Ahhhh..the blessed holiday is over. Actually for me, I've got one more party and THEN rabbit season is done. The festivities started last Saturday with the NJ Zombie Walk in Asbury Park, NJ as hordes of the undead in every shape and size took over everything from convention hall the the edge of the beach...cuz...zombies don't swim, ya know? The day's costume was Casey Jones with Undead April O'Neil and Leonardo bringing up the rear. My girls from Rigor Mortis Revue (best zombie geek burlesque in the states) were representing Decayed Americans and in general, the mood was uncoordinated, but festive! We quickly polled the crowd on what they wanted to see from the outcome of the elections and they resoundingly agreed that "Brains" were what
was needed. Brains, indeed. We snapped some photos, answered the call of some people showing their love for Team Turtle (+ one little girls who called me LAZA MAN!!) and scored a fantastically sculpted head of Vincent Price. We ended the night at a party where Peg Bundy showed her love for The Shocker, Lori got a lap dance ambush and I got fantastically drunk. A good night.
Sunday was ACTUALLY Halloween and the day Red Rain Batman would finally see the light of day..or rather the DARK OF NIGHT!! This would be the first time I put the costume together with the contacts, makeup and blood. I was off to a late start after a little too much Vodka the night before but swung into NY in record time. The process hit a quick snag though, as my contacts and my eyes didn't want to play together and when finally in, the left one threatened to make me blind. I had to pull it out, clean it and start all over again, but I finally got it. Unfortunately, I encountered my third time putting on eye makeup BEFORE putting in the contacts...which is dumb since there are a lot of tears..but I do it every time. Big time duh. Luckily, the smudging of the red and black together looked excellent for the effect I was going for, so yay me. So on came the armor, the shirt, the belt, the cowl and the cape...and lastly the teeth and we were off to meet up with Lori, Eileen and Heather which meant one thing. MASS TRANSIT! Of course this was way more amusing with Li Lu of The 5th Element and Vampire Batman on the train.
This being my first time anywhere near the parade route, it quickly became apparent finding the girls would not be easy. As we approached a cafe we thought they were inside, I looked to the left and saw my nemesis THE JOKER, who then spotted me and enacted an overly dramatic, slow motion realization and pointed at me. I pointed back, then pulled the Joker Gangmember head from beneath my cape and pressed its face against the glass making that awesome flesh-to-glass squeaky noise. He mock fell out of his chair and everyone in the place seemed to be laughing their asses off. We finally found Lori and Eileen a half hour later and after trying to fight through the crowd for another 20 minutes, I suggested we give up as "pressed super heroes" was not the way I wanted to watch the parade, and spend the rest of the night, as cozy as it was. As we made our way for open streets and a little breathing room, I discovered that any time we'd stop for more than a minute, people asked for pictures. This must be what cosplayers at conventions experience, but 100 times worse. On one particular corner I came across Nightwing, Superman and Joker in the nurse's costume, all coming from separate directions. FATE!! We took some pictures and drew a crowd that we actually had to walk away from after 20 minutes as the ladies were freezing their turtle butts off.
Back onto the slowest train in the history of trains (due to track construction..which is a smart thing to be doing on a holiday) and some quick pictures on the streets of New York, in a more sane area, and we were back at Bev (Li Lu) and Ted's apartment for a little Walking Dead and drinks. Lessons learned...
1. My boots suck and almost broke my feet. Bad boots. Bad.
2. Even in 40 degree weather, the cowl will still make u sweat your ass off.
3. If you try and drink after about 3 to 4 hours of wearing any Bat suit, you will very quickly find you have to lie down..or fall over..or sleep...which ever comes first involuntarily.
In short, that costume was a beast, but really awesome to wear! Looking forward to the next opportunity I can strap it on, if only for a shorter time period and maybe not so much walking. I'm now taking suggestions!
The Revoltech figure line was a Japanese answer to the question "How can we make action figures MORE FUN and take it all to the next level?" The result was a revolving ball joint that clicks into place, helping your figure hold a pose and when mounted on a clear flight stand, you've got KUNG FU MADNESS!! So far the mad scientists at Kaiyodo have brought classic battling robots, DC Comics superheroes, predators, aliens, anime all stars, video game bad asses and even Transformers into the line. Now...they have made something I can't possibly pass up..and will probably be buying a solid dozen of since I've got a serious army builder problem. When you tell me I can army build Ray Harryhausen Skeleton Warriors from Jason and the Argonauts in a super posable action figure format...I fall over, then check my bank account. Check out the amazing...
