Fan Expo was held in Toronto on August 23-26 this year, and size-wise was quite possibly bigger than ever. I’ve gone every year for about a decade now, but this con was different: I cosplayed for the first time! Nobody who knows me would be surprised that I decided to go as the Top, as I’m probably the Internet’s most diehard Top fan.
I cosplayed on Saturday, which is the convention’s major cosplaying day. And to my great surprise and delight, I met a Heat Wave cosplayer! While I’ve since learned that somebody else dressed as Captain Cold in a previous year, I’ve never personally seen a Rogue at Fan Expo, so it was really great to see one during my first time. And many people seemed quite excited to see Heat Wave (Brando Lars) and I together. We also met up with a couple of Flashes and participated in a photoshoot with other people dressed as DC characters. It was a lot of fun.
I was personally gratified to hear from people who recognized my costume and liked the Rogues, and had some interesting conversations with strangers. It was nice to meet and chat with fellow fans that I probably wouldn’t have met otherwise. The great thing about wearing a costume is you’re pretty much advertising what you like right off the bat, and gets it all out in the open for people to talk about. It’s a good way to show what you enjoy and meet people of like-minded interests, and if that’s something you’re interested in then I highly recommend cosplaying.
And now the photos!
Here I am in front of the green screen at the DC booth. The picture turned out fairly amusingly, as the green parts of my costume were rendered invisible and I looked somewhat like a ghost (which is fitting for the Top).
A meeting of Rogues!
With Flash fill-in artist Marcus To.
I was the last person in line to see Chris Sprouse at the DC booth, and people rather liked the visual of me holding the sign I’d been given. This photo was taken by a photographer from EB Games, and put in their Facebook gallery.
Apparently Flash has been brainwashing the Top again, tsk.
Some pics from the DC group photoshoot.
Poor Heat Wave; punched by the Flash and abandoned by his buddy. So much for Rogue solidarity.
We villains are on a schedule.
This picture (and the first one) was taken at a free photoshoot by Convoke Photography, and you had the option of buying the digital images on a CD if you wanted them. I was really pleased with the results.
Some links to other people’s photos:
A DC group shot taken by a stranger. The Flash doesn’t realize the danger he’s in…
This site has a nice picture of Heat Wave
What do you think? Have you cosplayed before, or are you thinking of trying it now?
Dat pun!
Fantastic costume, Lia!
Cosplaying is a LOT of fun. My wife and I cosplayed as Fry and Leila from Futurama for NYCC a couple years ago and enjoyed it so much.
Thank you! And maybe you guys should do it again sometime — going as a duo must be pretty cool. When I told my husband I planned to cosplay as the Top, he replied that he wasn’t going to dress as the Golden Glider :>
He could have gone as The Bottom.
You shall be PUNished for that one….
Excellent costume. I still have yet to get myself to a con. Definitely a goal.
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Thank you
And you should go sometime, they can be a lot of fun.
Awesome costume and photos, Lia! This and Devin’s painting make me want to dig out my Jay Garrick costume and repair the damaged parts for next year’s Comic Con.
Just go as “Battle Damage” Jay Garrick.
You totally should, I remember it looked great! And thank you
What parts got damaged? I split a few seams over the course of the day, but nothing major.
Thanks! There are three things that I need to fix:
1. The boot coverings were never really that well connected to the shoes to begin with, and need to be reattached. One of them actually pulled off during the con, and I kept having to reattach it. In most of the photos on line you can see the front of the shoe poking out from under the red “boot” in some of the photos. I’ll probably want to use a different kind of glue this time, or maybe try to find some real red boots and attach wings to them.
2. Another hat got stored on top of the helmet, which would have been fine except that we put both of them in a box, and the lid pushed down on the hat, which pushed down on the wings. They’ll need to be reattached properly.
3. The helmet needs to be repainted, since the wings have turned green! Also, it’ll be nice to repaint the main part of the helmet, since the clear coating ended up dulling the metallic look the first time around. (We were spraying that on the balcony outside the hotel room the day before. I was so annoyed that it messed up the finish, but at that point there really wasn’t any time to re-do it.)
