Misao Kusakabe

Misao Kusakabe
Kanji Name	日下部 みさお
Romaji Name	Kusakabe Misao
Gender	Female
Age	17-18
Status	Alive
Date of Birth	July 20
Birthplace	Saitama Prefecture
Blood Type	B
Height	162cm
Aliases	Misa-chan (by Ayano)
Family	Unnamed Grandfather
Seiyū	Kaoru Mizuhara
Voice Actor	Lara Jill Miller
Drama CD Seiyū	Mikako Takahashi
Manga Debut	Manga Episode 24
Anime Debut	Episode 11

Misao Kusakabe (日下部 みさお, Kusakabe Misao) is a childhood friend of Ayano Minegishi since kindergarten, along with Kagami, her fellow classmate.

General Information

Misao lives with her grandmother, grandfather, mother, father and an older brother (who, like Miyuki's "older brother", was only mentioned once or twice, and who is Ayano's boyfriend, according to volume 7). However, none of their names are revealed in either the manga or the anime.

Personality

Misao tends to be quite lazy, simple-minded and an outdoor type of person. She is in the track and field club, hates studying, and harbors a love for video games, despite not being particularly talented at them. She is also a noisy and rather clumsy eater. She has tanned skin, slightly slanted eyes, and a small fang in the side of her mouth.

Misao does not seem to be skilled at playing video games, yet plays them purely for fun; she notes on having borrowed many games from various people. In fact, her concept of "play for fun" is so strong that she does not mind losing to Kagami, instead marveling at how well her friend plays and making a loud, congratulatory spectacle. This leaves Kagami with a sense of guilt and bewilderment. At one point, Kagami compared Ayano and Misao to Tsukasa and Konata respectively, saying that she apparently tends to attract the same kinds of friends. Misao initially dislikes Konata, angry at her for "stealing" Kagami away from her group, and often rants about Kagami leaving her group for Konata who she knew for only one to two years. She calls Konata by the name "Chibikko" (ちびっ子, "Chibikko") which is literally used as an equivalent for "midget", and can be literally translated to "a very tiny object", and Misao is nicknamed "Misakichi" (みさきち, "Misakichi") by Konata in Manga (also in the OVA).

In the Japanese version of the anime, Misao generally speaks in slang which somewhat resembles a fake Kansai dialect, combining and shortening Japanese words, or twisting the characters around in a word to make a new one with the same meaning.

Soundtrack

Character song volume 013 contains 2 songs by Misao's voice actor, Kaoru Mizuhara. The songs are:

• Sugeendatte Va!
• Dayo na 3-byō Tama ni ha 5-byō

She also sang alongside Ayano in volume 009. The songs she and Ayano sang were:

• 'Lu' wa Lucky Star no 'Lu' ('Lu' is the 'Lu' in Lucky Star)
• Haikei Houdai Yariho-dai?(Is Being the Spearhead of Always Being in the Background Okay?)

Trivia

• Misao is only a centimeter shorter than Minami, yet Yutaka doesn't prattle on about her size, which may be because Minami is two years younger than Misao.
• There are several times in the anime in which Misao breaks the fourth wall by complaining about her role as a side character.
• Konata's nickname for Misao (Misakichi) arises from the fact that most Japanese names are made up of two kanji, and often the second can determine the gender of the name. Kanji that form kichi, hiko, rou, and taka are generally considered masculine. So Konata is basically making Misao's name sound more masculine (something that itself relates to Konata's impression of Misao being rather "boyish.")
• It may be more or less divulged from the manga that Misao may have occasional problems with cold sores.
• She also appears as a Figma exchangeable head included in Kagami's Summer Uniform figure.
• Much like Nanako Kuroi, she has a sharp tooth protruding from one corner of her mouth.
• Misao doesn't show much hate towards Konata in the OVA, only annoyance. They were even on the same volleyball team.

Gallery