#characterdesign000

The misunderstanding and gray areas of “goonerbait” character designs | #demonslayer #myheroacademia by Odyxey

.

Recently I wrote about Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave Theodora's character design, in and of itself, looking like gooner bait. And I mentioned how the story would need to do a lot of rationalization to justify her design. (Actually, looking back, I'm surprised how intensely negatively I ranted.)

After that post, it may be surprising to know that I do love Kill La Kill. So even though a story does have to do a lot of heavy lifting to justify nudity, it is possible for me to buy a rationalization. Still, the choice of Ryuko's unexposed skin during her transformed state to be her arms, instead of her underboobs and pelvis, was definitely a gooner/marketing decision. But the story did make me forget all that and suspend disbelief.

But that's the thing with Theodora: Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave isn't out yet. We don't really know her story. And I don't mean just backstory plot points. I mean presentation, atmosphere, tone, and details. It's the whole presentation that enables a story to rationalize female sexual objectification and get me to suspend (even forget) my disbelief.

And I'm sorry that the presentation of female sexuality has to be scrutinized so much, but after centuries of all mediums and all cultures objectifying women, it is something that needs to be scrutinized. But that just means using nuance, and that's generally a good thing. The more we examine the line between empowerment/freedom to show skin without being objectified, vs showing skin for objectification reasons, the more we learn what the difference is.

And one big reason is that these are fictional characters, not real women/girls. It is much easier to believe a real woman wears revealing clothing for her own sense of empowerment and ownership of her sexuality. When a real life woman walks into a room with you, wearing sexualizing clothing, it's easier to believe she's just confident and loves her body, and to treat her with respect for that confidence and respect for her as a person. At least, for me, as another woman, I just think she's being cool. But when the women/girls are fictional characters portrayed by men or in industries dominated by men in supervising positions, it's very difficult to fully believe that a female character's sexualization is for that female character's own empowerment, vs simply to tantalize an assumed audience. Even real life women who are confident in their bodies or sexuality in real life, suddenly become objectified when they are reduced to images on a screen. They are literally made into objects (images on paper, screen, merch, etc.). And that distance from regarding them as people, makes them too easily into mere images, objects.

I'll never forget when I first watched Nicki Minaj's "Anaconda" music video. I couldn't hear the sound. Maybe the TV was on mute or there was too much noise going on in my cousin's house that I was visiting. But I was unfamiliar with the song, so to me, the music video just looked like a bunch of sexual objectification on the screen. But then later I heard what the song was about, and suddenly, the women on the screen didn't seem like they were being sexualized for the Male Gaze. Now, I could understand how the song was about a woman enjoying her own sexuality. And suddenly the music video felt very empowering. Still, when that context is removed, when women/girls are reduced to just images, it doesn't take much for empowerment or ownership to be reduced to objectification. A big difference is "Who is the sexualization or nudity for?" That's why when it's a real life woman/girl, I can be confident that she's doing it for herself or that she's just confident in her own body.

But a fictional character can't be asked why they choose to dress the way that they do. Because they're not real enough to choose anything for themselves. Their character designer chose it. Or, the supervisor of the character designer choose it.

For example, the point of Bayonetta is to be sexual. She's a reference to stereotypes of witches being overly sexual (usually with the "devil"), as well as a more modern reference to witches claiming ownership and joy over their own sexuality. On the one hand, the character designer for Bayonetta is a woman named Mari Shimazaki. On the other hand, she still had to take the direction of male directors, producers, supervisors, etc. They were the ones who told her that Bayonetta needs to be a sexual character in the first place. On another hand, Shimazaki famously said that she ignored a lot of their direction and just drew whatever she wanted. The next best thing to a real life woman having her own motives for her personal presentation choices, that you can ask her about, is a character designer who is a woman. Not that there aren't female artists who objectify women, but even when they do, it's easier to assume that they're just celebrating sexuality and those aesthetics, rather than motivated to normalize women as objects to sexually satisfy, presumedly men.

