Don't be fooled by the cranky title, I actually love Halloween but this year an email from the Costume Shop Ireland has left me with a slight case of the Hulk smashy-smashy. "Check out our new costumes", they suggest. Surely, says I. To my delight and being a lover of all things popular culture, they have Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands costumes. To my horror, they also have them in "women's versions". This can only mean one thing; near nudity. Granted, in my time I have worn the obligatory skimpy Halloween costume. I'm a big fan of fancy dress and have previously been She-ra, Marie Antoinette (the dead version) and a Freudian Slip and yes, most of those were revealing in some way but the primary difference being that none of those were "male" costumes to start with that someone felt the need to make appealing to women by adding some arse and cleavage flashing.
If I want to dress up as Beetlejuice, why can't I actually dress up as him? Why the bastardised version on the right? Aside from everything else, she doesn't even look like Beetlejuice, more like an old timey umpire/prostitute, if such a thing ever existed.
Another thing that bothers me about these, is how sweet and demure the female versions are while the male ones actually resemble the real characters; creepy and weird, just like Halloween should be. My question is, why can't women enjoy popular culture how it is? Why do we need our own separate "sexy" version of it? Do women themselves find the concept of dressing up in the more authentic costumes unappealing because they would feel less attractive or is this something that, dare I say it, the patriarchy has foisted upon us over the years?
I myself had planned on dressing up as Ripley from the Alien movies this year and had the whole thing planned. All I needed was a flight suit. A cursory search on eBay gave me these results:
What I wanted was the man's suit on the right (which would be unwearably large on me) and what I find for women is the "suit" on the left. Ripley would've laughed in that woman's face, probably before rescuing her from a horrible death.
Gah.
Does this bother anyone else or is it just me being persnickety?
The Beetlejuice costume It looks more like Miley Cyrus dressed up as Robin Thicke
ReplyDeleteoh my god yes!! Haha, got a laugh out of that. It’s a pity they still don’t do women’s sizes in the ‘actual’ costumes. But no, that would be asking too much of us!
DeleteI actually laughed out loud when I read that, it totally does! Ha ha ha! :)
DeleteI agree! Why are womens costumes tighter,shorter versions of a costume rather than an actual costume??
ReplyDeleteExactly, it doesn't even look like what it's supposed to! Aargh.
DeleteI actually hate it when women feel the need to have 'sexy' halloween costumes, I much prefer the male versions because they look like the real thing!
ReplyDeleteI know, me too! I much prefer a wittier costume that you make yourself and actually looks like what it's supposed to!
DeleteIf people want to wear those tight and short versions then fine but there should be an option for other women to be able to buy something that looks like the real thing. And what about sizing? I could never buy anything from those sites because of my size. There really needs to be more variety. It's ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. They definitely need to sort their sizing out but tbh, even if they did, there's very little on that site that I would go near in the first place.
DeleteI'm with Aishling on the sizing. I've never been able to buy a "standard" Halloween costume from any shop or site because of my size (which is a 16 by the way, not exactly a Heffalump) - any of those costumes are not designed for a woman with my body shape, so I always DIY mine (which is more fun anyway). Those female Beetlejuice/Edward Scissorhands costumes are laughable - I'm a big fan of both movies and I have no recollection of either Michael Keaton or Johnny Depp roaming around wearing knee-highs and a coquettish smile. Halloween is supposed to be disgusting, creepy, and/or imaginative (btw - Freudian Slip! Amaze!) not "look at my arse". Excellent post.
ReplyDeleteThanks Sharon, I always diy mine too, for a few reasons. Firstly, it's cheaper, secondly cause all that's available is this sort of rubbish and thirdly because they're not very imaginative, it is all just boobs and getting your legs out. I like to think I can come up with something a bit better myself! Had a bit of a chuckle at your mention of Michael Keaton and Johnny Depp, very funny mental image!
DeleteGreat post, couldn't have said it better myself. It's supposed to be fun but there's so much pressure to look pretty - no easy achievement when you're covered in fake blood and guts.
ReplyDeleteThis is true. I'd rather look creepy and do it properly than this nonsense.
DeleteI know! It's so annoying. You want to wear a superhero outfit and all that's available is a corset and a pair of hotpants that would make a volleyballplayer blush. It's the male "Superhero" [insert any costume] and the female "Sexy Superhero". I'm sure if you're seraching for an astronaut costume you'd get the male version - a full suit, and the female version - a tight, cleavage-revealing dress and tigh high boots.
ReplyDeleteExactly. It makes little to no sense to me and it is rather enraging.
DeleteYep, totally agree! I'm not a fan of the skimpy costumes at all, they're not my thing, but if someone else wants to wear them, fine. I just wish costumers would acknowledge that there are some girls and women who don't want to dress in skimpy, short, tight half costumes.
ReplyDeleteI'm not really a fan of store bought costumes in general anyway, I think it's so much more fun to make and cobble one together, uses some imagination. However it's only just know that I realised that part of the reason I hate it is exactly this, because women aren't being offered the real versions of costumes, but rather this generic short skirt, tight fitting, cleaving flashing costume instead. I swear, I think the women costume designers have 2 actual patterns (short and tight with cleaving, short and tight with no cleavage) and just change the colours and stick on things to actually change the costume's look. Look at the dresses above, it's pretty much the same dress design just altered for the look! It's ridiculous! This is why I DIY (also because I don't want to shell out something that's not the best quality for an insane amount of money, I don't want to look like a generic whatever and also run the risk of having the exact same carbon copy costume as someone else and also sizing matters too)
lol obviously I didn't mean to say 'cleaving' above but cleavage!
DeleteI got ya!
DeleteI completely agree with you too, pretty much only diy costumes myself as well. It's always a bit more craic and at least you won't be mistaken for a stripper :)
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