I’m afraid this post will now be drowned in the sea of AFA posts due to its lateness, but I don’t really mind. There’s not enough blogs out there that provide coverage to our local cons, so there’s no way I can just give up writing this. And besides, the cosplay competition I witnessed (for the first time, since I usually don’t make it to the cosplay catwalk proper) was too fun to be missed (guess I owe that to some of the cosplayers and the officemates / barkada I hanged out with, but still, fun)

The Cosplay Catwalk

I-i-it’s not like I wanted to c-cosplay or anything!!

Fastforward to the Cosplay catwalk proper, where I decided to stand up with all might and pride… on a Monobloc chair (anticlimactic and lame, I know) — so I can get a better view of the cosplayers and take good shots of them too. Unfortunately, I was a few rows behind the other spectators in front, so lots of HEADS got in the way of my shots. Then there were cosplayers who quickly ran off the stage as though they had to hurry to the nearest restroom — either because they were shy, nervous, frantic, had LBM, or what — point is, they wasted their costumes by not strutting with all they’ve got. I know I’m not in the position to say this since I don’t know the feeling of the cosplayer up on stage, but hey, if you already had the guts to wear the costume and join the catwalk, the least you can do is to give it your best shot, right? Delight in the attention, enjoy the sound of shutters as people take your photos, and all that jazz.

And now, for the cosplayers who stood out and/or those I have something to say about (oh and I’m no longer going to talk about the Max Payne cosplayer who rendered this ‘max pain’-inducing song number, absolutely not):

The Chibis

There were three chibi cosplayers in the con, chibi Dekaranger, Ryoma Echizen, and Buttercup of Powerpuff Girls Z, and needless to say, they were all kawaii desu~! The appearance of these adorable chibis sent the crowds roaring — LOLICONS and SHOTACONS UNTIE!! Given the overwhelming responses of spectators to these little cosplayers, I’m starting to think that the road to cosplay fame is fairly easy if you start out this young. They’re supported by their stage mom/dad/bro/sis, who are more than willing to shell out cash for their adorable cosplay

Chibi Echizen was accompanied by his nanny… cute!

…and Buttercup was left to fend for herself D: She strutted her way to the catwalk, walking oh so slowly with all poise and elegance, like a flower girl in a wedding. She took her time, so people got to take lots of pics of her, that’s for sure. The other cosplayers could very well learn from this little girl, cosplay catwalk done right

zOMG They Glow in the Dark

They were a couple of cosplayers who had these reflectors on their costumes ( satin or metallic paper for the others), for obvious reasons. I mean, they are WARRIORS who need to SHINE and save people from the depths of DARKNESS [or whatever cheesy line you may think of with light and darkness]. It’s great if you want your costume to achieve that kind of effect, I guess.

PANDAMONIUM!! Pandaren Brewmaster from World of Warcraft. No I’m not a l33t gamer, I just learned about this character from my DotA fanatic officemates lol.

And here we have the beautiful geisha, who I’ve also seen (and took pictures of) in the other cons I went to. Aside from strutting down the catwalk with all poise and elegance, she also did a little “fan exhibition” (I don’t know what it’s called), which was really impressive. Awesome characterization, I’d say. She bagged the 1st place in the cosplay competition, which no longer comes a surprise to me ^^

Gaara is bishieliciously GAR. I haven’t seen other Gaara cosplays, but I’ve got to say this is one of the best.

