Meep meep, welcome to Anime Rants with Mono! I’ve been slowly working on a series of Sunday Select posts covering favorite characters based on hair color. Today is the next installment: anime characters with yellow hair! These are only my personal favorites, so don’t be surprised when I don’t include a lot of standard shounen characters like Naruto or Meliodas. No effort was made to include the most popular characters– personal favorites only. I’m actually pretty happy with the assortment I chose, since there’s quite a variety of personality types among these characters. FYI, entries are listed in alphabetical order and not ranked. We’ll go ahead and get started now, but for your convenience, other posts in this series can be found in the links below.

Favorite Characters with Pink Hair

Favorite Characters with Purple Hair

Favorite Characters with Red Hair

Favorite Characters with Green Hair

Favorite Characters with Blue Hair

Favorite Characters with White/Silver Hair

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Armin Arlert (Attack on Titan)

Personality Type: INFJ

Armin is a central character in attack Titan, being the best friend of Eren and Mikasa. Compared to them, he is more timid and fearful, but that makes him all the more courageous for still batting alongside the others. Armin has no special physical or combat abilities, but he has an incredibly sharp mind and keen intuitive understanding. His risky but intelligent plans often save the day for everyone. What Armin truly wants, besides remaining with his beloved friends, is to understand the world and other people. He craves both knowledge and deeper understanding. I feel like I have a lot in common with Armin, and he’s the one who I empathized most with in the anime.

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Kurapika (Hunter x Hunter)

Personality Type: INFJ

Kurapika hails from Hunter x Hunter, where is an important friend of protagonist Gon Freecs. The Kurta were the tribe of people to whom Kurapika belonged, but all except him were wiped out in a bloody genocide. As a result, this boy’s driving motivation is revenge against the murderous bandits who wiped out his people. Kurapika has excellent combat abilities, a patient and elegant demeanor, and a fairly sharp mind. He is very driven to accomplish his goals, but the one thing he won’t do is sacrifice his dear friends.

Later on, Kurapika becomes a Specialist-class user of the magical Nen powers, making him even more impressive. I like Kurapika’s whole aesthetic, from his basic character design to his Nen-chains and his feminine manners. It is interesting and a little sad to see him pursue something dark like revenge even while he does not enjoy violence and is kind at heart. He’s truly a fascinating character.

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Mahiro Fuwa (Blast of Tempest)

Personality Type: ESTP

One of the lesser-known characters on this list, Mahiro is one of the main characters in the apocalyptic psychological fantasy anime called Blast of Tempest. Simply put, Mahiro is not a very likeable character, or does not have a lot positive traits, but I find him psychologically fascinating. I also sort of admire his stubbornness in a way. Mahiro is arrogant, short-fused, and brash. Despite those traits, he’s also quite intelligent and thinks in terms of a strict sense of personal logic. Though he is known to have emotional reactions like rage, he rarely does anything truly stupid or hateful when it boils down to it. Why? Because his logical mind tells him it’s not worth it. Mahiro can also be considered a male tsundere, which is pretty interesting to me. Again, this character may be not be friendly, but his psychology is intriguing.

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Mami Tomoe (Madoka Magica)

Personality Type: ESFJ

This beloved character appears in the classic dark magical girl anime, Madoka Magica. She is an important friend and mentor to Madoka and Sayaka early on in the series. Courageous and caring, Mami fights evil witches who prey on humans. She is elegant and refined in her tastes and demeanor, loving the fine things in life and acting confident and calm. I admire Mami’s courage and attitude. I also like her character because, despite seeming almost perfect on the exterior, she is emotionally fragile. In many cases, Mami is the first of the characters to break down. Her occasional but serious lapses in judgement are also interesting to see unfold.

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Nino (Arakawa Under The Bridge)

Personality Type: INTP/INFP

Nino is the bizarre heroine of the even more bizarre comedy anime, Arakawa Under The Bridge. She is a young homeless woman who lives in a crevice under a bridge, spending her days fishing and sometimes interacting with her homeless friends. Her past before becoming homeless is a mystery, but she claims to be from the planet Venus. Nino is most definitely mentally atypical, which is why normal life just won’t work for her. Personally, I think Nino is one of the cutest mentally ill anime characters ever created. She’s so spacey, deadpan, and random. Trying to understand Nino can be tough, but one thing is for sure: she is a kind and thoughtful person who won’t hesitate to help others if the need arises.

