Welcome to Five by Friday! This is our first installment of our weekly list-making endeavor. We here at Avenging Force are really fond of making lists, and we know we’re not the only ones–how else would sites like Buzzfeed and Thought Catalog even stay in business, if lists weren’t popular? Every week, we’ll provide a nerdy topic of our choice, and start the game rolling with our own lists. Sometimes, we’ll work together on one list of five (as we did this week) and sometimes we’ll provide our own individual lists.
Join us in the comments or on your own blog–we’ve even provided a graphic for you, which you can either save to your own space or link from tinypic using the HTML code below. Just remove the asterisks, and you’re all set!
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Tardis Dress
This was cute and original when it first started appearing at conventions, but now it’s so popular you can buy a ready made version from Her Universe. To be clear, we don’t have anything against store bought costumes, but it’d more fun to see something new and original. Or even a new take on an old and tired idea. At this point it seems like every girl who watches Doctor Who has one of these dresses in her arsenal. It’s time to vary the field a little bit!
Hipster Ariel
This costume appealed to so many people so quickly that now if you Google image search “Hipster Ariel,” you don’t get the meme–you get pictures of women in cosplay. We get it–it’s super easy to do. Clothes in green and purple, red hair, and thick-framed glasses. You’re done! You’re Hipster Ariel! But the ease of this costume also made it explode all over Dragon Con last year, to the point that we were playing counting games with our friends. Considering the internet has basically moved on from this meme, we think cosplayers should, too.
Hipster Ariel Meme
Slave Leia
This has been one of the go-to cosplays for geek girls for over thirty years. It’s skimpy, it’s sexy, it’s immediately recognizable. It also comes mass-produced. You can buy it at Party City. While there’s nothing inherently wrong with pre-made costumes, we’d love to see Star Wars fans take on the myriad characters that aren’t provided en masse around Halloween. Nothing brings more joy to us than seeing Mara Jade or Visas Marr in a sea of more recognizable film-based characters.
Jayne Cobb’s Hat
Adding Jayne Cobb’s iconic hat to any costume is the lazy man’s way of crossing fandoms or adding something costumey to their street clothes. We get it, it’s supposed to be cunning and make you look ready to take on a pack of reavers. But really, Lieutenant Womac said it best, “That hat makes you look like an idiot.” We love Firefly as much as the next Browncoat, but this is just getting silly.
Unless, of course, you’re actually Adam Baldwin. Then you can totally rock the hat.
Tenth Doctor
There’s an abundance of Elevens as well, but we’ll never see quite so many of him as we’ll see of Ten. To be fair, his outfit is probably one of the cooler outfits the Doctor’s ever worn. He’s dapper! He’s in a suit! But he’s cool, because he’s also in Chucks! It’s an easy costume to throw together, and an attractive one. But at this point, the Tens seem to outnumber Stormtroopers. We’re at critical mass! Somebody do something!
Tenth Doctor, Doctor Who
What are your top five costumes you’re tired of seeing? Share your lists in the comments!
Steampunk versions of anything are completely overdone.
I actually like steampunk when it’s done well! You can tell how much effort goes into the costumes. I also like how varied they can be. The steampunk X-Wing pilot women last year in the parade were amazing!
There are so many people that think that adding gears and goggles to something makes it steampunk, which is not the case. And people still seem to think that doing a steampunk version of something is super original when several others have already done so. IDK, it’s probably a personal irritation with the “genre” at this point. (My phone wouldn’t let me login with Google when I made the above comment. o_O)
I’m not a costume enthusiast. I like how happy it makes my friends, because I want my friends to be happy.
So I look at faces more than stitches and accessories. It shows in the eyes of the wearer when a costume is an expression of enthusiasm.
The overdone ones, especially 10 and JayneHat, usually come with a face that says, ‘I’m fitting in by wearing this.’
My outsider impression is that they are doing it wrong.
I think that’s an excellent way to look at it and I’m sort of onboard with your outsider impression. Any costume will work as long as the person is excited and enthusiastic about wearing it.
What about Homestuck? I think they stick out more at anime cons than comic cons. You’ll end up seeing a large soup of grey and candy corns.
Nobody does Leias anymore. You’ll likely Deadpools, Frozen, or Harley Quinn.
I think Homestuck’s super new, comparatively. I know I only started seeing them last year at DragonCon, and I had to ask someone what they were. And then come up with a way to get away, because suddenly I was being told the entire plot of Homestuck. -T
Sorry for bringing up an old post, but what about Bucky Barnes? I’ve seen a lot of cosplays online of him… But I don’t know how popular it is at dragon con. (First time! Yay!)
Well, this post was written in 2014 pre-Dragon Con and at that time Bucky Barnes was not a hugely popular costume at con. There were definitely a lot of Buckys at con that year due to the release of “The Winter Soldier,” but not enough to have them make the list.