Characters / Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - Grove Street Families

This is the character sheet concerning members of the Grove Street Families gang from Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. For a full index of characters from the game, click here.

In General

The Grove Street Families

An African-American street gang and one of the oldest street gangs in Los Santos, San Andreas.

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• AM/FM Characterization: Classic east coast Hip-Hop and Gangsta Rap, obviously. Every time you get into one of their vehicles, they will be tuning into Playback FM and Radio Los Santos.

• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: They all wear green and you get more respect by wearing their colors.
• Drugs Are Bad: Under Sweet's and CJ's leadership, the Grove Street Families upholds this stance when it comes to the crack trade. However, the trope is downplayed in that they don't have a problem with selling and using lighter drugs like cannabis.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Unlike other gangs in the world of GTA, they possess standards. For example: They absolutely refuse to sell hardcore drugs like crack (pot is fine with them).
• Foil: The Leone Crime Family from the sequel. They are a huge contrast with the Families. Unlike them, the Leones have no problem with things such as drug trafficking, torture or supporting sociopaths like Donald Love.
• Gangbangers: A street gang whose business are less formal than The Mafia. Smoke, Ryder and Sweet even provide the trope image.
• Neighbourhood-Friendly Gangsters: They are violent and will not hesitate to use to force on enemies, but they are all big on family, brotherhood, and loyalty (well, the part of the GSF that are under the Johnson brothers are, anyway) and all refuse to deal with hard drugs.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: The main members all correspond to either a member or an affiliate of N.W.A. Ryder blatantly looks exactly like Eazy-E, CJ and Sweet vaguely resemble Dr. Dre and Ice Cube, and Smoke is a self centred traitorous big guy, like Suge Knight. The promotional artwork does it more justice than the in game models.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: The Families were based on the Crips, an African-American street gang from Los Angeles, California.
• Took a Level in Badass: After completing the mission Robbing Uncle Sam, GSF gang members will start carrying Tec-9s. This makes them better in Gang Wars and Drive-bys. If you do the optional "Tagging" sidequest which involves tagging over every opposing gang tag with your Grove Street Families tag, they take another level, replacing their pistols and Tec-9s with more powerful weapons like Desert Eagles and SMGs.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: After GTA: San Andreas, the Families' final fate is completely unknown. The loosely connected GTA V implies that the remaining OGs moved to greener pastures though, and Grove Street itself becomes Ballas territory.

OGs

Carl "CJ" Johnson

Carl "CJ" Johnson

"Ever since I got out the hood, shit been cracking!"

Voiced by: Chris "Young Maylay" Bellard

The protagonist of San Andreas and a former gangbanger representing the Grove Street Families. After his younger brother Brian was killed, Carl moves away to Liberty City to try to escape his past, only to be forced to come home five years later to bury his mother Beverly, who was killed in a drive-by shooting at their own house.

Unfortunately, he's picked up by the LSPD's C.R.A.S.H. Unit almost immediately after arriving, and subsequently framed for killing Officer Ralph Pendlebury (an Internal Affairs investigator, murdered mere minutes beforehand by C.R.A.S.H.), and dumped in rival gang territory. And so begins San Andreas...

