Cosplayers are a wonderful breed of people. Adults, teens and kids who are not afraid to dress up as their favorites heroes/characters/icons and go out in public for all to see. Costuming is not new – people have been doing it for thousands of years and yet it still amazes me when they get stares from the “mundanes” around them (mundanes being those who neither costume nor understand why other people costume).
This past week, I had the privilege helping a costumer achieve her dream, even if only in giving encouragement through the creation stages of her outfit and crash space while she was out here from New York. I shook my head as she told me the sad tale of her significant other’s subtle yet poisonous attitude towards her efforts of creating her latest, greatest costume and of her desire to meet her idol, Tom Hiddleson, the wonderful actor behind the devious and handsome visage of Loki, God of Mischief in last year’s movie, Thor, and its follow up story, The Avengers, set to open in the U.S. May 4th.
The tale is doubly sad as her naysayer himself used to costume in days gone by, but now feels it is too much of an effort for no payoff. I HATE when I hear tales of this sort and it is a lesson to all non-costumers to beware when you tread on the dreams of others. “Lady Loki” appeared on hollywood.com’s live feed of the Hollywood red carpet premiere of The Avengers as she was interviewed by Marvel themselves, so impressed were they with her costume. She also got to meet her idol, Tom, and give him a present of something he is well-known to treasure – a gift of music.
It can sometimes be too easy to give up on your dreams. You have to want something so bad it is a driving force to be able to manifest it when the odds are against you, but rest assured that when you do want something that badly, it will come to pass. Like many of us in science fiction/fantasy genre fandom, Lady Loki has a large support group in the Tom Hiddleson fan community, but they are more than just a bunch of fans. The emotional involvement and camaraderie of the cosplay community is not unlike an extended family – Gallifrey One and its Doctor Who community are the ones special to my husband and myself and have been for over 25 years. For Lady Loki, she has discovered this as she and they support each other in hard times as well as rejoice with each other’s personal victories, such as when one of them get to meet their mutually-admired actor in the flesh. At a premiere where there were thousands of Marvel fans lining the streets of Hollywood Blvd., the philosophy of following your bliss played out beautifully as a single actor met a single woman, reaping the rewards that will never be realized by those who do not believe in the power of dreams.
Lady Loki’s Marvel interview can be seen here at time code 1:16:15.
She can be reached via her Facebook page and Twitter handle of @Lady_of_Misrule.
