Everyone loves the 90s, that much is obvious from the influx of 90s clothing coming back into style right now, but MAN oh man it’s a great time to COSPLAY from the 90s, too!
Who doesn’t remember the corny 90s X-Men cartoon? We could all hum that opening theme song on command! Inspired by our love for this cheesy rendition of our most beloved X-Men, we dressed up for Wondercon this year to show our love!
Do you like mutants?
MICHELLE:
I wanted a really minimal effort cosplay for Wondercon, so I opted for Jubilee! I’ve always wanted to cosplay her, but felt like the costume was too “easy” so I had never bothered with it… until now!
I purchased the jacket and boots on Amazon.com, glasses on ebay, and found high waist denim shorts at Forever 21. The gloves I reused from an old Captain America outfit I made, and the earrings were easily made using pair of old hoop earrings and some printer paper.
It was bizarre having black hair, and then of course, having a TON of my friends not recognize me because of it! I was pretty pleased at the reaction most people had to Jubilee which was: “OMG 90S JUBILEE I LOVE YOU.” Who says there’s no glory in easy cosplay?
YUME:
Originally, I had no real plans to cosplay for Wondercon. However, as many experienced cosplay-procrastinators know, you should always decide to make a costume right before convention, especially if you work a 9-5 job so you only have a few hours every day for crafting.
Double points for not sleeping.
I do fancy some 90’s Jim Lee X-Men but I went for Marvel vs. Capcom 3’s Storm. I also decided to go with Kotobukiya’s Bishoujo Storm’s headdress since I liked the thickness and how it framed the face. I told myself I was going to keep it “simple” and “easy”.
I ended up doing what I do best, over complicating it for myself. I drew up a pattern for the bodysuit, made it out of black spandex with gold metallic spandex trim, and basically didn’t make anything easy for myself.
The first rule to casual cosplay, is that I should have been more casual about it! I also decided to straighten out an old wig and add a fake widows peak. At least I had the sense to just buy an easter egg and paint it for the ‘gem’. The boots were the easiest, since I already had them lying around.
When deciding to be an X-man, Storm really stood out. I think she has one of the more amazing character designs across the board. One always recalls the original black bathing suit, the Jim Lee 90’s White Power suit I grew up with, and let’s not forget her amazing Mohawk from the 80’s. She was even an Asgardian Goddess.
She’s not my favourite, that would be Rogue followed very closely by Gambit, but she’s pretty high up there. I also noticed when looking up references and admiring other Storm cosplays, I realized how few other Asian girls have actually cosplayed Storm. This is a tragedy! It just made me want to do this costume even more.
This costume totally came together in the end, literally, about 2hrs before I had to get up and get ready! I think I am definitely going to fix a few things and revisit this costume for another convention this year.
Til next time!
Michelle & Yume
