Plazabound

It was a town so dull that even the slave girls were bored by their punishments.

The thing that‘s really nice about "Plazabound" the artwork above, is its smooth combination of strong sexual bondage imagery with the mundane.

Of course, the first thing that catches your eye in the artwork is the hot (in every sense of the word) naked woman standing chained to a post and gagged.

A great image, but not an exceptional one in and of itself. What makes this image exceptional is the background. The woman in the image is bound in a sun-drenched public plaza, so you know she’s hot and thirsty -- but the other people in the image are either ignoring her or (most likely) mocking her.

A damsel in distress she might be, but you also suspect she might be a slave girl or a criminal (perhaps a whore receiving a deeply ironic punishment for public indecency). Whatever she is, she is she’s part of the normal institutions of this society. The nuns and the priest ignore her. The two clothed young women look on, one with her hands on her hips, her mouth open … you can almost hear the searing mockery she directs at the slave girl/criminal/whatever.

Now, that’s telling a story with an image. Would that filmmakers understood the power of such imagery to add rich layers of depth to any scene. For example, both of the Gor movies would have seemed a LOT more Gorean with just the addition of a few gagged, naked slave girls chained to posts around town. In fact, just about every sword and sandal or sword and sorcery movie made since the 1980s could use some images like this.

In the near future, a post about a real-life image very much like this one from a modern day non-bondage event held in the US every year.

Slave Leia's Secret

Fanboy erotic overload warning! Slave Leias at Dragoncon in 2007.

Image source: Leia's Metal Bikini.com of course!

Have you been wondering why dozens of attractive young women are showing up at Cons (science fiction conventions, comics conventions, etc.) half naked, chained and collared? Well, I have, because it's really happening, it's not just a fanboy wet dream.

The women are appearing dressed as Slave Leia, an outfit foisted upon Princess Leia when she was held captive by the gangster Jabba the Hutt. It should be noted that the Slave Leia garb only appeared for about two minutes of total screen time in "Return of the Jedi," the only movie in which the costume appears. Most of the time, Leia appears in the white robes of a Senator or the crisp uniform of a Rebel Alliance commander (or whatever her rank was). But the two-minute appearance of Leia in slavegirl garb made much more of an impression than any other costume she has ever worn, to judge from the way it absolutely dominates Leia cosplay at cons.

Why has Slave Leia become so popular 30 years after her initial appearance? I have a theory, and I propound it at length, with lots of visual evidence, in my article on the topic. But I am required by the American Psychological Advancement Association that if you are not already smitten with Slave Leia prior to reading my article, by the time you finish it, you will be. So be forewarned.