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Is the rebooted Lara Croft gay? Evidence for and against...

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As some of you know, I’ve been fangirling hard over the new Tomb Raider , the first entry in the video game series since 2008, and ostensibly a reboot for the entire franchise . Taking the form of an origin story, Tomb Raider 2013 depicts the events that transformed a beautiful, if bookish, archaeology graduate into a pistol-packing adventurer with a devil-may-care attitude. We meet Lara Croft as a pretty, fairly ordinary 21 year old, brooding over her work notes, listening to her mp3 player and very much confined to the shadow of her male mentors. By the end of the game, however, she’s taken charge – she’s had to! – and, battered, bruised and bloody, she’s both a survivor and hero, right down to rescuing the princess and carrying her away in her arms. Yeah, this is probably the best point to mention that there will be some Tomb Raider 2013 spoilers in this post, so read ahead with caution. Anyway, I loved the game. Technically it’s near faultless, it looks beautiful, the ov...
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Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Queer Icon (Part 4)

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Part 4: The mystery of Lara Croft’s sexuality “Now what’s a man gotta do to get that kind of attention from ya?” – Larson Conway (Tomb Raider, 1996) Despite being an icon for many queer pop culture consumers, Lara Croft’s own sexual orientation remains ambiguous. Outside of the Top Cow comics and live-action films – where Lara is blatantly heterosexual, with a fondness for slightly scruffy bad boys (who keep betraying and hurting her) – the character comes across as primarily asexual. Kurtis Trent is the only male figure who even comes close to being a love interest in the game series. Lara's apparent sexual disinterest is despite the adventurer appearing very sexually attractive herself; a figure of desire with bee-stung lips, voluptuous breasts, toned stomach and impossibly long, athlete’s legs. Yet Lara is never dominated by sexual yearnings or romantic affections. She is very much in control of herself at all times. It’s worth noting, however, that over time th...
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Defending Sam Nishimura

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Young documentary-maker Samantha Nishimura is for Tomb Raider fans a love-her-or-hate-her character. Appearing in the 2013 video game reboot , Sam is fledgling archaeologist Lara Croft ’s long-term best friend, flatmate – and One True Pairing, if the shippers were to get their way. In the game, Sam’s naiveté leads to her kidnapping by Solarii cult leader Mathias. Technically twice. The second time occurs when the twenty-two year old is just as trusting of expedition colleague, Dr James Whitman, and falls asleep under his “watchful eye.” (To be fair, Lara makes the exact same mistake the first time she meets Mathias). During the game, Sam is successfully rescued twice by Lara (there’s a third botched attempt that almost kills them both). Sam also notably manages to shoot off a mounted machine gun in the direction of her friends while trying to prove her usefulness. And she tries to get sympathy from a battered, bleeding Lara by commenting how terrible she, herself, must look … ...
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