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• Affably Evil: While he can commit wanton acts of criminal violence throughout the game, on a good day he's actually quite a loving son, brother and friend who is more than willing to cross moral boundaries if it's for their sake.
• AM/FM Characterization: Considering the songs CJ sings randomly over the course of the game, his musical tastes seem to be quite varied, ranging between classic east coast Hip-Hop, Gangsta Rap, Funk, and Disco.
• Anti-Hero: Depending on how you look at him, he's either a particularly brutal Unscrupulous Hero that fights against much worse people or a Noble Demon villain with Tragic Villain and Well-Intentioned Extremist (fights against the Ballas and other criminal organizations that sell hardcore drugs to rescue his friends and family from destruction) overtones.
• Bald of Evil: He can be customized to have this. You can even combine it with a Beard of Evil.
• Bare-Fisted Monk: He can visit various gyms, which can train him in Boxing, Kung Fu, and Muay Thai.
• Berserk Button: Being called a "buster" (poseur or fake) and if someone messes with his sister.
• The Big Guy: Possibly, and in multiple senses of the word. He can be bigger than Big Smoke, the only member of the OGs to have a Heroic Build, or both.
• Blue Is Heroic: His default outfit has a white tank top and black shoes so the only notable color on his attire is the blue from his jeans. Official artwork of him also depicts him wearing a light blue shirt. Provided he's not that much of a hero but he's generally a lot better of a person than the antagonists and he's probably the most sympathetic of the protagonists from the PS2 era.
• Butt-Monkey: While he does eventually progress from a lowly gangbanger to an incredibly successful business owner with powerful connections both legitimate and illegal, his journey there is filled with all sorts of setbacks, mishaps, and general humiliation at the hands of C.R.A.S.H., Catalina, T-Bone Mendez, the U.S. Government, and countless others.
• Character Development: Subtle, but there. He starts out as a "busta", willing to do anything for his 'hood out of guilt for the death of Brian and his subsequent absence (which led to the death of his mother). After realizing that he was played as a fool by Smoke and Ryder, and having to get his brother Sweet out of jail, he builds a semi-legitimate business career and various enterprises, and gets involved with massive heists, robbing a casino and even stealing a fighter jet, later telling Sweet that they don't have to live on Grove Street anymore. After Sweet chides him for leaving the 'hood to be ruined by crack dealers and the Ballas, he uses all the power and influence he gained from his adventures to improve the lives of everyone in Grove Street instead, and remove the bad actors that led to the downfall of his home.
• Contrasting Sequel Protagonist: To Tommy Vercetti, the previous protagonist in the series. While Tommy is a ruthless Unfettered who starts the game as a feared and respected mobster and builds a criminal empire on the cocaine trade, CJ is an Affably Evil Noble Demon who regularly gets dissed by everyone he knows (including friends and family) and is violently opposed to drug trafficking.
• Contempt Crossfire: He ends up in one when, after walking in on an argument between Sweet and Kendl, during which Sweet accuses Kendl of dressing like a "hooker," he's foolish enough to say, "You say it like it's a bad thing!" Both Sweet and Kendl reply with "Shut up, Carl!" before getting back to their argument.
• Deadpan Snarker: At times. For example, when killing mooks: "Aw, look, I got a gun."
  Voicebox: Time to see what you're made of.
  CJ: What it look like I'm made of? Pudding?
• Disappeared Dad: CJ mentions in the Introduction that he never knew his father and that Sweet was the "man of the house" in place of a father.
• Drives Like Crazy: Supporting characters will often comment on his reckless driving habits during cutscenes or missions. This is probably a case of Take That, Audience!, since even careful players are bound to crash into AI cars on a regular basis. Some of his own car crash banter can either be a potshot against the colliding driver or the player.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Receives nothing but insults from his brother Sweet, no matter how much work he puts into pulling his family out of the ghetto.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Happens to him in the mission "The Green Sabre" when Smoke and Ryder betray the Grove.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He and Sweet once robbed innocent people at gunpoint to pay for his mom's medical bills. The reason he returns to Los Santos is because of his mother's death in a drive-by, and his search for her murderer starts the plot.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • The OGs (CJ included) may be crooks, but they look out for their neighborhood. The Ballas flood their own territories with drugs, which CJ vehemently disapproves of.
  • Snitching and tipping the police is beneath him according to the code of the streets. He tells Tenpenny that he doesn't care if it kills him or his brother when Tenpenny asks him to tip the police to incriminate his target. He changes his mind when told that he is incriminating a District Attorney.
• Extremity Extremist: His Boxing moves consist entirely of punches, and his Kung Fu moves are all kicks. Averted with Muay Thai, as well as CJ in general, however.
• Freudian Excuse: Several tragedies that happened in his life, including the murder of his mother and Brian, motivates him to kill Ballas or any rival gangster. On a lighter side, he sometimes mocks pedestrians by claiming this ("Don't blame me, blame society").
• Forced into Evil: Much of his interactions with Officer Tenpenny and C.R.A.S.H. as a whole have shades of this. He'd rather have nothing to do with them but is forced to do a significant amount of dirty work for them or else face the consequences. After his brother Sweet gets arrested, multiple entities on law enforcement threaten Sweet to coerce CJ to do their bidding.
• Formerly Fat: It's implied CJ used to be bigger before he left Los Santos, as Big Smoke remarks that "[the] East Coast got [him] all thinned out", Ryder claims that he's "looking too skinny", and Sweet encourages him to hit the gym early into the story.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Starts the game as a dirt-poor returnee from Liberty City thrown into the violence-wracked, crack-plagued streets of Los Santos. Play him right and by the end of the game not only is he a member of one of the most powerful black gangs in San Andreas as well as the manager of Madd Dogg, but he can also own a statewide criminal empire.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: The responsible to Sweet's foolish.
• Gangsta Style: For any one-handed weapon other than the Desert Eagle, combined with...
• Guns Akimbo: When he reaches maximum skill with the 9MM pistol, Tec-9/Machine Pistol SMG's, or the Sawn-Off Shotgun.
• Hypocrite: He can slip into this territory at times, such as calling Catalina out on being a "fucking psycho" during the two's robbery missions and then buries a foreman alive just for calling Kendl a hooker.
• Image Song: "San Andreas Theme Song" from "San Andreas: The Original Mixtape": The debut of mixtape of CJ's voice actor and American west coast rapper, "Young Maylay" who provides the vocals of the song from CJ's perspective.
• Inexplicably Awesome: Unlike other GTA protagonists, he doesn't even have military training, and yet he manages to steal a jetpack from a military base.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Even at his worst, he's still deeply concerned about his friends and family.
• Justified Criminal: He and Sweet once robbed people at gunpoint to pay for their mother's lifesaving operation and to send Kendl to college. He also does many dangerous, morally questionable activities to rescue his native Ganton from internal and external destruction.
• Karma Houdini: In Grand Theft Auto tradition, the player character never faces consequences for the heinous crimes he, be it part of the story or during the player's free time, commits.
• Kick the Dog: Besides being one of the most "heroic" protagonists in the franchise (as far as a Grand Theft Auto protagonist can be), the moment when he buried a foreman alive is overly cruel.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: Very protective of his sister Kendl. When he hears that some nearby construction workers have been harassing her, he wastes no time heading to the construction site, killing several of the workers (should you choose to, anyway), and ultimately burying the foreman alive in a port-a-potty.
• It's Up to You: While this game actually does offer significant NPC aid at times, there's still a fair portion where CJ is left to do most of the work. When he isn't being forced to by those above him, the justification usually boils down to the incompetence or inability of his comrades.
• Lack of Empathy: While he is less ruthless than Tommy Vercetti, CJ rarely complains about what he does from a moral standpoint, even for his acts of criminal violence.
• The Lancer: Starts out as one to Sweet, being Sweet's right-hand man who helps him fight against hard drugs and the Ballas.
• My Greatest Failure: Carl is seemingly never going to live down Brian's death, though we don't know for sure that he caused that. (His family blames him for it, that's all that matters.)
• The Nicknamer: Wu Zi Mu invites Carl to call him "Woozie." Carl, perhaps inspired by this, later shortens Ran Fa Li to "Mister Farley", though Carl does pronounce it properly on occasion.
• Noble Demon: Especially when compared with the rest of the past player characters like Claude and Tommy (though the latter does have some moments, too). He cares for his family and the gang while opposing drugs.
• No-Respect Guy: This is most evident at the beginning of the game working for the Grove Street Families and being treated like garbage by almost everyone including his own supposed allies. While he does gain more respect from outside of Los Santos, he still gets treated pretty roughly by some of the people he's forced to work with like Catalina, Jizzy B, T-Bone, Mike Toreno, and Salvatore Leone.
• Odd Friendship: It's until he gets to Las Venturas and San Fierro - subsequently meeting The Truth (an old hippie, weed farmer and conspiracy theorist), Wu Zi Mu (an Asian, blind Triad leader), Zero (a nerdy white hacker) and Kent (a skittish, coke-addicted lawyer) that CJ realizes that there's more to life than petty gang banging, and expands the horizons of his previously limited outlook to massive enterprises like managing Madd Dogg, stealing fighter jets and organizing casino heists.
• One Degree of Separation: With three protagonists.
  • CJ works with Ken Rosenberg, who was an accomplice of Tommy Vercetti from Vice City.
  • CJ also used to work for Joey Leone, who would eventually work with both Toni Cipriani from Liberty City Stories and Claude from Grand Theft Auto III
• Only Known by Initials: He is called CJ most of the time.
• Only Sane Man: Shares this role with his sister Kendl in the GSF, being the ones most opposed to the gangbanging lifestyle and who actively want to leave it. CJ even successfully leaves it near the end of the game, and even attempts to convince Sweet that he can live in luxury with him.
• Outlaw Couple: Subverted with Catalina. While the two work together during his exile to the countryside, she develops an unhinged obsession with him and considers CJ her "boyfriend", even though he is not interested and clearly repulsed by her... personality flaws. Even after they "break up" and she moves on with Claude, Catalina repeatedly calls him up at several points usually to boast or insult him, showing that she is still obsessed with him.
• Out-of-Character Moment: The mission Deconstruction contains an infamous example of this among fans as the normally levelheaded and more anti heroic CJ suddenly becomes an Ax-Crazy psychopath who would make Catalina proud and murders a bunch of innocent construction workers and buries the foreman alive in a porta potty for saying his sister looked like a hooker.
• Pragmatic Hero: Double Subversion. After finally making a fortune outside of Los Santos, he tries to get a pardoned Sweet to just quit the Grove Street life and live with him in luxury. However, Sweet gives him a What the Hell, Hero? for sounding no different from Big Smoke. From there, CJ then decides that he should use his new resources to actually help the hood instead of just abandoning it.
• Really Gets Around: It is possible for CJ to have up to six girlfriends at the same time.
• Scary Black Man: The player can invoke this trope if they get CJ's muscles large enough. Even if you keep him at an average build, he still qualifies for it by being a One-Man Army that can easily gun down anybody in his path.
• Self-Made Man: With only his own wits and a couple of guns, Carl made his way from a lowly gangbanger to a respectable estate owner and a high-ranking criminal.
• Sibling Team: With both Sweet and Kendl.
• Strong and Skilled: Is Unskilled, but Strong by default but can learn a professional style to become the best of both worlds.
• Tattooed Crook: If you like, then you could go to a Tattoo parlor and get various tattoos.
• Trash Talker: Takes up Tommy Vercetti's wisecracks to another level. He especially goes bananas when hit by another driver.
• Trauma Conga Line: Carl finds out that his mother was killed in a drive-by shooting by the Ballas, prompting him to return to Los Santos. However, he was arrested by Tenpenny who stole his money and threatened to frame him for killing Ralph Pendelbury if he refused to do dirty works for him. After that, Carl gets thrown out of Tenpenny's police car in the middle of one of the Ballas strongholds.
• Universal Driver's License: CJ may have to take a Forced Tutorial before he can enter airports and jack planes (unless he elaborately hops the fence), but he still manages to figure out the jetpack pretty quickly. On the other hand, the player has to grind skill with most forms of transportation before they can use them with anything resembling competence.
• Unskilled, but Strong: His default fighting style is basically Good Old Fisticuffs, and involves wild haymakers. That said, it's around as effective as any of the trained fighting styles he learns.
• Vague Age: His age is never confirmed, but one would surmise that he's somewhere between the ages of 21-24, since the game allows the player to enter bars and strip clubs.
• Villain Protagonist: Though considerably less of a villain than past player characters like Claude and Tommy. He does a lot of terrible things for the sake of supporting his family, friends, and allies usually monetarily. While there are a number of instances of him being forced into committing crimes, he really doesn't complain about all the death and destruction that follows. His criticisms of Catalina's Ax-Crazy behavior is less about the moral quandaries of what she does and more about how impractical it is since it always makes them risk their lives unneccesarily.
• Virtual Paper Doll: The first highly customizable character in the series, as you can give him different hairstyles and tattoos, make him buff, skinny or fat, and buy him a wide variety of clothes. Wearing anything green will boost his respect amongst his fellow Grove homies.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: To Ryder, of course. He likes to snark at Ryder's constant insults directed at him, but Ryder's an old friend and a loyal homie that CJ respects. Until he finds out Ryder has betrayed him.

