This American Fourth of July holiday occurred this past weekend, which means that summer is in high swing, and that means that this is as good a time as any to begin Blonde Bikini Girl Week (though given the pace of updates here, it’s more likely to turn into a fortnight, or a month). We will obviously be looking at various figures of blonde female characters in swimwear, and we’ll start with Celia Cumani Aintree, one of the heroines of the eroge-turned-TV-anime Walkure Romanze.
I enjoyed Walkure Romanze’s anime adaptation much more than I thought I would have, particularly since I didn’t much care for the Princess Lover! anime, aside from the two OVA episodes, which were pretty solid. Walkure Romanze was generally entertaining, and more importantly, it lacked two of the things I really dislike in these sorts of shows: an unlikeable male lead and one or more overtly hostile female characters. The male protagonist, Takahiro Mizuno, is mostly a non-entity – a rather common disposition for a male character in a harem show, but he is at least an all-around decent guy, and if he’s not particularly memorable, he also isn’t at all offensive. The show’s central theme – jousting on horseback – is a little unusual, but the show presents it in a way that is basically similar to the common trope of characters finding inner strength through competition. Moreover, the anime isn’t above occasionally poking fun at this unusual sport.
Oddly, Walkure Romanze’s anime doesn’t actually feature much in the way of romance; rather, the female characters are mostly interested in recruiting Takahiro as a begleiter, which is something like a coach and cornerman. It makes for an interesting dynamic in which the main objective of the female characters is improving their jousting skills to win their school’s summer tournament rather than seeking love, and I think this makes them more appealing than they’d otherwise be.
A common activity amongst viewers of harem shows is picking the best girl, and Walkure Romanze has a number of candidates. The lead girl, Mio Kisaki, fills both the childhood friend and hard-working neophyte roles; the latter is somewhat controversial, since she gets the benefit of plot armor despite not having put in the training time that all the other characters have. I don’t have much of a problem with that but I liked her better with longer hair. Noel Ascot is the confident, outgoing, big sister type while Lisa Eostre is the predictably quiet and antisocial character. Akane Ryuuzouji is the friendly and formal Japanese girl who deeply idolizes Celia; the nature of her infatuation isn’t specifically clarified but she does get to put her head between Celia’s breasts and Celia’s head between her thighs. I think she was actually just a side character in the original eroge, with no romance options, but she’s gotten her own scenes in subsequent fan discs, and it’s nice to see that since I kinda think she’s my favorite character; I like how she is both gentle and refined and yet becomes completely unhinged whenever Celia’s around.
But then again, it’s really hard to pick against Celia for the title of best girl. She’s the best jouster and is highly intelligent, a natural leader, and the very embodiment of chivalry. She is composed, gracious, with an easygoing temperament and arguably the best body of any of the characters. It’s not at all a surprise that she was the first Walkure Romanze girl to get a PVC figure.
This is actually the second PVC figure of Celia; Kaitendoh’s beat this one to the market by a couple of months, I think. Celia’s popularity is reflected in the fact that she’s getting more figures in the future, while Lisa and Noel seem to have been frozen out for some reason or another. Hopefully Daiki Kougyou or Alphamax will get to them at some point. Anyway, this figure is manufactured by Daiki Kougyou in 1/6 scale, and it’s a very hefty 1/6 scale; Celia is about 28.5 centimeters in height, which is more or less typical, but her body proportions give this figure a substantial feel.
And that seems to be as good a place as any to start. I was initially disappointed when I saw this figure, as I thought Celia looked rather fat, quite unlike the source artwork or any other depiction of her. The figure is sculpted by Toshirou of Cobra Kai, and idiosyncrasies are part and parcel of what you get with his work; he’s also responsible for sculpting gangsta lean Saber and this peculiar Fate T. Harlaown figure, which also has a rather plump look. Actually, what bothered me wasn’t so much her thick physique but the small size of her head relative to her body; it’s a style that some notable artists use, such as Sei Shoujo, Mogudan, and Takuya Inoue, but it’s not a style that I like.