Because the truth is, even I consider a lot of sexual depictions to be "cute", "sassy", or admirably confident, and therefore empowering. I still watch the Victoria's Secret fashion shows, because I love the confidence that the model project while they strut down the catwalk. But because nothing exists in a vacuum, the preexisting patriarchal environment that has been objectifying and mistreating women for much of history, has to be considered as irrevocable context. And that context, more often than not comes with the danger of women being treated like objects, usually after they are sexually objectified. Still, if we could remove the patriarchal context, then a lot of "sexy" designs, in and of themselves, would be considered as simply "pretty". That's why when women (and people not attracted to women, or sapphics who are trusted to not mistreat women) discuss "sexy" clothing among ourselves, we often call it "cute" or regard "sexy" with this admirably daring and audaciously proud tone.

It's like that little girl who enjoyed the "Slave Leia" costume from Star Wars. She was only 5 years old. She described Leia's "slave" outfit as being very pretty, because she had her "hair plaited" and she had a "pretty dress". And yes, braids are pretty. The golden filigree on Leia's bikini was pretty. And the draping fabric of her "skirt" was flowy, and that's pretty. Outside of the context of patriarchy, even sexy things can just be pretty.

But where did this standard of those elements being considered "beautiful" come from? Where did we learn that Leia's "slave" outfit was pretty? Did those aesthetics develop out of sexualization? Sure, filigree and flowy fabrics are pretty, but most of "slave Leia's" outfit is about her body. A body in and of itself can be completely neutral. A group of women can fangirl over how cool a sexy outfit can make us feel, by showing off our bodies and our pride in it. Or, a body can be over-emphasized without our consent and men will use it to signal for mistreating Princess Leia as an object.

The type of sexuality that women choose, also tends to be different. I think it's telling that when directed to draw Bayonetta as a sexy women, Shimazaki choose to emulate fashion models. Both in the exaggerated proportions only found in the stylized art style of fashion design sketches, and in the typical runway model strut. Both resulting in portrayals of confidence and imposing stature. Meanwhile, I grew up on Harem anime, and I've noticed so many male-directed depictions of female sexuality, choose to portray women in vulnerable positions. They are often half-dressed, in compromised positions, viewed in angles they didn't intend or invite, and very often pouty and unhappy about being in their exposed states. I dare say that normalizing this type of sexual portrayal, kind of fetishizes a lack of consent, after a certain amount of over-saturation. Whereas fashion models and Bayonetta, invite viewership, revel in it, and are very intentional about their presentation (whether dictated by themselves, the fashion designer, or the character designer). It implies autonomy. The difference between many of the "beach queens" and "bunny girl" figurines that I see in my figure collecting hobby, versus the few sexualized female figurines that I do enjoy, is that the latter tend to be unafraid to depict female characters showing confidence and intentionality in their sexuality. They are often more dominatrix-coded, than the "oh no, my clothes are falling off", states of unintended vulnerability, found in many of the figures that I'm tired of. Maybe if such "vulnerable", sexual figures were rare, I'd just see them as cute depictions of very "ordinary, everyday" type of moments. Candid and messy in a charming way that mundanity is. But because of the over-saturation I perceive, I'm just tired of it, and I can only now see the lack of consent.

(Whenever I feel bad about how I used to not be so "over sensitive" about these things, yet now I can't even watch most of the Harem genre, despite formerly growing up on it, I remember: If the MCU fans can get tired of the "3rd act, sky beam portal" in under 10 years, then it's ok for me to be tired of female sexual objectification after much more than 10 years." Especially when it's the same type of sexual portrayals that has over-saturated everywhere.)

Context is important, but that context is also always submerged into our world's preexisting environment...of patriarchy and over-sexualization, of suspiciously, repeatedly, almost always, the same gender.

Again, Kill la Kill's, half-naked, kamui-empowered heroines and BNHA's Momo may have in-story reasons to justify their excessive exposure, but the context of our world, keeps me suspicious.

