It's not so much a matter of whether characters are ridiculously posed, but HOW they are posed. If it was just a matter of posing male and female characters with over-the-top dramatics, wouldn't they be posed similarly? As opposed to say, this?



As for sex objectification, it's not just something I came up with; even artists responsible have admitted "sex sells". But even going beyond that, one has to consider exactly why such pains are taken to contort female characters so that as many of theri sexual attributes are visible as possible.

I can get some more data and evidence, but it will have to wait until after work.