Category Archives: Bad Super Costumes

All I'm saying is, if you're going to fashion a costume that turns your head and its associated mouth into a ginormous key-hole, you better damn sure pray you don't ever meet the Keymaster:

"Hey, put that thing down ... no, seriously, that doesn't go in there, that's not a UUUURRRKRKKK!"

Bad, bad, bad choice there Mr. Key.

(Character and image ©DC Comics, Inc.)

I think making your helmet look like some sort of animal eating your head is a bad move when it comes to crafting a good super-hero outfit, but at least animals actually eat other things, a lesson seemingly lost on the Court Seamstress at Casa de Jade Flower:

For the record, walking around looking like you're being eaten by a flower is not -- repeat, not -- intimidating to your opponents. Anything that makes you look like something The Joker would shrink and stick in his lapel should, as a rule, be avoided when putting together your costume. Whenever you walk out of the house and people start pointing and/or laughing, you should probably turn back around and slip into something fishnet just to be safe.

In other words, that headpiece is appallingly bad.

The rest of the outfit is standard super-fantasy-villain fare and perfectly serviceable, and I by all means encourage more leggy females to saunter around in hot Robin half-boots and two dishrags joined by a bikini top, but anyone wearing anything on their head that makes me want to pluck them ought to be hung.

Finally, I get that all of the Amethyst nobles are named after particular gems, but that makes me wonder where Fire Jade is hiding her fire jade and why she went for the flower angle in the first place. And why there's no fire on her.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure I'd like to lead the expedition to discover the location of that fire jade on her person, although we'd probably end up as just fronds and I'd have to leaf her alone, back-petaling away like made to try and stem the flow of derision and insults and things in that vein.

(Character and image ©DC Comics, Inc.)

What we have with Polaris Spanner from DC's "Spanner's Galaxy" is a fundamentally decent costume horribly betrayed by one small but crucial element:

Although I hesitate to say it considering the location of the area in question, this is definitely a case of a small thing making a huge difference. I am talking, of course, about his crotch, which for some reason is bound to the open-flap tunic top like some kind of cosmic onesie. The urge to check underneath that thing for quick-release snaps is almost irresistible, and may in fact be why he was the most-hunted criminal in the galaxy. They took their fashion seriously back then, folks.

The other elements are mostly blah (with the exception of that white-fur collar which ought to be illegal in any century), but that simple decision to continue the tunic down to his hoo-hoo just ruins the entire thing. The headband transforms from a semi-neato sci-fi doodad to a hippie doofus accessory, the boots look like he's smuggling baby hippos, and let's not even get started with the bizarre galactic howler monkey.

Just remember kids, when it comes to fashion, particularly in your nether regions, just say "no" if any seamstress asks you if you want to span anything. Maybe if Polaris Spanner had learned that lesson, he'd be a free man today. Or at least, not in a canceled book.

(Image and character © DC Comics, Inc.)

Excuse me, Mister Starfinger sir? Black Manta called and wants his clothes back:

You would think that with the benefit of eleven centuries of advancements, a super-villain fighting the Legion would be able to do better than ripping off a lame Aquaman foe's look. But you'd be wrong.

The shame of it is, I always loved Black Manta's costume. Dude was seriously bad-ass, with that menacing saucer-head and evil fish-eye thing goin' on ... he was so much cooler than the pumpkin-clad Aquaman, I used to root for the bad guy to win.

But so blatantly stealing another guy's mojo is just lame. According to his writeup, "Starfinger possesses no known powers of his own, and is a poor combatant." Given that, perhaps outright fashion theft is understandable.

Less clear is why he'd also steal The Michelin Man's horizontal bands of bloat, but perhaps we'd better just leave well enough alone.

(Character and image © DC Comics, Inc.)

At the suggestion of some folks yesterday, I wanted to throw out a challenge and an invitation. We previously had a contest to see who could redesign the costume of golden-age character "The Black Terror". I thought you might like a non-contest follow-up to that, so after the jump I'm going to discuss another favorite from that time, "The Green Lama", and his outfit.

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If too much of a good thing is bad, then what is too much of a bad thing? Answer: This costume.

He's got one rope lassoing his face, and the other about to ensnare his package. One can only assume this outfit was designed and stitched by his passive-aggressive wife, too afraid to outright tell him to keep both his mouth (and everything else) zipped, and so reduced to this subtle yet menacing textile rebuke.

You'd think two obnoxious rope elements would be enough, but you don't get to the top of the second-rate super-villain ladder by taking half measures, my friends. No, you see those two ropes and you raise yet another one, this time actually tied to your waist. Undoubtedly it's there as an emergency backup lassoing device, which then raises the question of how menacing he'd be with his pants falling down. Or maybe those are sans-a-belt slacks; he's certainly clever enough to have thought that far ahead.

