Maya is a friendly, outgoing, silly, extremely
nutty older-sister figure, who is more likely to giggle and tell bad
jokes. She's the warm heart of the party, keeping them
cheered up when things are going badly, and providing the voice of an
adult (sort of) to the kids. She's loud, talkative, friendly, and kind;
she almost never shuts up in Tsumi!
Maya's motto is "Let's Think Positively!" ("Let's Positive Thinking" in
her special brand of Engrish) and even at the worst of times, she keeps
a smile on her face and tries to find a silver lining in the situation.
Her optimism and refusal to give up has saved the group more than once;
instead of despairing, she thinks of a way to solve their current
problems. However, despite her unending cheerfulness, she's fully aware
of how bad the situation is, and is privately rather doubtful that
things will turn out well. But instead of depressing the "kids" with
her worries, she tells them that everything will surely be okay, and
her strength keeps them going. At first I wasn't sure about her, but
she grew on me, and you only realize how important she is when she is
replaced by Shadow Maya, who only says pessimistic, snarky things about
humanity.
Maya has a great fear of fire, and the only time you see her lose her
cool is when confronted with a burning building. She cowers and cries
out for her father to save her. But she's brave and practical, and when
trapped in the burning Air Museum, she doesn't lose control, but
willingly goes through the building to save the schoolchildren trapped
inside, even though she's essentially trapped in her worst nightmare.
She's even willing to climb down a rope into a sea of flames to rescue
Ixquic.
HISTORY
Maya's father, Masataka Amano,
was a war correspondent, and was always away from home on various
assignments. One of Maya's memories is that he took Maya to Alaya
Shrine to pray that her dreams would come true. She said that she was
wishing that Daddy would stay home, and he told her that journalism was
an important job. She'd made him a little rabbit as a good-luck charm,
and he told her to keep it instead until he came home, saying that if
she cried, Mr. Rabbit would laugh at her. Sadly, Mr. Amano was killed,
and she never saw him again. So the bunny reminds her of her father.
Deep in her heart, she's angry at her father for being so selfish and
putting his job over his family, so she wants to be a journalist who
can balance her family and her career.
Maya continued to come to Alaya Shrine as a teenager and pray for her
future, and during a festival, she saw four little masked kids playing
together. She stopped to talk to them, and they invited her to join
their group - the Masquerade, which could make her dreams come true.
She was probably lonely and sad, so she joined the kids, becoming their
older sister. She came every day to play with them, amusing herself
with how they played and fought together. She taught them a game called
"Persona," which was supposed to show you what you'd be like when you
grew up.
Two of the boys, Red Eagle and Black Falcon, were especially attached
to her, and one evening they came to her apartment complex and knocked
on her window. At first she didn't recognize them; in the dusk, the two
boys looked like twins. But then she realized that it was Red Eagle and
Black Falcon without their masks, and she took them to the park near
her house to hang out with them. She told them about a German poem
she'd read; the two kids were the "doppelgangers" of the poem, and she
encouraged them to always be good friends. They in turn promised to
always protect her.
At some point, her mother decided to move away, and she had to tell the
children that she wouldn't be able to play with them anymore. She went
to tell them, and they were heartbroken and begged her not to leave.
Three of the children decided to lock her in the shrine overnight so
she couldn't leave, and when Tatsuya protested, they locked him in
there with her too.
Maya didn't panic, but played with Tatsuya all evening in the shrine so
that he wouldn't get scared. When it became dark, the arsonist Tatsuya
Sudou came to Alaya and set it afire. When she realized that the shrine
was burning, Maya presumably helped Tatsuya escape out of a window, and
banged on the door, telling him to run away, since the arsonist was
still out there. For the first time, she summoned her persona and was
able to escape the burning shrine, but she was badly burnt in the
attempt. Because the other three kids thought she'd died in the fire, a
rumor spread that a little girl's ghost haunted Mt. Iwato.
Soon after that, she moved away with her mom and didn't return to the
area until she took a job in Kismet Publishing in Aoba. She was made
editor of the teen magazine Coolest, and with her friend and parner
Yukino, they went around the city collecting info on the newest teen fads,
such as the new "Joker Charm" or the "Joker Curse." (You may
remember Mizuno complaining about Maya's article "The Dream of the
Rumored Student" in Batsu. In Tsumi, the rumored student was Jun, but in Batsu,
it's probably Tatsuya. That whole doppelganger thing again.)
