Design--I mean, Guardians, could we gather 'round, please?

[indigozeal.livejournal.com]

"Guardians, I've been looking around the Holy Land recently, and it's come to my attention that some of you have absorbed some serious Sacrea of Fug. I mean, honestly:



Just because you have more money than God does not mean that you can represent the Sanctuary looking like Tony Manero as a NASCAR-sponsored bullfighter at the Barnum & Bailey circus."

"I see Clavis has already fallen asleep in the muslin, so it's obvious you're not going to listen to me. I'm therefore turning the floor over to the only audience of which you attention-hungry himbos will take notice - your fangirls. Maybe after they gift you with a few dozen boxes of bonbons and point out your previous fashion triumphs and faux pas, you'll manage to avoid running around in leopard-print kimonos by year's end. Carry on!"




The Characters section at Neo-Romance.net's Angelique section (see sidebar on main page) features costume evolutions for each of the Holy Bird Guardians, which will be useful here. (In naming best and worst, I'm comparing official Guardian outfits only, not casual wear from the OVAs or anything.)


Julious
Best: I'm going to begin this with a shock and say his Koi Suru Tenshi outfit. (Yeah, starting out naming Koi Suru Tenshi best in anything - way to gain credibility.) It's a good balance of the blue and gold that so becomes Julious, yet it doesn't overwhelm the white and gold motif that should be the defining element of the Guardian of Light's outfit. The white is at the forefront of the costume yet doesn't become bedsheety, as his original outfit threatens to do. It's a good balance of soft white vs. metallic gold, of flowing & angelic vs. controlled, businesslike & strong.
(Criminy, I sound like I'm in love with Julious. I really don't like the man much.)
Julious has a lot of good outfits, though. I like the soft, detailed touches on his Etoile outfit (the soft sky-blue sash with the golden-wreath catch), but the odd, ungainly shoulder pads rendered in the soft-fabric-over-metal-but-with-no-metal-showing style of Etoile take it out of contention.
I also like the dramatic emblem on the shoulder-shawl he has in Special 2, but it's just too heavy a design and costume element. He's wearing a tapestry on his shoulder, for criminy's sake.
Worst: Trois. The slicked-back hair and form-fitted robe were an honest try at a change but just don't work for the character.

Clavis
Best: His original outfit, with robes detailed enough to hold interest but still basically recalling a swath of enveloping darkness. Sometimes, simple is best.
(The checkered-diamond motif of his Special 2 outfit is really striking but too distracting and, upon reflection, too sharp for the Guardian of Darkness.)
Worst: Y'know, looking at his Koi Suru Tenshi outfit, I actually like the more fitted black robe with the elven collar and the voluminous sleeves and oddly-yet-interestingly-placed shawl that provide Darkness's "envelopment" theme - but it's just so drawn so poorly and devoid of detail. I wish a respectable illustration of the costume were available. I might for the time being just fall back on his Etoile outfit for the shoulder pad reason again.
(I hope the "Worst" parts of this list don't become one long "Koi Suru Tenshi/poorly drawn" / "Etoile/shoulder pads" macro.)

Randy
Best: I like Trois's image of Randy, the young knight. His original outfit isn't bad for its strong balance of forthright red-white-blue, either.
Worst: Koi Suru Tenshi, hands down. What the hell is that T-shirt/vest thing?

Lumiale
Best: Trois. That's one beautiful costume - soft and fluid, but not a bit messy. Koi Suru Tenshi is really close, though, boasting its similar strengths fashionwise but through an accomplished balance of several different blues and costume elements - the short-sleeved open overrobe, the elven collar, the lovely aqua fall. (Like Clavis's, I would like to see Lumiale's Koi Suru outfit illustrated properly.)
Argh. It's a tie.
(Oddly, I like Lumiale's original outfit very much in the game but not so much in the illustrations.)
Worst: That ugly freaking scarf from Etoile is asking for it, but I'm going with Special 2. It's all wrong for the Guardian of gentleness - the Veronica Lake-turned-New Wave rocker hair, the bulky, top-heavy bedsheets. It's a big unbalanced pile of fug.
(In other news, I like the ideas behind all that the Etoile outfit attempted - the gentle scalloped shirt with a texture evoking ripples, the mix of blues that the Koi Suru Tenshi outfit did get right, the waterfall scarf, the water droplet-like dangling beads - but it failed in execution on all counts.)

