For the past five years, the staff at Comic Vine has been taking a close look at what makes a bad Halloween costume bad. Our Halloween costume experts have degrees in costumology and we're prepared to use it. Since 2010, we've been looking at some of the best and worst new costumes and explaining what makes them worthy of being on our lists. This year, we have a whole new slew of bad costumes for you folks to check out. As always, we only select costumes new for 2014 or ones that have never appeared on our list before. You can buy every single one of these dump truck costumes online, so if you want to look terrible this Halloween, click the links.
This year, Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy were huge box office successes, so we expected a lot of half-baked costumes. However, the costume industry, in their infinite wisdom, isn't on top of their game. They're still shelling out Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles dreck (which we've covered oh so many times in the past) to rope in that key demographic: 30-somethings who take their kids out trick or treating.
7. A Koba Costume For People Who Have No Clue Who Koba Is
Koba, one of the apes with more screen time in both Dawn and Rise of the Planet of the Apes, has yet to appear in any comic books, but the Planet of the Apes concept has been a part of comics since the 70s. BOOM! Studios, Dark Horse Comics, and Marvel have all had runs with this world. Koba was a major part of both movies, and he has the scars to prove it, eve though his costume doesn't.
Koba was the main antagonist in 2014's Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, so of course, when a movie does well and it has characters with a distinctive style, they get costumes made in their "likeness." We found this costume over at Spirit of Halloween, and it's an online exclusive costume because we're assuming if you saw this in real life, your life-force would be sucked away as if you were hanging out with Typhoid Mary.
For the price of $50, you too can look like an unwrapped mummy, minus the charm. With this costume, you get an officially licensed shirt and mask, and that's it. Once again, this is officially licensed. Someone signed off on this and said "that looks exactly like Koba! Good job, costume company with a great eye for matching likenesses!" This makes for a better Groot costumes than it does for any character in the new Apes films. Let's get real for a second. Who is going to a costume party as Koba in the first place?
6. "Jazz Hands" Chewbacca
Not a year goes by that we don't get some great looking Star Wars related costumes. On the same note, not a year goes by where our eyes are assaulted by the monstrosities that are terrible Star Wars costumes. Chewbacca is an iconic character who everyone is familiar with, whether you know what Star Wars is or not. He's appeared in comics at Marvel and Dark Horse, and by golly, only Han Solo can seem to understand him.
The monster you see in front of you is Chewbacca, without a doubt, but with all the Chewbacca costumes you can pick up, this one made the list for numerous reasons. Coming to us from Target's website, this costume was designed by either someone really lazy or someone who owns a surplus of brown, shag carpeting.
You too can look like the floor of a 70s discotheque for the super-affordable price of $129.99, marked down from $149.99. For that, you get the jumpsuit, bandolier, gloves, and mask. By the way, that's one of the saddest looking masks we've ever seen. It's like the person who designed it was told their dog died right before they started the process and all that emotion went into a Chewbacca mask that can only be described as "haunting."
5. Leftover Bondage Outfit
Two Star Wars costumes, back to back! I've come to terms with the whole "sexy" costume industry. I used to hate it, but now, I simply don't care. However, I still hate bad costumes. What we have now is Darth Vader, all sexed up. However, the one thing really bugging me is the torso part of this costume. Let's take a look at Jen and I wearing the same Darth Vader dress for comparison.
Aside from the helmet, the most iconic piece of Vader's costume is his chest plate, with all those blinking buttons. The dress both Jen and I are wearing (which was strictly for scientific reasons) has that apparatus on it. This costume slaps a winter hat with Vader's face on it and calls itself a Vader costume? If I paint my face yellow and my head red, am I Iron Man?
We found this costume over at PartyCity and for obnoxious price of $84.99, you get the Darth Vader winter hat, a cape, the corset, and the boyshorts. While I normally use this paragraph to make fun of the costume, I'd like to offer up some much better options to the ladies out there who want to dress up as Lord Vader for Halloween. If you want to go a more feminine approach, this costume from BuyCostumes is not only awesome, but $30 cheaper. Or if you just want to wow everyone and be the coolest person in the world, ad you're rich, just get this costume from HalloweenCostumes, which costs almost $700, but it's totally worth it. Finally, you could buy the dress both Jen and I are wearing from Her Universe. Or ask me for mine. It's extra large and ripped because I'm not good at putting on dresses... yet.
