Gogo Yubari

## ゴーゴー夕張Gogo Yubari

**Gogo Yubari** was the secondary antagonist in Quentin Tarantino's 4th film, *Kill Bill: Volume 1*. She was a sadistic and ultraviolent schoolgirl and a young associate of O-Ren Ishii.

She was portrayed by Chiaki Kuriyama.

## Biography

### Background

Gogo Yubari is a severely disturbed 17-year-old schoolgirl who gets a huge thrill when it comes to killing for fun. She was one of O-Ren Ishii's top assassins and also acts as her personal bodyguard. Gogo's disturbed mind and vicious penchant for killing is displayed when she offers herself to an unnamed Tokyo businessman in a bar and then disembowels him, gleefully recalling a disturbing pun in the act. To deceive her mistresses enemies, she dresses the part of a seemingly innocent schoolgirl. Thus, said enemies make the mistake of assuming she is no threat, which she quickly dispels.

### Working With O-Ren Ishii

One year after the massacre at the Two Pines chapel, O-Ren ruled a major amount of Japan along with being the boss of many Yakuza gangs including the Crazy 88. After living a life of violence, Gogo joins the Yakuza gang and, along with Johnny Mo, takes orders from O-Ren as her personal bodyguard. She is present for the meeting where O-Ren is accepted by the Yakuza clan leaders as their overall leader, except for Boss Tanaka. When Tanaka insults O-Ren's Chinese and American heritage, Gogo smiles sadistically as her mistress beheads him and holds up his head as a trophy.

### Arrival at the House of Blue Leaves

Gogo, O-Ren, and some members of the Crazy 88 then go to the House of Blue Leaves for a time of relaxation. During their time at the restaurant, O-Ren senses that a threat is inside the building. After she throws a dart outside their relaxation room paper blinds, Gogo is sent to see if anyone was there. The bodyguard sees no one as Beatrix Kiddo was hiding from her on the ceiling above. After her quick search, she returns back inside to her mistress.

After Beatrix called out to O-Ren using Sofie Fatale, she exploits her anger by cutting off Sofie's arm, much to O-Ren's suprise. The crime boss so sends her henchmen down to kill Beatrix, but they are easily slaughtered by her Hanzo sword. As Beatrix challenges O-Ren on any more subordinates that need killing, Gogo appears on the top of the stairs and waves hello to her as though she was merely a friendly schoolgirl, an image which is contrasted somewhat by the huge silver Meteor hammer she is carrying. Despite Beatrix giving her the opportunity to walk away, Gogo merely giggles, telling her, "You can beg better than that" and then their fight begins.

### Fight against Beatrix and Death

Gogo attacks Beatrix and easily gains the upper hand in the fight, managing to both hit and disarm her. In fact, Beatrix spends most of the fight under pressure and dodging Gogo's Meteor hammer, indicating that Gogo is a good fighter. When the assassin almost overcomes her by strangling her savagely with the chain, Beatrix spots the leg of a chair that has a long nail stuck in it, and in one last attempt to save herself, she slams it into Gogo's foot. Gogo screams in pain as she watches blood burst from her shoe, staining the white sole. Seeing that she can kill Gogo now, Beatrix yanks the chair leg out of her foot and slams the nail into the side of her head. Blood weeps from Gogo's eyes, and Beatrix watches as both the meteor hammer and Gogo collapse to the floor discarded and dead, respectively.

## Personality

Gogo is not afraid to kill and is always ready to protect her mistress from any danger. While she is not a person of a lot of words, she can match any psychopath without them. She is extremely sadistic, and like a cat, she prefers to toy with her victims before killing them in a slow, painful manner. Gogo is also shown to be somewhat arrogant, as she is unflinchingly willing to fight Beatrix, overly confident in her abilities and underestimating the Bride's resourcefulness, a miscalculation that costs her her life.

## Skills

Gogo was a very competent assassin, who not only stands a chance against Beatrix, but almost killed her. She was an expert with the Meteor hammer and as she was able to disarm the Bride rather early in their fight, that she mostly forced her to go on the offensive and was able to land a few hits on her, she was probably the strongest of O-Ren's bodyguards and one of the best fighters in the *Kill Bill* series. Gogo has shown herself to be quite proficient at her Meteor hammer, making complex and fluid movements despite the hammer's weight and the need to keep up its inertia when fighting with it. She also appears to have a great amount of strength despite her lean shape, blowing a hole through a table at the restaurant, as well as knocking Beatrix back several feet with her Hammer and with a kick.

It also seems that Gogo had some durability. When she was hit in the back of her head with her hammer, as well as falling on a table (breaking it in the process) she come back fighting. During the fight, Gogo was able to hit Beatrix twice: once with her meteor hammer as a sphere and other after she retracted her special blades on the sphere of her weapon.

## Trivia

* Gogo's surname **Yubari** means "evening" (夕) (**yu**) and "lengthen, counter for bows & stringed instruments, stretch, spread, put up (tent)" (張) (**hari**/**bari**).
* Quentin Tarantino has named **Gogo Yubari** after the **Yubari** International Fantastic Film Festival held in Yubari, Hokkaido, Japan.
* Gogo's role is a direct reference to Chiaki Kuriyama's character from the Japanese movie Battle Royale, featuring Kuriyama as Takako Chigusa. Tarantino has commented that Battle Royale is one of his favorite movies. Kuriyama's role in both movies is notable in that while both characters actually have very little on-screen time they both participate in one very violent fight sequence, are brutally murdered, and kill a man by stabbing them through the crotch.
* Quentin Tarantino wanted Kou Shibasaki to be Yuki Yubari, Gogo's sister, but due to scheduling conflicts her role was removed. Likewise, Shibasaki played the main female antagonist Mitsuko Souma in Battle Royale.
* Gogo's uniform is the same as Izumi Toyama from "Ju-on: The Grudge" which takes the role of Misa Uehara.
* Gogo's death, with the famous "Blood Tears", is a clear reference to the Italian movie "Paura nella città dei morti viventi" ("City of the living dead") by Lucio Fulci, where a girl inside a car dies in the same way. It was suggested to Tarantino (fan of Fulci's movies) by Kuriyama herself.
* Gogo is the only character in the series to have nearly killed Beatrix (not simply had the chance to kill her like O-Ren could have when she collapsed in the snow or Pai Mei at any time) without ambushing/surprising her.
* One could very well make the argument that she is also one of the smartest characters in the series. She made the extremely smart decision not to fight Beatrix in anything that resembled her strong suit, the katana. This is shown to have been rather effective since Beatrix was in defense for almost the whole fight, and how Gogo was able to nearly kill Beatrix on her own. In contrast, the Crazy 88's failed as they used blade weapons at close range.
* When practicing for Gogo's fight scenes, Kuriyama accidentally hit Tarantino on the head with the meteor hammer.
* The fight between Gogo and Beatrix won "best fight" at the 2004 MTV Movie Awards, a feat that would repeat itself in the second film with the fight between Elle Driver and the Bride.
* In "The Simpsons" season 23 episode titled "The Falcon and the D'ohman", a scene opens where Wayne trains by fighting villains from various movies and shows. Gogo Yubari makes a cameo being easily knocked out in a similar fashion as in the movie.