Spy Catsuit: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:thebaroness.jpg|link=G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra|frame|Exhibit № 1: [[The Baroness]] herself.]]

 

{{quote|"''A male rogue will wear dark leather armor with little metal studs all over it, because nothing says "stealth" like a bunch of glittering bits of metal all over the place. Ladies in the same profession lean towards the skin-tight catsuit look, because the first step in being stealthy is apparently to make sure every able-bodied man within a hundred paces is staring at you with his mouth slightly open... It's nice to see that when it comes to apparel, roleplaying games have a lot of equality: Everybody dresses like an idiot.''"|'''The DM''', ''[http://shawntionary.com/chainmailbikini/?p=26 Chainmail Bikini]''}}

During any infiltration or stealth operation, the female lead will wear an impossibly tight catsuit. It's almost always black, may be shiny leather or plastic. It's never a camo pattern, and it can't have pockets. There will often be [[Zip Me Up|a single zipper on the front]], which will result in [[Absolute Cleavage]] when it's unzipped. The suit will frequently be accompanied by [[Combat Stilettos|ridiculous high heels]]. If you see someone in one of these, there's little she can say to convince you she's not a spy or a fetishist (unless [[Latex Space Suit|It's a Sci-Fi series]]).

 

 

Shows up in most [[Spy Drama]] shows. Any action show that puts a female character through [[The Infiltration|an infiltration scene]] will use it. Mostly used with at least a wink these days.

 

See also [[Superheroes Wear Tights]], [[Impossibly Cool Clothes]].

 

* Erin eSurance, the female agent in the inescapable ''eSurance'' commercials, frequently sports one.

* Ali Larter sports a bright-yellow suit in the Absolut Citron advertisements/short films as her alter-ego Lemon Drop.

* In the first ad of T*Mobile's most recent ad campaign, their mascot-spokeswoman trades in her girl-next-door pink dress for a pink-and-black motorcycle jumpsuit. Justified in that she's going motorcycle riding (as a metaphor for the company's high-speed wireless network).

 

* In ''[[Ghost in the Shell]]'', Major Kusanagi wears a spy catsuit that really is a stealth device, called thermoptic camouflage. In the movie at least, this technology is used fairly extensively, although she has to be ''nude'' to use it (or rather, a flesh-colored skinsuit. The suit leaves a noticeable neckline where her skin color contrasts with the suit's.) It's somewhat less drastic in other iterations, which look more practical.

** While the Major's normal combat wear shows more curves than the standard models, it's generally quite practical. The major exception to this is in the ''Stand Alone Complex the 2nd Gig'' episode ''Cash Eye'', which plays with the infiltration and espionage tropes, and repeated references to ''Ocean's Eleven'', and has her wear a catsuit that fits this trope to tee with little purpose. Perhaps the outfit let the android fetishist [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] to mistake her for a combat android.

** The same outfits are worn by [[Wholesome Crossdresser|Ayumu]], Eucliwood, and Seraphim during a parody of the series in the ''[[Kore wa Zombie Desu ka?]]'' OVA.

* Used rather bizarrely in ''[[Death Note]]'', where professional thief Weddy wears a classic 60's style catsuit (built in high-heels and all) while infiltrating a building, for no apparent reason. Possibly justified in that the series artist has admitted basing her on stereotypical female spy archetypes, but it still clashes with the feel of the story.

* In ''[[Lupin III]]'', one of [[Ms. Fanservice|Fujiko Mine]]'s regular outfits is a black leather spy catsuit which she frequently [[Absolute Cleavage|doesn't zip up all the way]].

** The 1969 Pilot Film had Lupin in one, in a shot that gets homaged throughout the series.

* Angel of ''[[The Big O]]'' will occasionally wear one of these. Like almost everything else she wears, it's bright pink.

* In ''[[Tetsuwan Birdy]]'', Birdy wears one of these when she's spying/fighting. She's an alien, so it's easier to explain why she can move so easily in it. Most of it is also skin-colored, so it looks like she's wearing what amounts to a bathing suit.

* The [[No Name Given|Belladonna Lily Woman]] in ''[[Noir]]'' wore one. All of her male compatriots wore [[Badass in a Nice Suit|suits]].

* Belldandy from ''[[Ah! My Goddess]]'': [[Yamato Nadeshiko|sweet, kind natured, domestic]] and [[Innocent Fanservice Girl|prone to wearing really tight racing leathers with heart patterns]].

* Cure Muse in ''[[Suite Precure]]''.

 

* [[Catwoman (comics)|Catwoman]] ([[DC Comics]]) often, but not always, wears these.

