People have been cosplaying as Link and Zelda (and even Ganon) since the series first debuted, but those guys are (relatively) easy. They’re bipedal, they wear clothes, you put some make-up on, get a weapon, boom, you’re cosplaying as a Nintendo character. But what about Breath of the Wild’s Guardians, those giant stone warriors that shoot lasers out of their face, surely a human being couldn’t realistically cosplay as one of those?
Of course they can. It just takes brilliance, hard work and some very simple tricks of the trade. This is Allison Chase, someone who specialises in large, complicated cosplay, taking to the floor of Orlando’s MegaCon earlier this year as one of the ruined Guardians:
The size, the detail, the glowing, the way it plays music and sound effects, the way the eyeball lights up and changes like it’s about to actually blast a laser bolt across the convention floor....it’s perfection. By now though you’re probably thinking, like I did originally, is this even cosplay? Isn’t that just a robot, or a statue? Nope, it’s still cosplay. Chase is sitting inside the Guardian on a stool:
And is able to move and control the Guardian much the same way that Kenny Baker was able to move R2-D2's head while being stuck inside, by spinning the various sections while seated:
To give you another idea of how big this thing is, and how it all came together, look at this video of the Guardian being transported to the convention, a process that involved disassembling the whole thing, moving it on a truck with some dudes then putting it all back together again:
You can see more of Allison’s incredible cosplay work, including a Power Loader from Aliens, an entire Catbus from Totoro and very articulated Snowball from Rick & Morty, at her TikTok page.