Sean "Sweet" Johnson

Sean "Sweet" Johnson

"You gotta love your hood like you love your homies."

Voiced by: Faizon Love

"I say it's time we went down there and made it official. Keep that shit off our streets!"

Carl and Kendl's older brother and leader of the Grove Street Families. He, his siblings, and their friends were once very close, but when his younger brother Brian died, Sweet blamed Carl, and the family broke apart. Whereas Carl fled to Liberty City to escape his guilt, however, Sweet dedicated himself to the GSF, becoming the gang's leader and keeping it from falling apart.

When Carl returns to the city, Sweet is extremely skeptical of his brother, believing that he'll simply run out on his homies once again. After seeing firsthand Carl's determination to atone, however, he lightens up and reconciles with his brother.

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• AM/FM Characterization: Gangsta Rap. Sweet's favorite radio station is Radio Los Santos.
• Anti-Villain: Much like CJ, Sweet is against hard drugs and truly believes that the gangbanging lifestyle will protect his neighborhood.
• Childish Older Sibling: Ironically enough, despite being the most dominant leader of the gang, he's also the most immature of the Johnson siblings, being rather stubborn and bullheaded when it comes to making his decisions.
• The Comically Serious: At times, given his habit of not bating an eye at Ryder and Big Smoke's eccentricities.
• Despair Event Horizon: When he gets back to Los Santos near the end of the game and sees how his old hood has degenerated due to Tenpenny's letting Smoke run his drugs trade, he almost tokes on the crack pipe B-Dup's whore offers him, wanting to know what's so special about the thing that's destroyed his life, his worldview, and his friends. CJ saves him from what would doubtlessly be a tragic Face–Heel Turn or even Driven to Suicide.
• Determined Defeatist: He's known to give up when the situation looks grave for him like when he was in prison and almost caved into coke addiction, but he's still adamant on protecting his neighborhood and will fight when he knows there's a chance to succeed.
• Disappointing Older Sibling: At least that's how Kendl views him as. She is fed up with his closed-mindedness and ordering her around so much she even moves out of his house to live with Cesar instead. Plus she calls him out on his hypocrisy of telling her what is right and wrong while he spends most of his life gangbanging and murdering other gang members.
• Distressed Dude: His situation is pretty grave as the neighborhood is under assault by rival gangs and an influx of crack cocaine. He later gets sent to prison where Tenpenny says he'll be raped and killed unless Carl does what he says.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He’s a hard gangster, but he loves his mom and is absolutely devastated by her death.
• Fatal Flaw: While he is loyal to the Grove Street Families, his main issue is distrusting all others, and his loyalty blinding him to people who are actually distrustful, juxtaposed with CJ, who makes several contacts that give him help and are loyal to CJ, such as Cesar & Woozie, who are not from the Grove, whereas Sweet puts all his trust in Smoke and Ryder, who betrayed the GSF a long time ago. It backfires horribly for him, he is nearly killed, put in prison under threat of rape and death, and it turns out they were the ones who killed his mother, not helped either by the fact that they were aiming for Sweet outside of CJ, who wasn't around, he seems to be the only one of the main crew who actually stuck to their code.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: The Foolish to CJ and Kendl's responsible though he sees himself as being the responsible one.
• Honor Before Reason: His reaction to discovering CJ is either a millionaire or very close to it is disgust at 'losing his roots.'
• Hypocrite:
  • He's repeatedly called out as a hypocrite that preaches his principles but is comfortable with the criminal lifestyle. Kendl herself even lampshades this.
    Kendl: Ohh, what - a no-good narrow-minded hypocrite gangbanger telling me what is right and what is wrong. Let me guess, Sweet - senseless killing right, but a boyfriend from the Southside, wrong?
  • Also, despite rebuking CJ for not putting in any work for the hood following his release from prison, Sweet himself was willing to give up on the hood and tried to smoke crack given to him by an addict in order to let it destroy him, which would have been the case had CJ not intervened.
• Jacob Marley Warning: In The Introduction, he tells Jeffrey (OG Loc) to go to college, so he doesn't turn out like him and Big Smoke. It doesn't work.
  Sweet: Jeffrey, go to college, man! Make something of yourself. Me and the fat man, we messed our lives up. We fucked up in the game, man. We products of the environment. Don't be an idiot, man. Make us proud. Do shit different, baby.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • He's a gangster, but if someone doesn't keep drugs out of the neighborhood, who will?
  • While his criticism of CJ is very harsh, he is right that CJ keeps running from his problems and not helping the hood out when they needed him most (such wanting to leave the hood behind once he gained a ton of money and apparently left Brian to die). Right before the final mission, CJ takes Sweet's criticisms to heart and apologizes for not being around when his homies needed him.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Although he gives CJ a lot of shit over the course of the game, it's clear he really feels concern about his brother's wellbeing. And there are a couple of scenes where he apologizes to CJ for being an ass to him. Also, he allows CJ to pay his debt to Cesar by assisting him and his Varrios Los Aztecas gang in attacking Los Vagos.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: He’s this to Kendi and to a lesser extent CJ.
• The Leader: Of the Grove Street Families.
• Moral Myopia: Believes 'representing the Hood' is more important than actually building a better life for him and his family.
• Neighborhood-Friendly Gangsters: Thinks of the Grove Street Families as this. He may or may not be wrong. At the very least, under his leadership the Grove Street Families refuse to engage in the crack trade.
• Politically Incorrect Hero: He is one of the good guys, but he does use some offensive slang for Mexicans, especially Kendl's boyfriend Cesar and doesn't approve of her dating him for the same reason. Fortunately, he grows out of it.
• Principles Zealot: Is too blinded by "standing by his principles" to actually see the big picture outside of the hood.
• Sibling Team: Mostly with CJ, sometimes with Kendl, too.
• The Unfettered: Pursues the dominance of the Grove Street Families over the gangs of Los Santos with an almost deranged single-mindedness.
• Undying Loyalty: To Grove Street, so much that he refuses opulence over the hood and even flat-out states that it's where his life is probably going to end at.
• Ungrateful Bastard: How he reacts when CJ gets him out of prison and explains they're never going to have to work again. Justified, though, being locked up and all and at the risk of rape or death.

