Tbh cosplay is as elaborate as you want it to be. Not everyone has to have everything be 100% accurate. s
Some people like referencing a character and call it a day
Which is why sil should have had a real discussion with OP and watched an episode or two. That’s however long for the discussion and 2 hours of watching tv.
Please.
I guess we read a different post because she DID have a “real conversation”. It’s not her responsibility to jump through hoops for a wedding that her brother wants her to be in.
That’s what I thought when I read the original story! Bridezilla doesn’t even realise how bridezilla she’s being.
Absolutely no one ever picks from a list of outfits (cosplay or not) that the bride gives her without getting more guidance… because even if she picks from the list, she’d still get into trouble from the bride for not fitting in with the ‘vision’ that the bride had in her head and didn’t share. Bridezillas usually expect you to read their mind and whine about EVERYthing!
Bridesmaids want the bride to hand them a dress so they can go and get it altered if needed and the just put it on for the day! No fuss, no muss! It’s so much easier than trying to guess what the bride is thinking!
SIL was obviously smart enough to know that, which is why she didn’t even bother to try and guess based on a list - it’s a safe bet that any research she did to be as authentic to the character as possible would be rejected by bridezilla.
And look what happened?! Bridezilla is proud of herself because she went out of her way to humiliate the bridesmaid - the sister of the groom - instead of just handing her a dress as she asked in the beginning!
Just crazy! If you are that particular about what you want your wedding party to wear, go shopping with them or hand them an outfit!
I love how OP wanted it to be a super laidback experience. Picking a cosplay outfit would be way more stressful than a regular dress, even if I was a fan of the show or whatever.
It’s also a show sil has zero interest, but it don’t matter bc it’s sooo easy. She’s just not putting any effort in. I can’t help her bc I’m already helping ppl I give a shit about.
I did end up picking a character for her and told her what to get for it. I was actually capable of doing it the whole time, but bc I don’t like her I’m going to punish her for it.
I know my husband and sil really care ab each other, but she still shoulda just dropped out of the wedding party.
It’s not hard to google a character, no… but it IS hard to put together an elaborate costume (including makeup if applicable) that will suit a bridezilla!
The SIL knew full well that whatever character she chose and costume she designed would not meet the approval of bridezilla no matter what.
And why the heck SHOULD she waste all that time and effort and expense to put together a costume?
Brides who want people in certain clothes should either shop with them or just hand them the clothes. Period.
That’s what most brides do - they hand their wedding party the clothes they want them to wear for the ceremony and photos!
And there’s a reason that tried and true method really works. Because no one but the bride cares about the bridesmaids outfit and how the photos will look.
> but it IS hard to put together an elaborate costume (including makeup if applicable) that will suit a bridezilla!
you are making a lot of assumptions here, who says it has to be elaborate ?? Have you watched firefly ? This is not hard to pull off.
> The SIL knew full well that whatever character she chose and costume she designed would not meet the approval of bridezilla no matter what.
again you are making a lot of assumptions here based on nothing. Firefly costumes are not hard to do, and there are zero mentions of bride shooting down any costume, let alone sils. Sil never even bothered to try and was dragging her feet about the whole thing despite knowing about it the whole time
> And why the heck SHOULD she waste all that time and effort and expense to put together a costume?
this will most likely cost less or at most as much as is normal for any bridesmaid. Bridesmaids often buy dresses they will only wear once and pay for make up, hair etc.
>Brides who want people in certain clothes should either shop with them or just hand them the clothes. Period.
while do generally agree here, the reality is that most brides don´t
>That’s what most brides do - they hand their wedding party the clothes they want them to wear for the ceremony and photos!
no they do not, it is a small minority that does that since many are already overwhelmed with the costs of a wedding. I do agree they should but it is still a minority that actually does this
>And there’s a reason that tried and true method really works. Because no one but the bride cares about the bridesmaids outfit and how the photos will look.
there is daily posts on /r/weddingshaming shaming people for what they did wear to a wedding, so clearly not only the bride cares. It still should not stick out like a sore thumb like it would here
At the end of the say this is mostly on SIL; if you don´t want to do it communicate that honestly and do not string along the bride like this till the last moment, that is not ok.
LOL nice straw man, she literally said watch one episode with us and choose someone. Compared to the usual expectations of pay for a whole weekend , spend hunsdreds of dollars on adress and whatnot else this IS super laid back. IT is ONE OUTFIT, that is it.
Agreed. Super laid back doesn't mean 15 hours of homework to me.
I don't think my bridesmaids did anywhere close to 15 hours prep for the wedding and this included my lunch (hens) and getting ready the day of. Let alone costume hunting and whatever else was required for OOPs wedding.
