Baby Bonnie Hood

Baby Bonnie Hood (B.B. Hood for short; Bulleta (バレッタ, Baretta) in Japan) is a fictional character from Capcom's Darkstalkers fighting game franchise. Modeled after Little Red Riding Hood, she holds the distinction of being the only non-magical playable character in the series, and has been positively received by critics for her design and in-game characterization.

Appearances

Darkstalkers series

Baby Bonnie Hood makes her debut in Darkstalkers 3 as a monster bounty hunter who hails from Northern Europe.^[2] As a Darkhunter, she kills Darkstalkers for money, for which she employs modern weaponry such as an Uzi submachine gun (sometimes substituted by a MAC-10),^[3] land mines, knives, and apple-shaped grenades—an arsenal she carries inside her picnic basket that itself doubles as a rocket launcher—all in her missions of hunting down creatures that have encroached onto Earth from the otherworldly dimension of Makai. Though she fights evil as a Darkhunter like Donovan and Hsien-Ko, she is psychopathic and motivated mainly by profit, and her own heart was dark enough that Jedah Dohma, the game's main antagonist, considered her a Darkstalker and therefore transported her into Majigen, a magical realm he has created within Makai expressly for imprisoning souls he deemed valuable.

Design and gameplay

B.B. Hood's character design and name are a blatant play on Little Red Riding Hood, with her violent personality serving as a severe contrast to the innocent naïvete of her namesake. Character designer Akira Yasuda (Akiman) stated that while the other Darkstalkers characters were inspired by an archetype of either mythology, folklore or popular culture, B.B. Hood was instead inspired by the sinister qualities of the human race itself, thus serving as a personification of humanity's dark side.^[4] During development of Darkstalkers 3, after the design of B.B. Hood was finalized, the team could not figure out how the character should move in-game, so Akiman drew sketches of her moves and poses and pitched them to the graphic department.

B.B. Hood is the only fully human playable character in the Darkstalkers series.^[5] She carries her picnic basket on her arm during gameplay and has a small dog named Harry that watches the action from the sidelines and reacts to her taking damage in battle. Two rifle-wielding huntsmen named John and Arthur briefly appear alongside her in a special power-up move titled "Beautiful Hunting" that inflicts extra damage on opponents, and her victory poses range from her singing into a microphone to a man called Mr. K. counting money into her hand.^[6]

Other games

Like many of the Darkstalkers characters, B.B. Hood has appeared in numerous Capcom crossover titles. She is a hidden character along with Mega Man in the shooter Cannon Spike^[7][8] (for which she joined the game's cast on the October 2000 cover of GameFan),^[9] and is selectable in SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium^[10] and Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes.^[11] The character additionally appears in Onimusha Soul,^[12][13] in collectible-card style titles SVC: Card Fighters 2 Expand Edition and SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighters DS, as well as in the tactical role-playing game Project X Zone 2 as an enemy unit.^[14]

B.B. Hood makes unplayable cameos in the "Underworld" stage and in Darkstalkers boss character Pyron's ending in Capcom Fighting Evolution, on Dhalsim's "Toy Shop" stage in Pocket Fighter,^[15] and on a wanted poster in Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Dead Rising character Frank West can be dressed up as B.B. Hood in downloadable content for the 2013 survival-horror beat 'em up Dead Rising 3.^[16]

Merchandise and promotion

B.B. Hood is a featured character in the third and fourth chapters of the 1997 five-volume manga Vampire Savior: Tamashii no Mayoigo by Mayumi Azuma, in which she is called Baretta (the romanization of her Japanese name) and relentlessly pursues Gallon (Jon Talbain). She then cons her way into Majigen, as opposed to being invited per the game's storyline, by falsely claiming to be among Jedah's chosen souls in hopes of going after the Darkstalkers therein and securing a massive payday. B.B. Hood featured little in the 2004 Darkstalkers comic series by Udon Entertainment, making her largest appearance in a five-page sidestory titled "The Silver Necklace" in issue six, which additionally featured her on the alternate cover.^[17]

Capcom released a B.B. Hood figure in a two-pack with Talbain as part of their "Video Game Super Star" series released in the West in 1999,^[18] while other figures and merchandise of the character were available only in Japan.^[19] Enormous character stands of B.B. Hood and Lilith promoted Darkstalkers 3 at the Japanese arcade trade show AOU '97.^[20]

Reception

B.B. Hood was well received, including being named the best arcade game character of 1997 by Japanese magazine Gamest.^[21] Patrick Roesle of Hardcore Gaming 101 declared her "hands down the best idea for a fighting game character in the history of ever,"^[22] while Cyril Lachel of Defunct Games deemed her "the greatest Darkstalkers character of all time."^[23] Complex ranked her 22nd in their 2012 list of the fifty most dominant fighting game characters,^[24] and WatchMojo.com placed her eighth in their 2014 ranking of the top female fighting-game characters, calling her an "embodiment of a dark twist to the Charles Perrault story".^[25] B.B. Hood finished fourth behind series mainstays Morrigan, Felicia and Demitri in a fan-voted Darkstalkers favorite-character poll hosted by GameFAQs in 2002.^[26]

In 1998, Sega Saturn Magazine described her as "a really cool original character" while citing the viability of her attacks.^[27] Den of Geek deemed her "the true star" of Darkstalkers 3 in a 2015 retrospective on the series. "Not only is she an amazing design who is fun as hell to play as, but she exists as the best punchline for Darkstalkers. With all the different monsters involved in the games, BB Hood represents the monster that is man."^[28] Michał R. Wiśniewski from Wirtualna Polska noted B.B. Hood as a visually unique player character in Darkstalkers, as the other series characters could be categorized as either horrific or sexy.^[29] The character of Cisqua from the manga series Elemental Gelade by Mayumi Azuma was partially modeled after B.B. Hood.^[30]

See also

• Stryker (Mortal Kombat)
• List of Darkstalkers characters

References