Check Her Stance: Finally a Female Pokemon Trainer Stands on Her Own Two Feet

Editor's note: Meghan's holding out for a hero — a female Pokemon trainer without an unfortunate foot disorder. And to celebrate finally finding one, she looks back at the sad history of wimpy gal poke-trainers through the ages. -Demian

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A clip from Japan's more-than-slightly creepy Pokemon Sunday talk show recently revealed some new details about Pokemon Black and White, and my hands-down favorite news was — holy metatarsus varus, Zubat, er, Batman — a lead female trainer who wasn't standing pigeon-toed and didn't look like a slight breeze would knock her over!

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The female trainer concept art for Pokemon Black & White. Hooray, she's
not pigeon-toed and looks capable! Her amount of confidence
must be directly proportional to her hair size.

Why is that significant? Many, many, many women in Japan walk or stand pigeon-toed often. Opinions conflict on why this is (some insist it's because they sit in seiza all the time and thus permanently damage their knees, ankles, and lower body alignment), but the largest consensus I've found on the Internet is this:

The real answer is that it is a holdover from the days when people still wore kimono. If you walk normally while wearing one, the kimono tends to comes open so for modesty people began walking pigeon-toed. Even though people no longer wear kimono, a shuffling walk with one's feet turned inward is still considered modest, feminine, and even cute. [The Quirky Japan Homepage]

I don't think I'd be excited about this if I hadn't felt like every other female trainer in HeartGold was ridiculously pigeon-toed. Ms. HeartGold looks like she's in a constant state of tripping over something, perhaps a Squirtle.

Female trainers throughout the Pokemon ages. From left to right, Gold/Silver/Crystal,
Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald, Diamond/Pearl, FireRed/LeafGreen, HeartGold/SoulSilver.

In HeartGold/SoulSilver roughly 18 of the 41 female trainer sprites, or 40%, appear to be pigeon-toed (I'm embarrassed to admit I counted). Most of the remaining female trainers are doing something equally hyper effeminate, like jumping and tweaking one of their feet mid-step (which is a close cousin of the pigeon toe, I guess).

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Trainer sprites from HeartGold and SoulSilver. Red circles = female sprites with incredible
pigeon-toeing. Yellow circles = female sprites without incredible pigeon-toeing.

I'm tired of seeing so many female characters (especially in Japanese games) represented in such a demure, passive light. Sure, a big draw of Pokemon is that it's supposed to be super adorable, but I want some female characters who won't burst into tears if a random leaf blows off a tree and hits them in the face — a character who is strong and looks like she can withstand travelling in the world alone.

[Pictured right: Some of the worst pigeon-toed offenders from HG/SS. I have no idea how the top-left trainer or Team Rocket girl are standing like that AND defying gravity at the same time.]

I'll finish this post with a fun localization fact: The female trainers called "Lass" in the American versions are called ミニスカート (Mini-Skirt) in the Japanese version. There's also a similar reference in the Japanese Pokemon anime's opening song for the very first season, but that's a whole other blog post.