Melvin "Big Smoke" Harris (Unmarked Spoilers)

Melvin "Big Smoke" Harris

"Respect has to be earned, Sweet. Just like money."

Voiced by: Clifton Powell

" Like it says in the book... We are both blessed and cursed."

A leading member of the Families and childhood friend of the Johnsons. Smoke has been a loyal member of the GSF for years and feels a great deal of anger over the drive-by shooting that killed Mrs. Johnson. He encounters Carl shortly after the latter arrives back in Grove Street and helps him readjust to life on the West Coast.

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• Acrofatic: For a fat guy, he runs and moves pretty fast and is the toughest boss fight in the game.
• Affably Evil: Big Smoke's usually a friendly, laid-back guy. Even after his betrayal, he keeps being respectful towards CJ (unlike Tenpenny or Pulaski), to the point of calling him "my old dog".
• Alas, Poor Villain: CJ feels nothing but remorse after offing him, as everything Smoke did was for nothing.
• AM/FM Characterization: Funk and Disco. Smoke's favorite station is Bounce FM.
• Ambition Is Evil: The main root of his Face–Heel Turn? He got addicted to both the money and power he earned.
• As the Good Book Says...: He constantly quotes phrases he has derived from the Bible, which are, by interpretation, used as a means to hint at his impending betrayal.
• Bald Head of Toughness: You can see he's bald under his hat. This especially noticeable when studying the statue of him in his Crack Palace. He is also the toughest boss fight in the game.

