Applicable quote heard yesterday: “YouTube and Spandex are a responsibility, not a right.”
Applicable parable (paraphrased from a kid’s book I can barely remember and can’t track down): There once was a vain and clever gaucho who won admiration at every festival he attended, for the intricate ponchos he wove and flaunted. But weaving was hard work when a man looks after cattle, too. One year he kept putting off his weaving, or re-doing it to make sure each band of designs was perfect. ‘I can easily catch up,’ he told himself. ‘I am so good at this I will surely finish in time, and it will be my most magnificent poncho yet!’ When his time was almost up he realized he had only two handspans of beautiful weaving, and an empty loom above it. “I am fast as well as skilled,’ he told himself, and began weaving in a frenzy. His cattle ran away, and he was in danger of losing employ from his cattle-owning patron. He was so caught up in the daydream of what he wanted to make, that he did not see what he actually wove. Until he strutted into the festival, and heard jeering laughter. For only then he saw what the judges saw: two handspans of perfect work, and almost a whole poncho of shoddy, terrible weaving.
I’m a big fan of costume videography like the segments from Sneaky Zebra and other small studios. Cosplay (costume play) is an amazing art form, and I’m glad to see it getting noticed in the wider world.
I have been a costumer and props designer for years. The last time I was on a stage was in 1990, and that was for a joke skit in a local convention masquerade. I make things for other people, or I make them for my own hall costumes. Or I make them for the challenge, and because having a few museum-grade pieces around for shows is always a good idea. Nor do I usually cosplay as any character in particular – mine or anyone else’s. I design for ranges of emotion and theme, and apply my usually obsessive levels of detailing to the results.
I’ve never entered my costume or prop work in a major science-fiction or media convention. I skipped that step and went to national and international mainstream craft shows and magazines, because entering those venues was actually easier than the logistics of getting to big SFF conventions.
Costumes and physical props play a large part in my original fiction. Not so much as the typical ‘magic ring’ quest MacGuffin, but as details to help worldbuilding and push along plot: shapeshifting swords, ancient banners, significant jewelry and clothing, tragic shrouds, etc. I write about things I can envision as physical objects, even if I don’t have the skills, time, or tools to build them in real life. SFF writers like Jacqueline Carey and C.S. Friedman (who earned their costuming chops) inspire me to this day. The mainstream fine-craft community is a wellspring of information, too, since it relies on high levels of technical skill instead of ‘just-good-enough’ stagecraft.
So I was cautiously optimistic to hear about the Syfy Channel’s new series ‘Heroes of Cosplay’. Even at early stages of promotion, I had a sinking feeling that it was going to be more like ‘Project Runway’ than ‘MythBusters’: less actual how-to and problem solving, and more reality-show drama.
I watched the first episode. I’ll watch the second. If my suspicions are borne out, the series is getting cut from my to-be-recorded list. I saw things happening there that should not happen if 1) a costumer had his or her head screwed on right, and 2) if a costumer had not been somehow paid off to show themselves in the worst possible light. I’m tired of manufactured drama that not only rewards self-humiliation, but appears to encourage it.
Spoilers ahead, if you haven’t seen the show:
I admire contest judge Yaya Han’s designs, and I think it’s cool how she’s branded herself into a cosplay empress. But there are other world-class costumers out there. The first episode appears to almost be a Yaya Han commercial. She’s professional enough that some of the apparent drama around her own pre-convention deadlines came across as sort of fake.
Then there are the contestants, most of whom did their job and seemed to have fun with it. But that’s not the reality-TV way, which demands strife and setbacks. So we had some drama for the cameras, too:
Costumers should not get a prize for using storebought horns and modifying them at the last minute. Not when there are craftspeople in the room who did a better job all on their own. On time. I love Planescape and D&D, too, but fake fur does not a Tiefling make. I’m giving that segment a sad thumbs-down.
Costumers are certifiable fuckups if they go out drinking heavily the night before a major stage competition, and their very-detailed costume is not even done yet, and they know it should have been finished weeks before. The main problem was attaching bands of machine-embroidery that had to be next-day shipped to the hotel, because of previous equipment failure. The costumer was attempting to hand-sew the bands on a costume (kudos for not even thinking about hot glue) in what appeared to be only a few hours.
I’ve done similar insane things, and I’d set aside about 24 hours minimum to hand-sew those appliques. More, if I wanted it to show a couture-level finish.
What she was trying to do alone, stressed, and hungover? Is not possible.
This is a disaster of Lazy Gaucho proportions, and it hints at the underlying flaws in the show premise itself. The mere fact that the costumer was not able to finish, much less show, her design – after the camera crew had apparently been following her for several weeks – tells me she signed a release for this show. She most likely got paid for this unflattering portrait. That leaves me with two equally unhappy thoughts.
She either was paid to screw up on camera, which tarnishes her previous reputation as a solid costumer and the brilliant potential of her proposed design. Is any cameo on the Syfy Channel worth that?
Or she really did have a documented meltdown due to poor planning, mechanical failure, and bad judgement. She was alone, and had no one trustworthy to start sewing from the other end. It happens. I cringe to see a major cable channel (albeit the same one that brought us overhyped wrestling shows) make bank on such personal disasters.
I’ll be sticking with hall costumes, thank you.