The villains in Kill la Kill are fully clothed, subsumed by the aliens disguised as clothing, and obliterating their human silhouettes, to symbolize their lack of humanity. The heroes in Kill la Kill are either nudists or very minimally clothed, to symbolize their pride in preserving their humanity. The Kill la Kill protagonists wear just enough clothing to borrow power from their allied alien clothing, but are mostly naked, to preserve their human silhouettes and that symbolism of humanity in their human forms. Still, it's telling that the part of Ryuko's body that gets the minimal clothing, are her arms. Whereas in real life, any woman would cover the bikini areas. An entire lifetime of being taught shame, embarrassment, and to police our own modesty (and sometimes the modesty of others) isn't so easily forgotten. If Ryuko must be partially covered to borrow some alien power without it overtaking her, then why is the little covering she's allowed, on her arms, instead of her boobs and pelvis? Maybe I could cite earlier KLK episodes about Ryuko learning to discard shame and focus on more important actions at each moment. Or I could cite the "Nudist Beach" group's philosophies about sincere humanity. But the fact that studio Trigger, it's character designers, and KLK's director, chose unnecessary nudity, over other available options, which would have also been revealing enough for narrative/thematic reasons, would which would have signaled more respect for women and signaled less tantalization for the Male Gaze, for a series that they described as their attempt at a female-targeted version of Gurren Lagann...It's suspicious. The only thing that saves it is that, as I mentioned, the narrative was very effective at justifying the nudity as symbolic of the story's themes. By the end of KLK, all the protagonists are completely nude, and it FEELS by that point, representative of their humanity, rather than "skin equals sexualization". But Kill la Kill had to revolve it's entire story around fashion, clothing, an attempt at female perspectives, and hammering home the symbolism of "nude human figures representing Humanity", in order to pull that off effectively (in my opinion). It's very difficult to just show off a practically nude female body and not make my first suspicion, the same thing that so much advertising, movies, media, and history has often, almost always used the nude female figure for: in service of the audience, rather than in service of the woman/girl represented and her own volitions.

For example, because I haven't watched very much of BNHA, I'm more suspicious of Momo's character design, simply being more Male Gaze fanservice. She's not a real girl, making her own decisions, with her own consent, about her own bodily expressions. Her mangaka is a man, working under a publication that Eiichiro Oda warned whose editorial staff might be weird towards women. The only way to really know Momo and her story, would be to have watched more of BNHA, which I haven't done much of.

So I feel similar to my aunt who walked into my room at the height of my comic book collecting, pointed at my Psylocke poster, and her only comment was that she had really big boobs. And yeah, I hadn't noticed until that point, that everything about 1990s Psylocke's character design, her hem lines, pointed towards making her boobs the widest part of her body, highlighted by bold blue. It was both a combination of my accustomed exposure normalizing it to me, to levels of invisibility, as well as my aunt not knowing Psylocke's story nor seeing her as a person.

Momo creates objects out of her body, therefore, she is minimally clothed, so she can pull objects out of her body, wherever is convenient and at large sizes, if necessary. Which, as a concept in and of itself, begs the question: Why isn't this character the gender that famously is accepted as completely topless? And if the character with this power is female, then why isn't she showing female considerations for achieving that same amount of skin exposure? Momo's outfit completely neglects support for her boobs, while training for a very physically active profession. Nami Swan's post-timeskip outfit's bikini top makes more sense. Jinx's halter midriff makes more sense (though it could stand to be more backless than it is in Arcane, for Momo's purposes). Even if Momo constructed an invisible bra, to give her boobs support and to eliminate the need to worry about her boobs spilling out during movement, why would she bother to do that? Every woman knows that invisible bras or bras with clear binding between the cups is unnecessarily complicated. Using sheer fabric for that aesthetic is fragile. It's impractical for multiple uses, washes, removing and re-wearing, etc. It's supposed to be an outfit for strenuous physical activity, in a genre where superhero costumes/masks are constantly getting torn half off. Why would anyone choose the trouble of sheer binding between cups or the less effective, more unstable, more uncomfortable methods of bust support, that would be resorted to without mid-cup binding? And the answer may be that the Hero Course's costume department determined that such a costume design would be more effective to market and increase Momo's chances of making a living in the hero profession. But WHY would such a costume design be "more marketable"? It again points to utilizing sexualization, not as a form of the woman's/girl's personal expression, but to cater to gazing onlookers. Also, an in-world explanation isn't an excuse. Again, someone in OUR world decided to make that design and go through the trouble to rationalize it, instead of the other way around.