And what do you know, Ultraman didn’t want to miss out on the fun too! The cosplayer also did the trademark Ultraman-moves, which just made his surprise appearance all the more hilarious

And LOL, Mr. Satan is here again! It’s amusing how they referred to him as his Tagalog dubbed name, “Master Pogi” [Master Handsome -- literal translation, but doesn’t quite deliver the same comedic effect as its Tagalog counterpart] XDD See, Tagalog dubbing brings the LULZ into our anime (in a good way)

It’s a Dark Magician crossplayer!! I’m using this in place of the pic I took of his catwalk, because it looks much better. Anyways, this crossplayer decided to make his catwalk ‘extravagant’ (for the lack of a better word) — he popped confettis (with this confetti toy) and showered the audience with candies. And no, I wasn’t one of the lucky people who caught one of the candy freebie, but rather one of the casualties who got hit on the forehead with it!! *grumble* And of course, someone else took the candy that hit me TT___TT

One of the most unforgettable highlights of the cosplay competition is the appearance of Bui and Hiei. Bui first did his catwalk, then later on issued a challenge against his archrival Hiei, taunting “Vincent, lumabas ka! Tapusin! Tapusin!” [Hiei, get your ass off here! Finish him! Finish him!]. Vincent is Hiei’s Tagalog dub name, and the “Tapusin tapusin” chanting has been quite a dubbing trademark of YuYu Hakusho (we hear this in most of the youkai battles after all The crowds happily joined in the chanting and RAWWWRING with Bui, as you can probably see in the video.

The roaring became all the more intense when the challengee (is there such a word? lol) Hiei appears! Summoning his BLACK DRAGON too (supported by his 3 pals )! W00t!! Epic battle ensues, and Hiei manages to kick some Bui butt! Hiei dashes to the front, he stabs, and he HITS! And the audience witnesses the smokin’ balloon explosion effects the Hiei cosplayer (and his buddies?) prepared for this event. The Black Dragon spits out some confetti before taking his leave, though it was kinda anticlimactic given the more awesome balloon effect earlier Oh, and the Gaara and Hiei cosplayer tied for second place.

Another LOLworthy appearance in the cosplay competition would be…

Dun4x, it’s a Heero! Totally WTFudge, lol. Who would’ve expected that someone would actually cosplay him?!

And of course, what’s a Heero without a Relena (whom he wants to kill so much). Relena invites Heero to her birthday party, and he simply glares at her and says “Omae wo kurosu!” (I’m gonna kill you). Zechs joins them not long after (and the crowd was going “Zechs! Zechs!” to “Sex! Sex!” haha), and tells him not to mess with his sister (He said something along the lines of, “Ba’t mo inaaway ang utol ko?!” [Why are you messing with my sister?!” -- fellow Filipinos can attest to the LOLness of this line, it doesn’t translate well into English, sadly).

More Tagalog dubbing LOL + awesomeness factor came from this Hikaru Hanazono cosplayer, who issued her 'signature speech of rivalry' to Takashima before leaving the stage: “Takashima, tatalunin kita!!11!!” [Takashima, I'm gonna beat you!!].

The other Hikaru among the cosplayers, the mischievous older twin of the [twincestous] Hitachiin brothers from Ouran Koukou Host Club, in his kawaii Cheshire mode~!! *moeee*

And here we have the morena counterpart of Enma Ai, and I dub thee Moren(m)a Ai. What, lame pun, you say? I can’t hear you~~

As Enma Ai makes her exit, guess who gives her a friendly greeting — Pedobear!! I find it amusing[ly ironic] how these pedobear cosplayers deliver the totally opposite effect of its real counterpart, because lolis flock to them in conventions! Talk about reverse psychology

GIANT PORING!! If you think this cosplayer wasn’t able to go up the stage because of his costume, well, you’re right. The cosplayer could barely move! x__x He’s accompanied by his buddies almost 100% of the time, carrying his detachable wings for him too, lol.

Here’s the Suigintou who got “abducted” halfway through her catwalk, leaving the audience in “WTF-mode O_O” as the guy carries her all the way to the exit. Is the guy supposed to be his Father or Master, or something? I haven’t seen Rozen Maiden, so I don’t know what the significance of that scene is, if any.