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Saber/ Arturia Pendragon (Fate/Type Moon universe)

Personality Type: ISTJ

Saber is one and the same as King Arthur within the fictional universe of the Fate/Type Moon franchise. This female warrior king is completely bad-ass, with excellent sword-fighting skills and undying courage. Even though she was a king in her lifetime, she is not arrogant, and will loyally serve a mage who summons her as long as that mage is honorable. Personal honor and integrity are what’s most important to Saber. She is a serious person who wants to do the correct thing for the sake of fairness. Sometimes, Saber can be self-righteous or prideful, failing to see how she is pushing her values onto others. Nonetheless, I admire her greatly.

Despite facing all sorts of depravity and many purely nihilistic or hedonist characters, Saber does not lose her passion for what is good and noble. After Fate/Zero, she does fall into a depression where she begins regretting being king. However, Saber works through this in Fate/Stay Night and emerges even stronger on the other side. You can’t keep a good woman down.

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Tanya Degurechaff (Saga of Tanya The Evil)

Personality Type: ESTJ

If Saber is an example of a morally upstanding character, Tanya is the complete opposite. It just goes to show that even if characters have a similar personality type, their behavior and values can be entirely different. Tanya was a ruthless businessman in our world before being killed and reincarnating into a war-torn world where magic exists. The thing is, she is now a cute little orphan girl (at least on the outside). Due to her amazing natural affinity for magic, she is made to join the army and begin fighting for the motherland whether she wants to or not. She quickly becomes known as a devil for her work there.

Certain things about Tanya are relatable, like her enmity against the new world’s cruel and fickle god, who is known as Being X. But just because she fights a cruel god doesn’t mean she’s a good person. Tanya is unquestionably a psychopath who does not feel remorse for killing others and who is hugely petty, arrogant, and selfish. I don’t admire Tanya, but I love studying her twisted psychology. It’s also awesome and amusing to see a little girl be so brutal and savage.

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Honorable Mention: Satoko Hojo (Higurashi no Naku Koro ni)

Personality Type: ESTP/ENTP

Satoko is a clever and athletic young girl who loves her home in the tiny mountain town of Hinamizawa. She’s kind of a brat, but she cares deeply about her friends in the game club at school. Due to a long history of being abused by family members, Satoko is mentally and emotionally fragile. She is only truly at peace when she is with her best friend Rika. For most of the Higurashi anime shows, Satoko was a frequently victimized character whose development focused on becoming a stronger person who can trust her friends for help. However, in Higurashi Sotsu and Higurashi Gou, it’s revealed that there is a much darker side to Satoko. She is the antagonist.

I’m a huge fan of Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni, but I had trouble deciding if I should include Satoko or not; the main reason being that she often annoys or even infuriates me. But I decided to include her as an honorable mention for two reasons. Firstly, she was a fairly likeable character before Higurashi Gou and Sotsu developed her into a villain. Secondly, the fact that her villainy enrages me so much means that she’s actually a great villain. Despite sometimes hating her guts, I did enjoy Satoko’s deconstruction and character development in Higurashi Sotsu. That’s why she’s here as one of my favorite antagonists.

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Closing Thoughts

Before closing, I just want to express my disappointment that I must follow the Sunday Select format and include only seven or eight characters. I would have also loved to include Edward Elric from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. You can count him as another honorable mention, though. There’s one other note to make. If you know how much I love the anime Monster, you may be surprised that I did not include Johan Liebert on this list. The reason is simple; while he has hair that sometimes appears golden, I consider him a “blond” rather than a “yellow-haired” anime character. His hair is considerably lighter than all the other characters on this list. Sorry, Johan.

And with that, I’ve said all I feel like saying in this post. I hope you enjoyed it, and thanks for reading!