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Perfect Dark was inspired by Ghost in the Shell, Judge Dredd and more, while Joanna herself was based on Winona Ryder

Drawing from the greats
by rawmeatcowboy
17 May 2020
GN Version 5.0

While the Perfect Dark series might not be a hot commodity nowadays, it was a huge deal back in the N64 days. RARE's follow-up to GoldenEye 007 saw RARE create their own characters and universe in Perfect Dark, but that doesn't mean it wasn't inspired by some other greats. In an interview with Nintendo Life, former RARE dev Brett Jones explains some of those inspirations.

“We’d all been enjoying Ghost In The Shell and the Sylvester Stallone Judge Dredd film – a lot of influence from those. We were heavily influenced by early anime stuff. Even Joanna’s costume is almost directly ripped from Ghost In The Shell. Also, the leather outfit was inspired by Mrs Peel from The Avengers, and the dragon dress actually used the dragon design from Killer Instinct."

Some pretty major sources of inspiration for the universe-building in Perfect Dark, but what about Joanna herself? Jones says straight up that actor Winona Ryder is directly responsible.

“She was completely based on Winona Ryder. I was collecting images of faces, had a massive collection of reference images and we just picked her. She had this great pixie haircut and fulfilled the look of what we wanted Joanna to look like.”

[Link]