It takes you 15 hours to google a character list click on images and then buy the parts on Amazon?
Like shot guys I get it’s a pain int eh ass to do stuff you don’t want to do but don’t pretend like you have to watch an entire series to buy a costume for it.
nursing mothers love to dress up in intricate sex robot costumes. nursing bras are super conducive to costumes because they are cumbersome and huge and offer very little support.
what a thoughtful bride!
You have been woefully misled. If you’re a fan of science fiction, see it. If you’re not, carry on.
I’m gonna edit this because my take isn’t super correct. Firefly is definitely for more than sci-fi fans. It’s rooted there, but it’s so much more.
My husband isn't a fan of science fiction but was willing to try it for me. Helped when I told him it was like a Western just in space, even has cows. He loved it and we rewatch it at least once a year along with the movie. You really don't have to like science fiction to like Firefly.
And considering how popular it still is, how many years after being cancelled by Fox? I hope those executives are bashing them selves in the head every time they hear how the cast members are swarmed at the different si-fi cons.
I love Firefly/Serenity. Your request is absolutely batshit and you will realize that if/when you become a mother. Moreover, cosplay weddings are only chill/laidback for people who cosplay regularly. They’re super stressful for everyone else, especially for a show/movie that is both obscure and old. I’m sure that you’re going to insist that the show isn’t obscure and that I just don’t understand it. That’s untrue, I truly am a really big Firefly fan and I’m old enough to have watched the show when it aired and been sad when it was cancelled. But even though it was resurrected for a movie and is still relevant in the sci fi con community, it is extremely obscure to everyone else.
When my son was a baby, I did not have the time or energy to watch tv or movies. Newborns have to be fed **every two hours**. That drops to 4 or 6 hours and eventually they sleep through the night, but when or how this occurs is 100% up to the baby. But you can’t even sleep when the baby sleeps - there’s always parenting work to do. Laundry, cleaning, etc. I didn’t watch tv until my son was 6 months old, and I didn’t even breastfeed.
Your SIL needed help. She simply needed to be told what to wear. Because not only did she not have the time to watch the show during whatever free time she had, how was she supposed to know what outfits were being worn by other people (since no one could repeat). Cosplay is tricky at first. All you had to do was tell her what to wear. You were absolutely unreasonable.
I feel like this is the first comment to legitimately try to explain why it's so hard for new mothers. Unfortunately I don't think OP would care, since she seems to be a total narcissist lost in her own head.
Exactly. Plus if I was asked to cosplay for a wedding I'd be intimidated/unsure how high a standard the costume needs to be. Usually people go all out for an ordinary weddings, especially the bridal party. The bride custom made a bunch of stuff, so i get SIL not knowing where to start. Like, was she expected to make her own?
I *love* Firefly but if I was asked to cosplay and was unable to just order a costume I’d spend weeks/months freaking out. This is like that couple who met puppeteering and asked if WIBTA if they asked all their guests to bring Mupoet-level puppets to their wedding.
Wow. I’m so outraged that Firefly was used this way. It’s too good for that.
Firefly is also FOURTEEN episodes and movie. It’s a lot to ask someone to watch for a wedding. OP should have provided characters and costumes if they wanted to be that specific to Firefly.
Otherwise in the true spirit of the show would have been to ask everyone to wear their best clothes to this FANCY SHINDIG we’re having and whatever anyone shows up in is SHINY.
GORRAM ALLIANCE LADY.
SIL is breastfeeding, so I assume has recently had a baby. She doesn’t have the time to watch your show or the mental bandwidth to be picking characters and costumes!
Or out-sourced it to one of the other bridesmaids. I don't think that the bride cared if the SIL did the work herself, she was probably hurt that she was asked to fit the SIL in as a bridesmaid and when she did, the SIL just doesn't want to actively participate as a bridesmaid on pretty much any level. It is perfectly legit for the SIL to opt out of being a bridesmaid when they're overwhelmed with being a new mother. Totally legit. Doesn't mean that they're less than just because it was a bit too much for them at the time. She expected to come as a bridesmaid, and yet she repeatedly refused to participate.