4. A Costume for People too Cool for Halloween
Not a year goes by that another crop of t-shirts pop up marketed as Halloween costumes. I get it. There's people out there who don't want to dress up for Halloween that still want to partake in Halloween festivities. And once again, costume shops really try to get that key demographic of people who pretend to hate having fun, but want to show that they know who Superman is.
You can't really wear this shirt on a day-to-day basis though because it has a giant cape on the back. You're just going to look crazy, which is cool if the look you're going for is "adult seven year old." The shirt, itself, isn't even cool enough to wear at all. It looks like they hired someone who has no concept of anatomy to just "draw some squiggly lines that may or may not represent torso muscles"
If you were so inclined to actually pick this "costume" up, you could head over to Target's website to buy this for $18. What do you get for $18? You get this shirt with the cape. You could also buy Man of Steel on DVD for that price or even pay someone to be your friend and pretend you're interesting.
3. The Monopoly Guy?
Oswald Cobblepot is currently enjoying a string of success being amazing in the Gotham television series. In costume format, he's working on his two-step in hopes of being a contestant on a reality television dancing competition. Now, it's pretty obvious that this costume is based off the modern-day Penguin, rather than the Gotham series counterpart, but that doesn't stop costume designers from making a costume that looks nothing like the character from the comic.
The character of Penguin should be a pretty simple one to recreate: just wear a suit, top hat, monocle and fake nose. There is an attempt to do that here, but what kills it is that mask. Oh boy, that mask is something else. I know we're all thinking it, but why in the heck was the mouth left out? Was there a shortage in cheap-looking foam? Also, where's his hair? Penguin does have some hair around the side of his head.
We found this thing on Walmart's website and for the price of almost $60 you too can own this costume. For that price, you get jacket, pants, mask, and hat. The umbrella and gloves aren't included. Here's the opening description for this costume:
I saw her first. Gotta fly!
What? That makes less sense than the bottom of the mask missing.
2. Sassy Make-Up Sales-Silurian
Why hello. Fancy meeting you here. Our number two selection is a costume I could sit down in front of a fire with and have a nice malbec with, while falling asleep in its arms. Yes, this Lizard costume, based on the 2012 film Amazing Spider-Man, is dreamy and not frightening in any way. The Lizard is one of Spider-Man's oldest villains and fans waited for years to finally see him on the big screen.
This costume was spotted on Walmart's website. You'll sure to be the hit of any Halloween part wearing this, according to a section of Walmart's description of the costume.
You are certain to create a grand entrance at the party wearing this chilling costume.
"Chilling" really isn't the word you're looking for, but "chill" totally is. It looks like the Lizard just raided the medicine cabinet and took everything in site. This costume screams "Bro, can you hook me up with your dealer?"
If you happened to accidentally purchase this costume, for the price of $40-$62, depending on the size you ordered, you would receive jumpsuit with muscle torso and arms, attached tail and mask. It's a one-piece costume with everything you need to look exactly like how some dudes act at my local bars.
1. OVER 9000!
In the years we've been doing this article, we've seen this before, but for some reason, it just never went on the list. By the way, this is supposed to be Ghost Rider. Currently, a new person, Robbie Reyes, has taken over the role but the series is going on strong. He's the spirit of vengeance! Well, here, he's the spirit of goofiness.
If you were so inclined, you could head over to Walmart's website and pick this "bad boy" up. Nothing says intimidating like pleather and a super-saiyan haircut. The giant eye holes are really weird. They couldn't put some dark mesh over that? And what's up with the no lower jaw? This is the second mask that feels so unfinished.You know what the real problem with this whole costume is? Much like the Sexy Darth Vader costume, it feels more unfinished than a SHE HULK volume (too soon?).
Let's say you really wanted to buy this because you were going to a costume party deep inside of a cave with little to no light. This will only cost you $19, so at least the quality matches the price. For that price, you get the jacket and "half-cap mask." That's right, even Walmart admits it's not a full mask. Or, to make it more effective, you can light the mask on fire.
NOTE: ComicVine does not endorse or condone lighting things on fire, especially if you're wearing them.
That does it for another year of bad Halloween costumes! We'll see you guys next week when we offer up some of the coolest costumes available for 2014.