• Beard of Evil: Has a beard and is a gangster.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: With Tenpenny, although unknown to him, he is the lesser of the two.
• Big Eater: How much? He eats everyone's food during a car chase shootout! Someone did the math on Big Smoke's incredibly well-known massive order, and it's approximately seven-thousand five-hundred calories.
• Big Fun: After CJ returns home, Smoke is definitely the GSF member who's the nicest and most enjoyable to be around, what with Sweet being an Ungrateful Bastard and Ryder being a Jerkass. Then this is turned on its head when you find out that Smoke is in cahoots with Tenpenny and the Ballas.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: He's the friendliest and accommodating towards CJ, showing him only kindness and warmth while Sweet and Ryder constantly give him a hard time. It hides the fact that he's a traitor to Families and a willing pawn of Tenpenny.
• Cigar Chomper: Seems to always have a large cigar on hand.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: Smoke is by far the tankiest boss ever in the Grand Theft Auto series. Most GTA Big Bads either aren't fought directly or are at most only two or three times tougher than a regular Mook. Smoke can soak several full mags worth of automatic weapons fire before going down, even having a boss health bar. That bullet-proof vest of his must really be well made.
• Dirty Coward: In the mission "Reuniting the Families", both Smoke and Ryder drive off when the cops show up, leaving CJ and Sweet to fend for themselves. They do pull a Big Damn Heroes later in the mission, but this is still a major clue that they're not quite as loyal as you think. By the end of the game, Smoke is holed up in his crack house, his location a carefully guarded secret, and wears body armor at all times. Ironically, he faces you head-on and is the toughest enemy in the game.
• The Don: After the fall of Grove Street, Big Smoke becomes the most powerful drug lord in Los Santos.
• Evil Counterpart: To CJ — All the way. Both men are gangsters who want power and money, but while CJ is loyal and completely refuses to sell crack, Smoke sees it as a good deal. In other words, he represents what CJ would be if he had opted for hard drugs and corruption.
• Face–Heel Turn: Before the game even started - he was a loyal member of the GSF, but betrayed them for money and fame.
• Fat and Skinny: The Fat to Ryder's Skinny. Both men betrayed the GSF for Tenpenny and the Ballas in "The Green Sabre".
  • He's also The Fat to CJ's Skinny, unless the player chooses to work out/get fat.
• Fat Bastard: Post-Reveal. He was revealed to have been in cahoots with the Russian mafia, the Ballas, the Los Santos Vagos, and C.R.A.S.H. in accelerating the funds of his drug business.
• Fat Comic Relief: He's one of the funniest characters in the game, and his Big Eater status is the subject of quite a few laughs. In one mission, where the gang goes to get takeout at Cluckin' Bell, his order is larger than everyone else's combined, and he still steals their food.
• Faux Affably Evil: He presents himself as a friendly and lovable fella with a great sense of humor. But he's actually a greedy, selfish, power-hungry hypocrite who betrays CJ and Grove Street Families to Tenpenny.
• Final Boss: Since Tenpenny is a "Get Back Here!" Boss, Smoke is the last boss enemy you fight directly.
• Flunky Boss: He has several Vagos mooks to back him up during his boss fight.
• Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Smoke is never seen without his glasses and he's a ruthless gangbanger.
• Foreshadowing: There are several subtle clues about him:
  • His first appearance at the beginning of the game, he comes at CJ with a baseball bat before recognizing him in CJ's childhood home. Why would he be in the house while everyone else is at the funeral? To clean up the house of evidence that would tie him or C.R.A.S.H. to the shooting.
  • He moves out of Grove Street to buy a house in Idlewood (Ballas turf, no less) with some money he claims came from his aunt. It's most likely drug money, and the move showcases his lack of loyalty.
  • There's also the car chase shootout. Granted it's played for comedy, but he doesn't lift a finger to help the others as they're fighting a rival gang.
    • It's very possible that Smoke ordered so much food to lengthen the window of time that the Grove Family was out of the hood, as the Ballas car was going to attack the hood.
  • The license plate on his car reads "A2TMFK", which can be interpreted as "a two-timing mother fucker."
  • In one of the early missions, CJ walks in on Smoke and Sweet debating on whether or not the GSF should take part in the drug business. Sweet swears off of it on principle while Smoke is in favor of the drug trade because of all the money they could make off of it, showing that Smoke values money over respect for the 'hood and it also explains how he was able to afford buying a house outside of Grove Street.
  • When the Ballas ambush Grove Street during OG Loc's party, Big Smoke and Ryder are nowhere to be found.
  • When CJ and Big Smoke are attacked and chased by the Russians, he does several things that would/should have gotten CJ killed; Big Smoke parks in front of a barricade set up by the Russians instead of finding a way around them until CJ kills a few of them, claims the gearbox on his motorcycle is fucked and can't pick up speed, and the Russians seem to know exactly where he and CJ are going since they were able to set up a roadblock twice.
  • When the meeting with the Families is broken up by the police, Ryder and Big Smoke abandon CJ and Sweet. The two do return later, but during the police chase, Big Smoke circles around the neighborhood twice (which CJ points out) and drives through an active car wash, which gets soap in CJ's eyes while he's trying to shoot at the cops. At the end of the chase, rather than back up from an approaching low flying helicopter, Big Smoke decides to floor it, which could have killed CJ if he didn't duck in time. Big Smoke then claims the brakes are out, which should have killed CJ and Sweet if they had remained in the car where it flies off a ledge and crashes into a tanker truck below.
  • Like Ryder, he has frequent visits from Tenpenny and Pulaski.
• Getting High on Their Own Supply: By the time CJ returned from exile and confronted him, Smoke became addicted to his own product; to the point where he's seen openly taking a big hit of crack implied to have come from his own stash right before facing CJ in a final shootout. Like Tony Montana, this no doubt caused or increased his extreme paranoia, and led to him becoming a complete shut-in by that point.
• Heavy Voice: His voice is a lot lower and raspier than his friends.
• Heel Realization: Moments before his death, he acknowledges that he got addicted to the money and power he was earning.
• How the Mighty Have Fallen: Despite practically owning Los Santos after betraying the GSF, Smoke died paranoid, shut-in and addicted to his own product.
• Hypocrite: He is featured in WCTR claiming that he is opening an orphanage to help the children... right after he was revealed to sell out his gang for crack and money.
• Ice-Cream Koan: He likes sprinkling these throughout his conversations. Carl immediately calls him out on talking nonsense, however.
• Incoming Ham: His very first line in the game?^note Not counting his appearance in "The Introduction" in the special edition for PS2. "YOU PICKED THE WRONG HOUSE, FOOL!"
• Lonely at the Top: Even after betraying his friends and becoming a rich and successful drug lord in the process, Big Smoke is shown to have become completely paranoid, hiding at the top of his heavily guarded crack palace for fear that someone (either Tenpenny or CJ) is going to kill him off soon. When CJ reencounters him, he's seen playing video games and smoking crack and doesn't have much to say, being eager to end everything quickly.
• Narcissist: He is an opportunist who betrayed and sold-out Grove Street to become a successful crack dealer and to become more rich and powerful. When CJ confronts him at the end of the game, he only tells CJ that he's a success and that's all that matters to him as in his last moments, he just tells CJ that he "just sees the opportunity. When I'm gone, everyone gonna remember my name... Big Smoke" showing he doesn't regret anything he did.
• Orcus on His Throne: He's treated as one of the major Big Bad villains in the game, but unlike Tenpenny, who has a constant presence throughout the campaign, Big Smoke disappears from the story after the Los Santos chapter ends, expanding his drug empire while CJ goes on his state-crossing adventure. He only shows up again at the very end for CJ to put down in the depths of his crack palace.
• Plotline Death: At the hands of Carl at the first half of the final mission, End of the Line.
• Punny Name: He's a large man who's also a Cigar Chomper. Additionally, given what kind of person he turns out to be, one can say all his friendly, eccentric charm was just one Big Smokescreen.
• Pyrrhic Victory: He successfully betrays the gang, gets both CJ and Sweet captured, and lets Tenpenny and Ballas destroy all the work the Johnson brothers put into it, bringing Grove Street to its knees. Sure enough, he becomes head of the major crack dealing operation and is basically the kingpin of Los Santos, but at the same time, paranoia and fear of retribution from his former GSF friends force him to hole up in his penthouse and do nothing but drug himself into oblivion. By the time Carl reaches him, he's a wretched, pathetic shell of his former self and his death at the hands of CJ is more or less a Mercy Kill.
• Signature Headgear: His trademark bowler hat.
• Significant Monogram: Bullshit. It's later revealed that he had been bullshitting to Carl and the GSF about his loyalties.
• Sophisticated as Hell: He tends to combine his philosophical ramblings with the usual gang-banger slang.
  "Man, if you can eat your food, while everybody else is losing theirs and blaming you, you straight homie."
• The So-Called Coward: Despite becoming The Paranoiac by the final Mission, he's the only boss to stay and fight to the end (and even die with some (tragic) dignity). By contrast — Ryder, Pulaski, and Tenpenny are just Get Back Here Bosses.
• Unwitting Pawn: He thinks he's in charge of Los Santos, but like everyone else, he's really just a pawn of Tenpenny.
• Villainous Glutton: Likes to stuff his face and can be damn ruthless at times. What he becomes after The Reveal.
• Villain with Good Publicity: He at least tries to paint himself as this. During CJ's exile, the news mentions that he has opened an orphanage in Los Santos, and later appears in a bumper for WCTR claiming that he is a "well-known philanthropist".
• Walking Spoiler: Smoke spends much more time in-game as an antagonist than he does Sweet's ally.
• What the Hell, Hero?: "All we had to to do, was follow the damn train, CJ!" Expect him to say this a lot if you fail the train pursuit mission.

Lance "Ryder" Wilson

Lance "Ryder" Wilson

"I'm a motherfucking genius!"

Voiced by: Aaron "MC Eiht" Tyler

"Man, you say you down for the homies, but all you do is complain."

Another senior member of the Families, and yet another childhood friend to the Johnsons. He constantly challenges CJ's reliability, feeling that five years on the East Coast has made him too soft for the gangster life. To prove himself, Carl tries to help him secure weapons for the gang through several increasingly ludicrous robberies.

