![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Well muscle men are a staple of Bara works as far as I know so maybe.
Yaoi goes for fit, it doesn't go for the herculean nonsense that is often called male fan service.
edited 6th Jan '18 5:50:16 PM by Imca
Outside a few Shonen like Toriko how many of those actually exist in Japanese works? I mean even Goku in DBZ only reached that point early on in DBZ and they scaled back massively to the point it was a plot point.
Not many outside of Shonen, the problem is those are mostly what I hear people brand as "Equal opportunity fan-service", "Just look at all mights muscles~ How can you tell me that not for women"
I would be hard pressed to come up with stuff like that for too many Japanese works, western works sure especially Superhero.
The time that I see that come up the most in regards to Japanese works is in Street Fighter discussions, when people try to pretend that Zangief represents a counterpart to the multiple highly sexualized women of the cast.
edited 6th Jan '18 7:07:07 PM by IniuriaTalis
Looking at some of the female only character polls out there Zangief does appear on them but rather low on the list. Guile and Ryu seem to be the only two consistently on top.
Street Fighter is actually a good example of how this dichotomy plays out. From my observation the male characters can have all sorts of physiques ranging from ridiculously super shredded (zangief, guile, haggar) to generally muscular (ken and ryu in some games) to lean but fit (dhalsim, skullomania) to Stout Strength (Rufus, Honda). Most of the female characters on the other hand have a similar waifish body build (excluding stuff like Chun Li having larger thighs which is Fetish Fuel anyways).
The more recent games have been standardizing the male body build as beefcake, as well. There were a lot of complaints in the fandom that Ed, previously a skinny, short teenager, was redesigned into yet another big muscly guy when he was made playable. Of course, there's still more male variety because they're willing to have male characters be Gonks, which they would never allow for women.
edited 6th Jan '18 7:25:41 PM by IniuriaTalis
To be fair, the "men can have any body types, women can only be traditionally pretty" problem isn't really specific to anime or video games. It's a problem in the overall entertainment industry.
It's not something I'm super into but I have found female bodybuilders who I am attracted to. Christi Wolf
◊ for example. I've met a few other guys who are into it too. But yes, it's hardly a widely held idea so far as I know.
Of course, such attractions and fetishes are often born because these women are so explicitly rejected by the mainstream. A lot of desire is linked to defying normality. Or, rather, what society perceives as normal.
edited 6th Jan '18 8:53:56 PM by Nikkolas
If it helps, I remember a woman in Gundam Unicorn looking pretty ugly. She was a recurring character.
The fact that remembering a single unattractive woman is notable enough to bring up is an illustration of the problem in and of itself. For bonus points, try to think of an unattractive women who's both a likable, sympathetic good guy and is taken seriously by the narrative.
I don't remember her being villainous or unlikable, nor was she ever made a joke out of. She probably dies, though; I don't remember.
edited 6th Jan '18 9:15:44 PM by PhysicalStamina
There was a character in Hunter X Hunter that was exactly that, but her name escapes me.
Honestly though, Beauty Equals Goodness is a thing in anime and Japanese media in general.
I don't remember anyone like that in Hunter X Hunter, unless you count buff Biscuit.
The character from HXH in question is Melody/Senritsu
. She's one of the more sweet and compassionate characters, and there's never any jokes made about her appearance or anything of the sort. I didn't think much of it when I first saw it, but looking back on it's pretty remarkable.
While Hx H does have some pretty iffy stuff (like them glazing over Palm's creepy treatment of Gon on their "date" that makes her look like a pedophile), it's also weirdly progressive in a number of respects. Killua's sister Alluka is strongly implied to be a transgirl and it's actually used as a subtle bit of characterization. The only one who consistently respects her gender is Killua; everyone else in the family (who are mostly assholes) consistently misgenders her because they don't see her as a real person.
In general, while not perfect, I think its female characters tend to be better on average than many other battle shounen mostly because they don't just exist as love interests or sister/mother figures to be protected by the male characters.
edited 6th Jan '18 9:49:08 PM by Draghinazzo
Oh yeah. But then, doesn't she only look that way because of a curse?
Yeah, it's true. As I recall it had to do with some cursed flute or something. I still think it's worth mentioning though because even though her quest is to break the curse, we only ever see her in that form, so I think it still counts.
Too bad it takes forever for any female characters to get introduced in Hx H.
Is HXH it take FOREVER for to something happen.
There's a character who's drawn in muscular gonk style in the otoko-no-ko manga Mizutama Honey Boy. She's taken pretty seriously (though she does want to be more feminine), and there's even a mini-arc that deals sympathetically with her crush on the male lead.
It's been fun.
Face me now, Bitch!
Sakura Oogami
from Dangan Ronpa is drawn in a Gonk way, though only after intense training, as her official art showed she Became that way thanks to her intensive training
she's also considered to be the most Moe
◊.
Oogami doesn't qualify as a gonk, unless you consider characters like Azrael or most muscular banchou characters to be gonks.
Gay men I have no idea. I don't feel comfortable making generalizations.