That Time John Cosplayed As A 13-Year-Old Girl

John and I just had the perfect weekend at MegaCon: the ticket line was a breeze, the crowds were huge but manageable, the cosplay was plentiful, and our Claptrap was a big hit!

Plus, last week John decided he wanted to make a (very) last-minute costume of another Borderlands character for himself, so he could wheel Claptrap around. And not just any character; this one:

That's Tiny Tina, a 13-year-old girl-turned-explosives-expert.

Why? Because we thought the contrast would be funny, and because it'd never been done before.

I told John there was no way we could create an entire cosplay from scratch in just 3 days, but somehow - somehow - we did it. It was cheap, too, since all we used was thrift store clothing, craft foam, a few leftover supplies, and paint.

 

 Ta-daaa!

We made a gender-swap variation, so instead of a skirt John's just wearing the orange shorts, and instead of a bunny apron, he has a bunny shirt and vest.

He also used this cosplay as an excuse to have his hair bleached - which almost everyone has teased him about, but he LOVES. ("My hair finally matches my eyebrows!")

John handled all the sewing and basic construction on the costume, while I did most of the painting, cell shading, and smaller accessories.

It's kind of a shame Claptrap hides the bottom half. Here's a side view, so you can see John's two different shoes and knee cuff:

Clappy making new friends. :)

John also wore lightweight sticks of "dynamite" we made using cheap plastic tubing from Wal-Mart (apparently it's used to store golf clubs?) and leftover wire from Claptrap:

I made the bunny watch, pin, and simple orange cuff all from painted craft foam and glued-on Velcro.

I'm most proud of the mask, which we made from a $3 craft mask and more foam:

John used a heat gun to smash down the mask's original nose, and then puttied over it with a little glob of epoxy putty. From there I added the foam respirator circle and new eyes, and then painted it all up using this screen shot as a reference:

Some glued on thrift-store belts finished the whole thing off. 

 

 

The final touch was black eyeshadow (which was a hilarious ordeal, since John is VERY
BAD about having things applied near his eyes) and a few lines on his face to give it that sketchy look.

John was pretty nervous before going out the first time on Friday, but within minutes of the crowd catching sight of him and Claptrap, he was an instant celebrity. I spent the rest of the day grinning like a fool and just trying to get out of the way of all the cameras:

It was a different vibe than with John's Dreamfinder cosplay; nobody wanted to hug him, for starters. :D Guys still wanted to shake his hand, though, and people would just lose their minds when we told them Claptrap was filled with snacks. (Which he was.) High-fives and enthusiastic cheering galore, lemme tell ya. Ha!

It was also fun startling people by making Claptrap talk, though the speaker was much quieter out on a crowded con floor than it was here at home. (We'll have to find a way to crank up the volume before his next appearance.) Lots of folks even started dancing with him!

 

On Saturday we learned there was a Borderlands meetup scheduled, so John went out again for a few hours that afternoon. I'll have more of those group pics later, but for now, here's my favorite semi-candid shot:

I love Handsome Jack showing off in the back, and how Salvatore has his face in his hands on the left. Ha!

Oh! And yesterday John had his pic with a fabulous gender-swapped Dr. Zed re-tweeted by Randy Pitchford, president of Gearbox Software (makers of Borderlands)!

 
So cool.  Happily I was right next to the person taking that photo, so here's mine:

Welp, that's enough "Tiny Tony" for now. Hope you guys got a kick out of it, and stay tuned for lots more MegaCon cosplay!