Karen Fukuhara is an American actress, best known for her roles as Tatsu Yamashiro / Katana in the 2016 superhero film Suicide Squad and as Kimiko Miyashiro in the Amazon Prime original series The Boys (2019–present). Fukuhara is also known for voicing the character Glimmer from the Netflix series She-Ra and the Princesses of Power and Kipo from Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts.
Fukuhara was born to Japanese parents in Los Angeles. Her first language was Japanese, and she attended Japanese language school on Saturdays for 11 years. She has a younger brother. Fukuhara began practicing karate in middle school and became a brown-striped belt before leaving for college.
Fukuhara attended the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) while working as a reporter for a sports show on NHK in Japan. She was a member of the a cappella group Medleys, whose alumni include fellow actress Kelly Marie Tran. Fukuhara graduated from UCLA in 2014 with a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and a minor in Theater.
Fukuhara got her start in the entertainment industry in middle school when she was cast as a host for Movie Surfers, a short form entertainment news program on the Disney Channel.
Prior to her acting debut, Fukuhara worked various part-time jobs, including as a translator, subtitle editor, and waitress at a reggae-themed sushi restaurant.
In 2016, Fukuhara made her film debut as Katana in the DC Comics superhero film Suicide Squad, which was released in August 2016. Although she had prior martial arts experience, with a brown striped belt in karate, Fukuhara trained for about two months during pre-production in order to learn how to wield a sword correctly.
In early December 2016, Fukuhara announced that she had completed the first week of filming for Stray (alongside Christine Woods, Miyavi, and Ross Partridge).
Fukuhara voiced the characters Sewer Queen and Alexis in the Cartoon Network series Craig of the Creek. In 2018, she began voicing Glimmer in She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, a reboot of the 1985 animated television series.
In 2019, she began starring as The Female in the Amazon Prime series The Boys, based on the comic book of the same name.
In 2020, she began voicing the lead character of Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts, Kipo Oak. The series is based on the short-lived webcomic named Kipo.