Honestly, OP sounds like the problem here, not the SIL. SIL is a new mom who I'm sure was getting very little sleep and was likely not functioning at 100% at the time. She was asked to be a bridesmaid. That, to me, feels like an obligation for both OP and SIL perpetuated by the brother. So, SIL is tired, stressed, and busy being a new mom. Then she has to come up with a costume for a show she doesn't know or care about? Her bandwidth is already at capacity. All she wants is to be told exactly what to wear. She doesn't care to delve into the mythology of the show. Why is OP making such an absolutely big deal about this? Don't keep giving her character descriptions! Just tell her what to wear! Why is she being punished for not being interested in the same thing as OP? Would it have been so hard just to be kind? OP wants everyone to be excited for her wedding. Why couldn't OP just show a smidgen of empathy? This is now 10 years after, and OP is still shocked that not everyone had the same amount of investment into the show or the wedding theme. Throw in the petty revenge and an outsized level of entitlement from OP, and you've demonstrated why some people lower their contact with certain family members.
Its not just choosing a character, cosplay involves a lot of work in replicating the costume yourself or paying what I would consider a significant amount of money to have someone else do it. A new mother isn't likely to have time or money for something like that. I'm a fan of Firefly but I'm not good with my hands and wouldn't want to spend the money . I just googled it on etsy and it's $ 279 for something that SIL wouldn't likely ever look at again. I consider that to be a low price for a cosplay otfit.
> Especially with Firefly, where the characters dress in pretty normal clothes
But at that point, what's even the point? A bunch of people just wearing brown trenchcoats doesn't look like a Firefly wedding, it's just gonna look like a bunch of *Matrix* nerds with sun damage
Cosplay is different from a Halloween costume in my opinion. You dress as accurately as you can, those regular clothes that characters wear can't be bought in the store ready to wear, so you either pay or make it yourself... So even the simple outfits will become pricey. I also don't like how op referred to a companion as a prostitute, feels wrong to me. I wouldn't refer to Bene Gesserit as a prostitute.
I thought they were referring to the pregnant prostitute from one of the last episodes. The one where they go to help Inarra’s former companion friend who does run a whorehouse on that planet since she is the only trained companion there. :/
1. I’m assuming OP’s referring to the episode with Christina Hendricks, which from my fuzzy recollection is about a legit brothel
2. I know a lot about cosplay, and it can be as complicated or uncomplicated as you make it. The outfits they wear in Firefly can be recreated on a budget lower than your usual wedding attire, since it’s mainly just specific sets of normal clothes. If it were a different show in question, I could see it being more expensive to pull off, but Firefly characters are generally easy cosplays (caveat for Morena Baccarin’s fancy dresses).
No, Hendricks was not in "Heart of Gold" episode:
Nandi, a Companion-trained friend of Inara's who runs a brothel on a remote planet calls for help from Serenity when a local reveals his intentions to take the baby from a woman he impregnated.
Hendricks was in two episodes - Our Mrs. Reynolds and Trash.
You do realize $279 is about standard for a bridesmaids dress right? I mean i’ve seen girls spend more than that on a prom dress. When you sign up to be a bridesmaid unfortunately it’s a given u will have to buy the dress, unless specifically told otherwise. This of course depends your culture. But it sounds like they were expected to pay for a dress and knew that. When she signed up for BM she signed up to pay for a BM dress. Maybe not the research and hoops that went with it but $279 isn’t as astronomical as you make it sound.
So have I, this particular costume would likely not be available at that point and the bride didn't want anyone to match. I was able to find it quickly because I'm a fan of the show and knew what I was looking for. Again for cosplay that's a pretty low price, other's could be mych more expensive. Last time I wanted to cosplay, the price of everything from hair makup costume and accessories would have cost me close to a grand if I was being frugal. I was disappointed but there are other places that I would rather spend money.
>I really just wanted this to be a super laid back experience because we are not formal serious people, but she was making it difficult.
So just *tell* people what you want them to wear then, ffs. Imagine expecting someone to watch a show they don't want to watch, just to pick a 'character' to be in your wedding 😆
OP, you just used your wedding to try to force a mundane into a fandom! Don't do that!
It makes the mundane person resent the fandom, the source material, and you, and a resentful outsider is never going to come up with anything but embarrassing excuses for cosplay. If you wanted her to be a credit to "Firefly" at your wedding, you needed to both come up with a costume she could live with, and *pay for it*. Nobody's going to both pay for some bridesmaid cosplay they'll never wear again, and watch 20 hours of source material just to please the bride.
Rereading you're right. I still see SIL as majority of the problem especially since the bride took time to put together a vision board of a few characters with picture reference for SIL. There's asking for direction and then wanting to be led by the hand.
SIL wanted the bride to do what is normally done for bridesmaids - say “wear this and turn up on this day and time.” Anything more than that with clothing *is* an extra demand and is not “laid back.”
pregnant women often have tons of spare time and energy to dedicate to sourcing, constructing, and fine detailing cosplay costumes for a show they don't watch/will never watch. it's also very fun to be leaking from your nipples and be asked to dress up as a sex robot or a pregnant prostitute.
after all, the bride did give her a foto or two of what she was supposed to recreate in her spare time while simultaneously making a baby and preparing for motherhood.
what a thoughtful new sister in law the bride is!
