After 1,000 Year I'm Free!
Rita Repulsa has always been a favorite Power Rangers villain, not because she's good at her job but by how over the top, funny, and memorable she is. For me, that's a good villain. Someone who can leave a long lasting impression by how cartoonishly evil they are. And who can forget that voice?! I attempted this cosplay a few years ago and it was awful. However, over the years, I planned on remaking her and doing better. For this I needed a lot of help. The beautiful dress is courtesy of my friend Liao Yao, the collar and Madonna bra was made possible thanks to my crafting buddy Jeric Maglonzo (Sir Ductape), the wand was a remake of my old one which was improved by Alfred O'Conner, and thanks to the talented Jezebel Duplito I got the idea to use string for the wig. Yes those "horns" are actually Rita's hair. The most tedious part was Rita's hair. The headdress and her wig are one piece obviously. It's made using a bike helmet to keep in in place, foam boards as the cone base, Christmas snow cotton as the stuffing, a lot of masking tape and duck tape to hold it together and create the base surface, foam for the headband, two slips of cardboard coated in bronze duck tape for those two bands around my face, bronze duck tape for the design on the headband, three pieces of red fabric for the hair ties, and two large string rolls for the hair. Weaving the hair/string took from 10 pm to 7 am. Also a lot of stick glue to hold the hair together.
I wanna thank everyone who helped me make this cosplay again. It turned out better than I thought. I would have entered it in HeroCon 2018, however, I wasn't aware that registration closed at 2 pm (which is something you should put on your event page). But none the less, I had an fun time with everyone. And the judges were kind enough to give me a shout out and if I had entered I would have won. But maybe next time. Just glad I this cosplay even made it to the convention and I didn't bump into anyone or trip on my dress. (I have new found respect for people who wear long dresses. I normally don't crossplay, but this time I made an exception. Plus my past two cosplays didn't wow it seems enough people so I wanted to make up for that. "I have a such a headache! Somebody get me an Aspirin!" - Rita Repulsa, the Empress of Evil
Photos courtesy of Virgilio Valencia (top left) for the Pacific Daily News, Stephanie Quitugue (top right), and William Flores ( bottom left).
