As it is way too hot in this part of the world, we’ll look this week at Illya and Chloe von Einzbern, two girls who are dressed to beat the heat. They’re a little young-looking but that shouldn’t be anything too unusual for fans of contemporary anime. As the tradition here is to feature only one figure per post, we’ll start with the white girl and then take a look at Chloe in a couple of days.
Illya is the eponymous heroine of the Fate/stay night spinoff series Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA ILLYA. Unlike the main series, which is a serious, somewhat dour tale of conflict, drama, and sloppy interpretations of human history, Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA ILLYA is a comedic magical girl show with a healthy dose of fan service, as might be ascertained by observing this figure. The original Illyasviel is a friendly but vindictive girl whose confidence occasionally breaks as she loses heart upon meeting defeat, whereas the alternative universe Illya is a fairly conventional magical girl heroine: friendly, upbeat, a bit timid but always willing to try her best to make things right.
This figure is manufactured by Amakuni and is generally meant to be paired with Chloe, though no shared base is provided. Illya is sculpted in 1/7 scale and stands about 20.5 centimeters in height; as Illya is obviously quite small in stature, ths figure is also not particularly large.
Curiously, Amakuni only produced figures of Illya and Chloe, skipping over series co-protagonist Miyu Edelfelt, who, despite being a central character in the show, seems to have been shunted aside. One wonders if the irresistibility of the pseudo-incestuous relationship between Illya and Chloe diminished Miyu’s relevance.
Two obvious things stand out with this figure; Illya is all but naked and she appears young – very, very young. She’s wearing a tiny white micro bikini, obviously set to contrast with Chloe’s black swimsuit. Further, her bikini bottom is falling off of her hips, and while her embarrassment is evident, she’s standing nonplussed, making no move to restore her suit to its proper state.
Perhaps she’s making no move to fix up her bikini because the string is meant to be broken; it’s not actually untied on the side. I wonder if this was an intentional detail or just an oversight on the part of the sculptor. I’m not entirely positive but I think the artwork that this figure and Chloe’s figure were derived from depicted both characters in the nude, so the latter explanation would be my guess.
From the back, we can see that her bikini is a thong, which is pretty racy. It shows off her body quite well, though; actually, Illya’s physique is quite a bit curvier than one might expect for a character as evidently young as she is. She has a narrow waist and broad, prominent hips and quite a nice backside.
Her sculpt is generally very attractive, though the bulges and indentations on her stomach look a bit strange, almost as if ripples were radiating out from her navel. Being fairly familiar with hentai artwork, stomach deformation is not something that moves me much, but these markings do look odd, particularly since I can’t think of an obvious explanation for them.
Illya comes with a couple of display options, both of which add a modicum of modesty, I suppose. First, she can hold up this star, which is mostly opaque and hides her rack, such as it is. Even so, should you choose to display her this way, nobody’s going to think that you are any less of a pervert.
She also comes with a separate right leg to which her magical wand Ruby is attached.
Personally, I think the wand also looks strange, as if the handle were some sort of wiggling red worm or tentacle. But that is how Ruby is depicted, so it does make sense.
Note that there’s no castoff option so you can’t actually display her completely naked without commissioning a talented modder.
The concept behind this figure is obviously very, very wrong but unless one has a distaste for the sexualization of blatantly underage characters – and I certainly would cast no aspersions against anyone with that sentiment – this is a very nice figure. I’d prefer it if it were a little larger, of course, partly because I favor bigger figures and also because that wrongness would be even more evident. Nonetheless, this is a nice take on Illya, showing off her shy side while she shows virtually everything else off.
