Viewtiful Joe (character)

Viewtiful Joe (character)

Viewtiful Joe (ビューティフル ジョー, Byuteifuru Jou?) is a title character and the protagonist of the Viewtiful Joe series. While normally a regular person named Joe, he obtains the ability to transform into Viewtiful Joe by entering a movie and gaining the ability from an older superhero named Captain Blue in order to save his girlfriend, Sylvia. He was created by the game's director, Hideki Kamiya, and illustrated by Kumiko Suekane. In the video games he is voiced by Dee Bradley Baker, while he is voiced by Jason Palmer and Tomokazu Seki in the English and Japanese dubs of the anime series respectively.

Joe has appeared in several video games, both in his series and in spin-off material. He first appeared in Viewtiful Joe, where he obtained his signature costume and abilities. This release was followed by two sequels titled Viewtiful Joe 2 and Viewtiful Joe: Double Trouble; in the first, Joe is teamed with Sylvia, who has become the superhero Sexy Sylvia. One more game was released in the series titled Viewtiful Joe: Red Hot Rumble, a fighting spin-off game featuring Joe amongst other characters from the series. Joe has appeared in three other fighting games from Capcom: Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars, Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds, and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Joe has received generally positive reception.