It takes a lot more work put into a story, to suspend my disbelief, when up against our ever-present environment of patriarchy, sexually objectifying women/girls, specifically, for so long. Not that it can't be done. I just explained how Kill la Kill was very effective TO ME, in getting me to suspend my disbelief and therefore, suspicions, about fictional female character nudity being simply for the Male Gaze. But we are surrounded by so much media and history that puts female nudity (for the Male Gaze) first, rather than a story first, which is supported by nudity as a symbol. And it is so prevalent, that it's often more often correct to assume sexually objectifying reasons behind nudity. I can't tell you how often, as an aroace, that I assumed non-sexual motivations and everyone mocked me for not realizing "the obvious". And if that's the "corrective" experience of an ace like me, then I can only imagine how much more often sexual assumptions about others' intentions are accurate and come more naturally to allos. Even so, even I've been conditioned to expect sexual reasons behind others' motivations. Therefore, it often requires a whole story and humanization of the character, in order to understand their nudity as their own self-expression, and develop enough parasocial relationship to see the fictional character as a person, rather than as an objectified object.

Still, this may be why fictional female characters at a certain level of nudity are interpreted as "sexual objectification", when their designs are taken in and of themselves. If you don't know the character, when all you have to go by is the costume/character design, then it's difficult to see the person (especially when they aren't real in the first place).

For example, Bayonetta is almost completely covered. But when she moves, she expresses herself and reflects who she is, which is a very sexually confident woman. So when she's just standing there, in a non-deliberately posed portrayal, her costume makes her seem relatively neutral. But once she starts moving, she expresses sexuality, and because we can take that as her intentional decisions to move that way and talk that way, then any sexuality she expresses is more believable as her own personal expression and autonomy. It's not "sexual objectification"; it's "confidence", "sexual autonomy", and "ownership over her own sexuality". Because it comes from who she is as a person.

In contrast, if Momo or post timeskip Nami Swan were just standing there, in neutral poses, without knowing their characters, it's easier to interpret their designs' nudity as Male Gaze, when the viewer has no concept of Momo or Nami feeling like "real people" and only having our real world's societal conventions as references. But if a viewer actually knows Momo's or Nami's stories, enough to perceive them parasocially, like real people, then there's less likelihood to dismiss their costumes as Male Gaze. Rather, after seeing fictional characters as "full people", it's easier to believe that they have autonomy, chose to dress that way, and that their clothes are expressions of their character, rather than tools on objects designed to be perceived.

But contrast and precedent within an artwork/setting are also important. For example, Kasumi's "Violet" costume in Persona 5 Royal was very controversial. People could explain all they wanted about how she's a rhythmic gymnast and leg-less leotards are common for rhythmic gymnastics. But without knowing that, in and of itself, I couldn't blame people for being suspicious about her design being merely sexual objectification for the Male Gaze. It's a precedent that had been set in most other media, in lots of history, and even within the same Persona 5 franchise.

It wasn't too long before P5R, when Persona 5 Dancing Star Night (Dancing in Starlight), had an official music video where the girls were all in cabaret lingerie, while the male cast's official music video was just them playing instruments and in a getaway drive after a heist. I was so accustomed to anime fanservice, that it took seeing other people's reactions to notice anything amiss. I saw people squirming and saying they felt gross about watching the female cast's music video, because they were all teenagers, being deliberately dressed in sexual clothing, and lying around on satin sheets. In contrast, the male cast's music video wasn't conventionally sexualized at all.

