With Halloween less than a week away, you might be in that familiar situation where your costume choices aren’t limited to what you want to go as, as they are what you can get at the last minute (or, in my case, shipped via Amazon Prime by Friday).
While people might not be talking quite as much about Stranger Things, the Netflix’s ’80s homage creepfest, as they were a month ago, you can still pull together a costume that’s going to have those who binged the series going “Heyyyyy – I know who you are…”
First stop, someone at Amazon has smartly put together an intelligent response page to the query “Stranger Things costume.” Instead of getting a bunch of pop culture mashup t-shirts, you get some very relevant costume items. The Waupaca t-shirt and two-tone trucker cap are perfect if you want to go as Dustin. Sadly, I couldn’t find a jacket that was as mind-blowingly ’80s as Will’s deer hunter jacket; but the First Class windbreaker definitely has the right throwback style.
But what about accessories? Those are a little harder to find. Still, I have a few to suggest.
First, no matter if you’re going as Will or Eleven, you’ll need a calculator watch. Luckily, Casio makes one that’s perfect. The Casio CA53W sports a digital display, is water resistant (for those times you’ll need to spend in the sensory deprivation pool), and most importantly has a full function calculator built in. The buttons are really, really teeny (I remember them as being bigger when I was a kid; but then maybe it’s just that my eyes aren’t what they used to be); but it’s the look we’re going for here. The Casio is exactly the kind of throwback retro touch that you need to complete your costume. It doesn’t hurt that it’s less than $15 on Amazon.
To put things over the top (because some people need as many accessory clues as possible to figure out a costume), you should grab a Trapper Keeper to carry around with you (and maybe keep some D&D character sheets in). When I was in grade school, these were the only binders that a self-respecting student carried around with them. They no longer come with Pocket Portfolios like the old school Trapper Keepers, but you can pick those up separately (if you’d like to use them after you’re done tricking out your costume). They do, however, now have a magnetic closure instead of the always-breaking snap closure. I even found a Darth Vader version while I was researching that I immediately picked up to house my Edge of the Empire RPG materials.
Speaking of D&D, you could bring the whole ensemble home with a classic AD&D Monster Manual. Then, when people ask if you know where the Demogorgon is, you can pop open the page and tell them all about its stats and attack values. If you’re feeling really ambitious and want to get something that you could brain denizens of the Upside Down with, grab a Skullsplitter metal dice set. They’re super-heavy (there’s no overroll on these babies), they come in a gift-worthy metal container, and there are a ton of decos to choose from – I particularly like the Industrial Metal set that they sent over. You could also grab a D&D Starter Set if you wanted to have some pen and paper adventures of your own once Halloween was done.
So go forth! Get your Stranger Things on! Just watch out for blinking lights and maybe keep some Eggos handy.
Disclaimer: Casio, Mead, and SkullSplitter Dice were kind enough to send materials along for this article. Opinions are of the slug beast that emerged last week from my cooling corpse.
