A full-moon night, a stone house deep in the forest. A young woman with long black hair down her back, a deep hood drawn over her, steeps herbs by lamplight. Complex tattoos run over her fingertips, a forbidden jewel hangs at her neck. Or else a girl in a frill-laden costume, striking a pose with a magic wand raised. A being gathering light and dark, sacred and profane, purity and allure in one body. Majo fetish (witch fetish) is the term for finding strong sexual or aesthetic appeal in the witch and magical-girl character types.

Two lines: the classical witch and the magical girl

The witch fetish splits broadly into two lines by the character type it targets. One is the Western classical witch, holding a black robe, a pointed hat, a broom, a black cat, a great cauldron, drawn as a mature woman. Bewitching, intellectual, of uncertain age, more than human: such are the fitting descriptors.

The other is the Japanese-subculture magical girl, an adolescent girl in a frilled costume, ribbons, a magic wand, transparent wings, and pastel colours. Beginning with Mahoutsukai Sally (1966) and developing into a vast genre after Sailor Moon (1992), the “stylised beauty of the transforming heroine”, the transformation bank, costume, and finishing-move pose, became established, and as a fetish object the totality of costume and conduct is loved.

The two are superficially opposite, but share the core attribute of “a woman with more-than-human power”, forming a continuous taste-cluster.

The magnetism of “the more-than-human being”

One psychological root of the witch fetish is sexual desire for the non-human. Desire toward a being who is not an ordinary human, who holds special power, who deviates from the logic of the world is a universal sexual motif continuing from the age of myth and folklore. Each culture has its lineage of “women with magical power”: Circe of ancient Greece, the Valkyries of the North, the mountain-hag and demon-woman of Japan.

When the witch is drawn as an object of desire, she often takes the active position of “the seducer”, “the curser”, “the one who holds the initiative”. This functions as a contrast to the female image expected to be passive under patriarchy, consumed as a device of a liberating sexual fantasy. Representations of the succubus, the night-demon, and the vampire-woman lie on this extension.

The detail of the magical-girl costume

Narrowing to the magical-girl line, the fetish object tends to concentrate on costume detail. Miniskirt, ribbon, choker, colourful boots, gloves, transparent wings. These ornamental elements are objects of cosplay taste even alone, but combined within the magical-girl costume they make a distinctive stylised beauty in which “childishness” and “flashy ornament” hold at once.

In chakuero-style adult works, shoots imitating the magical-girl costume are established as a standard project. The method of summoning sexual arousal through the sign-value of the costume with almost no exposure is a typical mode in which the magical-girl fetish is consumed. In secondary creation, a thick layer of works centres on the motifs of “the magical girl defeated” and “the magical girl corrupted”; the very gap of a character who normally fights for justice being sexually conquered drives the whole genre.

The influence of Western Halloween culture

From the Heisei period, as Halloween culture settled in Japan, the witch costume became a standard item of fancy dress. The style of pointed hat, black mini-dress, fishnet tights, and high heels fixed as the “sexy witch” and ranks among the main products of cosplay-costume shops. The witch costumes seen in October Shibuya and Harajuku lie on this Western-imported lineage. Anglophone genres such as “sexy witch” draw heavy adult-search traffic in the Halloween season, a seasonal demand that influences Japanese search trends too.

Adjacent tastes

The witch fetish is adjacent to character-type tastes such as chakuero and the bunny girl, and near the costume genres of magical-girl works and the cheerleader. The classical-witch line connects to “older woman” tastes, the magical-girl line to “bishoujo” and “adolescent character” tastes. From the standpoint of taste for the more-than-human being, it is continuous with fantasy-race fetishes for the demon, succubus, vampire, and elf.

See also

• Magical Girl
• Chakuero
• Cheerleader
• Bunny Girl