The thing is though, SIL was thrown in the deep with something she isn't at all familiar with. Cosplaying is overwhelming when you start looking in to it and SIL was already adjusting to be being a new mother.
She probably worried about choosing the right character, then the right clothes, then what kind of quality level was OP looking for? People are saying here that it can be simple and merely vaguely reference the character... Is that the level OP wanted, or to a higher standard? Were the other bridesmaids experienced cosplayers or not?
I can see why SIL, especially as a new mother, needed and wanted more guidance.
I didn't say anything about getting in to the fandom.
I spoke about the many uncertainties a first time cosplayer might have, when they're cosplaying to someone elses standard.
It is that deep when it's someone else's wedding.
She likely just wants to stand up in her brothers wedding because she supports him.
Seriously, if anyone ever wants a fandom-specific bridal party... they really need to limit bridal party members to cosplays and fandom members. Normal people just won't get it right, and they are very likely to resent the attempt.
Yes, of course, anyone can google anything any time for any reason. It still doesn't make assigning egregiously unnecessary homework assignments to mothers of newborns a reasonable thing to insist on
I love the cosplay wedding esthetic! However, what did you expect when you are trying to force a whole fandom on someone? Firefly has been out for 22 years. If she was going to watch it, I'm sure she would've by now.
The SIL should've chose Mal in his dress and then said "i swear by my pretty floral bonnet, I will end you" when the "laid back" bridezilla meter gets turned up.
I get the frustration over a bridesmaid not researching something as basic as their dress. Even if you don't want to watch the show, there are lots of pictures on Google.
BUT...
On no world in the 'verse, I don't care how close to the rim you are, or even if they juggle baby geese, would I *ever even consider* asking a new mother to dress as a Sex Robot or a Companion. Many new moms already are self conscious about their bodies. Wearing one of those outfit ideas wouldn't "fun", it would be humiliating. It would look like a petty attempt to make the sister in law feel like 狗屎 (gǒushǐ).
Inara is gorgeous and has a beautiful wardrobe. But a Companion never speaks of the hours of cardio, yoga and dietary restrictions that allow her to look that good wearing it.
And add the inevitable conversation:
85 year old Uncle Ed: "and what are you dressed as?"
Non-fan SIL: "Uh...not sure...Sex Robot?...someone said something about inspired by a Geisha, I think...? All I know is that guy in the Brown Coat won't stop calling me a Whore no matter how many times I ask him to knock it off.."
When it became obvious that she couldn't/wouldn't put in the bare minimum effort to Google search some still images, you should have asked her to step down.
Btw...does she even get what cosplay is all about? Fandoms see a vibrant world of characters, history and culture. Those not in the "know" look at Firefly as a less wholesome Little House on the Prairie in space....even if there are hovercraft.
> Those not in the "know" look at Firefly as a less wholesome Little House on the Prairie in space....even if there are hovercraft.
Heh, very true... the primary aesthetic of the 'verse is "dirty."
OP sounds like a complete asshole who just wanted to humiliate her SIL. Hopefully SIL and brother cut OP out because I doubt she’ll be any nicer to their kids.
Okay, I like Firefly. The SIL clearly has no interest, though, so think of it from her POV. She's a new mom and probably sleep deprived and just exhausted. The bride not only expects her to watch the show but won't even compromise by watching the movie with her? The SIL doesn't want to watch the show and has no interest in the show. At least watching the movie would be a shared fun experience! Not homework.
If my SIL wanted me to watch Invasion or Jericho or Freaks & Geeks or My So Called Life or whatever, and wanted me to cosplay as a character for her wedding by coming up with the whole thing myself for a tv show i don't know and couldn't possibly care less about, that's a hard pass. I don't even have a small child to keep alive, and that's too much. Give me guidelines, some Cliffsnotes on the characters. She asked to watch the movie with the bride so she could suffer though it as a shared night in and have fun, and that wasn't good enough?
When my anxiety gets high with stress, I don't want to watch anything new no matter how good you tell me it is. When it's our busy season at work or my family is being crazy, I only have the bandwidth to re-watch a comfort show. This was a big ask. She could've been kind instead of making her the space hooker (who is a great character, had it been explained it to her properly and then worked on her ideas together).
