Tawna Bandicoot

"This time, no one will catch me."

- Tawna Bandicoot

Tawna Bandicoot (commonly shortened to just Tawna) is a character from the Crash Bandicoot series. She is Crash Bandicoot's girlfriend who has appeared prominently in four Crash games: Crash Bandicoot, Crash Boom Bang!, the N. Sane Trilogy remake of the first game, and Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled. She has cameo appearances in Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex and Crash Twinsanity.

Crash Bandicoot
In the first Crash Bandicoot game, after being captured, she became another creation of Dr. Neo Cortex and Dr. Nitrus Brio. Crash escapes, falling out a window and waking up on N. Sanity Island. Driven by anger that the doctors still have his girlfriend, he decides to thwart Cortex's plans and rescue her. Tawna is used as bait throughout the game, with Tawna Tokens appearing throughout the various levels. Upon collecting three tokens, Crash is teleported to a bonus level with Tawna waiting at the end, before she is swept away from him again.

Once Crash has collected enough gems, he can make his way through The Great Hall and be reunited with her on the balcony that awaits. The two then fly away on a large bird. After Crash defeats Cortex, he is also reunited with Tawna upon the blimp. The couple take the airship and fly into the sunset.

Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex no Gyakushuu!
In the Japanese manual for Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, it is stated that Crash and Tawna broke up leading to her dating Pinstripe, explaining her absence in the game. This is meant to line up with the manga (which was released at the same time). This tidbit is completely absent in any other version of the game, and has never been confirmed by Naughty Dog either, meaning it's exclusive to the Japanese lore of the game.

Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped and Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex
A picture of Tawna can be spotted in the Bandicoot House on the fireplace, meaning that she and Crash are still staying on good terms with each other.

Crash Twinsanity
Tawna only makes a cameo appearance as a picture that appears on the sign of Moulin Cortex. In a deleted scene, Dingodile was going to have dinner with Tawna in his cabin as opposed to just reading a book.

Crash Boom Bang!
She is an unlockable playable character in the game, making her first proper appearance in a Crash game since Crash Bandicoot and her first appearance as a playable character.

Crash: Mind Over Mutant
There is a poster of Tawna inside Crash's house on Wumpa Island.

Crash Bandicoot: N. Sane Trilogy
Tawna reappears in the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy. She is shown as more competent, beating down a lab assistant before being captured in Cortex's castle. She also manages to briefly escape Cortex before being captured again at the end of the Tawna bonus levels.

Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled
Tawna makes an appearance in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled as a reward in the game's first Grand Prix which launched on July 3rd 2019. She appears alongside Isabella, Megumi, Ami and Liz to form the Nitro Squad. CTR Nitro Fueled is the first game to feature Tawna with a voice, revealing her to be a tough, no-nonsense woman determined to win no matter the cost, or the enemy. Completing the Grand Prix also grants her an alternate motorsport-themed costume, which seems to grant her energized power. If she was not obtained during the Nitro Grand Prix, she can be purchased at the Pit Stop along with her Motorsport outfit. She only became available at the Pit Stop, however, during the Spooky Grand Prix.

Stats

 * Speed: 4/7
 * Acceleration: 7/7
 * Turning: 3/7
 * Difficulty: Intermediate

Manga
Tawna is mentioned several times and makes cameos in Dansu! De Jump! Na Daibouken. When Crash wakes up to see where Tawna is, he finds a note saying that she's gone off with Pinstripe. She is seen when Crash is daydreaming about being irresistible and saving the world. When Crash is crying about Tawna, he mistakes Coco (who visits) for Tawna. Her design is different in the manga, looking more like an anime female than her bandicoot design.

Appearance
Tawna is significantly taller than Crash, her blonde hair and breast size being based off of celebrity Pamela Anderson. She has orange fur, cream skin, green eyes and a small, blonde tail. Her clothing consists of a red, sleeveless shirt, blue shorts, red socks and sneakers identical to Crash's. In Crash Boom Bang, her shirt was changed to a pink top.

In the N. Sane Trilogy and CTR Nitro-Fueled, Tawna's shirt is now magenta and features a white outline of Crash's mug, her shorts have become denim and her socks are white. Her design is also altered a bit, having a smaller chest and hip size, and a more proportionate body shape.

Gallery
See: Tawna/Gallery

Trivia
According to that text, she was something much more than just a "simple damsel in distress": She tried to help Brio leave Cortex and she would foment a revolution among Cortex's henchmen. She appeared to be a strong, intelligent and independent woman who would do whatever she could to help Crash foil Cortex's plans. You can read her full description in the gallery. This actually makes Tawna (despite her few (so far) physical appearences in the series) one of the most important sidekicks in the original games.
 * She is often referred to by players as "Tawna Bandicoot", but this full name has never been officially used prior to the character selection menu in Nitro-Fueled, where she is labeled as "Tawna Bandicoot" while in her default attire.
 * If the deleted scene in Crash Twinsanity was taken into consideration, Tawna would have had a relationship with at least 3 other characters in any iteration of the Crash Bandicoot series: Crash Bandicoot, Pinstripe Potoroo and Dingodile.
 * According to Naughty Dog, Tawna's design was based off celebrity Pamela Anderson, for her blonde hair and breast size. She was also based on Jessica Rabbit.
 * Tawna is shorter in Crash Boom Bang!.
 * After Crash Bandicoot, Naughty Dog removed her from the series as Universal Interactive wanted her to be redesigned as they felt she wasn't appropriate for a child friendly game. Sony also wished for her removal, according to character designer Charles Zembillas, which led to the introduction of Coco Bandicoot for future titles. She was eventually given a slightly less sexualised redesign for the N. Sane Trilogy, which was developed by Vicarious Visions. This same design reappears in Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled.
 * Like the other major characters from Crash 1, Tawna has her own description from the Crash Bible.
 * This tells us that Tawna could be the reason that Brio finally stood up for himself and left Cortex (who had abused him during the first game) and worked against him in Crash 2. She's also probably the reason that Cortex was without his minions in the second game.
 * The Japanese ending of Crash Bash has Crash mistake a hologram created by Coco to be Tawna. The hologram itself resembles Isabella and was intended to look like Coco reimagined as an adult.
 * She was the first female character to appear in the series.
 * Tawna was originally named Karmen.
 * Tawna's skirt was originally green before they changed it to a dark blue. Her muzzle also had no skin tan, her entire face being orange furred. In-game artwork of her can be seen in levels such as The Great Hall in her original color scheme. She was also originally wearing high heels in her concept art.
 * Tawna is mentioned in unused dialogue for Cortex in Crash Tag Team Racing.
 * She never had any dialogue at all since her first appearance (though she has gameplay grunts in Crash Boom Bang and can be heard gasping in the opening cutscene of N. Sane Trilogy). She officially makes her speaking debut in Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled.
 * Like the rest of the Nitro Squad in Nitro-Fueled, Tawna has an associated Paint Job seen in marketing screenshots. This Paint Job was not on the selection screen prior to the Back N. Time Grand Prix and not for sale until the Spooky Grand Prix, even though the AI drivers would use it randomly prior.
 * In Skylanders Academy, she was mentioned in the episode called The Skylands Are Falling! when Crash says that he's going to find her and save the world from Dr. Cortex, although Crash refers to her as his friend as opposed to girlfriend.
 * Tawna, alongside the trophy girls, are the only bandicoots to have visible tails, as Crash, Coco and Crunch all lack them. It's worth noting that this is a common inconsistency among the anthropomorphic characters in the series.