Charity begins at home

Well Superhero and Spies day as the kids called it (Comic Relief) has been and gone and I must admit I was quite interested to see what cosplay creations there would be in the school playground.  I didn't go to any of the local supermarkets to see what costumes were available there, although I vaguely remember seeing a couple a while back in our local Sainsbury's.  In a previous post I said about what the kids wanted to go as and I very much doubt that Green Lantern has anywhere near the popularity needed for major chains to stock the merchandise.

It started off well enough - minor alterations were needed to the Green Lantern costume to make it fit a little better but considering the responsibility for looking after all of the parts of the costume (suit, mask and cheap tacky ring of power) fell to my lad, all of it was found, in working order (which is a minor miracle in this house sometimes).  The Princess Anna dress was clean and ready, I had already laid out some other things for my little lass to wear underneath because even though it was a floor length dress, I wanted to make sure she was still warm enough, and the kids were bouncing off the walls with excitement.

Now, whilst I really enjoy cosplay and the kids love dressing up too there is a much more serious message with the whole charity thing.  In one job I had a few years back we were encouraged to support the company's chosen charity and I used to run for them, I am by no means a runner and by no means a fundraiser but over the time I worked there I raised around £1000 - and also donated to my colleagues as well.  Explaining to a 3 year old is challenging but I think my 9 year old son understood the concept how I understood it for the theme; you ARE a superhero just by helping those less fortunate than yourself, regardless of whether you wear a costume or not.  So serious note done, it was time for a little photoshoot, as is a father's perogative!

So seeing the kids to school all dressed up was pretty cool, and as a bit of a comic book geek I was really interested to see who won out of Marvel and DC - and whilst it was close, it was a win for DC just about.  The main costumes were the obvious candidates, there was an entire clone army of Ironmen, Spidermen and Supergirls, and to be fair not a lot else! Certainly not another Green Lantern, and whilst there were some Queen Elsa costumes, I didn't see another Princess Anna either.

Superheroes and Disney Princesses

So it's world book day this week apparently and the school my little ones go to is having a day in fancy dress to mark the occasion.  As far as I can gather, this is pretty much the same as most schools and not just some one-off that only the kids school is doing.  The theme that was chosen was superheroes and after talking with the kids we have managed to get everything sorted.

Let's spend a minute to put some context here.  I cosplay.  I go to comic conventions dressed up as some character or other.  I have been as Green Lantern, Wolverine, Marv from Sin City and I am building others all of the time.

Now my lad is prone to a little hero worship on occasion (and who doesn't love that just a little bit, come on, admit it!) and so during the discussion about what he wanted to go as (considering he already has Spiderman and Batman costumes because he is male) he said "I want to be like Dad".  I asked him what he meant by this and he said he wanted to go as one of the characters I had cosplayed.  We talked more and I decided that sending him into school with fake knives between his fingers and a cigar wouldn't really set a good example of parenting we ended up with Green Lantern.  Ebay has duly delivered and my lad is now the proud owner of a miniature version of my Green Lantern costume, complete with mask and ring of power, the only real difference apart from size is mine lights up around the chest motif with LEDs.

That was pretty straight forward to be perfectly honest.  Now came what I thought would be the tricky part.  Far too many heroines are way too sexualised in my eyes to have a 3 year old girl dress up as them.  I don't think it is appropriate, and whilst I can really admire some of the costumes (like my friends from LittleBlondeGoth cosplay, barbarian below is one of theirs), I can't agree with a child wearing something like that.

So what female superheroes are there that don't wear skin tight spandex or a chain mail bikini or similar? Searching within my own ability as a costume maker found basically nothing.  Searching on Ebay found basically nothing.  As comic book heroes and therefore most superheroes have a market that is predominately male, it is very difficult to find anything that isn't of the nature that is meant to hook into the male psyke and make you buy more comic books.

We decided to cheat instead.  Whilst strictly not a superhero, my little lass will be going to school as a cartoon character who is the main protagonist of a major film and a well known character.  She is going as Anna from Disney's Frozen.  With her being blonde I guess I could have got her dressed up as Elsa instead but she was given the choice and she said Anna (which is awesome because I had given her an Anna ballgown dress for Christmas!).

So there we have it - the school did send out a message saying please don't feel you have to buy costumes etc but there is the matter of pride (especially when you are known at school as a cosplayer), and I couldn't let the kids get ridiculed for going in a substandard costume or no costume at all.