For decades, the magic of Disney animation has enchanted and inspired audiences everywhere. From magical princesses, to wicked sea witches, to fan favorite talking animal sidekicks, cosplayers and creators have been so moved by the excitement of these movies, that they have taken on the true challenge of bringing them to life.
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While the final outcomes seem as effortless as the genie snapping his fingers and as fantastical as the shine of Cinderella’s slipper, an immense amount of hardwork and talent goes into each and every one of these creations. Here are 10 ridiculously hard Disney cosplays that fans have pulled off.
Timon & Pumbaa
Inspired by the spectacle of Broadway and by a deep love of Disney’s The Lion King, cosplay husbands Leon and Jamie of Red Lion Cosplay took on the challenge of creating everyone’s favorite duo, Timon and Pumbaa. These amazing costumes actually took over 10 months to make, with Leon and Jamie hand stitching over 320 feet of thread and hand painting every last detail of the cosplay, including over 60,000 dots on Timon’s bodysuit. Pumbaa is just over 7ft long and 4ft wide but despite this, he actually weighs less than Timon, which might be due to just his hair, made of four wigs carefully sewn together into one massive hog hairdo!
While other Disney characters take on a more humanoid form, giving cosplayers at least a pre-made base to work from, taking on Disney’s animal characters requires an even more immense amount of work than usual. This combination of puppetry, sculpting, painting, and sheer hard work makes this cosplay one of the most daring and beautiful Disney cosplays to have ever been pulled off. (Photo credit to Alasdair Watson Photography.)
Rapunzel
Speaking of hairy situations, Disney’s Rapunzel, with her ocean of hair, creates an incredibly unique challenge for cosplayers. Even animating so much hair was a challenge for Disney, making the task of carrying around that much weight in reality a seemingly impossible.
But cosplayer Saikoumaniac remained undaunted at this obstacle, weaving together three incredibly long hair pieces to form the base of the famous locks and then styling them with braids and flowers until the desired result was achieved. In addition to this hair-raisingly difficult task, Saikoumaniac also made a full corset and gown for her project. While wearing this cosplay was surely as much of a difficulty as creating it, the results are incredible and reflect all the hard work put in to its creation.
Belle
Belle’s sweeping, golden gown has been the object of fantasy for any person who has ever dreamed of being a princess, a true icon of romance, adventure, and fairy tale. But while Belle had a magic wardrobe to produce her gown of a lifetime, cosplayers are not so lucky.
Panteronacosplay took on the task of bringing Belle’s dress from screen to life and she did it in under a week, which makes the stunning results all the more noteworthy. Perfectly fit, incredibly sown, and not a flounce out of place, this cosplay glimmers with every bit of the enchantment of the original movie.
Cinderella
As Disney took their own movies from animated to live action, the challenges for cosplayers only grew. Replicating a drawing is one thing, but when faced with the gowns Disney is able to create with its army of designers and stylists, not to mention its high budgets, the task gets that much harder.
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One cosplayer who looked this hardship directly in the eye is Anastasia_Lion. Her rendition of Cinderella’s live action ball gown could pass for the original. Wired with lights, studded with pearls, and carefully sewn together into a sweeping, watercolor daydream, this massive ball gown looks like it stepped right out of a fairy tale realm. Hopefully, unlike in the movie, all this hard work will not be vanishing at midnight.
Summer Elsa
While Elsa’s traditional icy gown has great challenges of its own, this alternative version from Frozen Fever, a Disney short which catches Anna and Elsa in the summertime, is an intricate test all of its own.
With hundreds of tiny flowers and layers of floating fabric, one can only imagine the amount of time and patience it took to manifest this cosplay. There’s an effortless to the overall results created by Briorecosplay that perfectly captures Elsa’s grace, style, and magic. A fitting outcome for a powerful queen as this difficult cosplay comes to life.
Ursula
Sometimes it’s all in the body language, or in this case, the makeup. To become the Sea Witch, Ursula, cosplayer S0alania had to fully recreate the natural lines on her face and creatively apply makeup to bring the character to life instead.
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Taking inspiration from the drag queen Divine, who originally inspired Ursula as well, Alania lifted her eyebrow sky high, donned a palette of pale purple skin, and set off the whole effect with dramatic contact lenses. Truly a work of art!
Esmeralda
The Hunchback of Notre Dame was released during the period called the Disney Renaissance, and while the name doesn’t necessarily speak to the style of the art, the name calls forth a feeling of rebirth and reinvigoration, and indeed all the movies produced during this time were lush and colorful, with a lively joy and opulence.
Capturing this spirit, cosplayer Dressesandcapes brings Esmeralda to life in an array of red, gold, and jewel tones. Her gown spills around her, set off perfectly by her handmade crown and jewelry. The appliquess and edging of the gown are impeccable, the wig is incredibly styled, and altogether this intricate cosplay brings Esmeralda’s strength and beauty to life perfectly.
1920s Tiana
The world of transformative art includes so many instances of artists inspiring other artists. In this case, Hannah Alexander’s rendition of Princess Tiana’s ball gown in the style of the Roaring 20s served as the jumping off point for Cocoasugarcosplay’s incredible work.
Perfectly capturing the base art, the magic of the Princess and the Frog, and the spirit of the 20s, this cosplay pays homage to love, fairy tale, and history. It is an incredible work that from the beading, to the fabrication, to the final products, deserves every accolade.
Maleficent
One of the most treacherous and beautiful villainesses of the Disney collection is Maleficent. The sorceress now appears in two Disney hits, the series under her own name and the animated classic, Sleeping Beauty. In the former, not only does Maleficent have an elaborate headpiece that must be recreated by any cosplayer hoping to due her justice, but also an elaborate set of wings.
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While this could be an obstacle to achieving an amazing Maleficent cosplay, cosplayer Valli_Musonova slays on all levels. Her wings are works of art, comprised of lush feathers that seem to have a life of their own, and her headpiece is point perfect, all of this not even going into the beautiful details of her gown. This challenging cosplay truly met its match.
Khal Jasmine
The world of cosplay makes mashups that might never appear in canonical works possible, as beautifully evidenced by this cosplay, by Cutiepiesensei, of Khal Jasmine. Mixing together two iconic properties, Cutipiesensei cleverly combines elements of the Dothraki tribe from Game of Thrones with Princess Jasmine’s traditional Aladdin outfit.
The result is a masterclass in design and cosplay, a transporting work of fashion that reveals mastery of the craft. Khal Jasmine, in a palette of Jasmine’s traditional sea green fading down into a Khal’s desert hues, arakh’s in hand, looks ready to lead Agrabah and take the seven kingdoms in one fell swoop.
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