Flea (Chrono Trigger)
creation: January 2002worn at: Katsucon 8, AX 2002
why flea?: I do not like Chrono Trigger. ^^; Everyone is appalled by this. In fact, so many people tell me that it is their favorite game! I agree that it had an awesome soundtrack and good battle system, but there was so much about the game I disliked. First of all, I hate Crono. I hated all the main characters except Frog, and he was a frog. However, I absolutely loved some of the weird unimportant characters. Flea is one of my favorite characters ever. I also love Ozzie and Johnny (the MAN). Flea, Ozzie, and Slash are an interesting trio. Why do I love Flea so much? Simple. When you meet Flea (who is an evil mage, incidentally), one of the good guys comments on "her." However, Flea corrects the character by explaining that he is a guy. This leads to a "Wait, you're a GUY?" reaction. Flea's response: Male, female, what's the difference? Power is beautiful, and I've got the power! Flea is so weird it is amazing. He blows kisses to confuse your characters and then laughs at their confusion. Despite his claim that he is male, he has boobs and wears a skirt. Go figure. I LOVE bizarre characters. The question is, does this count as crossdressing? I'm so happy that people recognized this costume. Some guy actually ran after me yelling, "Flea!" and that made my life so much better.
con notes: For AX, I met up with Marle, Lucca, Ayla, and Crono. Lots of people recognized us and we got to do battle! YEAH!
construction: I had a lot of fun making this costume. After working with satin to create Fina, I figured that a flashy texture would be fun for such a crazy and eccentric character. The cape was so much fun to make, although it ended up weighing a ton! The most annoying part was getting the red ribbon on there to be perfectly straight (I had to handsew it). The interior of it is a cheap black taffeta, and I used two buttons and some leftover red ribbon. I made the bodice from the same white satin. I ended up having to hansew a lot of it, since I didn't have a machine to work with part of the time, and using the boning was tough. The skirt is also made from satin, and I'm so happy that it came out as cute as it did. I bought short stretchy satin wedding gloves and cut the fingers off (finishing the ends took even more handsewing). I bought a pair of cheap velcro shoes and painted the weird orange parts, although a lot of it chipped off. I wore dark brown pantyhose to make my legs darker. I found the perfect wig and cut those weird bangs in and styled it, although it was a giant pain to get all the hair on top of the head for such a high braid. The white hair decorations are sewn on because I was afraid they would fall off! The wig was also very heavy and gave me a bit of a headache when I wore it. The belt is some sad $3 thing from Old Navy. The teapot was bought from an antique shop because I really liked the shape. I didn't have enough makeup or time to get those pointy ears on, and I also neglected to make the socks. I'm quite happy with the end result, though!
There is actually another Flea cosplayer. She did an excellent job on her costume, and has the most amazing wig! I though it was amazingly cool that someone else love the character enough to make a costume for him. If you are a fan of the character, check out Cherry's cosplay.
photo credits: Eurobeat King, Maboroshi Studios