Abstract: Video games have been productively analyzed for their narrative and world-building possibilities as transmedia expansions of other cinematic or literary source material, yet decidedly less attention has been paid to what is at stake when games characters provide the “primary” source material for other media. Through a close examination Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft, and the shifting relationship between Croft-as-game-character and Croft-as-film-character, Jessica Aldred contends that video game characters have never been more crucial to the successful translation of intellectual property across media.