Category Archives: Bad Super Costumes

The Forties and Fifties weren't all bad in terms of super-hero costume design; sometimes they were downright terrible, as proven by The Red Bee:

Let's ignore the guy's pathetic "powers" -- he keeps a bee in a box on his belt buckle and no, I'm not kidding -- and focus just on the costume which is, frankly, horrible enough to stop criminals dead in their tracks all by itself. Which is lucky because, come on, otherwise he'd have to rely on the bee and clearly that's not gonna work.

The first problem is that The Red Bee has broken Cardinal Rule Number One of the Male Super Hero Costume -- he's wearing pink. Now I'm as fashion-forward a progressive fellow as you're likely to meet, but not in a super-hero costume. Honestly, can you name even one super-hero who's achieved prominence wearing pink? Can you imagine Batman jogging out in a set of pink bat-ears, or The Pink Lantern? And no, the Pink Panther doesn't count, because for one thing he used to pitch insulation and for another thing I'm not even sure he's a guy. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Worse than the mere fact of wearing pink, of course, is that he's wearing pink that clashes with the red in his outfit. While I'm sympathetic to Robin Williams' point in "Good Morning Viet Nam" that "It's a war, uniforms should clash!" I don't think it applies to super-heroes.

But let's say for a moment that you're the kind of guy who can carry off a pink outfit successfully, and let's further pretend that the pink you choose doesn't clash with your other colors, and that you name yourself The Red Bee instead of the Pink Bee and no one complains. Even with all that, you don't put pink on puffy see-through sleeves! That's just wrong. I tell you, if I were that bee stuck in his belt buckle (does he have air holes or what?!) the first thing I'd do when the cry of "Release the Bee!" went out would be to sting this poorly dressed schmuck right in the eyeball for crimes against fashion.

Shockingly the outfit gets worse and worse the lower you go, with the awful red-and-yellow striped leggings and the blue boots. What kind of crack is he smoking that his world is populated a) by red bees and b) by red bees with stripes of yellow? Did they run out of black ink when they were building bees on his planet? And why blue for the boots? That just makes no sense. Maybe there was a law in the Forties that decreed that any super-hero had to have red, yellow, blue, and black in their costumes or they'd get a stiff fine or something. It's the only explanation that makes sense.

Finally, and nothing against the Golden Age here, but who decided that those masks could hide anyone's identity? Seriously. "Is that Bob?! I can't tell because of that paper-thin, inch-wide strip of cloth across his eyebrows, because like any right-thinking American I depend on eyebrow recognition to know who's who!"

Luckily The Red Bee figured all that out and made a costume so sphincter-clinchingly bad that surely no one is ever going to even see his face, much less recognize him.

His tagline is "He stalks the world's most dangerous game", but unless that game is deaf I think he's got two very large, very bulky, very obvious problems to deal with before he's stalking anything but a can of metal polish:

Apparently you have to have flunked out of the Fashion Institute to be called "Manhunter" (see my entry on DC's attempted relaunch in the Nineties), unless you happen to be from Mars where, let's be honest, they're very snazzy dressers. Or were, before they all died. Best looking corpses in the solar system though, you have to give them that.

Anyway, this particular Manhunter is all too Terran, and someone has, in what I can only imagine is the world's best fashion-related practical joke, convinced him that wearing weapon racks strapped to your shins is a good way to be a stealthy assassin. I bet he was too dazzled by the glaive-length push-dagger they also gave him (which naturally wouldn't fit in his leg-holders) to object when they were shown to him. "Yeah yeah, metal sword sheaths, check, giant sleeves, whatever, have you seen the SIZE of this thing?!"

I can't decide what's going to give him away sooner, the flapping of his sleeves in the wind or the clanking of his leg-born display cases as he attempts to run over the rooftops. He'd have to waddle like Howard the frigging Duck to avoid banging those suckers into each other, not to mention the effect fifty pounds of metal strapped to his feet is going to have on his top speed.

I've seen a lot of impractical super-hero get-uppery in my time, but I think this might be the worst of all. It's a shame because the overall costume isn't bad, it's just the idea of an elite assassin walking around sporting the display rack from "Bubba's House of Discount Swords" for boots that ruins it.

I bet whoever designed those sky-blue UN helmets for their "Peacemakers" was also behind this delightful piece of headgear for the similarly-named "Peacemaker" from DC Comics:

The sideways metal croissant is bad enough, but when you add in the stylized dove and the bedroom eyes, the whole thing devolves into farce. "Come hither, baby, I've got a head for peace and a body for loooooove ... " The helmet got progressively worse, as you can see from this full-body shot:

I wonder if maybe the croissant waxes and wanes in accordance with how peaceful he's feeling. Like, when he's at home watching "The Bachelor" sipping on some Courvoisier it's all small and limp, but when (as on this cover) he's gripping a hard-barreled revolver, charging down a runway intent on blowing the crap out of some bad guys, it's all puffed up and angry.