Oscar
Best: Trois's form-fitting armor, which stylishly says both "yes, I'm a knight" and "yes, I'm a ho."
Worst: Y'know, Oscar's outfit is the one that really brings the utter weirdness of the Etoile cloth-over-metal approach into focus. Big, ballooning shoulders *and* pecs outlined in cloth - who thought this was a good idea?
Revisiting the outfit, though, it does have an interesting contrast with the Nordic strength of the delineated pecs and leather straps on his upper chest and the flat, soft unprotectedness of his lower chest to the upper legs. His Koi Suru Tenshi outfit, on the other hand, compounds the bad aspects of Etoile and adds a sloppy shirt that's not only open all the time but bulging at the waist, giving Oscar a fabric beer gut. Between Oscar and Randy, what's with all the Koi Suru Tenshi wide-open shirtage?
(Honorable mention: was he stealing Zephel's hair gel in Special 2?)

Marcel
Best: Trois. It keeps Marcel's basic youthfulness and green genkiness but adds a certain elegance lacking in his previous Robin Hood-like outfits. I like the bindi, too.
Worst: Etoile. It's not horrible (Marcel doesn't really have any bad outfits), but those boots are, to steal from Project Runway, insane.

Zephel
Best: I dunno. Zephel's not really one for fashion. Trois keeps it simple. I like the sunglasses and jacket of Koi Suru Tenshi, but, again, the art quality obscures an honest appraisal of the costume.
Worst: Original outfit. Long, light white cape with those shorts is a big no. Also, yellow anything is completely wrong for the silver-and-black color scheme.

Olivie
Best: Trois. It has a certain elegance yet retains the over-the-top Olivie style. Best hair and make-up job, too. (Also, it looks oddly a bit like lingerie, which makes it oddly sexy on the man.)
Worst: Original. It's dominated by that big fug black feather boa. The built-in boa on his Koi Suru Tenshi (hereafter KST; I'm sick of typing it out) $9.99 Target workout top isn't far behind, but at least that outfit that has an interesting color story on the bottom.
Olivie's style is awesome when gotten correct, but it's easy to muck up. His OVA casual outfits have treated him better than his work clothes. His Etoile and Special 2 Guardian outfits are his only good ones, from where I'm sitting.

Luva
Best: Luva doesn't have any bad outfits, but I like how Etoile gives the scholar a stylish, fitted businesslike quality. The color story is also smart - the green and brown earth tones rendered in slightly unconventional, Neo Angeliqueish shades; the very light beige that recalls his desert home; the light foam green accents, which add a touch of life and lightness to the traditional Earth outfit.
Worst: The original, only for being a bit robey/bulky and lacking the more complex elements that marked his later costumes. Again, Luva really doesn't have any bad outfits.


For the Sacred Beast Guardians, click for Special 2, Trois, Etoile, and KST costumes. Yes, I know the Special 2 link is grainy.


Leonard: The new guys have only 2 outfits each, so we can knock them out of the way quickly. It's an obvious concession to his role, but I like the swath of gold cloth on his KST outfit, which has a sharper feel that his original fur-lined costume. No, he's still not getting out of the Sephiroth Cosplayers Club.

Francis: That KST boa. Do we really need to say anything else?

Heuye: I'll go with his Etoile outfit simply because that KST fringed skirt is fug. I will say, though, that while Heuye's outfits are always colorful and feature a detailed mix of tribal accents, they're too busy for their own good. There's simply way too much going on, and your eyes don't know where to go. (That, plus they've never really differentiated him from early Randy, what with the similarities in the face, hairstyle, demeanor, and red-white-blue motif.)

Timka
Best: Timka's costume never seems to vary - except for Etoile, whose costume is a nice change and has a restrained regalness to it, particularly in those dramatic shoulder pieces, but, like Heuye's, has simply too much going on in it. I'll pick Trois, it being the most attractive variant. The touches of black give Timka a certain maturity.
Worst: KST, mostly for the Valley Girl ponytail. They weren't even trying with the draping on the front of his outfit, though, and the costume accents go over the line from "Indian" into outright "genie".