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• Actor Allusion: "Gyeah" was also the catchphrase of his voice actor.
• AM/FM Characterization: Gangsta Rap. Ryder's favorite radio station is Radio Los Santos.
• Ambition Is Evil: He is convinced by Big Smoke to join him and betray Grove Street so he can be in charge of his own destiny and make tons of money off the drug trade.
• Asshole Victim: He stabs his friends in the back for money and power and is killed by CJ in retaliation. Later on, when CJ actually expresses some regret for killing him, Cesar reveals that Ryder had tried to force himself on Kendl in the past, further killing off any remaining sympathy.
• Brutal Honesty: Ryder will never hesitate to tell his honest thoughts on CJ since the latter ran away five years ago, as well as pointing out his general flaws additionally, and he does so in a rather brusque tone of voice.
• Card-Carrying Jerkass: Ryder never bothers to make any attempt to hide the fact that he's a megalomaniac jerk and even shows blatant pride of his gangster attitude, which is part of his Establishing Character Moment in the beginning.
  Ryder: I got wit' them motherfuckers though! Showed them niggas who's gangster! Ryder, nigga!
• Celebrity Paradox: Compton's Most Wanted, of which MC Eiht was the frontman of, has "Hood Took Me Under", which can be heard on Radio Los Santos. Making the whole thing even messier, Ryder looks just like Eazy-E, despite that Eazy has a track on Radio Los Santos, another track as part of N.W.A and is the subject of a diss track by Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, which is also on the same station.
• Character Catchphrase: "Gyeah" and "Busta" (an insult he usually calls CJ).
• Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: Looks almost exactly like Eazy-E. To a lesser extent, he resembles his voice actor, MC Eiht, who was also famous for his hat and Jheri curls.
• Cool Shades: He's never seen without his blackout sunglasses on.
• Deadpan Snarker: The snarkiest of all characters of the whole game, he makes many caustic remarks and is extremely brusque towards CJ at times.
• Demoted to Extra: He starts off as one of the major characters in the first act, but after his betrayal, he is barely mentioned compared to Big Smoke, and is treated as being another one of Tenpenny’s minions at best while Big Smoke becomes part of the Big Bad Duumvirate. He appears in a few missions as an antagonist before being confronted and killed by CJ halfway through the story and is only mentioned once afterwards during a conversation between CJ and Cesar before being completely forgotten afterwards.
• Dirty Coward:
  • Ryder, along with Big Smoke, pulls this in the mission "Reuniting the Families" when the cops show up and their only option is to hightail it to leave CJ and Sweet facing the cops on their own. This hints to their eventual betrayal.
  • Despite his constant boasting of being gangster, when he is finally confronted by Carl during “Pier 69” instead of fighting him he jumps off the pier and tries to escape in a nearby boat. ^note  Although this is mostly because when it was finally decided that he will turn into a traitor, he was originally going to be the one killed on the pier while T-Bone was the one who was supposed to escape by boat, but their deaths were reversed for some reason.
• The Dragon: To Big Smoke.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: He dies in an extremely anticlimactic manner, getting killed off in a boat chase, without even getting a cutscene death like Smoke, Tenpenny, and even Pulaski. ^note  Originally, in the beta version, his and T- Bone’s fates were reversed with Ryder being the one killed by Cesar and Carl on the pier and T-Bone the one the player would have to hunt down in a boat chase. This was changed for the final release for unknown reasons. Or the player can give him a more Undignified Death by just sniping him.
• Establishing Character Moment: His first line in the game, and to CJ, during an impromptu getaway is "Keep up, motherfucker!" - right after Mrs. Johnson's Funeral, and he spends the rest of the way taunting CJ. He also even embraces his attitude after making it to Grove Street along with the other three in the same mission. Also, his attempt at robbing the Well-Stacked Pizza parlor in Ganton in the following mission shows that he's not quite as smart or competent as he claims to be.
• Eyes Out of Sight: His eyes are never seen behind his sunglasses.
• Face–Heel Turn: Like Big Smoke, he was once a good friend to CJ and loyal member of the Grove Street Families before he betrayed the gang and allied himself with Tenpenny and the Ballas.

