Goodbye cartoon breasts, hello sweat stains: the feminist reinvention of Tomb Raider

Finally, Lara Croft no longer looks like a strong wind would knock her over. Netflix’s new animated series boldly reimagines the adventurer – with no thought to the male gaze

Hot on the heels of that Oasis reunion comes news of the return of another 90s icon – Lara Croft. She bounds back on to our screens with a new animated series, still sporting that holy triumvirate of classic ponytail, backpack and combat boots. From the get-go she’s performing seemingly impossible feats in the name of archaeology: she outswims a ravenous crocodile, and uses her signature blend of parkour and gymnastics to avoid a pit of sharp spikes. But this isn’t the Tomb Raider star quite as you might remember her.

The eponymous star of Netflix’s Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft – voiced by Agent Carter’s Hayley Atwell – looks different to how she appeared in the original games. Her thighs are now strong enough to realistically run, climb, stomp, swim and do all the other myriad things Lara has to do on a daily basis, while her waist is more realistically proportioned. Her shoulders are broader, her arms more defined (biceps, triceps and flexors; oh my!), and those impossibly perky and oh-so-pixelated breasts have been deflated to a size that fits somewhere within the realms of reason.