It’s funny. Every October Swan Fungus web traffic explodes. I guess when you spend six years writing Friday Top Ten lists about Halloween costumes your Google Rank is positively affected. It’s a shame, too, because I’ve written a few hundred top ten lists (I’ve barely written any this year) and no one seems to care about any of them except for the Halloween costumes. I guess the nerd/audiophile community cares about my list of the best/worst classical composers of all time. But other than that the most popular pages are Sunday mix tapes and my investigation into whether or not Gail Simmons was fat last summer. The two most popular Halloween costume lists are from 2008 (The Dead Heath Ledger Year) and 2009, in case you were wondering.
I’m supposed to attend a number of Halloween parties this year (at least four that are already scheduled, none of which are actually ON Halloween). So it’s important that I put together a good costume or two. That might make this year’s top ten list the most important one yet. It’s as if…I’m actually beginning to…care.
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2010
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2009
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2008
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2007
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2006
The Top Ten Halloween Costumes Evan Has Worn (2005)
The Top Ten Halloween Costume Ideas For 2011
10. Macho Man Randy Savage – You all know I’m a big proponent of costumes on the cheap. So if you want your “bare essentials” Macho Man costume I’d say just wear a lot of neon colors and walk around with handfuls of Slim Jims. If you want to get into it and try to hit a homerun with the sunglasses and the cowboy hot and all the other accessories, be my guest. I just wouldn’t advise dressing as the Macho King (an embarrassing little anecdote from Savage’s wrestling career), as purple underwear paired with a crown and scepter could have people guessing any number of costumes when they forgot all about the brief reign of the Macho King atop the WWF.
09. Doug Hutchison – A few years ago I would have said that dressing as the character Horace Goodspeed on LOST was a respectable idea. And I likely would have said that dressing as Doug Hutchison, the actor who played Horace Goodspeed, was a really nice, obscure costume idea. But this year Doug made headlines because he married a 16-year-old in Las Vegas. So if you want to dress as Doug this year, all you have to do is show up at your party with a criminally underaged girl in a bikini on your arm and everyone will applaud you for the effort. And really, in 2011, you can’t dress as a character from LOST anymore, so this is the closest all of you LOST nerds are going to get to recapturing the glory of the LOST years. Dress as Doug. Dress as a pedophile. Find the right creepy-young looking girl and you’ll be the star of your party. Hey, you might even get laid.
08. Sexy Antelope Carcass – Stun all the “Sexy (insert person/deity/animal)” girls at the party this year by dressing as a sexy dead, rotting creature. You’ll impress all the sluts AND you’ll impress the girls that go too far trying to perfect their zombie bride costumes. Or you could be a slutty leprous street beggar. I mean, doesn’t every third world country have leprous street beggars? They’re pretty easily recognizable, right? So why not flip the paradigm on its head and dress as a slutty leper? Hell, you could mix and match the two costumes and be a slutty hollowed-out Antelope carcass or a sexy leper instead of a sexy dead animal or whorish leper. Either one should do the trick.
07. Alex Rodriguez circa 2011 – This is pretty simple. Find a blonde dyke to pretend date you for the night, then swing and miss every time someone goes to give you a high five. Because that’s what A-Rod did in his last at-bat of the 2011 season. This costume works best if you’re already a closet case homo. Try to make sure your blonde dyke date has larger muscles than you.
06. Human Centipede – I like to include at least one group costume whenever possible in my annual Halloween costume ideas lists. And since HC2 was finally released in the states last week, it should be pretty obvious that this is my recommended group costume for the year. But seriously…if you and a friend or two could pull off a decent Human Centipede costume you would be the star of your Halloween party. And if you’re hosting the Halloween party, you need these stationed all over your house/apartment. You can do it. I have faith in you.
05. Your Favorite Character From The Wire – The greatest show in the history of television, which I’d never seen prior to 2011, could be a fantastic avenue for a Halloween costume this year. And because everyone who has seen the entire series agrees that it is the best show in television history, you’re bound to make at least one new friend at the party. Even better than making new friends is, of course, justifiable black face!
04. Dumpster Baby – You know those guys who dress up as Oscar the Grouch by finding a trash can that will fit around them? You’re going to do that, but there will also be a coat hanger fitted around your head to look like it’s going through your skull. Now you’re a dumpster baby. Feel free to act like a total dick to anyone at the party. You can use the excuse that no one ever wanted or cared for you. You’re a dumpster baby, you can get away with murder if you want to.
03. Asian Stink Bug – These things are actually spreading outside of Allentown now, according to news reports. And instead of just calling it the Asian Stink Bug like we did it college CNN is referring to it as the “Brown Marmorated Stink Bug.” I guess that sounds more technical. Who cares. I might have been the only Muhlenberg student in my time there that didn’t experience firsthand the smell of a stink bug. I always seemed to clear them out of my dorm rooms and apartments without issue. So why would you want to dress as a stink bug? Well, isn’t it obvious? You’ve got carte blanche not to shower and to stink like ass all night without any threat of embarrassment. I mean, it’s your costume! Just don’t plan on getting laid.
02. Occupy Wall Street – This is a female only costume. Well, I guess it could be a female and gay male costume. You basically have to walk around with a fake “Wall St.” sign on you all night, getting drunker and drunker, and asking people you want to sleep with if they want to “occupy” you. They’ll get the hint. You’ll thank me in the morning. Oh yeah, and remember: condoms are for the 99%.
01. Any other dead celebrity you can think of – The first party of my Halloween season this year is a dead celebrities party. So I’m not entirely sure if I should dress as ANY dead celebrity or one who died specifically in 2011. Nate Dogg crossed my mind. People who ALMOST died but were in comas for a while (Bryan Stow, Gabrielle Giffords) crossed my minds. Really the cheapest way to emulate a dead celebrity is to find their picture in a newspaper or magazine (hell, you could even print it off the computer if you have a decent color printer) and tape it to your face.
Or, you know, you could don that gay-ass Robert E. Lee jacket you just found at the vintage shop with your skinny jeans and Palestinian scarves to pretend you’re an East Side hipster again. It never gets old.
Robbie The Werewolf – Rockin’ Werewolf