Maya had a
stalker who she was worried about; this was Tatsuya Sudou again, who
thought she was a Witch for having escaped him with her Persona
power. So when he took off his mask at the Air Museum, she knew exactly
who was chasing them...
In Xibalba, Maya quotes the second
half of the poem "Le calmant" ("Sedative") by Marie
Laurencin (translated into
Japanese from the French;
here's the original
poem in French and English.)
Maya adds on two lines of her own:
Worse than forgotten
Is being a woman who ties people down.
Maya would never want to become the kind of person who causes pain and
sadness to those she loves, the way that the rest of the group was
traumatized by their childhood losses. If she were to die, she would
want them to forget her completely so they could be happy. At the end
of Tsumi, that's why she tells them to "hurry up and forget about me,"
unlike most characters who tell people not
to forget about them when they die.
That's why at the end of Eternal Punishment, it was really strange (in my opinion) for Maya to even CONSIDER clinging to Tatsuya, weeping and begging him to take
her with him. That would be creating ties for him and making it harder for
Tatsuya to leave peacefully. By refusing to forget and move on, Tatsuya
would be betraying her dream too....
FUTURE
Unknown!
TRIVIA
Maya's theme song is called
"Open your heart," and you can hear it several places. The "uprifting
house mix" is available on the drama CD, "Errors of their Youth", and I
like it a lot. She uses it as her cell phone ringtone in Tsumi, it
plays when she first enters the scene in Sevens...in Batsu, the
background music for Sevens is a remix of "Open your heart."
Maya works at Kismet Publishing. Kismet means "destiny" or "fate". The major publications are the Weekly Coolest (for teens), the Weekly Mu (paranormal phenomena) and Weekly Gourmet Gems (a cooking/foodie magazine).
She hates cooking, cleaning,
and is bad at applying makeup; her room is a total mess.
She has an entire outfit that
only cost 1 yen (less than a cent) - there was some television promo
that a certain store was selling clothing at 1 yen apiece, so she raced
down there and shopped like crazy. (I guess her current outfit cost ten
yen, then?)
She met her roommate Ulala Serizawa in high school, and they must have been living together ever
since graduation.
Maya's precious keepsake is a
small worn handmade bunny; she calls him "Mr. Rabbit" and uses him to
cheer Tatsuya up in the Bomb Shelter. "If you're sad, Mr. Rabbit will
laugh at you! Hop, hop!"
OFFICIAL PROFILE
Nicknames:
Makki (used by Fujii), Big Sis Maya, Big Sis Birthdate:
July 4, 1976
Zodiac Sign:
Cancer
/ Fire
Dragon Guardian Dragon:
Light Height/Weight:
168 cm (5'6") / 48 kg (106 lbs) Bloodtype: O Occupation:
Journalist at Kismet Publishing (assigned to the teen magazine
"Coolest")
Tarot Arcana:
Moon Elemental Affinity:
Water Starting PERSONA: Maia Ultimate PERSONA: Artemis Weapons:
Cute pink handguns Appearance:
Well-endowed. The right side of her chest has a severe burn scar that she got when she was younger. She
actually wears pants most of the time.
Idle Animation:
While lost in thought, she tugs her earlobe. Likes:
Driving (although she's terrible at it), people-watching (she's a
reporter, she has an instinct for it) Favorite Sports:
None (actually, she really enjoys scuba diving and aquatic sports) Family:
Father (Masataka Amano, a war photographer killed on the job when
she was in middle school), Mother Talents: Jan-ken-pon (she almost always uses "pon") and arguing Favorite Foods:
Canned crab (she really likes crab), ramen Hated Foods:
Crab roe, kusaya Phobias:
Fire (she has a terrible phobia of fire ever since she was caught in a
burning building),
cleaning (take a look at her room), alcohol
(absolutely no tolerance!),
mornings (she has low blood pressure which
makes it hard to get out of bed in the mornings, and because of the
nature of her job, she couldn't help becoming a night person),
dating (basically, she's married to her job),
makeup and cooking
(Ulala takes care of both) Dream:
To be a successful journalist who can juggle a career and a family Games:
Main party character in Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment Voice Actor:
Akiko
Yajima