** Subverted in a ''[[Batman Adventures]]'' tie-in comic that introduced Catman as a villain inspired by Catwoman. So much that he wears Catwoman's rather feminine-looking catsuit, which looks rather comical on a male figure.

* In Adam Warren's ''[[Empowered]]'' comic, the heroine doesn't just wear a shiny skintight suit, it's a shiny skintight suit of power armor that tears like a wet hanky if she brushes against anything that has a point on it. Of course, his comic is a parody of all the tied-up, mostly naked superdamsels in distress he was drawing for commissions, but ''still''...

** "Empowered" goes well beyond skintight; the power suit is actually a membrane-thin piece of nothing that leaves the wearer effectively naked, while fighting crime in public. The point to 'Empowered' is to get your humiliation fetish in your ironically-titled supers fantasy.

* The [[Black Widow (comics)|Black Widow]] in the [[Marvel Universe]].

* [[Archie Comics]] Betty and Veronica wear black catsuits when acting as "[[Teen Superspy|Agents B & V]]".

* [[The Baroness]] in ''[[G.I. Joe]]'' wears this as her standard outfit in every incarnation. Scarlett of the Joes does as well, though hers is more of a leotard worn over tights.

* Femme Appeal from the ''[[Darkwing Duck (comics)|Darkwing Duck]]'' comic wears one. Hardly surprising, considering that she's a furry [[Captain Ersatz]] of Emma Peel.

 

* The Kensington ladies and Foxy Cleopatra from ''[[Austin Powers]]'', obviously.

* If there was a point to the movie ''[[Entrapment]]'' beyond showing Catherine Zeta-Jones in one of these as she slinked through a maze of trip beams, it's not clear.

* The likely [[Trope Maker]] is Irma Vep in the 1915-16 French serial ''[[Les Vampires]]''. Musidora, the actress who played Irma had been a circus acrobat and the catsuit is probably derived from her leotard and tights.

 

* [[Lampshaded]] in ''[[Star Wars]]: Legacy of the Force: Invincible''; [[Action Girl|Jaina Solo]] more-or-less complains about how the suit she stole from a GAG soldier is more suitable for someone trying to draw some attention to themselves: ''...a full size too small, and snug in all the wrong places for a woman trying to avoid attention.''

** We also have a straight example in [[Action Mom|Mara Jade Skywalker]] - made even more obvious in the Japanese covers for the ''[[New Jedi Order]]'' novels as well as that of ''Sacrifice''.

* Pookie, a Pervect bodyguard from ''[[Myth Adventures]]'', wears one of these as her work clothes, along with a short cape. How much this qualifies as [[Fan Service]] depends on whether the reader is into bald, rail-thin women with green scales.

* In ''[[Into the Looking Glass|Vorpal Blade]]'', Two Gun uses this to describe the skintight suits that [[Powered Armor|Wyvern]] operators have to wear when using their suits.

 

* Rather persistently averted in ''[[Alias (TV series)|Alias]]'', where any given spy is much more likely to be in nightclub wear. There are also episodes featuring camo Army-style getups, various forms of local ethnic costume, and tourist gear. Somewhat effected anyway in that nearly all these costumes end up being form-fitting and flattering.

* ''[[The Avengers (TV series)|The Avengers]]'' has the female lead, Emma Peel, and Cathy Gale before her, in this outfit frequently, and may have originated it. It didn't [[media:emma.jpg|look so out of place]] in the '60s. She also had a purple one.

* One episode of ''[[Walker, Texas Ranger]]'' had the rangers break into a vault (for some reason). The relatively minor female ranger does it because "She's the only one that can fit into the stealth suit."

* Wendy Watson in ''[[The Middleman]]''. Actually, she wears one in the opening credits, but "The Obsolescent Cryogenic Meltdown" is the first episode in which she wore one within the episode.

* ''[[Honey West]]'' often wore a bodystocking in a clear mimicry of Emma Peel's "Emmapeeler" catsuit. Unless she actually predated it. In which case, it wasn't a clear mimicry at all.

* Parker in ''[[Leverage]]'' is fond of these... ''under'' street clothes or bulky harnesses that provide pockets and carabiner loops.

* In ''[[NCIS]], McGee fantasizes about Kate in a catsuit in one episode.

* [[Bionic Woman|Michelle]] [[Jekyll|Ryan]] wore one as [[Doctor Who|Lady Christina De Souza]] in ''The Planet of the Dead''

** And Wendy Padbury, as Zoe Heriot in the Second Doctor's era, wore a sparkly catsuit.

* Kochanski in the [[Red Dwarf]] Season 7, Episode "Ouroboros" (later destroyed in "Duct Soup").

