The Lolita Complex: - Scholarly Commons Home

specifically, Hime’s violent and bloody methods of destruction. Hime’s
various weapons of choice are the rapier, axe, hammer, sword, circular saw,
flail, mace, pitchfork and, her favourite, the chainsaw. But Hime is also
Princess Resurrection. She is given this title because she resurrects a young
man, Hiro, from a corpse. While this is the only male she saves, she brings
him back to life, however, only to bring him into an existence of complete
servitude: Hiro must drink Hime’s royal blood for sustenance; without it he
will again die; Hime uses this dominating position to completely control
Hiro’s every move; he must succumb to her demands or go without his life-
force which she often chooses to withhold at her whim, making him even
more susceptible to her power.
In regard to these powerful types of “battling beauties” in shôjo manga,
Mari Kotani argues that, although they are imaged as hyper-feminine or
hyper-girly identities, they are “also able to evade the imposition of
patriarchal categories”. 223 This symbolic endeavour to take revenge against
patriarchal constructs is made more obvious in a “Special Bonus Spinoff”
provided as an insert at the end of Princess Resurrection, Vol. 1. In this short
story, a very young girl is found chasing an older man down the street.
When she is able to confront him, she says:
Little girl: “It’s been a year…. I finally found you. I will take you to hell!”
Man: “Me? I’m just an ordinary businessman.”
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