I’m not sure if this is just a random parody of Uncle Sam, but to think that he even rendered a song must mean that he’s… a special character from some anime/manga/game/whatever… O_o;

I don’t know who she’s cosplaying… Guys will certainly agree that she’s hawt though. As if those *looks* from the guys on the left of the pic aren’t enough proof of that =P

I was surprised that someone decided to cosplay as Hino of Kin-iro no Corda. Even more awwstruckingly surprising was how she actually played Pachelbel’s Canon with her violin…! O_O

There were 2 pairs of Ranka x Sheryl cosplayers in the con, one of which showed the yuri-esque side of the relationship lool. The above pic is actually a “hybrid”, Ranka#1 with Sheryl#2.

So here we have Sheryl #1

Who is reconciled with Ranka her love, and yuri rabu rabu ensues. Or so the guys wished =P
The crowd was cheering “Yuri! Yuri!” while they were performing this “yuri-ish friendship act”

And the other pair, Ranka x Sheryl #2, the same Ranka who joined the karaoke competition (refer to part 1 of this post).

Amazingly detailed costume! She’s cosplaying Asagi of the J-Rock D (an androgynous MAN, or TRAP, for short). See the real one here.

Sgt. Keroro also campaigned for presidency… to RULE THE WORLD, LOL. He even ‘hired’ a campaign manager

Beyond the Catwalk

Some of the notable cosplayers who weren’t part of the catwalk, the ones loitering around the place, strutting their stuff:

Kururu from Air Gear, definitely moe~ Oh and she’s part of the Air Gear group cosplay.

Shinigami-sama and Death the Kid, father and son :3

Someone actually cosplayed Cheese-kun ROFL XDDD

Glad I spotted this one, the ‘evil’ Princess Claire from Princess Tutu~! Ahh, I feel like rewatching it now.

I fail for not having spotted the Gojo and Hakkai cosplayers that someone else did, though D: I was too focused on the catwalk to look around for costrippers (from the root word ‘costrip’ – cosplay trip, which means you attend a convention in a cosplay but with no intentions to join the catwalk/competition).

The Group Cosplays

First up in the group cosplay competition was the PoT team, which seriously lacked manpower (well all of them were girls after all, but that’s not it) and had to resort to having one of the members do a “double cosplay”, switching from the Hyoutei side to the Seigaku lol. I honestly don’t know which PoT characters they were trying to portray, and the performance was rather draggy. They just decided to make up for it with BL moments…

The Battle Royale group cosplay was totally fun and crazy. They acted out various scenes from the movie (which I found out from my officemates since I haven’t watched it ), dubbed in Tagalog with wacky SFX… all voiced by one talented member of the group. Too bad I wasn’t able to take a video of them… the quality of the ones uploaded in youtube aren’t that good. And I don’t think it’ll be funny unless you understand it in Tagalog :[ But well, since you insist, here’s the link, just don’t expect me to translate it

The Air Gear cosplay group decided to go cheesy and dramatic, as they performed a rollerblade-powered interpretative dance of a medley(?) of songs — the one I can only remember is “I Believe I Could Fly” lolz.

The last performance I witnessed was this WWE group cosplay, which was totally MEH to me since I have no interest in WWE, at all T__T Sadly, I had to take my leave because it was getting late, saddened that I wasn’t able to witness the rest of the group cosplays.

(this one has better video quality, but not embeddable; this other one has better sound quality, but lower video quality x__X)

Fortunately, my fellow countrymen were gracious enough to upload their recorded videos of the event, and so I managed to watch the award-winning Naruto-themed performance of the “Tuxedo Team”, the winner of the group cosplay competition. Boy am I impressed. Awesome choreography in the fight scenes +__+

I’ve lost count how many times I said ‘awesome’ in this post, lol. Goes to show how awesome I found this con experience to be, I guess. No special guests, no silly doramas, just plain ol’ fun — that’s what this con was about

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Related posts:

1. Fun Times @ UP AME 8th Avenue (and a Lame Attempt to Lure Ranka Fans) Part 1
2. Rage Against The COSF*CKERS