• Flipping the Bird: Although we don't actually see it due to none of the character models having separated fingers (at least in the original versions), his pose as he's preparing to jump off of Pier 69 and escape from CJ certainly suggests that this was the intention.
• Foreshadowing: Much like Smoke, it's foreshadowed a few times before The Green Sabre that Ryder is not as loyal as he claims to be and is in fact a traitor that works for Tenpenny.
  • Mid-way through the bicycle chase, he yells "Keep up motherfucker!" Remember that CJ has just left the funeral of his mother.
  • In the first mission, he will not be targeted by the Ballas car, just like Big Smoke.
  • Like Big Smoke, Ryder gets visited by Tenpenny and Pulaski.
  • In "Home Invasion", CJ gets fed up with Ryder's trash-talk and tells him "One day you're gonna wish you hadn't pissed me off."
  • During the Ballas attack in "House Party", he leaves before the fight even begins to pick up Smoke and get back up which never shows up.
  • Like Big Smoke, he abandons CJ and Sweet to the SWAT officers during the meeting between the families. Later on during the mission, he gives CJ a crappy AK from Emmet that ends up jamming and almost results in his death despite the fact you just spent several missions for Ryder collecting powerful weapons that should be readily available and more than useful to have in this situation.
• Forgotten Fallen Friend: Double Subverted. CJ actually grieves having to kill him, since for all his many, many flaws, Ryder still was a friend of CJ's from childhood. After Cesar tells him he tried to "bang" his sister Kendl once (implying he may have tried to rape her), he pretty much gets over it and forgets about Ryder.
• Green and Mean: He wears green like every other Grove and is shown to be a huge asshole even before he's revealed to be a traitor.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: He just never knows when to calm down.
• Hypocritical Humor: At the beginning of the game, Ryder tells CJ that he needs a haircut, while having a rather long and messy mop himself that's only held in place by his hat.
• Hypocrite: Calls CJ a busta for having run out on the gang five years ago, and for expressing hesitance or caution for whatever dangerous plan is being suggested, but in the mission "Reuniting the Families", Ryder himself turned tail the second things went south, leaving his own homies behind to fend for themselves. To say nothing on how he's outright betrayed the gang before or during the period of time CJ came back to it.
• Informed Deformity: Ryder is apparently short, as other characters mock his height. In-game, he's taller than CJ. The frequent cracks at his height are probably an allusion to Eazy-E, who was 5'5"^note  approximately 165 centimeters in real life.
• Insufferable Imbecile: Kind of like the franchise's other Lance. He's a loud-mouthed shermhead who constantly puts C.J. down and betrays him, and claims himself to be much smarter than he actually is.
• Jerkass: He is one of the more troublesome members of the Grove Street Families, often high, always sarcastic and excessively rude to everyone, especially CJ. And you eventually find out he turned on Grove Street before the game even began.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Sure Ryder is an asshole and a traitor, but when you think about it, most of the things he calls CJ out for being (a busta for leaving to LC, a bad driver, always complaining) are true.
• Know-Nothing Know-It-All: He claims to be a "genius", but he's probably the most idiotic person in the whole game, having more of the education of someone who's in the 11th grade. The fact that he's almost constantly stoned off his ass probably doesn't help.
• Large Ham: As stated in the manual, he is loud, wild, and unpredictable.
• Laughably Evil: In spite of his betrayal, he did provide a lot of humor in many of the missions he appeared in.
• Lean and Mean: Is much lankier than the rest of the Grove Street OGs, and a complete asshole with a massive ego who likes to constantly insult CJ.
• Leitmotif: He has his own theme music here that plays in the background of both his scene in The Introduction movie and Home Invasion 's beginning cutscene. Much like Ryder himself, the theme is rather unpredictable with a
• Minor Major Character: Despite starting off as a main member of the Grove Street Families, his role is relegated to a treacherous minion who suddenly becomes unimportant the rest of the way.
• The Napoleon: If his Informed Deformity mentioned above, as well as the rapper he was based off of, is anything to go by.
• Narcissist: He describes himself as "too smart for school", calls himself unstoppable and even flat out states that he is a "genius".
• Never Bareheaded: With the exception of his attempt to rob the Well-Stacked Pizza, he always wears a black baseball cap on his head and never seen without it.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Appearance wise, he's a dead ringer◊ for the late classic gangsta rapper Eazy-E.
• No Indoor Voice: We don't need to go there. Ryder yells "Come out you old bastard" at a crazed war veteran when they go to steal his guns.
• Obviously Evil: A downplayed example, considering members of Grove Street Families aren't exactly the prime examples of morality, but given Ryder's smug, condescending and overall shady nature, it would have been more surprising if he didn't turn out to be secretly working for Ballas. Even CJ himself is more shocked to see that Smoke turned out to be a traitor as well given the latter's more affable nature.
• Occidental Otaku: Ryder is a self-proclaimed "kung-fu master" and is constantly making references to Asian culture.
  "Ninja these mothafuckas!"
  "You know me, Sweet, cool as a Shaolin monk."
• Offstage Villainy: After CJ shows genuine remorse for having to kill Ryder, Cesar tries to snap him out of it by claiming that Ryder tried to bang his sister. This was never even hinted at beforehand.
• Precision F-Strike: His first line in the story is "Keep up, motherfucker!" Said to CJ during the group's getaway from the Ballas in the beginning.
• The Resenter: While his constant digs at CJ appear to be a case of Vitriolic Best Buds at first, after the revelation of his betrayal, it becomes clear Ryder has a lot of genuine contempt and envy towards CJ.
• Signature Headgear: His trademark baseball cap with "San Andreas" embroidered in white on the front.
• Sinister Shades: Ryder is never seen without his shades, and he's an unapologetic asshole who is always mean to CJ and the rest of the GSF.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He clearly thinks he's a lot more intelligent and competent than he really is. While he is a competent gangbanger, he still has the education of a high schooler.
• The Stoner: Is pretty much constantly under the influence of pot, which leads to him acting unpredictably and making rather stupid decisions. He considers himself an Erudite Stoner, but he's much dumber than he thinks. Although it's not pure weed that Ryder's smoking, it's sherm (joints dipped in PCP), which explains his... less rational decisions.
• Sunglasses at Night: He always wears his sunglasses, even indoors or at night.
• Token Evil Teammate: Of the four initial Grove Street characters (CJ, Sweet, Big Smoke, and himself), Ryder is clearly the most rude and abrasive. Not to mention bad-tempered and reckless to boot. Then again, this all serves as a Foreshadowing to his later Face–Heel Turn later in the story.
• Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: Implied by CJ, who revealed that Ryder started selling drugs as young as 10 years of age and has even beaten up a teacher all because he/she had on purple, the color that Ballas wear. These allude that Ryder has been a short-tempered, belligerent banger even during his childhood.
• Two First Names: "Wilson" is also a very popular first name.
• Verbal Tic: He has a habit of saying "motherfucker" a lot.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With CJ. Ryder constantly insults and acts cruel to CJ, and CJ usually can't stand him either. Despite this, both are close friends from childhood up until Ryder betrays CJ and the GSF.
• With Catlike Tread: In the mission "Home Invasion", after arriving with CJ at their target's house, CJ suggests a stealthy approach. Ryder agrees... only to immediately start yelling for their target to come out and gets called out by CJ for nearly ruining their burglary attempt.

Other members

Gang Members

Gang Members / Homies

"Open your eyes CJ!"

"Take this Balla Bitches!"

Low-ranking Grove Street gang members that can be found around GSF territories, they can be recruited by CJ to help with Drive-bys, Gang Wars and even some Story Missions. Are openly hostile to the Ballas, Vagos and Aztecas, and will shoot their members on sight.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Ryder, CJ and Sweet call them "Homies".
• Awesome, but Impractical: Bringing a literal busload of these guys (you can recruit up to 8 if your respect level is high enough) to the gang wars you have to do late in the game seems like a great idea on paper. In practice, not so much. They're armed with a TEC-9 at best or a puny 9mm pistol at worst, which is no match for the MP5s and AK-47s that the Ballas and Vagos carry later on, though this is kind of a moot point when they can't hit the broad side of a barn to begin with. But the worst part is that if any homies under your "care" get killed (and against the heavily armed gangs it's a sure thing that they'll all be wiped out) this actually lowers your respect level and completely cancels out any gains made by capturing the territory. It's best to just get lots of ammo and go it alone.
  • That being said, their usefulness can change considerably if you spray all 100 Tags in Los Santos, allowing them to carry weapons such as Desert Eagles and MP5s, making them more effective in combat against the Ballas and Vagos.
• Bottomless Magazines: They have infinite ammo, which is good since they don't really shoot straight.
• Establishing Character Moment: Their first appearance in The Introduction movie has two of them playing dice while their OGs (Sweet and Big Smoke) discuss important matters, highlighting their low-rank within the Families. One of them later shows up during the Green Sabre's drive-by and bravely fires on the car in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the Ballas from getting away. This showcases both their Undying Loyalty (the homie risks his life to halt the Ballas' escape) and ineffectualness (is unable to stop the Ballas from escaping and all of his bullets miss the Ballas members inside the Green Sabre).
• Gangland Drive-By: Their forte. When inside a vehicle, they will act as gunmen and shoot at rival gang members. They are much better at Drive-bys then gang wars.
• Gangsta Style: They always fire their 9mms (and later TEC-9s) like this. With the Desert Eagle and MP5, however, they use the Weaver stance and fire from the shoulder.
• Red Shirt: They generally don't last very long in gunfights. The fact that most of them are armed with only 9mms and TEC-9s doesn't help either. Most guides actually advocate using them as distractions instead of protection. Spray 100 Tags however and...
• Took a Level in Badass: They'll be packing Desert Eagles and MP5s enabling them to easily take down rival gangs with minimal casualties (important for Gang Wars).
• Undying Loyalty: They are pretty loyal to the Grove Street OGs, the Johnson brothers in particular. For all their snarking against CJ, they will never turn on him unless CJ provokes them first.
• What the Hell, Hero?: They will call out the player if they crash a car during a drive-by.

