And don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that the 2 ladies have some breast support now, but their breasts are still very clearly accented by their clothes for some reason. The designs are getting better, sure. It’s definitely an improvement from a Child’s-Small-size Halloween costume with shoestring (not even a better version than Ozzie’s Green Arrow), but we can do better.
I do hope that Brendan George continues to work hard with his team toward getting that “more mature and respectful” aesthetic that he wants. He’s not all the way there yet, I think.
-Icy
Definitely looking forward to more positive changes to Mortal Kombat character designs in the future, but so far it’s merely a step or two ahead of writing checks they cannot cash for “Doing women better”. Especially when the bar was set that low.
Because are we really supposed to celebrate an exchange of a giantboob window for a smaller boob window on Kitana?
Once again, I’d encourage our readers to not settle for the smallest, safest improvements in female (and/or otherwise marginalized) representation. I get it, we’re starved. But we have the right to ask for more.
New rule for female armor: if you design female armor and you wouldnt be willing to cosplay it, you’re making a mistake.
I’d like to propose an expansion of rule:
If you’re a guy and you’d wear it because “it’d be funny” but you wouldn’t respect a female cosplayer who wore it: You are a mistake.
– wincenworks
Another caveat to the rule, inspired by an article we linked in the past: if a costume is (near*) impossible to replicate or too uncomfortable to wear for cosplayers – it fails as a costume.
~Ozzie
Honestly, if a cosplayer would need to use double-sided tape in order to maintain their decency while wearing your costume, maybe just… don’t.
-Icy
*”Near impossible” only because cosplayers are amazing and can somehow make even the most absurd shit work on human bodies somehow. But at what cost?
Fantasy does NOT have to follow real world rules. Fantasy does NOT have to relate to some real world event, country, concept, law, or history. Fantasy does NOT have to mirror any particular time period or country, even if you’re basing your world on a real world one. There is NO SUCH THING as “historical accuracy” in fantasy as it relates to the real world.
THE ONLY THING Fantasy has to do to be believable is follow the established rules OF ITS OWN WORLD. Fantasy can literally be anything you imagine it to be.
If your fantasy world excludes people of color or those belonging to the LGBT+ community, if it’s grossly misogynistic and white cis-male centric, that’s because YOU made it that way. Stop blaming “historical accuracy” or “believability”. It’s not the genre; it’s YOU.
@bikiniarmorbattledamage I believe this is highly relevant to the rhetoric you guys often combat.
Indeed all of this relates to all the stuff we talk about on BABD.
Ultimately, no matter the justifying rhetoric, it’s the creative decisions that will be under scrutiny, not some superficially “objective” rules regarding a fictional setting.
~Ozzie
The cool thing (that people sometimes forget), is that a fantasy setting, rather than being historical fiction (somehow), instead illuminates the values of its creator. Sure, it feels bad to be called out, but it really does make you a better creator if you ask yourself: why are all my characters light skinned/skinny/cis/straight/male/etc?
Sometimes, there are good reasons, like if the story is about (to use a basic example) race-based oppression, and all the characters are on one side of that. But sometimes the reason is just “cause that’s what i like.” And honestly, besides being a bad reason, that’s just boring.
If I hadn’t gone through this process myself, I wouldn’t have my favorite Pathfinder OCs! Just sayin’.
I remember when Fortnite first came out I had a look and felt that while it was kind of nice they were doing a little body diversity, they had a pretty clear agenda when it came to the Female Constructor design:
Apparently there are still those out there for whom this is not sufficient conformity to traditional pandering, even if this character is also an option in the original game (no PhotoShop required)
Have to say though, I feel pretty proud that “tumblrization” is credited for any sort of deviation from these designs. Another bright side is this has pretty great meme potential (with a few great ones in the Twitter thread already).
– wincenworks
It’s quite telling about attitudes towards beauty standards when a slightly cartoony female character of average human built, with tan skin tone and clad in regular street clothes (and not the “unfeminine” full battle gear) is such an unbearable level of SJW pandering which the status quo warriors find necessary to “fix” with whitewashing, bikini tops and photoshop-based plastic surgery.
Just imagine how they would “un-tumblrize” Constructor if her original design wore a bulletproof vest, had darker skin and hair, zero makeup, fatter body and more detailed, less smooth facial features.
~Ozzie
Credit to icantatricks and mitotic for the discovering of the photoshopped image,
So, as well as just to remind the world in general what the kind of people who complain that their female characters in battle royale games are “not sexy enough” are like… before Tumblr turns to ash and we all forget it existed except as a cautionary tale: I thought it’d be nice to bring this one back.
Not just because of its content, but because well when @gailsimone (who would never troll ANYONE) made a similar series of posts about the Punisher… well certain demographics did not show it the kind of support you’d expect. At all.
unpopular opinion: harley quinn is better with clothes
made w @chokit-pyrus on paintshop pro 9 and paintshop pro X8
Also unpopular opinion: she looks more badass that way.
Further unpopular opinion: it just makes sense for her to wear more than a bikini. Gotham is fucking cold and she’s a graduated psychiatrist and psychologist, not someone immune to cold. Plus, body armor and potential for concealable weapons.
I especially appreciate the reinforcement of the diamond motif and red/black color scheme that got changed to red (sometimes pink?!)/blue for no reason over the years.
We touched upon this before, but the big problem with most contemporary depictions of Harley Quinn is that her designs convey anything but her Harlequin/jester theme.
Who is that? Some randomly underdressed biker chick? Why is she wearing a cropped leather jacket directly over drafty lingerie? Where are her pants? Is there a reason for her girlish pigtails? Hell if I know! ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Good character design, including costume and make-up, should work context-free. The only thing thing we’re told by this sort of Harley design is “she sexy”.
i wanted to fix some things that made me uncomfortable…also it was fun kinda redesigning these ladies from bnha cuz god damn their original suits are shit and dont make sense according to their quirks….
first off: shutup omg. yall forgetting these are fictional women written by a man. “they design their own outfits” is a dumb argument. these women dont exist and didnt decide anything. the artist/writer did. get smart.
second. the only thing different with momo is i took away the tittyshow of a 15 yr old. she still has a window on her chest and tummy but a lot of the shit she forms from her body comes from her back and limbs. there’s an inch long difference between her weird ass skirt and the shorts i gave her– i think she’ll make do.
ashido is a disaster. her quirk is secreting acids so why are the parts of her body that show as much skin covered? legs take up a lot of the body. the only other difference in her uniform is–once again— i took away the tittyshow of a 15 yr old. i literally gave her MORE skin to show.
let me wrap it up with nemuri since yer argument to this was by far the dumbest. nemuri can still rip off her clothes. she is STILL showing the same amount of skin as the original. I just changed the color and design so it looked like this bitch didnt just roll outta bed and throw over a hot topic lingerie set over a white lace onesie.
Those are very awesome redesigns of some of the worst female costumes in current mainstream anime. Thank you, @bumbleshark, for saving those poor heroines.
And it’s not like My Hero Academia can’t do female costumes well. It just seems to mysteriously give up when a certain threshold of boob size is crossed ( ͠° ͟ʖ ͡°)
~Ozzie
Well yeah, Ozzie; at a certain boob size, you gotta give them a window to breathe through. Thenyou strap them in with your boob sealbelt. And MHA’s got both!
