One thing that seems to be reoccurring in Dark Magical Girls is that their costumes tend to be much more on the revealing side than our sugary and innocent protagonists.

A mild example I've just noticed is Kanon Hatori, from Kiruminzoo.



Her outfit is for the most part closed, but that heart shaped opening is a little suspect.

Then we have Kraehe from Princess Tutu whose outfit is basically a skirt with two paddles extended upward to cover her chest.



Fate Testarossa is another mild example, but comparing her to Nanoha, we can definitely see something going on with that. People sure love that little bit of skin that shows between the skirt (or in this case leotard) and stockings. Her outfit is also much more skin-tight, which if I recall is justified because she's much more speedy than Nanoha.

Then we have the Dark Magical Girl from 6Hearts Princess who is almost entirely topless with a couple of pasties on her chest.

It would make sense if this was done as a reflection of the protagonist's purity and innocence, compared to the Dark Magical Girl who aren't as sweet.

While I wouldn't really call them evil, I feel like this has a lot to do with the trend of making female villains sexier, having them wear skimpier clothes. Black is also considered inherently sexy, and thus most female villains wear skimpy, black outfits, bonus points if leather is involved. They can also be prone to acts of seduction, whereas our protagonists would probably become nervous wrecks if they so much as spoke to someone they had interest in.

It puts me in a weird area emotionally because I'm so used to thinking of kids shows as squeaky clean, but as far as magical girl shows go, Precure tends to be the most of that, with things that come off as fanservice being pretty rare.

Sometimes we get this.



But then sometimes we get this.

I agree with you on a lot of points. But really i'm not sure it's to show any form of sexuality. I think that in some cases sure, that's totally what's going on but in others, I think it might be more of the state of mind of the character than sexuality. I for one don't really think of sexuality as something we thing about  in ourselves often and it's part of just a hard wiring for us in whatever fashion, so by that it's a sort of sub conscious thing that while may be represented in their uniforms isn't necessarily the main reason for it. 

After all the villains are sexy in their way and the reason for the more reveling outfits could just be it looks cool or they winged something at the end there. 

There's also like you pointed out the total 180 to the heroes. Like Princess Tutu she's dressed (For a ballerina) rather modestly. While her opposite is one major move away from a nip slip. but i think that Kraehe's outfit is more a refection on her metal state. She goes through so much over the course of the show, and she grows and falls as a character in her story. She never really seemed to me to be the dark magical girl more the sad lonely girl who doesn't really understand what's happened to her. I thought she was just caught up in the mess her father wanted for her. but my memory of the show is fuzzy.. I'll have to rematch it to make sure.

Speaking of the "6 Heart Princess" villain in particular,

the music video was made to promote a cosmetic line, I know the video made the viral rounds, but in the interviews with Shu Uemura's representative - 6 Heart Princess was made to tap into the feelings of women, Pink - for their more innocent and sweet side, and Black - to represent their darker and more sensual side. (The ideal situation for the company of course, is for customers to get both sets so they can tap into both "sides" depending on their mood)

In the video, our villain is a more studious shy girl in school - but suddenly transformed into sultry jailbait thanks to Uemura's cosmetics. This says to the other shy viewers "buy this makeup, you too can become sexy as you've always secretly wanted to be"  


Speaking as an adult woman who's had 1st hand experience as a goody-two-shoes wallflower, those thoughts of "what would I be like if I was hot", "what would I be like if I could just be selfish", "what would I be like if I was loose and wild" - it comes up. Sometimes the vision of yourself having those traits is a little more twisted and darker than you'd like it to be.

I think that's why dark magical girls (especially if they're written by girls for girls) get sexier clothing, because they try to tap into a power fantasy their audience could have had or be having. 


A dark magical girl I think exerts this is Vanilla from Sugar Sugar Rune. She's not really sexual -but she's definitely more brash.


and even Black Lady from Sailor Moon R

Well you have to consider Japan''s Kawaii Culture; good is cute and innocent and evil is sexy. Dark magical girls are not generally on the side of good (until they convert) and much like the villains tend to show more skin and have more developed figures.