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Heroes of Cosplay final thoughts... |
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Posted Sep 18, 2013 - 11:36:20
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So I watched the finale of Heroes of Cosplay, and while
I talked about it not long after the first episode aired, I figured I should give it another go-round now that it's finished.
And boy do I have some thoughts.
Now I was fairly harsh last time I talked about the show - primarily in how I find Yaya Han fairly elitist and exceptionally unnatural on camera (although she is, to her credit, an excellent cosplayer). There's also the standard reality show criticism for how staged the show feels, and how I disliked the emphasis on cash prizes.
To explain how out of place the "cash prizes" angle is, you have to understand that most of the cash handed out on this series was subsidized by Heroes of Cosplay's production staff. These were not events that normally gave out large cash prizes, and it's a 100% false construction of the series. In fact, a lot of these cons weren't heavy cosplay events, but instead selected because they were willing to cooperate with the television program.
This is why half the events featured in the program did not feature prejudging, a standard practice in any serious cosplay competition. Hell, from all reports the second "Group Cosplay" contest in the series finale at Kansas City Planet Comicon was created specifically for the television program.
There are other events in the show that bugged me tremendously too - in one episode, several members of the cast are sitting around (in a very "natural" scene) when one of our "heroes" says that people should only cosplay to their body type. This is, of course, bull malarky and snobbery - and almost everyone seems to agree with her... well, everyone except one - Chloe Dykstra - who is the only one who says it shouldn't matter. Yaya Han follows that up by calling Chloe naive.
Chloe is apparently the only one who "gets" it though.
There's also a controversial moment in the series finale when, backstage, there's a confrontation between a group of "Heroes" (Jessica Merizan, Holly Conrad and Becky Young) and a local Doctor Who group. Now I read about this confrontation long before the episode ever aired, so I was primed to be on the side of the Doctor Whovians... but I don't know anymore. You can
read the Whovian reaction, but one of the things that seemed weird to me was the criticism of the "Heroes" for being out of towners. That sincerely bugs me.
The closest con to where I live that I've gone to in the last year was a forty-five minute drive away. I cross timezones for cons, and that's just what it's like. You know what convention organizers call out of towners? Attendees.
Was it unfair that some groups had to repeat their skits repeatedly for the cameras? Yes. Was it unfair how Heroes of Cosplay took over events? Maybe - but you should blame the event organizers though for acquiescing on that though. Was it bad though that people not from the local area participated? No. Not at all.
To the credit of the "Heroes" though, Jessica Merizan did tweet out the following:
In the end what Heroes of Cosplay did was poorly represent the convention scene while following around some talented cosplayers. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I'm happy it's over.
And I really hope it doesn't get renewed.
Update: Just ran across
this bit on HoC and Anime Matsuri -- well worth the read.
- Traegorn