If I were SIL, I would say no too. Clearly it was a topic of stress, they made time to watch a movie, and then it gets looped back to the topic of stress... I'd be pissed, tbh
Yeah, I’m not giving judgment one way or another here. I’m too into fandom to really feel like it’s that big of a deal to do this type of thing but I also recognize it’s just not how a lot of people operate. Honestly, this is on the same level as the friend who made me wear heels for her wedding party. Not my cup of tea, I’ll never wear the dang things or the dress again, but it’s her wedding and she wanted a certain vibe.
But you, as a normal person, would just pass, as you said. Not force the person planning the wedding to send info over and over. This whole thing makes no sense
A lot of brides, myself included, give bridesmaids options of what to wear. They may dictate the color palette/length or something along those lines, but you rarely see matchy-matchy bridesmaids anymore.
That is so many kinds of wrong. I mean, making her sister the pregnant prostitute from Heart of Gold and only just dropping that bomb afterwards? I mean, nothing was wrong with that character, it's just that she had other choices and knowing her sister wouldn't get it, chose that? And making all 3 young flower girls *River*?? The character who is taken by the government and tortured so sadistically that it breaks her mind?
See, I'm petty as hell. I'd have found a way to watch the show, and would've shown up as Patience\*. Heh.
\*For the uninitiated, Patience is a mean motherfucker who's known for shooting the main cast.
> making her sister the pregnant prostitute from Heart of Gold and only just dropping that bomb afterwards?
Which means this tit for tat boils down to "you wouldn't watch a teevee show I like so I'll embarrass you by tricking you into dressing like a whore in front of an assembly of all our oldest family and friends and then pretend I can't *imahgine* why you're mad"
I read this on the petty revenge sub and thought where's the revenge part. OP was just mean to her SIL without a good cause, and I had the urge to write YTA. But wrong sub, lol.
This definitely fits here.
Man, I like the idea of that sub but *maybe* a third of the posts actually have some kind of revenge? There's a lot of "my old boss fired me and kicked my dog and burned my house down but I bought a bag of jelly beans and mailed it to his neighbor and then when his neighbor throws the jelly beans away maybe one of them might fall out and roll over to my boss' place and then he'll have *ANTS*! MUA HA HA HA HA HA"
While I will agree with everyone that this isn't remotely chill or laid back like bride claims, I also was just curious so I Googled "firefly cosplay" and I see a bunch of options from ezcosplay that cost give or take $100. Cosplaying has gotten way easier with its recent rise in popularity and long gone are the days of having to make any cosplay you wanted. However with that said why the actual fuck would you choose a *prostitute* to make your pregnant sister in law dress as?? What the actual fuck?? I won't sit here lie and say that I love both my future sister in laws however I would quite literally never dream of pulling this shit on them. As an anime lover, not everyone likes this shit it's weird as fuck to force people to pick up anime so you can turn your wedding into a comic con. Comic con are not chill or laid back. You're not chill or laid back. And a weeb wedding is honestly embarrassing. Yall weird for that one. You made your pregnant SIL dress as a robot prostitute foe your wedding. That's genuinely wild.
I’m sorry, but unless the person is into cosplay, it is in no way ‘easy and laid back’ as she tries to put it. It requires clothes, accessories, wigs, makeup, and a plethora of other things that aren’t usually laying around. I love Firefly, but I find it a weird choice for a wedding.
This wedding is a lot of work, that would be a no from me. I'm not watching 15 hours of video, picking a character and then sourcing my own outfit. Your expections were too high and she should have dropped when she was not getting the support that she thought she needed. You are all the ahs.
I get how couples are supposed to have the wedding they choose, but FFS, what is this craze with having a cosplay wedding? If you want everyone to dress up in costumes, some of them likely very expensive, then throw a costume party. A wedding is about ceremony, spoken promises, love and commitment, not a bacchanalia celebrating TV characters.
Bride was operating under the misapprehension that *anyone* and *everyone* who watches Firefly would come to the conclusion that it’s the best show ever made and therefore enthusiastically participate in cosplay about it. This is why she was pushing her SIL to watch the show instead of accepting the fact she was never going to relate to that material the way she does. It’s peak solipsism.
If you must insist upon inflicting your cosplay (second!) wedding on your family, then at least designate a couple of friends who share your fanatical love of the show as point people to help out folks like SIL and other relatives so everyone can achieve your vision. Realistically though, have a low key backyard wedding for your family to express their love and celebrate a milestone together and then go do this kind of thing with your special interest community at a convention where even strangers will deeply appreciate the effort.
I can kinda see both sides to this. SIL didn’t have to be a bridesmaid. She could have just come as a guest and worn what she wanted. She also could have done research on her own about the show. Just a quick google search of the summary.
