Bishoujo means beautiful girl and Japanese toy companies have been making figures and models in what is known as the bishoujo style for a while. The bishoujo concept is to adapt an existing character or idea and render it in an anime inspired style. So you get pretty girl versions of characters in manga or comics that conform to the usual Japanese tropes of pretty, big-eyed face with fat ass and titties. Bishoujo takes the character and puts it thorugh an anime-fication filter just as you'd expect. There have been Bishoujo takes on lots of western characters but they tone down the stripper dimensions (mostly). To see examples just do a google image search for:

Marvel bishoujo
DC bishoujo
GI Joe bishoujo

There's also a different take on girl figures from the mecha genre where a female figure is incorporated into a fantasy costume that is comprised of robot parts. Gundam and Macross have been doing this forever. For some fantastic examples of these mecha girl figures check these out:

Armor Girls Project (AGP) MS Girl FAZZ
https://www.metalbridges.com/armor-girls-project-agp-ms-girl-fazz/

VARIABLE FIGHTER GIRLS MACROSS FRONTIER VF-25G SUPER MESSIAH KLAN KLANG
https://www.aoshima-bk.co.jp/en/product/4905083057230/

Now Transformers is getting the Bishoujo treatment and instead of leaning heavy into a mecha girl style, we get something that is neither bishoujo or mecha. We get basically Transformers Cosplay Girls:

https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/transformers-bishoujo-optimus-prime-and-megatron-revealed/46676/

These things aren't as good as the Marvel or DC or GI Joe versions because the source characters aren't human so you can't nail the likenesses in human form. But then they don't go the mecha girl route either. Instead they just dress the model up in robot inspired clothing.

I would almost be disappointed but I have always wanted a line of Transformers trick-or-treaters wearing the old Collegeville costumes from the 80s. So this is close. It would also have been neat if they did figures of the cosplayers seen at various Transformer conventions. I would buy the hell out of that.

On Wednesday, February 23, 2022 at 8:30:45 AM UTC-7, evil.king.m...@gmail.com wrote:
> Now Transformers is getting the Bishoujo treatment and instead of leaning heavy into a mecha girl style, we get something that is neither bishoujo or mecha. We get basically Transformers Cosplay Girls:
>
> https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/transformers-bishoujo-optimus-prime-and-megatron-revealed/46676/

I keep seeing this in my news feed, and I keep ignoring it and hoping that it was a fever dream or something.

I mean, you see a lot of Transformers fan art like this, and I guess it's cute enough. Anime girls dressed up like Starscream or Soundwave or whatever. Most Transformers characters are distinctive enough, with their colors and weapons, that they don't even have to wear the full costume. Just a few pieces of armor in the right color to suggest the character.

I honestly think it's yet another example of the official company waking up and going, "Hey, the fans really like this. Maybe we should do it, too, so we can make some money off of it." The problem is, when it's officially sanctioned, it loses some of its appeal. Oh, well.

Zob (at least it's not Kiss Players again)

Zobovor <zmfts@aol.com> wrote:
> On Wednesday, February 23, 2022 at 8:30:45 AM UTC-7, evil.king.m...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> Now Transformers is getting the Bishoujo treatment and instead of
>> leaning heavy into a mecha girl style, we get something that is neither
>> bishoujo or mecha. We get basically Transformers Cosplay Girls:
>>
>> https://www.seibertron.com/transformers/news/transformers-bishoujo-optimus-prime-and-megatron-revealed/46676/
>>
>
> I keep seeing this in my news feed, and I keep ignoring it and hoping
> that it was a fever dream or something.
>
> I mean, you see a lot of Transformers fan art like this, and I guess it's
> cute enough. Anime girls dressed up like Starscream or Soundwave or
> whatever. Most Transformers characters are distinctive enough, with
> their colors and weapons, that they don't even have to wear the full
> costume. Just a few pieces of armor in the right color to suggest the character.
>

I think the Optimus is kind of genius in how effectively she evokes the
character with so few elements of the character model. It’s not my thing as
a rule, but I’m slightly tempted to make an exception.

This is also why I love Alternators Shockwave. The bare minimum design
elements to make the character utterly recognizable.

I don’t think the Megatron chick is at all as successful, but possibly just
because Megatron isn’t as consistent a character model as Optimus.

> I honestly think it's yet another example of the official company waking
> up and going, "Hey, the fans really like this. Maybe we should do it,
> too, so we can make some money off of it." The problem is, when it's
> officially sanctioned, it loses some of its appeal. Oh, well.
>
>
> Zob (at least it's not Kiss Players again)

This is way more tasteful than Kiss Players. More tasteful than most of the
rest of the characters from that anime girl company too.

Gustavo! (I though we had all agreed to never discuss Kiss Players again)