mainly focusing on assassin work, Bean much prefers focusing on his driving skills and when actually getting into fights uses only a knife. Speaking of knives, Bean uses a simple (yet really sharp and sturdy) switchblade while Radinov prefers using a more complicated ballistic knife. Bean wears a bullet-proof leather jacket, Radinov meanwhile one-ups him by wearing a full on bullet-proof Badass Long Coat.
- Expy: Radinov's character design is very similar to Riff-Raff and Lufy from Gall Force.
- Made of Iron: Between natural toughness and the heavy body armor, she survives a makeshift antipersonnel mine Minnie May creates in the final battle and tries to end Rally once and for all with an ax in her best impersonation of Karl.
- Minor Injury Overreaction: Radinov's reaction to having her earring shot off, and her earlobe along with it. She reacts first the sight of her missing earlobe.... then the pain. She takes this further in the final episode, where she tries to murder both Rally and May over this.
- Multiple Gunshot Death: Rally finally gets rid of her by unloading her CZ-75 on her chest at point-blank range when she tries to copycat Karl.
- Mythology Gag: Some aspects of Radinov from the OVA are quite similar to Bean from Riding Bean, love for sharp weaponry and a weighted bulletproof jacket (trenchcoat in Radinov's case).
- One-Man Army: Roy alludes to it, when described her as being: "not an assassin, but more like The Terminator". She proceeds to live up to her reputation by storming through a police safehouse and mowing down a dozen or so officers and federal agents, in order to kill Washington.
- Psycho for Hire: She has a few screws loose, which makes her very much a wild card for her employers. She even kills off one of them and opens fire on Rally and May despite her employer being very close by.
- Psycho Knife Nut: She owns a ballistic knife and is very fond of it, she also clearly not the most sane assassin out there, one of the Mooks working with her outright calls her a psycho for her strange choice of weaponry.
- Red Baron: a k a "Bloody Pierce".
- Renegade Russian: Former member of the GRU, now working as a Psycho for Hire.
- The Silent Bob: Radinov doesn't talks much through the mini-series (one "Dosvidanya" during her first kill, one "I'll Kill You!" after Rally shoots her earring off, a lot of angry yelling and grunting). Her actions speak a lot for her.
- Trenchcoat Warfare: Underneath her Badass Long Coat is enough firearms (and melee weapons) to turn her into a Walking Armory.
- Villainous Breakdown: After losing her fight against Rally and May (alongside getting her ear lobe shot), she slowly loses her mind and become more and more Ax-Crazy till she's full on Screaming Warrior in her last ditch effort to kill Rally.
- Walking Armory: Radinov has more guns in her coat than she knows what to do with, and that's on top of it being armored. The woman must be immensely strong.
- Weapon-Based Characterization: Her final attempt on Rally's life has her taking out what appears to be a fire axe when charging out of the ambulance, it's hard to say if it's actually hers or for some reason an ambulance had one laying around. Either way, her use of an axe in a last ditch attempt to kill Rally cements that she's on the last legs of her Villainous Breakdown.
Edward Haints
Edward Haints
Voiced by: Seizō Katō (Japanese), Aaron Krohn (English) Other voice actors
- Big Bad: Is this for the OVA trilogy.
- Corrupt Politician: He runs a gun-running ring to fund his political campaign and promises to increase gun control with the implied reason to gain a monopoly on the Illinois black market.
- Engineered Public Confession: Misty and Becky get him to confess his association with Radinov and show that he is not anti-gun as he presents himself as, by having Misty pose as Radinov and leaving an empty handgun on a table near Edward.
- Hypocrite: His campaign runs on the promise to increase gun control. He runs a gun smuggling ring to fund his campaign.
Johnathan Washington
Johnathan Washington
- Butt-Monkey: Not much good happens to him nor his gun-running operation and he's ultimately taken out in a PsychoShowerMurder homage.
- Face Death with Despair: Spends his last seconds of life begging Radinov not to kill him.
- "Psycho" Shower Murder Parody: What happens to Washington when Radinov finds him.
- Mythology Gag: He presents two prosthetic weapons to Rally that are a reference to two characters in the manga.