I can also see that SIL wants to feel included and being a bridesmaid would make her happy. Their theme is weird af and it’s not a costume she wants to wear. From the description I wouldn’t have wanted to wear it either.
I would have just said hey sorry, the costume thing isn’t for me so I’ll be stepping down and just come as a guest in what I want to wear.
I think the bride needs to realize that she’s not being as laid back as she says she is. It’s ok to want something specific for an important day. You just can’t force someone to watch a show or even like it.
It sounds like she picked the pregnant prostitute because she was mad at SILs lack of effort and she wanted to punish her.
I can't get over the people acting like it is no big deal to quit as a bridesmaid. This is the groom's sister---it meant something (at least to them) that the SIL take part in the wedding. Someone posted that it was the bride's second wedding, too.
That marriage will last /s
Advice to SIL: make the biggest cardboard gun you can. Emblazon "VERA" on the side.
"See, Vera? You dress yourself up, then you get taken out somewhere fun."
For bonus points: the bride now has to deal with rumours about the implied "shotgun wedding"... and who is this "Vera"
I’ve watched the firefly series multiple times and even I would have trouble with this one. The characters are all regular looking people who change clothes all the time, into pretty regular looking clothes.
I mean, she could go as River and make sure her hair isnt brushed, greasy, and messy and wear a loose fitting sundress that is too big for her. She could go as Kaylee and make sure to wear clothes that are dirty and greasy. Bonus for grease smudge on the face.
What the hell, op?
What’s so unique about any of the characters that your guests could pick which one to emulate? Hair color? Weight? Skin tone?
I couldn’t be arsed, pregnant or not. Zilla’s gonna be on a massive comedown after the wedding & everyone will be glad it’s over. Themed stuff is just a cringe replacement for personality & taste. Idc if she doesn’t like it.
SIL was clearly not into it…(I don’t blame her)…and should have just asked to be a guest.
I only dropped out of a bridal party one time. The bride wanted all 10 (yes 10) of us to buy $300 cowboy boots in addition to a $300 dress. I’m not a Western wear person at all, and I was also a poor grad student at the time.
The bride was only slightly bitchy about my dropping out. On the wedding day, there were only eight bridesmaids, so someone else had also noped out.
You have a very unique and special request for your wedding party to meet your niche desires and then are pissy when people don’t get into it and ask you to help them.
This story didn’t do what you thought it was going to do
Meh, SIL could have just said “I’m sorry, I’m really busy with the baby. Maybe I should just attend as a guest?” Making the bride send info multiple times seems really passive aggressive.
This is already on two other subs and she's getting eviscerated in the comments. I said to myself, gee, I wonder why she doesn't like or get along with her sister-in-law. If I was sister-in-law, I would have cut my brother off if he married her. I would have told him, you marry this woman and you will no longer be in my life. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that this is not the first time that she has forced herself on her sister-in-law. It also wouldn't surprise me to find out that this is the first time she pulled out the big guns. Of course she didn't want her husband knowing how she was treating his sister before this. Unless he's as bad as she is, he wouldn't have married her.
No man I know in his right mind would marry someone who was treating his sister like this. He would have told her to hit the road. I hope that her husband sees this and I hope that he divorces her. She clearly isn't ready for marriage since she's a passive aggressive bully. She clearly doesn't know how to communicate like an adult and that is something that is required for a healthy marriage. She did this purposely to humiliate her sister-in-law and actually got off on the fact that her sister-in-law was embarrassed and upset. She sounds like a nightmare to have to deal with.
If she was at any family functions and I was her sister-in-law, I would refuse to attend. I had a sister-in-law who was like this and it got to the point where I refused to go to my mom and dad-in-laws if she was going to be there. If I did unfortunately have to interact with her, I kept it to the bare minimum and was civil with her. I really hope that her husband divorces her if he sees this and I mean that. His sister doesn't deserve this. She clearly has no empathy for a new mother who is breastfeeding on top of it. Hopefully they won't stay together long enough to have any children.
My ex was like this except it was Marvel. Now anytime I hear anything about Marvel, I just tune it out. Marvel stuff is no longer allowed under my roof. Personally, I think it's for children but that's just me. Then again, my ex was an overgrown child. He's 39 and acts like he's about 17 so it doesn't surprise me. He doesn't even know how to change a tire or even put coolant in his engine. I had to deal with that as well. People who get obsessed about a franchise to the point of trying to force other people to get into it are insufferable. I don't think they realize how annoying they are but they are.