Not.

Or at least, not if you consider the evidence of those armpit cutouts so everyone can enjoy his manly aroma and the super-baggy sleeves. Seriously, how does he even throw the rope with those sleeves? "I have you now Firesto -- crap! One sec, tangled on the sleeve ... there! OK, now -- CRAP!"

I don't even want to know why he has metal boots and gloves. I've been to my share of rodeos, folks, and not once did I see a cowboy roping with metal gloves. I'm just sayin'.

Of course, they also weren't about to get the ol' block and tackle lassoed by their seamstress wives, either, so maybe the use of metal covering in strategic locations is a good idea for ol' Slipknot. And suddenly it becomes clear why he might prefer running around town in that outfit to going home every night ...

(Image and character © DC Comics, Inc.)

I won't go so far as Randy Neuman did and claim that "short people got no reason to live", but I am willing to say that people who wear purple shorts with purple shirts and purple pointy-topped boots got no reason to be super-heroes:

Look, if you're wearing an outfit that would fit right in at a McDonaldland Playscape Junior Play Date and you're over the age of ten, you probably shouldn't even be outside, much less adventuring. My hope here is that somehow Mr. Tomorrow badly misread the corporate "Casual Friday" policy and, since he's packing heat, everyone was too scared to say anything.

I could almost live with this ridiculous get-up if it weren't for the pointy-topped skin-tight boots. If he were gadding about space in, say, some fashionable yellow or purple flip-flops, we'd be getting somewhere, like he's "Tommy Tomorrow the Space Cabana Boy" or something. I'd even be willing to spot him a pair of low-slung pointy-toed floppy Robin booties, but those things he's got on now have got to go.

And why, in the name of all that's sartorial, would you wear a long-sleeved shirt with your shorts? Do they not have thermostats in the future?

I do, though, feel happy that in the World of Tomorrow they at least they recognize that anyone willing to go out dressed like that isn't to be trusted to hold on to their gun, and so is forced to wear a tether.

At least someone up-time has some sense.

(Image and character © DC Comics, Inc.)

When you mix bad hair, disturbing metallic outfits, and inspiration from the worst music ever created, the result can only be Dazzler-icious Shimmer-riffic!

On the plus side, Shimmer never has to worry about showing up at a party where some other super-chick is wearing the same outfit. So that's nice.

Of course, that's because no one else in their right mind would ever think of making an entire costume from metallic spandex, then topping it off with the worst Day-Glo-orange Afro this side of Bozo the Clown.

You also have to be impressed with the large solid gold (and I mean solid, no clear-center hoops for this on-the-go gal!) disc earrings she's sporting, perhaps acquired in the same discotheque-gone-bust yard sale where she got the bulk rate discount on the spangles for her costume. Because nothing sets off a big white-chick Afro like ginormous flashing jewelry.

What really makes the outfit for me, though, are the completely gratuitous cutouts in the front. As if skin-tight shining metal and a color scheme right out of the left end of the Crayola box weren't revealing enough, some guy (and I do mean guy) at Corporate must have sent a memo requiring the artist to use, and I quote, "more skin."

That was Eighties DC for you, right at the cutting edge of class, refinement, and feminism.

Given all of that, I can't blame Shimmer for turning to a life of crime. If someone slapped those thigh-boots and long gloves on me, I'd sure as hell feel like killing someone too. So you go, girl!

(Image and character ©DC Comics, Inc.)

Note to any aspiring super-villains out there: Don't let your costume be designed by someone with the express intent of appearing as a character in a radio-only drama, because the Promotions Department might just pull a gag on you like they did on poor Molly Maynne, aka "The Harlequin":

You might ask why you need a costume for a radio-only drama, but maybe that's just how they rolled in the Forties. And granted, a Harlequin is supposed to be an entertainer, but ye gods! Seeing some poor deranged woman staggering drunkenly up to me sporting a dunce cap, striped leggings, curled-toe shoes, and Queen Elizabeth's neck ruffle around her waist would probably inspire more pity than fear.

But then again, since her power is in her super-hypnotizing glasses, maybe the whole point of the outfit is to be so horrifically bad that onlookers are momentarily stunned, giving her a chance to slap the ol' googly-eyes on 'em. If so, it was brilliant, because I frankly can't look away. Just keep telling yourself that the feeling bubbling up inside is joyful laughter and not incipient nausea, and no one gets hurt except your keyboard.

(Image and character © DC Comics, Inc.)