 

* [[Britney Spears]] sports this in music videos, "Oops I Did It Again" and "Toxic".

* September's backup dancers in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qux6PhqbBBU Cry for You].

 

** And, of course, there's the Harlequins in their skin-tight acrobat leotard that emits hologram fields.

 

* Maureen in ''[[Rent]]''.

 

* ''[[Half-Life]]'''s Black Operations females wore skintight suits. In fact, in ''Half-Life 1'', their breasts jiggled when they walked. It was removed in ''Opposing Force'', an expansion. It's also worth noting that the ''males'' wore skin-tight black, too.

** The character designer for ''Metal Gear Solid'' admitted that Snake and Raiden's outfits, particularly Raiden's, were inspired by looking at bondage gear, probably an admission that it was intended as [[Fetish Fuel]]. On the character art, he draws an arrow to Raiden's buttocks, [[Mr. Fanservice|explicitly pointing out where his underwear lines can be seen through his clothes]] - it's subtly visible on the in-game model itself.

* In ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'', Rouge the Bat has a tight suit complete with a [[Chainmail Bikini|heart breastplate]].

** Replaced with a generic [[Stripperiffic]] outfit in ''Heroes''. In addition, in [[Sonic X]] Rouge has a "stealth" version that's all black in some scenes(the SA2 version has a good deal of white). It still has the pink heart breastplate(and the pink hearts on her [[Combat Stilettos|gogo boots]] for that matter) though.

** Uhm, Zero Mission, Other M, and a Smash Bros. game? That's at least 3.

** Also in said ''Super Smash Bros.'' game, [[Metal Gear|Snake]] appears in ''his'' catsuit.

** Seems to be the normal outfit of Asari Commandoes. "Commando leathers" are mentioned a few times in explicitly fetishistic context.

** The [[Cold Sniper|Nemesis]] and [[Highly-Visible Ninja|Phantom]] Cerberus troops of [[Mass Effect 3]] are women dressed in these, in sharp contrast with other Cerberus soldiers who are men in [[Powered Armor]].

* Natalya wears one in the last location of [[Destroy All Humans!]] 2. Lampshaded in one conversation, wherein Krypto asks her how she managed to fit in it. Her response? "Shoehorns and lubricant."

* [[Street Fighter IV|C. Viper]], a CIA [[Double Agent]] wears a black catsuit with a [[Sexy Backless Outfit|heart-shaped cutout]] in the back as one of her alternate outfits.

** And don't forget when she's aiding Josh Stone in DLC, ''Desperate Escape''.

* Jenny sports a tight racing suit in ''[[Dance Dance Revolution]]''.

* [[Catwoman]] in [[Batman: Arkham City]] gets special mention for sporting one of these with the [[Absolute Cleavage|zipper down]], showing off her [[Most Common Superpower]] in sub-zero weather.

 

* ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'' uses the second type of subversion during the ''Painted Black'' arc, where three female characters are put into brightly-colored catsuits for a infiltration / rescue mission. This is only clear in the colored strips, though, not the standard black-and-white artwork.

* In the Future Developments arc of ''[[SSDD]]'' Tessa wears a dark grey catsuit that's implied to provide some protection (though an Inlay's bullet penetrates it easily), and as she's putting it on she complains about how tight it is and that Dr. Cook only designed it so he could see her tits when she wore it.

* Thae of ''[[Overlord Academy]]'' is wearing one of these in her first appearance.

* In ''[[Tales Of Gnosis College]]'', Ashley Madder wears one of these (explicitly modeled on the ''maillot de soie'' worn by Irma Vep in [[wikipedia:Les Vampires|''Les Vampires'']]) to infiltrate Professor Corwin's laboratory.

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* [[Gentleman Thief|Jeremy Archer]] from ''[[Shadow of the Templar]]'' wears one while he's "working". [[Mr. Fanservice|It's slick material and skintight]]. While [[FBI Agent|Simon]] doesn't approve of Jeremy's job, he ''does'' [[Dating Catwoman|approve of the catsuit]].

 

** Turns out all Monicans wear this.

** In one episodes, one of their gadgets were a "literal" catsuit, a skintight black suit with cat ears on the hood. It was specifically designed to give the wearer the nimbleness of a cat.

** The catsuits on ''[[The Amazing Spiez]]'' manage to be quite stealthier as parts of them are black along with the usual bright coloring. They also include shoulder and knee pads, unlike their predecessors.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Mysterious Woman]]

[[Category:The Sixties]]

[[Category:Turn-On Tropes]]