Anime, manga, film offer source for costumes and role-playing.
MOUNT BERRY, Ga. – Wigs, contacts, makeup and sewing needles.
These objects, along with a mashup of styling tools and costume projects, take up half of a dorm room filled with anime posters, character drawings and sci-fi memorabilia. The closets contain all sorts of costumes, weaponry and accessories. Instead of housing textbooks and calculators, the room’s desks hold myriad manga comic books and a tablet device with outfit designs and films of every genre.
This room belongs to some Berry girls who are not part of any theater group. They are cosplayers.
In one corner of the room, two girls try on purple wigs, comparing and contrasting style ideas to go with their maid outfits. In another, a girl combs through one of her wigs with her fingers.
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| Grace Dunklin, Berry student and cosplayer |
Cosplay is “fun and it’s a stress release,” said Grace Dunklin, a senior Communication major. “I like to sew and to make my own costumes. There is nothing better than taking a flat piece of fabric and cutting it into smaller, flat pieces, then sewing them together into something that is 3D and wearable. There’s nothing quite like that feeling of seeing something just come to life by your hands.”
Cosplay growing
This term may be unfamiliar to many, cosplay seems to be on the rise. Asked to define the term, Samantha Haag, a Berry sophomore, said it involves dressing up and role-playing as a favorite character from anime, manga, film or videogaming.
It’s “a way to bring to life a character you like,” David Kelley, a freshman cosplayer, said.
The term conjoins the words ‘costume’ and ‘play,’ and although it has been around for quite some time, the currency of some of cosplay’s staple media forms seems to be feeding renewed interest.
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David Kelley, Berry student and cosplayer
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“It’s not a new thing; it’s been around for years,” sophomore Tayla Lammers said. “However, there’s no doubt that it is growing now more than ever.”
Lammers pointed to the relatively new TV show, Heroes of Cosplay, on the SyFy network as evidence.
“You can tell fandoms are becoming more of a thing,” Lammers said, “maybe with the return of Doctor Who and Sherlock and all these cool new animes [like] Attack on Titan and Sword Art Online.”
How to choose a character
Berry interested in cosplay say choosing a character can be hard.
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Tayla Lammers, Berry student and
cosplayer
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“All of my cosplays have a twist,” Dunklin said. “Personally, the ones I like to portray are supernatural. I have an Alice cosplay, where I take on the character of an 11-year-old high on LSD. I do a Jedi cosplay. I also do a cosplay of Pansy Parkinson, the Sytherin student from Harry Potter.”
Cosplayers tend to choose characters they can relate to on a personal level or characters that they find interesting or intriguing, Dunklin said.“I am attracted to the crazy, yandere [an anime character that has a psychotic and violent obsession over the main character of the series] type of females,” Lammers said. “But I just love cosplaying characters that have a deep background or personality, someone I can relate to.”
“Don’t think I’m weird”
Even with the knowledge that they might be judged for their eccentricities, Berry cosplayers say they aren’t deterred.
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Berry students Megan Flink, left, and Samantha
Haag promote Berry’s cosplay convention, BerryCon.
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“I am just expressing a hobby that I love,” Lammer said. “We all have our weird quirks. You might find dressing up is only a child’s activity, but it’s really just an all-year-round Halloween for us.”
Alicia Matthews, a relatively new cosplayer at Berry, said cosplay shouldn’t be viewed as that different than, say, sports.
“If you like it, it’s good to express your passion for it,” she said. “It’s no different than buying your favorite team jersey and wearing it and going to the games and rooting for your team.”
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