As I chewed through the Kotaku RSS feed this afternoon, I was greeted by images of 23-year-old professional display gymnast Alison Carroll, the latest hot young girl chosen by Eidos to remind invariably male attendees of countless conventions/press events/boat shows/etc. that, were Lara Croft a real person, she'd be far too intimidating to make eye contact with, let alone actually talk to. My first thought was that it seemed awful soon for a new Croft-ette. Sadly, that thought spontaneously combusted mere seconds later as I scrolled down to page and saw this image.
As creepy as it is that Eidos is still paying girls to dress up like Lara Croft and calling it PR, I actually think it's kind of awesome that they've picked someone with acrobatic chops, someone who might actually be able to pull off that crazy handstand-to-slow-mo-backflip move. That said, I feel like I now know things about Lara Croft that should be privileged medical information. As Brad noted, that blank, focused look in her eyes doesn't help much.
In the interest of diffusing some of this image's crazy arousing/discomforting/confusing energy, I've made some slight modifications.
I'm sure Eidos would like you to know that Tomb Raider: Underworld will hit shelves in the US on November 18.