I have just replayed all 3 Arkham games recently (Yes, I said 3, Origins does not count) and while I love all of them and they are my favourite interpretations of both Batman and his rogues gallery of villains and also among my favourite games of all time, there is one particular thing about them that I am torn about.

As I said, I absolutely love all the characters in the game and how they are portrayed, but the one thing as a man that both excites me and frustrates me to no end is the design of the female characters (not that there are very many of them. Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn and Catwoman are the only 3 MAIN ones that come to mind right now), they are ALL extremely hyper-sexualized in their character designs.

Now, as a straight male, of course I love looking at women, especially very sexy and attractive women, and the Batman games are no exception, but I honestly feel that Rocksteady took it a little bit too far, especially with Arkham Knight. With Harley and Selina, their boobs are so big that they are almost bursting out of their outfits and with Ivy, her prison shirt only has one button done up in the centre of her boobs and is literally only covering her boobs and nothing else AND her underwear is literally made of leaves, like she is Eve from Adam and Eve. I mean for gods sake, they literally even give them really sexy and sultry voices (except for Harley, I actually find her voice extremely annoying at times with how high pitched it is. I love Tara Strong, but yeesh). Selina is constantly flirting with and teasing Batman. She even flat out says that she knows a couple of hotels they could go to in Arkham Knight after she is recued by Batman from Riddler. Honestly, I don't know how he has the mental strength to resist her to tell you the truth.

Even the side female characters like the doctor you have to rescue underneath Wonder Tower and the League of Assassins/Talia Al Ghul in Arkham City are given really skimpy outfits. With Talia and the assassins in particular, their midriffs are constantly exposed due to how low-cut their shirts are. Literally the only female character in the entire series of games that is not sexualized in her design is Barbara Gordon/Batgirl, both when in her wheelchair and when she is full on Batgirl in one of the Arkham Knight DLC stories, and possibly the news reporter Vicki Vale. There are obviously other female characters in the games, but they are so extremely minor, they are not even worth mentioning since they have maybe a minute of screen time at the very most, such as all the random GCPD officers, but obviously, none of them are going to be sexualized in their designs, being police officers and all that.

My point though, is if you look at the MCU, particularly in the last few years, they have managed to strike the perfect balance of making their female heroes and villains sexy, without actually sexualizing them AND making them look very comic accurate all at the same time. A few perfect examples of this are Black Widow, Scarlett Witch, Captain Marvel and several members of the Guardians of the Galaxy. I wanna focus on one in particular though and that is Wanda. Her outfit that she gets in the final episode of WandaVision is the PERFECT example of how it should be done. She look absolutely badass, dangerous and very sexy, but she is not blatantly sexualised. Her breasts are not exposed in anyway, but they are still very clearly there and there is very little skin visible. Also, to use another superhero game as an example, Insomniac's Spider-Man on PS4 and 5 gets it right as well. Their female characters such as Mary-Jane Watson, Yuri the police captain and in particular Black Cat are all very attractive women, but none of them are sexualized with their outfits, and Black Cat is a character you could have easily done that with, but they didn't.

In the age that we are in now with more and more women coming forward with sexual assault allegations and the Me too and Time's up movements going on and people like Bill Cosby and Harvey Weinstein being publicly shamed, outed from Hollywood and put in prison for their actions, I personally think that having female characters designed like that in games (and movies as well) is just not appropriate anymore. But on the other hand, as I said I am a straight male and I am not denying that they are extremely pleasing and arousing to look at. I just think that those types of designs are more appropriate in the realm of adult entertainment (as long as it is consensual and the people involved with it and watching it are of legal age) and fan artwork, rather than is a movie, game or show.

I have attached images of the characters I have discussed in this post so that you have more context as to what I am talking about.

This was a very long take/rant, but I am very interested to know what your opinions are. Please leave them in the comments below.