Needs Help: Biker Babe

The description of this trope spends just two sentences not really explaining what this trope is other than "Women who operate fast vehicles are apparently attractive." and then the rest of the description talks about how this trope (which hasn't been explained) relates to other tropes.

Unsurprisingly, the most of the examples on the page and wicks entries for this trope are either zero context examples or "this girl owns and/or can ride a motorcycle"

Wick check results (25 wicks out of 489 total):

this girl owns and/or can ride a motorcycle (11)

• Characters.Ace Attorney Witnesses And Other Characters Phoenix Wright
• Ah! My Goddess
• Characters.AIR
• Characters.Bayonetta
• Bigend Books
• Black Cat
• Blonde in Black Leather
• Bubblegum Crisis
• Characters.Code Geass Main Characters
• Characters.Cross Ange
• Dennou Coil

Zero Context (14)

• Another Note
• Characters.Arrow Main Characters
• Arrowverse
• Ben 10
• B Gata H Kei
• Bakuon!!
• Bitch Slap
• Characters.Brainbent
• Brooke Adams
• Carry On Girls
• Devil May Cry
• Durarara
• Flashpoint
• GI Joe The Riseof Cobra

edited 24th Apr '16 2:13:25 PM by captainpat

Even though there's Badass Driver, Badass Biker, and Ace Pilot, female drivers of any vehicle are all slumped together in Biker Babe for some reason. If anything, all of the well-written example should be merged with whatever vehicle they drive, with Biker Babe simply being cut.

edited 23rd May '16 5:27:25 PM by Josef5678

There is definitely a more type of character here than just a girl on a bike. Works tend to make the characters specifically sexy and such with outfits that no one would normally wear like a skin tight almost catsuit and sticking their ass out while riding and such.

Maybe the trope should focus more on that?

Looking at the currently airing Bakuon, there are 5 girls in the club but really only Rin is a 'Biker Babe' with her racing suit and stuff like this◊ and the rest are not. Raimu is the only only one of the five with the skills to be a 'Badass Biker'.

There is also the old media stereotype of only 'butch' girls can ride bikes, real ladies are a passenger at most.

edited 23rd May '16 6:18:40 PM by Memers

True, there is a trope in that actual biker babes usually are portrayed as more butch, or that their outfits are a form of fanservice. However, everything else is simply just "This character is a badass biker/driver/pilot who also happens to be female". Many of these should be moved to other tropes, not to mention the oddity of having bikers, drivers, and pilots all filed under badass biker.

edited 23rd May '16 8:48:38 PM by Josef5678

The "driver" aspect goes back to the original YKTTW; the idea is it's the fastness of the vehicle, not the motorcycle specifically, that makes it hot, with "biker" just being the most common form. I'm not sure about "pilots" though. (The age of the YKTTW also helps explain the bare-bones description.)

edited 24th May '16 1:18:50 AM by MorganWick

If that is the case then this needs a rename to Sexy Speedster, Speed Fetish or Fast Is Hot or something.

Because "Motorcycle Babes" are a massive thing on their own, with entire magazine dedicated to models with bikes and cars and such and has translated into drivers and pilots in media including other vehicles like Mechas ala Kallen in Code Geass.

edited 24th May '16 7:17:58 AM by Memers

Badass [Vehicle Operator]/Ace Pilot refer specifically to skillset. Biker Babe, I think, should keep focus on the sexy/fanservice aspect of it. Theoretically, a Biker Babe need not be a badass in terms of vehicle operation, but simply a normal one, while the vehicle combined with the catsuit/leather is played for fanservice.

Seconding.

I think this trope should be limited to motorcycles. Wearing skin-tight or scantly clad clothing on a motorcycle sounds a lot more impractical than wearing it in a vehicle like a car.

edited 26th May '16 4:39:52 PM by captainpat

I disagree on making it bike exclusive, many other types of vehicles are treated the same way. a mecha pilot's outfit a powered armor outfit◊ MEKA pilot◊ mecha pilot.

I do agree on making it a fanservice exclusive trope though, the original idea for Speed Fetish and such should be split off into something else.

Memers, 0% of those have a Biker Babe asthetic. This◊ is what is typically referred to as a biker babe. Black leather, spikes, skimpy, and air of both sex an danger. No some brightly coloured Cat Suit.

In the west probably.

In Japan those types of outfits do not really exist, only occasionally with some delinquents but those are rare. Instead you get stuff like this◊[1]◊[2]◊ even in the 70s they wore things like this◊ Biker + powered armor◊ another one originally from the 70s◊

They also do not have Harleys and such which is what western Biker Babes use.

That also has translated into mecha and airplane pilots, heck the pilots in Rinne No Lagrange and Kallen in Code Geass even sit in their mechs like a motorcycle, just Kallen btw most other mechs have a normal cockpit. Complete with fanservice camera angles [3]◊ like other bikers.

edited 27th May '16 7:33:02 AM by Memers

I'm not sure that Japanese example belong on here at all in that case since it seems they have a completely different trope at work. Maybe we should just ban Japanese examples and make them their own trope.

edited 27th May '16 8:55:08 AM by shimaspawn

I could go for that, there are a lot of differences including the actual bike they ride and image. With Harley vs a Sport Bike and dangerous vs sleak.

Although I have no idea what it would be called or how to write that up.

edited 27th May '16 9:19:08 AM by Memers

It makes much more sense than trying to cram two completely separate tropes together.

I'm not sure about names either, but I know that it doesn't belong here.

edited 27th May '16 9:20:58 AM by shimaspawn

On one hand, I agree that futuristic mecha outfits would not be eligible for this trope. On the other hand, form-fitting racing suits would be viable for this trope, even in Western works, since they too are associated with biker babes, albeit more so in motorsports than with Hell's Angels.

edited 27th May '16 9:26:54 AM by Josef5678

What about renaming this to Rebel Biker Babe, isn't that the stereotype? a Sexy and dangerous biker rebel on a Harley.

Make the second trope about Sporty Biker Babe or something, which would include western examples mostly focused on racing, with some redirects to more futuristic Sporty Mecha Babe and such? As those are completely meant to invoke the same imagery. They tend to be focused on speed and sleakness as apposed to being a rebel.

edited 27th May '16 10:11:40 AM by Memers

It depends what we're trying to establish here. If we're making this into a specific Biker Babe stereotype, then most, if not all of the non-biker examples should be cut.

On the other hand, if we're generalizing to "sexy driver in skintight clothes" as a fanservice trope, then other examples are fair game.

Of course, we could do both.

I'm pretty sure most examples that don't involve bikes would go under Latex Space Suit or Future Spandex.

bump.

I think we do need to change the name of this trope. I'm not surprised with the amount of shoehorning this thing has already with a name like Biker Babe.