'Bishoujo' simply means "pretty girl" in Japanese.
A
bishoujo series, however, is a more loaded term. They are
Fanservice series
aimed towards male audiences. These series will use highly attractive female characters up to
about twenty-five years old whenever possible. This is especially noticeable in a series where
male characters and older women make unusually few to no appearances, even if the story's setting and premise would create that expectation.
Lately, among fans, it often takes a self-derogatory tone. Many bishoujo series blatantly appeal to male audiences with pandering tropes, causing large amounts of
Selective Squick and
Values Dissonance that help cement the
otaku stereotype. Adding a guy to the mix ironically just gets it labeled as a
Harem Genre story.
When a series of this kind does attract
Fan Girls, the series often loses this term. Compare and contrast
Shoujo Genre and
Magical Girl, in which there are cute girls, but the target audience is female. Also contrast
Puni Plush,
Gonk,
Hunk,
Bishounen.
Improbably Female Cast is a
Sub Trope.
Examples:
Anime and Manga
- Pretty much every girl in Elfen Lied, Diclonius and human alike, is very beautiful. Because of this, the opening scene is particularly memorable, what with Lucy going on a killing spree while wearing nothing but a mask.
- Gunslinger Girl has an especially jarring dichotomy between the age of the girls in question and their occupation.
- Naturally sent up in Excel Saga, which featured a bishoujo episode in which the art became noticeably more shiny and all of the male regulars except Pedro were deliberately excluded. Pedro's Big "NO!" comes when the male cast finally comes to exact punishment for his appearance — and we still don't get a good look at any of them.
- Azumanga Daioh - although it is expressly not a Harem Series, but rather a Schoolgirl Series; the only regular male characters are a creepy, middle-aged teacher with a fetish for high school girls and a giant floating orange cat that may or may not be Chiyo's father. Plus, you know, that one schoolboy who fixes Yukari's bike and is then thrown into the series whenever they need to show another student aside from the main cast? Yeah, we're talking about him.
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- Galaxy Angel is a bishoujo series; the Galaxy Angel gameverse has the same characters as a Harem Genre, but the anime removes the central male.
- Soukou No Strain.
- ARIA, where only beautiful young girls appear to be allowed to steer sight-seeing gondolas.
- Koihime†Musou is notable for its sheer volume of bishoujo. There are literally dozens of all shapes and sizes.
- Similar to Strawberry Panic, everyone in Maria-sama Ga Miteru is insanely beautiful, including the regular passerby - too bad if you're male though.
- Tenshi Ni Narumon.
- To Love-Ru.
- Reimei No Arcana.
Literature
Live-Action TV
Video Games
