I call Trope Repair Shop on this, I just don't know how. :D

For one, there are a ton of Child Mage examples. Two children in Video Games who animate teddy bears into giant monsters.

Need to emphasize that strength and durability are important.

And probably rename the trope from Cute, since it leads to confusion as to what it is. Child-like Looking Bruiser? Beautiful Bruiser (which would've made the removed Tifa example fit)? Dwarfish Midget Bruiser?

Removed this X Just X example:

• Pippi Longstocking

• A lot of female Mixed Martial Arts fighters fit this trope, although Your Mileage May Vary due to personal tastes. To compare, you would have, say, Cristine "Cyborg" Santos: very lean muscled, and with her hair down at least (she wears cornrows to fight) rather pretty. Then you have Gina "Conviction" Carano, who while also being toned is somewhat differently built and is, by general consensus, just flat-out beautiful.
  • There's also Roxy Modafferi◊. She's not as sexy as Carano, perhaps, but she's damn cute, and arguably a better example of this trope, since losing a match didn't make her quit fighting. She taught herself Japanese through manga and anime, currently teaches Japanese schoolchildren English, has read the ENTIRE Wheel of Time series, goes by the ring name Happy Warrior. On the bruiser side of things, she's had more fights than Cyborg and Carano put together, is one of the most talented grapplers in WMMA, and is a serious grinder, with most of her fights turning into 3 round wars.

Are these examples? If they are, they need the terrible YMMV cruft taken out. Examples Are Not Arguable.

Eiko Magami, Hikaru Shidou and Lina Inverse perhaps? Most anytime Beauty Brains And Brawn applies to underage girls.

We should really put this in folders

We should really put this in folders

A lot of the ones still on the page don't quite seem to fit.

I've deleted

• Puss In Boots from Shrek 2. Combines this with Badass Spaniard, by virtue of being voiced by Antonio Banderas.

Yes, he's cute. Yes, he's small compared to Shrek, and Donkey, but he's not small for a cat. But most of all, he's not a child and he's not super strong.

and

• Dragaera's Aliera e'Kieron. Admittedly, she's a Dragaeran (read: elf) and therefore about 6 feet tall, but for her species, that's really short. That doesn't stop her from carrying a soul-destroying BFS and taking enormous pleasure in using it. In fact, it's actually stated that her previous sword was longer than she was tall.
  • One of the books mentions her tendency to wear dresses too long for her height, and levitate a few inches off the floor rather than walking, to compensate. She likes the excuse to duel those who call her on it.

For much the same reason. She's not a child or young, she's simply short. And she's never presented as being extraordinarily strong.

That Runaway image◊ doesn't look much at all like "cute" or "little child", even if the entry for it says she's 11... This Sasameki Koto picture made me think of this trope, even if Lotte doesn't have the superpowers of most of the examples...

Took this out...

• Tifa from Final Fantasy VII. Being one of the three characters who fight unarmed in the game (beside RedXIII and Cait Sith) and still able to dish out damage with the best of them, you really have to wonder just how bizarrely powerful she is.
  • This is extended even further in her appearance in Kingdom Hearts where her fighting prowess has increased to the point where she has super human strength enough to punch in a metal door.
  • Not to mention her ability to hold her own in a fight with Sephiroth (one of the most feared and respected villains in... well in video games) armed with nothing but determination after Sora fights him .

...because Tifa is NOT a child, or even close to one. (Being the poster child for Boobs Of Steel doesn't count.)