Look, I get it, I really do -- men like breasts. As a man, I like breasts. It's one of those hard-wired, involuntary-parts-of-the-brain things, I can't help it. They bypass all the centers of higher reasoning and short-circuit the entire mind-body connection, like pulling the plug on a toaster. I consider myself a fairly enlightened member of the gender but nonetheless, breasts (and of course the wonderful female human beings they're attached to) are tremendously important in my life.
This is not, of course, revolutionary information, as anyone who's ever seen a magazine, movie, television show, or college campus is pretty much in on the secret. If sex sells, boobs seal the deal, it's just the way the world works. And since much of my life is now spent in comics, and in particular super-hero comics, they're pretty much being thrust from every spandex outfit in the multiverse. Add in that I also read a fair amount of fantasy and it's even worse.
But the abuse those poor oversized glands are subjected to is, frankly, appalling. Can you imagine wearing underwear strapped to your sensitive bits that's made out of chain mail? Cold, hard, ouchy metal rings, ready to snag and blister and pinch at every movement? And yet even so savage a woman as Red Sonja is forced to leap about so clad.
The biggest reason for this, of course, is that most comics are drawn by men who never quite made it out of adolescence (guilty as charged, your honor), and who thus don't really quite understand breasts. Not having them ourselves, that's understandable. So they get jammed into tights that would suffocate the woman trying to squeeze into them, revealed through gauzy silks, asked to defy gravity by not beating their bearers to death while flying at high speeds in a heavy head-wind, and much more. At this point I've pretty much just given up on expecting anything even vaguely realistic on the comic-book-boobs front.
And yet, sometimes I stumble upon an outfit so inane that I am brought up short and have to go whahunh?! Case in point, "Warlands" number 6, a 2002 production from DreamWave in Canada:
My question here is, just what in the name of all that's holy is holding those breast bands on? Take a closer look, they're basically rectangular boards unattached in any way to any other part of her outfit. They have two holes in them, with a rope running between them, which is the kind of thing you usually see when the top piece is tied to a bottom piece. Only there ain't no bottom piece here. Which leads me to the profoundly unsettling idea that those boards must be held on by being tied to her nipples.
Excuse me while several different sphincters contract in sympathetic horror upon thinking about that.
I've wracked my brain, but I can't figure out anything else. Magic, of course, or maybe some sort of Elfin Velcro, I dunno, but that just doesn't look comfortable. And what's the point of suspending two sheer Bounce tissues from the boards?
All in all, this is one of the more bizarre "Bad Costumes" I've seen in the course of writing this feature. I feel badly for the Elfin girl shown -- not only is she having to go out in wrapped thigh-boots, furry underwear, long ggloves, and a frankly painful looking set of earrings, but she's got very sensitive bits of her anatomy wrapped up in some kind of sick bondage scheme. Galadriel will not be pleased.
The look on her face tells you how much pain she’s in.
Wow, Jeff. Simply wow. You really take these poor women seriously, huh? I am impressed by your compassion.
That said, and now being serious, I am glad that your HeroMachine women aren’t misproportioned in the least, much less do you provide such ridiculous outfits as this. There is indeed one decent man left out there, and I think we’re all glad to know him.
i agree with you what the hell is holding the boob covers on!!!!
Most men do, anyway. 😀
Looks like she’s one breeze away from a wardrobe malfunction. By her expression, it’s perfectly believable that the boob-drapes are uncomfortably pinned-in-place.
Building on what you said about Red Sonja – yeah, there is no practical reason for wearing a chainmail bikini in the thick of medieval battle. Imagine how it’d feel to sit down on a triangle of tiny cold steel chain links. “Ready to pinch at every movement” indeed.
Elven Super Glue!!!
Yes! Magical tree sap is the double-stick tape of the sexy female elven bombshell. Tee-hee. I typed bombshell. Seriously, the monkey part of me likey da boobies, BUT(!) I frickin’ hate non-tactical outfits on heroines. Anyone see Vampirella’s outfit fix in the movie? It was only added after a fight scene because she kept ‘poppping out’. 😛 Save the ta-tas.
Maybe the “curtains” are there for a twisted and perverted game of peek-a-boo?
Is the off-screen speaker perhaps refering to improvising a more practical garment? Heck, even fashioning the cloak into a makeshift sort of toga would be more practical than what she’s wearing (or not wearing) now. …Unless the tissues are made from a early form of Elfin Handwavium, because that would explain everything.
I always thought the chainmail bikini was the *reason* Red Sonja was so savage. I know it would ruin my mood.
@xStacy: Could be. I know I get grumpy when I wear my tin foil boxers.
Wow. Okay first…thats kind of a hot picture.
Second.:OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWw
That is wrong!
my number 1 annoyance on spandex female superhero costumes is the troubles of going to the toilet with them and even worse, getting back in them (sorry, just keep seeing the scene in Friends where Ross tries to put his leather pants back on…..)
But that’s only an annoyance on “spandex female superhero costumes”? 🙂 What about the men? I haven’t noticed a lot of zippers in the large-but-smooth crotches of spandex male costumes either. Not that I’ve really been looking, mind….
…hey I know what the “elf boards” there anti-gav boob straps!
There certainly seems to be a lot of people interested in this topic. Anyone here interested in getting bikini boards for themselves?
if i was a cartoon i would so date her in a heart bet
To be honest, sometimes I wonder why people just can’t draw women completely topless instead of having to resort to utterly inane things like this. I mean…it looks ridiculous! After all, a bare nipple doesn’t hurt anyone, those things hurt your common sense!
D3