We're still talking about his helmet, right? Right. Good.

Later, DC Comics bought the rights to the character and "updated" him so he'd be more modern which, as we all know, involves leather thigh boots and hand grenades and a mask with no nose hole:

Because nothing says "Peace" like a lovingly delivered hand grenade by a man with a variable metal helmet and leather thigh boots who can't breathe, because that's a dove on his helment y'all, and doves mean love. You can look that stuff up.

As Pixar documented so brilliantly in "The Incredibles", capes present a real dilemma to the super-hero fashion designer:

Capes can kill you, and when they're not killing you, they're all folded up on themselves so you can't even see what's on them, which is why most heroes who opt to wear one go for a plain, one-color affair.

Which is where "The Green Turtle" -- already reeling from losing the "Animal Mascot Lottery" -- goes so horribly, horribly wrong:

In case you can't tell, his cape features an enormous green turtle design on it, terminating with his head in place of the turtle's. Which, let's be honest, is as ridiculous as it is silly. He doesn't even have a turtle beak, for goodness' sake (and while we're on the subject, why the hell do turtles have beaks anyway? That's just wrong.) That's just a bad cape. When he's at rest in no wind, you can't see the design. Of course this is a comic book so there's always a dramatic wind blowing, but still, the only people who can appreciate it are those who are behind him. I suppose it's a good thing his enemies -- who you assume are the ones in front of him -- can't see it, because that's not exactly the picture next to "intimidating" in the dictionary, you know?

Of course, then there's the rest of his outfit. Or should I say, the not-rest of his not-outfit, since it's pretty much just swimming trunks, gloves, and boots:

Granted, he's fighting in China where the climate is pretty hot, but still, I dare you to think of another job where running around that close to bare-ass-nekkid won't get you arrested at the minimum. And no, "Baywatch extra" doesn't count. You have to give him credit for loyalty to his theme, though, right down to that "I can't believe I have to hold on to the hilt with these legs sticking out of it" turtle dagger.

So to review: "Incredibles" good, turtle mascots bad, especially non-violent green turtles; capes bad, ugly capes worse; and cover up those man-nips, nobody wants to see a fifty year old retired male super-hero at Mardi Gras shouting to the girls "Let me show you MY boobs!"

Which concludes this "Most Random Bad Costume Post EVER", I believe I have meds to take now.

(Images from "Blazing Comics", number 3, 1944.)

If you ever get down about your inability to create a cool looking character, just remember that people at DC got paid a lot of money to assemble THIS look:

First of all, if you're an intrepid adventurer for good or evil and you get the idea to dress up in a costume to hit the streets, let me offer you a quick word of warning from the dizzying heights of my years of super-costume experience:

Don't make your mask out of your initials.

Sadly, no one was there to help Wraith with that little tidbit, so he's forced to wear a giant purple "W" as a helmet. Since this character predates the ascension of George W. Bush to America's Presidency, we can safely assume that rather than some sort of political statement this is, instead, just a horrible fashion faux-pas. "Oh no," I hear you crying, "I am sure that was just an accident, that's not really supposed to be a W!" Riddle me this, then, O Defender of the Sartorially Challenged: why then does he have another W woven in similar clumsy style onto his top?

I thought so.

Not content with one assault on the senses, though, Wraith has gone a step further by making the offending piece of headwear out of purple and orange fabric.

Purple. And. Orange.

It's bad enough the thing looks like Batman's cowl is getting eaten by by an X-Wing Fighter without forcing it to deal with those two colors, each horrible in its own right and each made even worse by its proximity to the other. Throw in the "Cape With Only Three Notches" that looks like a leftover from the "You Too Can Make a Batman Cape" seminar and we have yet another in the long line of nemeses who tried to ape the Darknight Detective's fashion sense only to get an epic fail. I think the slightly-too-high-to-be-comfortable purple leg strip really seals the deal. It's like someone wanted a Rob Liefeld leg pouch but couldn't bring himself to actually do it. Maybe they blew their "Copycat" load ripping off Bruce's tailor and just couldn't get over the hump, but whatever the reason, we should all be thankful.