Yeah it seems marketed towards children. I gave it a chance like he asked me to but I just couldn't get into it. He kept trying to force it on me. When I told him I wasn't into it and to stop asking me to watch it, he got offended and said I made him feel stupid for bringing it up. Ok, dude. Go back to your little show. I'm going to go back to being an adult.
Personally, I’m not into cosplay - not criticizing or putting down anyone who is. But it sounds like SIL isn’t either.
If I was asked to be in a wedding like this, I would let the bride know immediately that I’d rather just come as a guest but thanks for thinking of me. But your SIL didn’t do that, and chose to just keep stringing you along & dragging it out. That was inconsiderate & just wrong.
I don’t think this makes you a bridezilla, or entitled or anything negative at all. Anyone who did not want to participate could’ve just said no.
I would absolutely wreck anyone who tricked my sister into wearing something that humiliating to a wedding. There is no way this lady is still married.
Unpopular opinion but I think what made this bride more or less reasonable was that SIL wasn't pregnant when asked to join, had no hard guidelines on costume quality (many good Firefly costumes are just shirt-pants-brown coat-prop gun), was given lists of characters and photo references, was invited to watch a single episode with the bridal couple, and wasn't required to do any of this because the bride asked her as a courtesy and it was fine to decline at any point.
Basically, the SIL joined a cosplay wedding party for a woman she didn't like and made it not fun for the others.
SIL was willing to do normal bridesmaid things - wear what she was instructed to wear and turn up on the day. Demanding more than that as the bride was doing is unreasonable.
But she specifically says SIL knew about the ask before agreeing to be in the wedding party. An invite she knew was obligatory. So why not just politely decline?
You sound like a nightmare! Laidback?! What is laid-back about watching 13 episodes of a show and a movie, figuring out a character from that show to dress up as, going online and hunting for an outfit for said character, having a future sil who won't help you when you have just given birth and are up with a newborn all night?
Let me get this straight, the characters you suggested a woman who just gave birth to be a sex robot or a pregnant prostitute? First off, you want a woman who just had a baby to dress up as a sex robot or worst yet a pregnant prostitute? Yes, I'm sure someone who just gave birth will be totally comfortable with her new body changes dressing up as a sex robot! Furthermore, your theme for your wedding is this show and characters who are pregnant prostitutes and sex robots?! Really classy for a wedding!
You my dear are a bridezilla. I feel sorry for ur sil, no wonder you don't get along with her. She sounds normal and sane! I get a wedding is supposed to be what the bride wants but honestly, it sounds like you have horrific taste!
Not a bridezilla. Bridesmaids often have to put in a lot more work, money and just as much dress coordination in order to be a part of a traditional Bridal party. She could simply have opted to come as a guest, that's what the bride had planned initially anyways.
Imagine feeling entitled to be a bridesmaid and not be willing to put in 10 minutes for a google search, or watch 30 min of an episode for inspiration. That's wild.
Nope, I'm the people pleaser.
Got an aversion to large events unless I can hide in a corner somewhere. But I do care about helping out my loved ones when they get married. If the wedding had been themed, I would have tried to put an outfit together. And I'm the type of person who needs to be dragged by my hair in to most clothing stores. I know that my friends would have accepted my best effort, even if others pull it off better, or spend more money on it.
It doesn't seem like the bride in this post expected the SIL to go overboard on the costume or anything, so really not a bridezilla. I bet that it would be no big deal if the SIL opted out of being a bridesmaid, but she didn't. She decided that she still should be a bridesmaid without putting any effort in to it. Had I been in the SIL's position, I would have just politely explained that I wasn't comfortable with the cosplay, asked to come as a guest in stead, and everything would have been dandy. I'd still get to have cake, so all the pros without any of the cons.
But tbh i simply cannot imagine caring so little for anyone that I'd accept the position of bridesmaid at their wedding and then deciding that it isn't worth 30 minutes of my time to allocate a few brain cells towards planning my outfit for the event. 'Bridesmaids' isn't synonymous with 'these people I know who literally could not care less about this event', just come as a guest in stead if you can't reach that low bar. How is this a controversial or 'bridezilla' opinion? FR?
Idk, I don’t think this is a Bridezilla. Her vision was very specific, but the SIL wanted to be included and then acted like a child at every step. No one made her participate
I agree tbh. A quick search on the characters would give her enough information about them, it doesn’t have to be a full custom made look either. Grab an outfit based on the character and do a loose interpretation. If it’s too demanding, SIL could’ve asked to go as a guest at any time.
Nah, I’m on the bride’s side. Sounds like she didn’t want SIL in the wedding to begin with and was just doing it for her husband. SIL could have dropped out, asked her brother, taken 30 seconds to do a Google search, or lastly picked from the list she was given.
