Michael

I don’t know about you, but I love Halloween. Hardly anyone knows the history of Halloween and I doubt if many people care about how Samhain became known as Halloween (I do, but that’s just me), but nonetheless All Hallow’s Eve is celebrated widely. It seems most people see Halloween as a day to cut loose and partake in a little bit of theatricality. I have mounds of respect for anyone that puts a good deal of thought and work into their costume. The way I see it you have 364 days a year to be “normal” and one day to be anything you want, so why not prepare a bit? That’s the real beauty of Halloween. You get to roam the streets looking hilarious or just plain terrifying and don’t have to worry about the nice men in white coats taking you away to a padded room. What I can’t stand are half-baked costumes.

Sure, there are people who just use October 31st as another excuse to get loaded just like any other night, except in costume. I used to look at them in disgust but I figure that on Halloween there should be little to hold someone accountable since you have that one night to be as nuts as you really are. Considering that the Gaels used to sacrifice animals and humans in fire on Samhain, having one too many drinks ain’t so bad. Just give the car keys to your friend and all that. But please, if you’re going to do all that partying, at least make a good costume and maybe use a mask to hide your shame!

Me at the NYC halloween parade

Toronto loves Halloween and it really shows. I could almost swear that there are more people who put up Halloween decorations in October than those who go through the trouble of Christmas lights in December. Everywhere you look there’s cobwebs, a bloody something or other, ghosts and black and orange everything. Each year I see more Halloween pop-up shops appear around the GTA and they keep getting better and better. Of course the Zombie Walk is great fun and I’m always impress by how many undead show up for the shuffle. The only city I’ve been to that tops Toronto in terms of enthusiasm for this holiday is New York. There is a year-round costume shop where you can literally get every little piece you need for a fantastic costume. That includes makeup, hats, boots (not those extremely annoying boot tops seen on so many crappy costumes), prosthetic teeth, contact lenses, smoke machines — you name it, they got it. One of my personal favourite costumes (undead skeleton pirate) that I put together was made possible by that shop when I lived in NYC. Don’t think badly of me but I loved that my costume actually scared quite a few people when I hit up the New York Halloween Parade because it was so “lifelike” and I acted the part perfectly.

Toronto is fast catching up to NYC though. This year there is the Queen West Halloween Parade and I’m interested to see how it goes down. My sources at the West Queen West BIA tell me that they plan to make it a yearly tradition, just like the Village Halloween Parade in New York. It’s unfortunate when Halloween falls on a work night, as it does this year. The upshot, however, is that you actually get to celebrate more than once since people take advantage of the weekend before Halloween to get some mileage out of their outfits. This past weekend I had a great time at Silver Snail Comics’ annual Halloween bash and I was delighted to see that every single person in the room, except two, had great costumes.

I just can’t stand half-assed costumes. The two people at the Silver Snail party that made me want to hit them with my bloody prop axe were the guys in the “Clark Kent” and “Kip” from Napoleon dynamite costumes. Every year there seems to be a significant number of what I call “cop out costumes” and it drives me bananas when I see them next to all the people who spent the time to give Halloween the respect it deserves. Last year the most popular cop-outs where “Don Draper” and “Joan Holloway” of Mad Men…LAAAAAMMMME! How many Clark Kents and leggy women with devil horn hairbands, tiny tridents and even tinier skirts can one take!?

Guerilla Printing made these

Although I may sound like a costume nazi, I also get some flack for my costumes some years. Sometimes people treat me as if I am actually the character I am costumed as. That’s the trade off – if you make your costume too good people will somehow unconsciously believe that you are capable of performing whatever feat that made the reference character notable. In my case the feat would have been serial axe murders. I pulled off a very convincing Patrick Bateman (from American Psycho complete) with a clear plastic raincoat, lots of fresh looking blood (courtesy of Casie Stewart), earphones playing Huey Lewis and the News, and Patrick Bateman business cards printed up by the good folks at Guerilla Printing. They’ve done a few jobs for me in the past and I’m always satisfied. Make sure to check them out for all your printing needs.

On the way to the party people would pull over and tell me that “I’m creeping everyone out,” to which I would reply, “exactly!” Needless to say I didn’t score any digits because I’m pretty sure I repulsed a good percentage of the crowd,

Mission Accomplished.

Here are the pics from the Silver Snail Halloween Bash 2011