The Perils of ‘Peril’

By Brantley Thompson Elkins

You can find practically anything on YouTube these days, including superheroine videos. Only most of them seem to be videos for people who hate superheroines. Lately, a lot of them come from Japan.

It might appear that the argument about so-called “peril” sites has been done to death, but there seems to be an explosion in peril videos – videos in which the ostensible superheroines are stripped of their powers and abused. These often go beyond bondage into actual torture, as some of the online peril comics have gone into gang rape and the like.

There have been arguments about this at the Aurora Universe Readers Group and forums and blogs at superwomenmania.com and supersexyheroines.com. A lot of fans don’t seem to see what all the fuss is about. And yet the issue won’t go away.

Over at Supersexyheroines, JonX gave a rave review to one of the Japanese superheroine videos, Astro Girl: American Heroine, available through either a cumbersome (and often futile) download process or as a $75 DVD that is said to take at least five weeks to arrive and plays only on Region 2 or Region 0 units. Some of Jonx’s comments:

I really think that this is the best amateur film since the Steele’s Awakening. Whilst I’m not into Japanese girls, the actress playing Astro Girl (Delcea Mihaela Gabriela) is not only quite stunning but has got a cracking figure to play the superheroine.

The special effects and the fighting are great and especially with the strength scenes I always felt that Astro Girl really looked strong and invulnerable.

The bullet bouncing scenes were brilliant and Astro Girl’s reaction at the end and her dialogue throughout were good.

Despite the subtitle, Astro Girl is indeed played by Delcea Mihaela Gabrierla, a Romanian who found her way to Japan somehow and has appeared in a number of movies there:

http://www.eigapedia.com/wiki/Delcea_Mihaela_Gabriela

She has a killer body and a face with real character. She is said to speak seven languages fluently, which suggests that she is really brainy, too. From JonX’s review, Astro Girl I seems to be a dream come true for our kind of superheroine fans, as we can see in a couple of clips that have been posted at YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYpeeegJmS4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFkUD_KDOQc

That second clip may be the best bullets-and-boobs footage ever; in other clips, a bullet flattens against her eye à la Superman Returns, and a knife turns into twisted metal against her abs, At superwomenmania, djitters sure thought he’d gotten his money’s worth from the complete video:

Based on JonX's valuable review I downloaded and watched the movie last night. I liked what I saw. I'd say the bullets bouncing off AstroGirl's chest scenes were worth the price alone, if I knew what the price was (I don't know what the conversion rate is from yen to US greenbacks). In any case, in addition to AstroGirl 2 it appeared from some other titles listed, there might some other films featuring Superwomen. Does anyone have more information on that?

Encouraged by Astro Girl I, djitters downloaded Astro Girl 2, which also stars Gabriela, but in an entirely different costume than the first. Alas, the costume was not the only change:

I downloaded and watched AstroGirl 2 last night. My advice: save your money folks! This was a disappointment after AG1. The heroine wins at the end but she's on the ropes throughout most of the rest of it (i.e., she's getting pounded on). The fight scenes aren't as well done as AG1, long on yelling short on action.

There’d been some of this sort of thing in the first video, where a nasty alien gets hold of some Kryptonite and subjects Astro Girl to the sort of abuse we’ve seen before at so-called peril sites like Superheroines Demise. But that was only a brief interlude, JonX reported, and our heroine was triumphant at the end.

From clips of a number of Japanese superheroine videos, it seems that “peril” is the real thing for most of them. Typically, the clips start with a bit of superheroine action, then move right on to the abuse. The only differences are in the costumes, which are usually tacky – in one, the heroine wears a motorcycle helmet. The stars seem interchangeable.

One exception to that last point is the Japanese actress who stars in Steel Angel. I don’t even know her name, but she’s as cute as all get-out, as is her skimpy superheroine outfit:

Now this is cheesy exploitation, of course, and I’m sure feminists would jump all over it. Yet it’s basically good-natured: it invites any normal man to fantasize about making love with this luscious young woman, and invites our kind of superheroine fan to fantasize about adoring her in bed, covering her with kisses and caresses, sharing every pleasure with her.

But that’s not the sexual fantasy agenda of the video itself, as is painfully evident from the eight-minute official trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgFwTjRFV6o

Less than 30 seconds of superheroine action, and seven minutes of superheroine torture. It’s absolutely sickening -- watching the heroine violated makes me feel violated. Yet Zen Pictures – the same studio that made the Astro Girl videos – expects fans to get off on this sort of thing. And the response to the trailer at YouTube has been quite positive.

The prevailing attitude towards superheroine “peril” fiction, photo layouts and videos seems to be: “Hey, different strokes for different folks.” Another common argument is that if there isn’t any challenge to the heroine, there can’t be a story. Yet these arguments miss the real point: in legitimate superheroine fiction, whether at the Aurora Universe on in the photo stories at the Steeleverse and other sites, the fans are rooting for the heroines when they get in trouble. At the “peril” sites, they’re rooting against them. They want to see the heroines pounded on and raped – and they’re really obsessive about it. In a post a Superwomenmania, Kelly Johnston, proprietor of the Steele sites, had this depressing assessment:

…let me tell you, in the superheroine genre, we are few. VERY FEW! The Steeles get thousands of requests every month that fall in the realm of the girls getting "ass raped" (And sometimes worse) by the villain. The superheroines in bondage/peril fans may be sickos but are legions strong. If I took half of the requests we got from those people, we'd be driving exotic foreign cars and out picking our new island by now.

I hope that the peril fans are just a noisy minority, like the die-hard racists who hang nooses and paint swastikas and desecrate cemeteries. But if they are indeed the majority, I want nothing to do with them. It’s a matter of principle. I know it seems pretentious: how can I or any author of superheroine erotica bordering on porn claim to be standing on moral ground? Yet stand I must.