"Open your eyes CJ!"
"CJ you a maniac man!"
"If we keep up at this speed we're dead!"

• You All Look Familiar: They all share the same three models. There are actually two extra models, but they are only used in cutscenes and nowhere else.
• You Are Too Late: A homie shows up near the end of The Introduction to protect Mrs. Johnson and stop the Green Sabre from leaving, but is too late to do both as Beverly has already been murdered and the Green Sabre quickly speeds away.

Kendl Johnson

Kendl Johnson

"Oh, what? A no good, narrow minded, hypocrite gangbanger telling me what is right and what is wrong?"

Voiced by: Yolanda "Yo-Yo" Whitaker

Carl and Sweet's younger sister, who the two care deeply for, and would do anything to protect. She holds a great deal of disdain for their lifestyle, viewing their gangbanging antics as hypocritical and immoral. Nonetheless, she cares a lot about them, and is always there for them when they need support.

She is in a relationship with Cesar Vialpando, the leader of the Varrios Los Aztecas, and while this initially causes some strife, it ultimately forges a partnership between the two gangs.

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• All Girls Want Bad Boys: She is dating and eventually gets engaged to Cesar, a gang leader. Subverted, as, his line of work notwithstanding, Cesar is shown to be a loving and caring boyfriend to Kendl.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Along with CJ, the Responsible to Sweet's Foolish. She's much more reality-based and open-minded than Sweet, and helps Carl keep Doherty garage's afloat.
• The Heart: The only Johnson sibling to not be a criminal (her older brothers made sure that she wouldn't turn out like them) and the most moral member of the group. Also doubles as The Smart Girl since she keeps CJ's legitimate business (his Doherty garage) running while he continues on his criminal dealings and the pursuit of revenge.
• Hypocrite: She constantly derides CJ and Sweet for their gangbanging criminal lifestyle, but has no problem helping them in their criminal operations and even got romantically involved and engaged to an active gang leader.
• Maligned Mixed Marriage: She gets a lot of grief from Sweet over being in a relationship with Cesar, who is Hispanic.
• Official Couple: With Cesar after they're engaged.
• Only Sane Woman: She's a lot more morally upright than her siblings, though has no scruples in helping steal cars.
• Quit Your Whining: Tells CJ this when he starts ranting and lashing out against everyone over the derelict garage Catalina had given him. She tells him that he always wanted something for nothing and now that he has what he wanted, he doesn't know what to do with it. Ergo, he should make the garage better than it is rather than whine about how useless it is to him.
• Sassy Black Woman: Black and loves to sass her siblings.
• The Smart Girl: Once Carl moved to San Fierro, she manages his and Cesar's chop shop.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Subverted with Cesar. Thankfully, Carl is considerably more tolerant than Sweet. Sweet also implies he doesn't mind anymore as he allows CJ to help Cesar in one mission.
• Stripperific: To the point that Sweet tells her she looks like a hooker. It also results in a lot of construction workers getting killed after they harass her for her scantily clad appearance.
• You Don't Look Like You: Kendl never appears outside of cutscenes, except in the mission "High Stakes, Lowrider", in which she is in Cesar's passenger seat during the race with a completely different model of a pedestrian NPC. This is because her model was heavily changed late in development and her beta model turned into a pedestrian with some minor tweaks, and they had no time to create an in-game model for her sole appearance outside of a cutscene.

Barry "Big Bear" Thorne

Barry "Big Bear" Thorne

"Everyone likes to party sometimes CJ ...I'll see you around."

Voiced by: Kurt Alexander

A former Grove Street OG who got hooked on crack cocaine and became a drug slave to former Grove Street member B Dup.

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• Formerly Fat: Big Bear is implied to have gotten this name for his large size, and he has a fatter character model in game files, implying that he lost a lot of weight due to his crack addiction. This is later outright confirmed by deleted voice files of Carl questioning Big Bear's drastic change in appearance, to which Bear snarks that it's the "Best diet I've ever been on".
• How the Mighty Have Fallen: Was a high-ranking OG in the Families before he got addicted to Crack Cocaine and subsequently became B Dup's malnourished and weak-willed slave.
• Made a Slave: B Dup's basically turned poor Big Bear into his personal slave, telling him to clean up the toilets and do housework while addicting him to crack cocaine.
• Slave Liberation: At the end of the game, where he finally stands up to B Dup after his constant mistreatment before rejoining the Families.
• Weak-Willed: He became this due to his drug addiction, obeying B Dup's every command while declining both physically and mentally. He thankfully stands up to him at the end of the game and willingly puts himself in Rehab.

Former Members

Brian Johnson

Brian Johnson

The youngest child of the Johnson family, who was killed sometime in 1987. His death is what caused CJ to drift apart from his family (Sweet in particular) and move to Liberty City. Sweet blames Carl for causing Brian's death and resents him for not showing up at his funeral.

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• Death of a Child: According to pre-release PlayStation magazine articles◊, poor Brian was only 10 when he met his untimely end.
• The Ghost: Unlike his mother, who at least appears in an old photograph during Big Smoke, Brian is constantly mentioned by CJ and Sweet but is never shown.
• I Let Gwen Stacy Die: On the receiving end from CJ. CJ blames himself for Brian's death, and he left San Andreas for Liberty City because of this.
• Loved by All: Sweet, CJ and Emmet have nothing but good things to say about Brian, implying that he was well-liked in the community.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Implied to have looked a lot like CJ, if Emmet confusing CJ for him is any indication.
• Posthumous Character: He's been dead for a very long time, but his death plays a role in the frosty relationship between CJ and Sweet.
• Riddle for the Ages: We never learn who killed Brian, why he was killed or what CJ did to get blamed for his death.
• Youngest Child Wins: Averted. Brian is said to have been the youngest child in the Johnson family, but his life was tragically cut short in either a murder or an accident.

B Dup

Mark "B Dup" Wayne

"CJ? The fuck you want? Hey, get the fuck outta here!"

Voiced by: The Game (Rapper)

A former Grove Street Families member who took up drug dealing and aligned himself with the Ballas.

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• Dark Is Evil: He wears a midnight blue chore coat and a matching pair of baggy jeans, which gives a good visual indicator that he dropped his flags a long time ago.
• Ink-Suit Actor: He bears a resemblance to his actor.
• Jerkass: See the quote in the caption? That's the first thing he says to Carl after five years on the East Coast. His overall attitude befits a man who is rotten to the core.
• The Corrupter: He's the reason Big Bear is a weak-willed base slave.