I also love how, in this illustration, he apparently has no idea how to carry a briefcase. "Hmm, I've got this bag of loot, but NOW what do I do with it?!! Curse these modern carryalls and their confusing handlery! If only my W Mask wasn't eating my face I could figure this out!"

I think we'd all be better off if this garter-wearing pinata-colored letter-masked no-briefcase-carrying buffoon would make like a real Wraith and just fade away ...

There's a reason Pampers doesn't make leopard-skin diapers, and besides a complete lack of absorption that reason is this:

Because even babies wouldn't be caught dead looking that ridiculous.

Not so "Atlas" from "Choice Comics #1". I guarantee that somewhere the god who gave him the idea for his powers is about to hit the "Smite" button.

Why? First, putting green, red, yellow, black, and orange all in the same costume ought to be a hanging offense. Combine that with long sleeves over no pants and it should change to a shooting, then hanging offense. Top it all off with a big huge stiff collar and no cape, and you've got a crime against fashion that can only be expiated by tacking on a trampling by hillbillies on their way to a ten minute dollar sale at the Wal-Mart, then a shooting, and finally a hanging for good measure.

My favorite part, though, is how proud Atlas is of his big red belt and its enormous yellow "A". I imagine he's barely learned his letters, having just mastered the first one, and he wants to show it off.

So to recap, we have a color-blind illiterate wearing animal-print diapers and no pants, who forgot to attach his cape to his popped collar, which is a shame since it would have hidden the chest logo the nice man at the Logos-R-Us store promised was a fist but which is, in fact, a thinly veiled call to party with Hannah and her Five Sisters. And they wonder why the comic never took off.

I love Thor's winged helmet, and clearly, despite living in an alternate reality, so does DC's "Darkwing". Unfortunately he doesn't know the same high level of dwarven craftsman the God of Thunder does:

Somewhere a roll of flat sheet metal is missing two wing-shaped cut-outs. My favorite part of the homage, however, is the metal clamp holding the cut-outs onto his noggin. Because nothing says "Scary Super Villain" like headgear you attach with a screwdriver. Apparently Thor isn't too pleased either:

At a certain point, inspiration turns into desperation, and I think Mr. Darkwing passed it a long, long ways back. It's not just the pathetic flat Thor-wannabe helmet wings, or the doughy ill-fitting Superman underwear knocoffs, it's the fact that even though his foe is Hawkman, he stole Hawkman's logo!

Granted, he reversed it left-to-right, but come on, pal, it's like you're not even trying. If I were Hawman, I'd hit him again. Because as bad as a Thanagarian thief is, a Thanagarian fashion thief is even worse.

(Thor character and image ©Marvel Entertainment. Hawkman and Darkwing characters and images © DC Comics, Inc.)

That's right, kids, it's time for the game show sensation that's sweeping the nation, everyone's favorite super-villain costume design quiz we like to call "GUESS! THAT! ORIGIN!"

Judging from his costume, how did this unassuming "pool hall owner" (I'm not making that up) become the dreaded nefarious mildly irritating "Dr. Spectro"?

1. Bitten by a radioactive "Lite Brite" set;
2. Child of an unholy union between "The Dazzler" and "The Rainbow Rider";
3. Body taken over by a sentient alien disco ball determined to make Earth dance to that funky beat ... til it is destroyed!! Or until they meet Olivia Newton John, one or the other.

You gotta love DC, the company whose mid-80's motto "No idea too ridiculous to publish" still serves as an inspiration to us all.

(Character and image © DC Comics, Inc. From "Who's Who in the DC Universe: Update '87".)

Apparently in the future everyone dresses exactly as you'd expect hyper-intelligent, bored, lazy, passive nerds to:

I get that this poor schlub is from a future with no criminals, but surely he had a video of one, or a photo, or a drawing, or a description of a photo of a drawing. Something, anything, to give him a clue that his outfit is incredibly lame.

First of all, a unitard is hard to pull off for anyone, and granted, I'd kill for a set of pajamas with the footsies already built in. But not boots. You don't mix footsie PJs and boots, that ought to be a criminal offense right there.

Second, if your name is Knodar, you don't put "P" all over your uniform, ok? Work with me here. Even if you're going for a prison-fetish look, like he is, it's confusing to have a letter on your outfit that doesn't appear anywhere in your name.

Third, lose the hat. A hat and a mask and a popped collar move you well beyond "cool pulp character" and into "fashion disaster".

Finally, you're from the incredibly advanced future, and the best weapon you could come up with is an electric spatula? Really? I'm starting to think the other future citizens "helped" Knodar figure out how to "escape" to the past, just to get rid of this Loser for the Ages.

(Character and image © DC Comics, Inc.)