I did eventually buy this figure – at Mandarake, for a slight markup over the preorder price – and while my concerns aren’t entirely allayed, I do think I can mostly overlook them, particularly when Celia’s clothes are removed. Speaking of which, I had heard that removing and replacing her swimsuit was a pain, and I steeled myself for a frustrating experience since I really dislike figures with difficult castoff systems, but it wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be. Removing Celia’s head is the hardest part and requires a fair bit of force, and it doesn’t help that her neck has a ball joint which lets her head wiggle and wobble around while you try to pull it off. After that, her bikini top unclasps near the bottom of her right cup and her bikini comes off with clasps hidden under the ribbons over her hips, which are removable. No instruction sheet is included, which is typical, but at least the process was fairly straightforward.
I like Celia best with her swimsuit removed, not just for the obvious reason but because it reduces her bulky look by a little bit. This is a very, very stylized look for her, and anything that gives her a leaner profile is a plus in my view.
And while she does look very thick, the sculpting quality is quite good, particularly around the abdomen. Her breasts are very large, which also isn’t completely consistent with her anime or eroge appearance, but it’s pretty much a complementary thing to this sort of body design.
Heavy liberties have also been taken with her pubic region. Komori Kei, the artist of Walkure Romanze, is one of very few ero artists to draw pubic hair on his characters. This version of Celia obviously lacks any hair in this region. There’s not a ton of detail here either, but there’s enough there that you probably wouldn’t be showing this figure off to casual company.
Conversely, the detail present in her armor is very nice. There’s a lot of engraving and faux-filigree work there which looks great next to her naked skin.
Just seeing her legs alone, she doesn’t look quite so thick.
Her face doesn’t feature Toshirou’s typical heavy eyelids, which is a little strange as that is one of the hallmarks of his style. She has a pretty, friendly face, without too much in the way of definite emotion, and that seems congruent with what her actual personality is like.
Her hair is also quite elaborate, with her tresses splayed out and corkscrewing all over the place.
There’s really only one way to display her, and that’s with her facing forward. The hair covering her right eye means turning her to her left obscures her face. Also, turning her to either side shows one of the oddities of her pose, which is that her back is really, really arched. It looks almost painful if you look at it for a while, though there’s also something quite sexy about the way it tilts her breasts up and pushes her buttocks out. Incidentally, this is also one of the common comments made about gangsta lean Saber, that her posture looks very strange (hence my nickname for her).
Not that you can really tell under her mass of hair, but she’s got a really huge ass – another one of the strange stylistic quirks of this figure. She also has a somewhat yellowish skin tone, reminiscent of Daiki Kougyou’s older figure of Leina from Queen’s Blade.
But quirks aside, I like this figure quite a bit. Not as much as I otherwise would – if this figure had more typical proportions, it’d probably be amongst my favorites, but I do like it more than I initially did. Celia has a very sexy pose, her armor looks great, and her nude body looks pretty good too, at least from the front, where those quirks are a little less obvious. Toshirou is doing Daiki Kougyou’s figure of Bertille, and while I think I will buy that figure, I kinda hope that if they make figures of the rest of the girls, they spread the work out amongst other sculptors, just to get some variety in the designs.
It’s a nice figure, nice long flowing hair, thick body which is different from what I remembered from the anime but I like it. Best girl in the series for sure. Her dakis by the game’s artist Komori Kei are good too, maybe I should get them in the future.
I bought one of the wall scrolls, the one where she’s lying down while covering herself up with a jousting lance. It’s a little flimsier than I thought it would be, I had hoped it would be made of a sturdier fabric. It’s all good, though; the art they used for the merchandise is still high quality.
Nicely written review, the anime was at least fun, Mio was a good girl, too. Also she looked better with the long hair.
Well, small heads look a bit odd on voluptuos bodies, not everyone can tolerate it, I decide it by case. Celia is… Woah that detailed belly sculpting *fuck*, even down there it looks pretty.
Might have looked quite good with a little pubic hair effect.
You should have put oil on her belly XD
No, that seriously looks lovely, fat Pochako is somewhat scary for my taste, but this woman looks great with her mature plump body. Too bad that the bikini top changes the whole look so much, but it’s probably difficult with such nipples ;D Well, away with the bikini!
While her pose looks nice also when when one eye is covered by her hair it is interesting, but I would have prefered it, if her face would point in the same direction her boobs do. Does the ball joint offer small movements with her neck?
