Highlights
- Princess Peach: Showtime allows Peach to step out of her usual role and take on different forms suited to various situations, including the homage to Japan's Takarazuka theater troupe.
- The game features Peach taking on the villainous Grape and the Sour Bunch in different locations, such as a sweet shop, a martial arts school, and a museum, with more forms yet to be revealed.
- Swordfighter Peach's design in the game draws inspiration from Takarazuka's all-female theater troupe and the iconic character Oscar from the Rose of Versailles, featuring a dashing outfit and fencing moves.
The recently announced Princess Peach: Showtime allows Super Mario Bros' iconic princess to step out of her typical "damsel in distress" role and take center stage. The game centers around a transformation system that lets Peach take on a variety of different forms suited to her current situation. One of these forms, Swordfighter Peach, sees her don a dashing suit while fighting her way across a rose-strewn stage. Princess Peach: Showtime's Swordfighter Peach design pays a surprising but welcome homage to Japan's all-female Takarazuka theater troupe and their now-iconic depiction of an onstage swordswoman.
Princess Peach: Showtime sees Peach take on the villainous Grape and the Sour Bunch, who have caused chaos in a variety of locations. The September 14 Nintendo Direct trailer showed her becoming Patissier Peach at a sweet shop, Kung Fu Peach at a martial arts school, and Detective Peach while investigating the robbery of a museum. The trailer also indicated that more forms would be shown off in the future. The most prominent form shown, Swordfighter Peach, is donned when Peach has to save the show at the Sparkle Theater with the help of its guardian Stella.
Peach's Character Is A Perfect Fit For Takarazuka
Named after its home base, a town in Japan's Hyogo Prefecture, the Takarazuka Revue was founded in 1913 as a deliberate contrast against Japan's traditional kabuki theaters, which did not allow women to perform. Today, the Takarazuka Revue has expanded to consist of five distinct troupes - Flower, Moon, Star, Snow, and Cosmos - and performs dozens of productions annually. The troupe's shows include Western musicals like Chicago and the Sound of Music, productions showcasing Japanese history and myth, and even adaptations of manga, anime, and video games including the Ace Attorney series.
The Takarazuka Revue was created to give women the time in the spotlight that kabuki and other Japanese theatrical forms had denied them. This is a perfect fit for Princess Peach, who began as a constantly-captured victim for Mario to rescue. Fortunately, recent portrayals of Peach, including in the Super Mario Bros. Movie, where she was portrayed by Anya Taylor-Joy, have focused more on her role as the leader of the Toadstool Kingdom and a capable combatant in her own right. Still, Peach has had relatively few chances to be the main character, with the 2005 title Super Princess Peach as the rare exception.
Swordfighter Peach Brings To Mind Rose Of Versailles' Lady Oscar
The Takarazuka Revue's most famous production is Rose of Versailles, an adaptation of Riyoko Ikeda's iconic historical romance manga. The main character, Oscar Francois de Jarjayes, is seen as the ultimate role for a Takarazuka actress, as it requires embodying a character who dresses and acts as both a man and a woman and seamlessly crosses gender boundaries throughout the show. Swordfighter Peach's design draws much from Takarazuka otokoyaku (male or male-presenting roles) in general, and Oscar in particular. She sports a cravat, jacket, gloves, knee-high boots, and a jaunty hat with a rose in it and is surrounded by rose petals when she moves. She also fights using fencing moves, as Oscar does - her spinning finishing move is particularly reminiscent of Oscar.
Swordfighter Peach is far from the only transformation in Princess Peach: Showtime that will feature inspiration from other characters. Detective Peach is shown wearing a deerstalker hat, which, although never actually mentioned in the original Arthur Conan Doyle stories, has become associated with master detective Sherlock Holmes and the best detective games. With Nintendo confirming that there are even more unseen transformations to come, it is possible that Takarazuka and Sherlock Holmes will not be the only sources drawn from when creating Princess Peach's many stylish new outfits.
Princess Peach: Showtime will release on March 22, 2024 for the Nintendo Switch.
