How Cosplaying Fits Into The Multiverse

The Concept of A Multiverse Makes Cosplaying Even Cooler

I mentioned this when I talked about Rick and Morty, but the modern media landscape of including alternative dimensions has made cosplay somehow more within the canon than it already was. With the aberrant timelines of Loki’s TVA, the various and changing events of Five Nights at Freddy’s, and the gender flipping of Finn into Fionna, recent expanded universes and spin-offs work to not only inspire more cosplays but canonize every variation.

Now, I’ve no desire to detract from the creativity of those who make alternative cosplays. They, themselves, are just as much artists as the original makers—but those original makers having their art explicitly within echoing universes further enhances the escapist appeal of cosplay. By having it baked into the rules of the connected universes that any character can be any gender, ethnicity, sexuality, body shape, etc. implicitly or explicitly, it makes every convention have a meta-narrative.  

Conventions are a place where you can run into Deadpool, or a Transformer, or the entire Scooby Gang, either OG or Buffy style. That’s cool on the face of it. But with this, it becomes a nexus of different versions of characters existing side by side. A crossover event where no one fights, and everyone is as powerful and esthetic as you please.

Cosplaying is already amazing. The creativity, the skills displayed, the experiences for those that participate in it—but it can always be made even more fun. And this multiverse trend is on that track. Any change that allows the Joker to have an army of Goombas behind him stare down Avatars of both Airbending and Na’vi variety is a net positive. And, frankly, something incredible.