Tricia Takanawa is a reporter for Quahog 5 News. Her ethnicity is Japanese, and she is based on an on-the-scene reporter also played by Alex Borstein from a news segment sketch on MADtv. Tricia is usually at the scene of some unenviable news broadcasts, such as a hurricane in "One if by Clam, Two if by Sea", where she is knocked down by a flying car, the height of a flu epidemic, in which she vomits, while hung over the toilet, during the actual news report in "Stewie Loves Lois", interviewing a Renaissance Fair Jesterin "Mr. Saturday Knight", and a guy who rides his ten speed in the heavy rain in "Peter's Daughter. In "Da Boom" she is eaten by Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons. Tricia also interviews the Mass Media Murderer, while he is escaping the prison, who wants to kill Chris Griffin in "To Love and Die in Dixie".
In "It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One", she covers the Mayoral debate between Mayor Adam West and Lois Griffin, as well as the first day of a purified Lake Quahog. There, she interviews the manager of Britches and Hose, Jason Voorhees.
She has been known to have a major obsession with David Bowie. When she meets him in Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, she loses all control, and tells him, in a completely different voice than she usually has, then begins to dry hump his leg. Tricia also gave a makeover to Meg in "Don't Make Me Over", and was seen dancing in the musical number "Peter is Slow" in "Petarded", and she once did a three part story where she ended up having sex with Glenn Quagmire, who thought she was a "Spanish Chick".
In "Road to the North Pole" she sings "All I Really Want For Christmas" with the rest of the cast. She has no solos.
Tricia's cultural background prevents her from entering certain buildings. In the series, she cannot go into thePark-Barrington Hotel because "they don't allow Asians inside". In the video game, she can be found in her dressing room at the TV station, where she gives the same reason for not being allowed in the reporters lounge. Also according to the game, that particular dressing room was given to Tricia due to her old one being converted into a green house by Diane Simmons.
Her name was mispronounced as "Tricia Nakahoma" by Joyce Kinney in "Grumpy Old Man".
Tricia currently has a boyfriend, Tyrone, as revealed in "Livin' on a Prayer".
An Indian version of Tricia appears in "Family Guy Viewer Mail No. 2".