Now I will take a look at that Bertille again, excuse me… (￣▽+ï¿£*)
Yeah, Mio was definitely better with long hair, I don’t really like how anime girls cut their hair to signify transition. I’m sure it’s a cultural thing but I like long hair.
I really freak out about putting anything on my figures XD I can imagine someone putting a paint-stripping oil like mineral oil on a figure and then watching in horror as all the paint melts right off.
The ball joint offers very little movement, her head cannot rotate very much at all. I’m not sure why it’s there; it’d certainly be a lot easier to remove her head if they used a conventional peg-and-slot setup like everyone else does.
Bertlile’s definitely looking better in my eyes XD Though I kinda hope someone does a figure of her with more normal proportions with her in her jousting armor. Her armor is definitely the best.
Lol, please not this kind of oil, who would do such a thing?
I liked Bertille, she’s a funny ojousama character (＾∇＾). Ah yes Daiki made these girls with rather milf like proportions, I don’t mind it that much, but in the origin they are supposed to look “younger”
Yeah, this is kind of an odd take on the characters. Not necessarily a bad take but it’s not really the first idea that would come to mind when adapting Komori Kei’s character designs..
the best I’ve seen lately
great review. i did the same thing by passing this girl up when she was first released. but when i finally got her. she became one of my favorites. passed up on mio, same don’t like the short hair, but got bertille on pre-order. hope more girls are made
I got Mio somewhere around here; I guess I’ll probably get Bertille too. I don’t think I’m digging the Alphamax version of Akane all that much so I really hope Daiki Kougyou does one of her.
I liked her the moment I saw this DELICIOUS figure …. She stands up right in my permanent exposition …..MY LIVING – ROOM ! Among some dozens of other BEAUTIFUL figures this is by herself a HIGHLIGHT !!! Just in case ….I bought two of them …….
A good plan; they seem to be holding their resale value too, in case you ever decided to mvoe the extra.
Recent announcement of Akane from Skytube was real nice. I can only hope I could see unsculpted girls like Hiiragi Ayako from their lineup in the future (she does have a bikini armor as a school doc, strange but I can’t complain), Noel, slender Bertille, or skinny Celia.
Yeah, that was auspicious timing. I’m not sure if I like the figure as much as I hoped that I would, though; not that I necessarily want a figure as curvy as this one but her hips don’t look large enough to support her torso to me. Regardless if Daiki Kougyou doesn’t show off an Akane at Wonder Festival, I guess I would feel compelled to get it. I’m gonna guess that a figure of Ayako would be unlikely though who knows; she seemed to get a lot more exposure in the fan disc so maybe that’ll inspire one of the figure companies.
Finally you did get to review her. Excellent work by Toshihiro. Btw, he’s got Bertille coming this September iirc. If you saw her pics, her armor is even more detailed. Mio is sort of a disappointment, Melting Neuron usually crafts great figs but his version of Mio, great all over until you reach her pudenda, it isn’t that detailed than Celia but what’s even worst? There’s a mold line perdendicular to her “vessel’s” mouth…….arrgh!
Skytube has Akane in the pipeline too, this December. Kind of awkward a bit that the Daiki version’s don’t have detailed pudenda but Skytube (already a 90% given) might have a more detailed lips(unless Ricotta declares that all figs won’t be that detailed.
Interesting; I have not taken Mio out of the box so I didn’t know about that. That would be a little discouraging to see. I’ll need to think up how I want to photograph her so that I can take her out of her box to see for myself.
I would guess that Ricotta will have absolutely no problem with figure companies making explicit figures, seeing as how Princess Lover! got two full-blown hentai OVA episodes. It’d probably be an advantage for them, seeing as how they’re known for their eroge.
She’s a lot nicer of course, but I’m reminded of my Mega House Cattleya who I only wish had received as much detailing in her nether region. Speaking of which, it’s a shame that they chose not give her pubic hair.
Having just attended the LA Anime Expo I have to say that this figure would make for an excellent cosplay.