Personally, even though I grew up watching rhythmic gymnastics, Violet's outfit didn't immediately make me think of a gymnastics leotard---until, once again, she started moving with her rhythmic gymnast's ribbon. Honestly, with all the Phantom Thieves before Violet, wearing pants, I found it jarring that she wasn't wearing pants. I compared it to being in a room where everyone was wearing pants, then someone walked in without pants. Regardless of any sexual undertones, that contrast against precedent would just be odd.

Even though Futaba canonically calls all the girls' Phantom Thief costumes "kinky", I only really recognized Ann's costume as sexualized. It was in Ann's entire establishing storyline and the crux of her story theme. I expect Ann's Phantom Thief costume to be about sexual perception, dominance, and autonomy. And I think her costume reflected her story well. ...Then again, my brother who doesn't know anything about Ann as a character, saw her character design and immediately preordered her Figma, when I asked him to place my order for me. (We used to combine our figure preorders.) So once again, it's so easy to reduce a female character down to a sexualized character design, when taking the costume design, in and of itself, without knowledge of their story or gaining a parasocial sense of the character as a person.

It's just unfortunate that this nuanced line is so difficult to tread. Is a female character's nudity an expression of her autonomy and confidence? Or is it "the hand of the author" just designing a tool for titillation, and contributing to a long history of female sexual objectification? But I guess nothing progresses without questioning how things are and how they could be. I think normalization is key. Right now, faceless bodies and women/girls treated like objects is normalized in too many places. But asking for media to portray women/girls with their humanity in the forefront, their own choices and autonomy in the forefront, I think is a good way to nudge towards more progress. Maybe right now, the more accurate assumption in most situations, is that nudity is female objectification. It is too easy to turn any female nudity into that, without perceiving her as a person. But also right now, I think we're getting more female characters with their own control and pride over their sexual autonomy, making both their "prettiness" and skin exposure their own expressions of self. I think Bayonetta is a vast improvement over Barbarella.

(Man, did Barbarella try hard to portray female sexual autonomy, but just fall face-first into "for the pleasure of male characters'/audience gaze"...SO many times. But I don't expect too much from the 1960s. I mean, it was an improvement that she didn't mind participating in sexual activities, but why were they all situations forced onto her? Why did the writers CHOOSE to write those situations in that way? And that opening sequence was just for the audience's viewership, not that character's reality. Anyway...)

Maybe one day, female fictional character skin exposure will be regarded the same as BNHA's Kirishima. Just a practical or convenient thing for the character, with no obvious sexual overtones---unless particular views are into that. Which is how it should be! Just treating everyone as neutral, unless there's actual interest there.

So I guess I'm saying the shower scenes from Star Trek Lower Decks were exemplary. And yet, because they managed to conceal nudity from the audience beyond the 4th wall, the characters' nudity wasn't distracting, in the way that the shower scene from Starship Troopers was. Starship Troopers' shower scene tried to do the same as Lower Decks (but years beforehand), and I think both IPs succeeded in portraying characters who don't treat nudity as an inherently sexual thing. But I think that Lower Decks' "censorship" allowed the scene to focus on how the characters interacted with each other, rather than giving the audience a chance for voyeuristic titillation. That focus emphasized a demonstration of how to not act like nudity is "weird". Whereas, Starship Troopers, with its nudity, which our real life audiences beyond the 4th wall, have been raised to overreact to, is distracting from the actual meta progress trying to happen.

I heard a scene described from the Netflix series Alice In Borderland, where a female character was revealed to be trans fem, and suddenly, the director knew how to shoot a woman in a bikini without sexualizing her. Before the reveal, the character had apparently been sexualized with all the usual sexualizing camera shots, that many are used to by now. But after the reveal, that same character, apparently fought an entire action/fight scene, while in a bikini, and the camera work was described as suddenly non-sexualizing...for the entire scene. Maybe even for the rest of the series, regarding that character, for all I know. But though this double standard proves that female sexual objectification is often a deliberate bid to titillate the audience, it also proves that people, right now, know how to portray women without sexual objectification, even when they're showing lots of skin.

Theodora looks weirdly too modern | #fireemblem by TBSkyen Shorts