The representation of women in the media is recently under more scrutiny than ever, as the industry is starting to acknowledge that women have been portrayed in negative ways fueled by patriarchal and misogynistic ideals for decades (Curtis, 2017). Keywords: Postfeminism, videogames, ludology, narratology, Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, action heroine. This paper argues, through an analysis of the Tomb Raider reboot (Square Enix, 2013) and Rise of the Tomb Raider (Square Enix, 2015), that the new version of Lara Croft, who appears in the three most recent Tomb Raider games, presents a different version of female heroism than that of the older version of Lara Croft, and that this new heroine archetype is replicated in representations of other contemporary heroines in AAA videogames. Moreover, Lara Croft’s narrative now includes a particular focus on her relationship with her deceased mother, and ludological elements of the game change the way in which Lara Croft navigates her environment. Some aspects of Lara Croft’s characterisation that have changed are her wardrobe, her body shape, and the character’s emotional complexity. The rebooted Tomb Raider game trilogy, released from 2013-2018, presents a new version of Lara Croft, who is a departure from the postfeminist action heroine archetype that Lara Croft exemplified before the character’s reboot in 2013.
Lara Croft, the heroine of the popular Tomb Raider videogame franchise, is a representative of femininity in contemporary popular culture. The New Lara Phenomenon: A Postfeminist Analysis of Rise of the Tomb Raider by Janine Engelbrecht Abstract
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