Being not a fan of pubic hair on anime characters, I’m quite glad they went without XD It would be a very nice cosplay option though I’m sure it would draw some nasty comments from the rabble on Tumblr. I recall there was a somewhat-similar World of Warcraft cosplay at Blizzcon a couple years back that had its detractors.
I’d swear I’ve changed opinions on this figure between viewing just about any two pics of her subsequently. From her chunky aspects I can hardly see her other qualities from Sei Shoujo PTSD from Discipline flashbacks. I largely shy away from abundant proportions in general (not that I don’t partake on special occasions) but the small head thing instantly snaps any threads of respect I begin to develop for the beefier gals.
Probably what’s so torturous about this figure is that her head/body ratio isn’t quite Sei-class so I keep finding myself baited into her allure. The armor is really nice and it’s remarkably slimming for her legs…not what I expected. Gah, just a couple millimeters shy up top (not her head obviously) and a few more down low and she’s be a slam dunk but upon every review of your shoot I find that I’m cycling between hot and cold.
It seems like Daiki has always tried to keep a large lady in the lineup but I sense a general enbiggening as of late; now it seems like there are a few bigger lasses either out or pending. It shouldn’t be an issue except that I can tell that this is a really nice figure. Somehow I need to get a consensus among my mental sages as I suspect this quandary will keep cropping up.
tldr; Great shoot; you’ve succeeded in re-confusing the hell out of myself.
How dare you insult Sei Shoujo. Why, I’ve never!
Well mostly just the one game of his that I’ve played. ;D The designs are generally still pleasing to look at even if a bit off-kilter but all but one of Discipline’s endings were needlessly and inexplicably nasty and spiteful. That realization kind of blind-sided me so I admit that colors my strongest recollection of his signature style.
I’ve only played Bible Black and am currently in the middle of Starless. I’ve enjoyed both thoroughly and expect discipline would follow a similar motif to those two. I’m curious if you were able to play it with an english translation as I would def snatch that up if it is indeed available. *masochist doesn’t seem to be the right term here*
Yeah, it’s got a legit US release. Pretty sure I got it from RightStuf.
Every time I look at the game CGs from an eroge he’s illustrated, I cringe because I remember going through the Starless images and running right into all those scat scenes. I like his work – particularly his older work on Bible Black and Discipline – but there is no way I’d play any of the games he’s worked on unless there’s an option to disable the scat graphics.
I recalled you mentioning something along those lines before, and there have been a few close calls. But, its been blessedly poop free thus far. Hopefully, this will be a continuous course throughout the game.
It’s Toshihiro’s style to give his gals the plump treatment. The original line art of hers isn’t all that beefy.
http://i.imgur.com/GR3n1FV.jpg%5B/img%5D
And the small head, it ain’t small but more of an optical illusion de to how Toshihiro posed Celia to accentuate her breasts.
You’re right, the original art’s proportions, while not that far off, are in much better harmony.
I did notice the pretty severe back arch (though not so bad as so far as I can tell) that’s the likely cause of the illusion you pointed out. No doubt this is why certain angles seem to throw me for a tailspin more than others. Still, illusion is more than potent enough to telegraph Sei’s headshrinker vibe thus perpetuating my quandary.
It was kinda weird; while viewing her straight-on, I could convince myself that her body proportions weren’t too excessive but when viewed from any angle or from the rear, it’s blatantly obvious that her physique is very bulky and that her head is a little undersized in terms of anime proportions. I do think it’s unfortunate that her head wasn’t a little larger, though; as you say, I think this would be a spectacular figure if it had been.
Walkure Romanze provides great combination of lovely girls and shiny armor pieces, both of which I believe all guys love. I’ve been thinking about Celia’s unique double-layer style bikini panties but it looks like even Daiki did not try to make it really two separate parts. Also it’s always kind of hard to look at the body from the back when the character has bulky long hair (off with her head!)
So sad I haven’t got any one of these girl knights in their armors. 1/6 standing figure is still too large to me for most characters, and the one from Vertex just has a lance that’s too realistically long. The 1/8 Ryuuzouji from Penguin Parade seems the only small scale with armor but I don’t find her dark samurai style armor so attractive (give me something shiny) The only Walkure figure I have so far is Penguin’s naked apron Celia, yes, without the armor you could not even tell her from any other blond student council president in those animes, there are perhaps a thousand of them.
