Comic Con is this week in San Diego. I’ve never gone; I’ve never even thought about going. I can imagine that it would give me plenty of content for The Christian Nerd. It would also give me an excuse to spend more time in San Diego.
Even though I’ve never been to Comic Con, I know that it’s full of all things nerdy, including nerds. And the nerds in attendance aren’t simply satisfied with standing in line; they also want to dress up in honor of their favorite nerdclinations. I wonder how some biblical cosplay would go over at Comic Con.
John the Baptist
John the Baptist would be great for cosplay because he had such a distinctive outfit. To dress up like JTB I would only need a camel and a honey pot (hopefully no one would confuse me for the world’s worst Winnie the Pooh). Whenever I think about JTB I always picture Charlton Heston from The Greatest Story Ever Told. He basically looked like Moses from The Ten Commandments; he was just dropping the hammer on Romans instead of Egyptians. I don’t know if there are any fountains at Comic Con, but impromptu baptisms would be amazing! I can just picture baptizing a bunch of nerds dressed like Malcolm Reed, Sailor Moon and Chewbacca.
Dancing David
One of the main components for cosplaying is spandex. This is rather unfortunate because a lot of nerds, myself included, should never wear spandex. Never. I don’t know of any biblical characters who wore spandex but Dancing David would definitely pose the same problems. When the Ark was brought to Jerusalem, David danced before it in his underwear. I can only imagine the horror of some of the portlier nerds attempting to replicate David’s outfit. The costume would be bad enough but there would also be a lot of dancing and gyrating; it’d be like that other dancer in Return of the Jedi. That’s a terrible thought, which is why my wife and my dog will be the only ones seeing me in my underwear.
Bathsheba
Cosplaying isn’t just for fat nerds like myself; it’s also for women who want to make said nerds drool. There’s definitely a sexier side to cosplaying that I’ve never really gotten into. A lot of bibilical cosplay for women would be pretty boring. “Oh look, it’s another woman in a robe with a head covering.” The only real variation would be sticking a beach ball beneath the robe and going as Mary. Bathsheba definitely tosses out the robes and head coverings. I don’t know what the indecency laws are like in San Diego but I don’t think a woman can just go around naked. She’d at least need a towel or a shower curtain.
The Bible provides plenty of cosplaying inspiration but I don’t know how well any of it would go over at Comic Con. If you dressed like Jesus everyone would probably just think you loved The Walking Dead.
What other biblical characters would make good cosplay?
You could get a donkey outfit from the movie “shrek” and go as Balaam’s donkey!, Adam and Eve would pose similar indecency/gross-out issues, Moses would be easy as he is just a bathrobe and wooden stick, good for shy nerds too as he wasn’t a good speaker.
Young nerds could go in ill-fitting armour as Young David.
Thanks! Those are some great cosplay ideas.
For ladies who want to go the skimpy route, there’s Salome. I think Moses would need the tablets with the commandments to be identifiable, otherwise he could be any random shepherd or prophet or apostle or whatever.
And of course you could go with a crown of thorns if you wanted to play the big J himself.