Carbon Costume

Helena Bertinelli (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is the incarnation of DC superheroine Huntress that appears in Birds of Prey (Harley Quinn‘s liberating follow-up to the Suicide Squad film). Like many of the female leads in this new film, Helena’s conquered some horrific demons, such as watching her entire family die at the hands of rival mobsters. Armed with her crossbow and wits, Helena seeks revenge for her family’s murder and aids the reinvented Harley in her fantabulous emancipation.

Misunderstood and bullied since childhood, blue-skinned shapeshifter Mystique (played onscreen by Jennifer Lawrence and Rebecca Romijn) truly understands anti-mutant oppression. Her early experiences of mistreatment shaped her stance in the fight for mutant equality — or even dominance, as her leader, Magneto, gravitates towards.

Mystique is easily remembered for her onscreen appearances wearing only the strategically-placed blue scales she was born with (requiring Rebecca Romijn to spend hours in the makeup room), but comic book portrayals have been slightly more favorable to cosplayers attending family-friendly venues. You could buy the blue jumpsuit and stop there, but I’ve included some additional garments which draw inspiration from my personal favorite Mystique look from the retro X-Men arcade game.

Medli is a young, kindhearted Rito (bird person) living on Dragon Roost Island. She befriends Link on his oft-sidetracked quest to rescue his little sister during the events of The Wind Waker, and assists him in her capacity as the apprentice caretaker of Valoo the dragon. When I first saw this character while playing The Wind Waker for the first time, I immediately fell in love with her cute aesthetic and kindhearted nature. Naturally, I had to recreate her costume!

Athena Cykes works for famed Ace Attorney Phoenix Wright at the Wright Anything Agency. A childhood trauma led her to a career in law. With her sensitive hearing and training in Europe as an analytical psychologist, she’s especially skilled at picking up on witnesses’ vocal tells, which she uses to her advantage in the court room.

Most Regalia / Shinki (weapon-sidekick-people) belong to one master alone, but Nora’s developed a reputation as “The Stray.” Yato is one of many to have utilized Nora’s weapon form, but has since, to her ire, acquired a Regalia of his own. (Keeping a Regalia to himself is an entirely different challenge, given Yato’s careless, narcissistic personality, but that’s really not Nora’s problem.) Suffice to say, she gets jealous easily, yet is undeterred by others’ conflicts of interest.

Nora / The Stray wears her kimono folded the way of a corpse, and wears a hitaikakushi on her head like the ghosts of old Japanese mythology. We can recreate this ghostly headdress using a white headband and a small, folded cloth napkin, since it’s not something readily available, given its taboo nature. Additionally, we’ve used a large, striped shawl-scarf in place of the traditional obi sash worn around the waist of a kimono.

Gia Sunoo is a Korean-American backpacker bent on spending 100 days on a tour of Europe. She sketches in her ample spare time, traveling by train between countries, and collects small rocks as souvenirs from every place she visits. Her idyllic plans get interrupted over and over again by encounters with snobby Hayden Park. In this modern-day Pride and Prejudice, Gia’s humility and humble background both fascinate and confuse the traveling celebrity, and opening Hayden’s eyes to the harsh reality of normal, “ugly” living is a challenge Gia finds herself embracing.

While visiting Italy, Gia attempts to get a haircut not unlike Audrey Hepburn’s in Roman Holiday; what she winds up with instead is a cute, curly bob that can be reigned in with just a bit of styling.

Whenever I think of Arthur, I can just imagine him calling for “Meeeerlin!” in a peeved, pompous voice. Bradley James brought a youthful incarnation of the once and future king of Camelot to life on British television screens (and various streaming services around the world), making him all the more relatable to young viewers. Arthur starts off as an arrogant, self-absorbed “prat,” according to his totally-not-magical manservant Merlin, but over the course of the series, he develops into a majestic ruler and responsible leader.

Clueless, coy, and unrequitedly obsessed with Dr. Daniel Jackson, Vala Mal-Doran (Claudia Black) is a newer addition to the cast of Stargate: SG-1. She was first introduced as a guest character during the episode “Prometheus Unbound,” where she and poor Daniel were confined on a spacecraft together. The team continues to encounter Vala throughout the coming months until it’s clear that they (the team and Vala, not Daniel — stop it, Vala) are quite inseparable and belong together forever. Prior to her appointment to SG-1, Vala made names for herself as both the host of the Goauld queen Qetesh, and a fair to middling con artist.

In early appearances, Vala sported a single streak of white in her hair. Eventually, this went away, but Vala continued to style her hair in pigtails or with childish hairclips — a reminder of Vala’s penchant for shiny things.