Charlie
Best: Well, here's someone who's had markedly different looks throughout his career. None of them are killer, but the tailored lavender suit from Trois is the sleekest. His introductory outfit isn't bad, but it's hard to see him so unpolished nowadays.
Worst: Ahaha. I think what happened with Charlie is that he was so happy to be named a Guardian that he commissioned his multimillion dollar corporation to deck him out in the most outlandish "Guardian" outfits possible, because he's been dressing like an insane, overdesigned superhero ever since. Which is worse - the racecar driver bodysuit with white gloves and twenty different colors, or the pirate outfit with the utterly insane and completely incompatible flame cloak? Really, though, it's hard to hold anything against someone so enthusiastic.

Sei-lan
Best: Trois. I like the softly vibrant colors and the intricate yet self-contained collar. He had pretty good hair here, too. (I keep putting Trois in the top spots, but it did have some excellent art design.)
Worst: KST. Like Sei-lan would be caught dead wearing that sickly hospital-green apron. Also, this isn't strictly fashion-related, but it's hard for him to look good in anything in KST with his head consistently drawn three times bigger than it should be.

Ernst
Best: I like all of Ernst's outfits, actually. He wears the basic Royal Research Institute outfit well, and once he gets fashion, it's attractive but still professional and practical and Ernst, y'know? (I particularly like how they make the metal accoutrements eye-catching but streamlined and utilitarian and steely.) Part of me is too used to see Ernst in his Trois research outfit, but I have ultimately to choose KST's witty touch of Victorian steampunk.
He needs to loosen up his hair, though. His head's beginning to look like an eraser.
Worst: Special 2's robes fit Ernst slightly not-as-well as pants, but it's still a great outfit.

Mel
Best: Mel's another one like Timka who never really seems to change his look. Also like Timka, the Trois outfit has a mature beauty to it.
Worst: I think Mel's KST outfit might be the very worst in all of Angelique. At least Charlie's can be explained as the product of extraordinarily misguided in-character enthusiasm. They didn't pay attention to how his sleeves were cut. They didn't pay attention to how all the colors were both individually ugly and didn't belong in the same outfit, and they particularly didn't pay attention to how red never, never goes with pink unless your name is Strawberry Shortcake. They just draped him in random bits of cloth and called it a day. God, that is fug.

Victor
Best: I like the uniquely-sculpted chestpiece on his Trois outfit, and I think down-to-earth military garb is better for Victor's character. The garnet-and-steel gray color scheme on his Etoile garb, though, is a stunning union of downplayed military pragmatism and happy color. It fits the character beautifully.
Worst: the KST variant of this, though, is sloppy. Victor's not one for bell-shaped skirts.


I'd do the girls and Arios, but this post is already way past trying everyone's patience. What sayeth you, comm, about the Guardians' fashion decisions?

Comments

[guardianrandy.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's way too long at all. I actually enjoyed reading it from beginning to end. #1.) It's a post about the original Angelique cast of characters and not Neo, as everyone has jumped on the bandwagon with that simply because of the TV series. #2.) You used a Tim Gunn reference at the get-go (though you should've used gigantic words like superfluous. Haha). And #3.) I like how you detailed all the ins and outs of each outfit with specific attention to the small details.

I think one of my least favorite outfits EVER is Marcel's Etoile outfit because of those god-awful short shorts and those knee-high purple-knit? leggings. Plus that necklace that resembles a peace sign is a bit too tacky for me.

As far as hair and make-up go (don't even get me started on that section, or I'll go on forever), I think Special 2 had some pretty bad cases. Randy's mullet-esque hair and Olivie with his neon green streaks of hair mixed in with a star on the face? Too. Much. That game had 1990s written all over it in one of the worst ways. Even the Sacred Bird Galaxy couldn't escape the fashion trends of the times.

[btamamura.livejournal.com]

I have to agree in regards to Lumiale...I still find myself trying not to cringe when I see his Special 2 design...

[sableblanc.livejournal.com]

It looks seriously like she raided Wedding Peach's wardrobe
Gah, so I *wasn't* imagining things XD;

[indigozeal.livejournal.com]

That appraisal was dead-on, I thought.

[sableblanc.livejournal.com]

Excellent~ I've been expecting the Mr Blackwell types to show up over here for ages XD