Ah, I see — yeah, I’m glad I didn’t have to fiddle with anything small and troublesome like wings. My biggest problem was making the mask, which was tricky to engineer at first but fairly easy once I figured it out.
Awesome cosplay, Lia! I have come to really appreciate the Top after reading his Silver Age appearances following learning about him under Johns (both in his crazy and sane personas). I think he has a great look with the stripes, and your costume captures it wonderfully.
Now we need a video of you spinning around really fast.
I’d love to get a Top logo t-shirt as well…
Thank you! And I’m really glad to hear you’re a fan, there aren’t too many of us
It was the Silver Age that really made me a fan too; early on in my Flash reading I read some bio on him and was utterly delighted by the weird stuff in it. But I also enjoy the modern stuff a lot as well.
One stranger who approached me at Fan Expo was an older gentleman who remembered buying his very first appearance over 50 years ago (and when he mentioned the issue number, he was only one issue off, so he clearly does still recall it). And then he told me about the circumstances around buying another Silver Age Top issue as a kid (and he had that number correctly). I was really charmed that this fellow remembered all that 50 years later, and wanted to share it when he saw somebody cosplaying at a con. It was pretty neat.
A video of me spinning would be hilariously disastrous. I’m ashamed to admit I get dizzy really easily (my terrible secret is out…) And I would LOVE to get a Top logo shirt. Maybe we should custom-make one!
That’s a great story about the older fan at the show. I think too often we get caught up in the here and now and only think about comics fans as folks our own age. But when it comes to charcters who have been around for as long as Flash and his Rogues have, truly there are fans of all ages.
That story reminds me of a guy I I used to work with who was twice my age, and we used to talk about old Blackhawk comics — which he grew up reading and I discovered in the last few years. Or, talking with my father in law who read Captain Marvel as a kid and remembers watching the Shazam! TV show on Saturday mornings!
I had tried a few years back (around the time of Rogue War) to make a Top shirt using online services such as Zazzle or Cafepress, and the problem was the stripes. I don’t know how to conquer that particular problem, honestly!
I did think of this, though… worked out that you ran into Heat Wave instead of Captain Cold… last time Top and Cold got together, it wasn’t pretty!
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Yeah, I really admire old-school fans who’ve been reading a lot longer than I have. There’s at least one person here who read the Flash title in the Silver Age, but I don’t know if he wants me to name him. And I have a friend who doesn’t follow the Flash anymore but did read it back in the Silver and Bronze Age (and had a letter printed in part two of the Top’s funeral storyline. That was in 1976.)
I guess a top emblem with green and yellow stripes might be evocative enough that (some) people would get it. Might be an idea. I have no graphic design/art skills, but might try it sometime, or pay someone a few bucks to design it.
True about Top vs Cold…although it might have made for a pretty good photo op :>
I don’t know who they were, but I love the people who came up with that Lego Superman and Plaz outfits.
Heh, yeah, Lego Superman was a lot of fun. He was standing away from the group photoshoot with a bunch of people, and then somebody noticed him and invited him over. And Plastic Man was really good, especially with his stretching/extending arm.
In case you missed it: The Top cosplay http://t.co/eKKmAFI8
Im acually cosplaying at Comic Con this Saturday! My two friends are going to be Superboy and Robin, and im going as Kid Flash to make it the Teen Titans!
Oh cool, have fun! Maybe you should submit photos, I bet people would like to see them (I certainly would)
Is that Black Adam standing behind you in that first group shot? He and Captain Marvel look great.
Love your costume. I hardly cosplay any for fears my wife has that such activity on my part will eventually lead to a set of stormtrooper armor or Starfleet uniform hanging in the closet.
Yeah, I really liked that Black Adam, he had the fierce villain persona done perfectly.
And thank you
Just tell her that if you indulge in this kind of hobby, it keeps you out of the trouble you could get into otherwise 
It seems appropriate that this was the *ahem* Top new post for the week: http://t.co/eKKmAFI8