Kicking off this list, we thought we’d use a role from a game, Reina from Yakuza 0. Although the character is played by different actresses in other installments, Tsuru plays the 20-year-old version of the character, who is living it up in Japan’s height of its economic dominance in 1988. As the young Reina, Tsuru gives the character an appropriate spunk in context to her job as a high-class bartender, and shows a unique kind of friendliness and comfort towards Kiryuu and Nishiki, who others would find intimidating since they’re thugs for the yakuza. If you visited her bar, she’s the girl you want to drink your problems away to.

If we could choose which of her roles was the sexiest, it would be without a doubt, Reiko Mikami from Ghost Sweeper Mikami. As Reiko, Tsuru perfectly exhibits a voice that reflects her buxom figure and her confidence. In addition to effectively conveying Reiko’s authority in exorcism, she plays her in a way to let the audience and her customers know that also doesn’t come cheap (showing that she’s more money motivated). Despite making so much money, she looks down on her employees and gives them a cheap salary (by today’s modern standards, she’d be labeled a black company), most notably her teenage assistant, Tadao. And as for her (literally) spirited secretary Okinu, what does a ghost need money for? For those that don’t know, Tadao is played by Ryo Horikawa, the voice of Vegeta. So if you want something tongue in cheek, Horikawa’s and Tsuru’s chemistry gives a different result with the characters they play here for Dragon Ball fans to enjoy.

In comparison to other roles on this list, as Ukyou, she exhibits a different kind of personality. As Ukyou, she’s masculine when it comes to how she dresses in a boy’s school uniform and feminine when in conjunction to her love for Ranma. While she’s Hokkaido born and Yokohama raised, as Ukyou, she speaks in a Kansai accent to reflect that character’s background. The Kansai way of talking is an excellent balance of being aggressive and upbeat, and Tsurumi excellently captures that quality in order to portray Ukyou. In addition to voicing the character, she also contributes to the series soundtrack as a singer with the rest of the female seiyuu cast as DoCo, a spoof of CoCo, a popular idol group during the series broadcast.

Internationally, Tsuru will always be remembered as the voice of Bulma starting back to Dragon Ball. Throughout the series run, we see Bulma go from adventurous teen to a dedicated mother who spoils her son. Due to Bulma serving more as a supporting character, we had to put her at number two. However, Tsuru’s performance does a great job of balancing Bulma as she ages throughout the Dragon Ball saga. As a teenager, she shows a genuine sense of adventure as travels to search for the Dragon Balls. When we get to the end, we see how her experiences shaped her into being capable of standing up to a God of Destruction. Thanks to Tsuru’s performance, we see her go from curious teen to a stubborn middle aged lady.

If there is one role that defines her as a co-lead, it would certainly have to be that of Madoka Ayukawa from Kimagure Orange Road, the original Shounen romance title. Thanks to her voice, she can portray a young lady (as the Britney Spears song goes) who is no longer a little girl but not yet a woman. The character is feared as a delinquent, but Tsuru’s portrayal shows that even though she does engage in activities that a 9th grader shouldn’t be doing, once you get to know her through Kyousuke, she’s just a regular teenage girl, and has very feminine qualities. Her chemistry with Tooru Furuya, Kyousuke’s seiyuu, helps bring out the best qualities to Madoka and helps viewers that we shouldn’t always judge people on the outside. Sometimes, tomboys can be the most feminine.