2020 Halloween Costumes: the good, the bad and the ugly
A wealth of extraordinary events in 2020 created a wealth of potential Halloween costume ideas; however, that doesn’t mean you should have actually worn all of them. NICO VALENTINE, Staff Photographer
In these trying times, I often find myself clinging to traditions and events more so than usual, trying to savor things that give me a sense of normalcy. Halloween started for me and my roommates Sept. 1, when we decorated our house and watched “An American Werewolf in London” on a projector in our backyard. Since then, we’ve watched an array of classic scary movies.
Leading up to the day itself, we’ve watched a movie every night and worn costumes to really bring out the Halloween spirit. Some of those costumes have been funny, others have not. Our experiments with different outfits had me thinking: what are the best and worst – or the good, the bad, and the ugly – 2020 Halloween costumes? Here’s a comprehensive guide.
The Good
Goldfish
“The snack that smiles back” was my first and easiest costume created for our movie nights. It’s beautiful in its simplicity – simply wear all yellow (or orange, if you want to be “flavor-blasted”) and put a pair of sunglasses on your head.
Controversially, this is hilarious. I’m constantly baffled by how truly anything can be marketed as sexy and at this point, I just have to respect it. Sexy hand sanitizer also seems more feasible than sexy toilet paper.
Honor your local mail carrier and support the United States Postal Service by dressing up as a mail carrier. With a half-sleeve button up, a patch and a satchel, you can easily have the entire room clinging to the edge of their seat for their order.
The Bad
Yourself but in high school
This is a good one to do with a group, especially when you need a secondary costume for multiple nights of Halloween. The best way to do this is to find an old picture of yourself and try to recreate it to the best of your ability. Some may be harder than others. The problem is trying to relive high school doesn’t ever really work out for anyone.
Movie characters
My friends and I have done a lot of these, from Robert Pattinson in “The Batman,” to Robert Pattinson in “Twilight.” I put a lot of gel in my hair so we could do characters from “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.” They’re just pretty generic, at the end of the day.
The Beatles
Put on a suit and comb your bangs to cover your forehead. Simple. And also derivative.
The Ugly
Tiger King’s Joe Exotic or Carol Baskin
Remember season one of quarantine? Curling up on the couch and binge-watching the feud between Joe Exotic and Carol Baskin is a fond memory from when we thought COVID-19 would be over in a month. The issue is these costumes don’t feel like a fun throwback; more like a depressing reference to a depressing time.
What better way to honor frontline workers than objectifying them?