They actually did make it two separate parts! I wish they hadn’t since it makes it twice as annoying to remove or put back on (the inner bikini isn’t actually a full bikini, it’s just the top part that would appear over the outer bikini).
Yeah, I’m not so sure about the Vertex one, the lance is huge and the pose looks odd if she’s not holding it, and it’s really expensive. It’s unfortunate that Volks’s garage kits never were made into PVC figures as they’d probably work well for your purposes; they’re all slightly smaller than 1/8 scale (though I think they’re listed as 1/7 or something) and they all have them in their full armor.
I’d really love a preview option. D:
A preview option would be nice! I wonder if WordPress has a comment plugin that might accommodate that, hmm …
Celia is great and it’s such a shame mio didn’t come out looking as great you could clearly see the difference in size and the pose mio has makes her armor looks kinda funky from her shoulders angle,I preordered bertille as well i wish she’s as big and flashy as celia and not on a smaller scale like mio… Also i wonder if daiki will make the rest of the girls like akane, noel and lisa because skytube recently made an akane figure and I’m still debating whether to get it or not, i like the daiki way of making the armor on them they are a nightmare to cast on and off but i like displaying them in thier bikinis they look amazing! Celia definitely is one of my favorite figures and i just also preordered that figure of her made by the E2046 people i hope that one comes out as nice as it looks.
Mio isn’t in smaller scale. She’s just petite compared to the othe gals in Valkyrie Romanze. You did take a look at the super fail of Melting Neuron at Mio’s special “spot”
Yeah i would say her special spot isn’t so good at all kinda weird lol the whole figure has a few flaws the sculptor didn’t do quite well in it but still she’s gorgeous and completes my walkure romanze figure collection though I’m only interested in the daiki line, I can’t wait to have bertille but considering i ordered her from ami her release date will probably be pushed back a month of two…:(
I’ve got Mio somewhere; I guess I should take a look at her sometime and see how she compares. I would really like it if Daiki Kougyou would do the rest, as the Skytube figure of Akane doesn’t look that great to me and nobody else seems inclined to make a figure of Noel or Lisa. I was sort of hoping they might show some prototypes at Wonder Festival but I don’t recall seeing any, which is a little disappointing.
The gathering line made by the E2046 have all the walkure romanze girls made in 1/8 scale, i never had a figure from them before so I don’t know how my little gamble from them will turn out to be but as i recall they had prototypes displayed at the wonder festival too so I suppose that’s what made me trust them and order theif 1/6 celia, also they have a pattern of always releasing the garage kit first then after a while they do the prepainted version, they only just a few days ago released a quite lovely looking 1/6 bertille gk kit I’m guessing she’s 2nd in line to celia in their walkure romanze sexy looking 1/6s, I’m quite excited for the bikini warriors future release too they seem to be planning on making figures from it I can’t wait to see how will they turn out. http://www.e2046.com/product/23486
Erp, I never did respond to this comment. My bad. I ordered the PVC version of the paladin so I’m good there but I still want to review their weird Saber figure (maybe not so weird-looking now seeing as how Alphamax has a somewhat-similar one due for release soon), and probably their Misato figure, too.
Somewhat related note. Just received another of Toshiro’s goddesses………Bertille. Just got the regular edition without the cell image of her with the moist panties. Her armore is more exquisite in design though not as fragile as Celia’s (those extensions on her knees keeps on falling off)
Also, Toshiro added a molded @nus on her.
A great follow up on their Valkyrie Romanze line. Really disappointed with Mio……..what a lost opportunity.
Ah, good to know. I actually did not order her, as I’m hoping she gets a discount, seeing as how Bertille is not nearly as popular as Celia. She seems to be in stock everywhere still, at least. You know, I never really examined Mio; I should probably just photograph her already and see how she looks.
where can these statues be ordered and are the ceramic or plastic?
They’re plastic; PVC, to be specific, and I guess some figures might use ABS for parts that need to be more sturdy. There’s a bunch of places that they can be purchased; I buy most my figures from Hobby Search and Amiami. US stores that sell figures include Bigbadtoystore, Entertainment Earth, and – I’m pretty sure – Amazon.