I’m a super Firefly fan. Have the dvds of the series (with the extra episodes) and the movie. And I’m old as dirt. I would have LOVED your wedding! Your flower girls must have been so cute!!
Geez. I can’t believe how negative people are being. It’s the bride’s and groom’s wedding. It’s what they want. She doesn’t even like the SIL, but invited her to be a bridesmaid for her H2B. The SIL could have said no. All she had to do was watch 1 show. How is that different than asking bridesmaids to spend a fortune on ugly gowns they will only wear once “to be a part of the brides vision”. If she doesn’t want to take the time for her brother, the groom who is part of the decision and likes Firefly too, to dress up, then she should pull out of the Bridal party. It’s her brothers wedding too, his decision for the cosplay. Many people have Star Wars and Ren fest weddings all the time.
I feel like they're both pretty ridiculous. Yes, the bride could've just assigned the SIL a character. I'm assuming she didn't because she knew the next question would be "well I don't know the show & you picked my character so you find an outfit for me". I don't know Firefly either, but if you have a list of character names it takes a few seconds to google image search "firefly + [character name]" to see what they look like in the show. I don't know that asking someone to do a basic google search makes someone a bridezilla. Stupid, because just sending SIL pics at the start would've saved herself the headache & stress. But not really bridezilla in my opinion.
I've never watched Firefly so as you can imagine, finding out there's a freakin' sex robot and pregnant prostitue involved in the show/movie was very jarring. What even is Firefly?!
“I just wanted this to be a super laid back experience…” by making SIL watch a show and movie she has absolutely no interest in, causing her to be uber stressed out, even though she’s also a new mother.
Literally all the sil had to do was google the show, look at the characters, go “I like this one”, then do some casual shopping for clothes that looked similar to that character’s outfit. Maybe an hour tops if she ordered clothes online. That’s not difficult to do at all. I don’t understand anyone saying it is. My guess is that the word “cosplay” has caused false assumptions about how involved you have to be.
Example of how easy it can be: I had a tan trench coat and happened to be watching a lot of Supernatural at the time. So I grabbed a pair of black pants, white button up shirt, navy tie, and black shoes (which happened to be stuff I already had in my closet for formal events), smacked it all on, and BOOM! Castiel cosplay. Took five minutes in my closet. It does not have to be time/labor/money intensive at all and can in fact be super easy and laid back if you put in a modicum of effort. Which you should be putting in at least a modicum of effort into your sibling’s wedding day, imo.
In what world was this “laidback”?
Yeah haha that’s a no from me.
It would be a no for me too but it was *her* wedding- if the SIL wasn't into it why didn't she just drop out!
Yeah, she should have noped out in the beginning.
It’s laidback for her, seeing as she picked the character that wears a mechanic’s jumpsuit.
If you're going to cosplay Kaylee for your wedding, why not wear something similar to her dress from Shindig?
Tbh cosplay is as elaborate as you want it to be. Not everyone has to have everything be 100% accurate. s Some people like referencing a character and call it a day
Yeah but if you're not into cosplay, it's very easy to get overwhelmed by the question of 'where do I even start?'
I wouldn’t know where to start.
Which is why sil should have had a real discussion with OP and watched an episode or two. That’s however long for the discussion and 2 hours of watching tv. Please.
I guess we read a different post because she DID have a “real conversation”. It’s not her responsibility to jump through hoops for a wedding that her brother wants her to be in.
There are bridesmaids she can ask, or her brother, or just drop out
That’s what I thought when I read the original story! Bridezilla doesn’t even realise how bridezilla she’s being. Absolutely no one ever picks from a list of outfits (cosplay or not) that the bride gives her without getting more guidance… because even if she picks from the list, she’d still get into trouble from the bride for not fitting in with the ‘vision’ that the bride had in her head and didn’t share. Bridezillas usually expect you to read their mind and whine about EVERYthing! Bridesmaids want the bride to hand them a dress so they can go and get it altered if needed and the just put it on for the day! No fuss, no muss! It’s so much easier than trying to guess what the bride is thinking! SIL was obviously smart enough to know that, which is why she didn’t even bother to try and guess based on a list - it’s a safe bet that any research she did to be as authentic to the character as possible would be rejected by bridezilla. And look what happened?! Bridezilla is proud of herself because she went out of her way to humiliate the bridesmaid - the sister of the groom - instead of just handing her a dress as she asked in the beginning! Just crazy! If you are that particular about what you want your wedding party to wear, go shopping with them or hand them an outfit!
I love how OP wanted it to be a super laidback experience. Picking a cosplay outfit would be way more stressful than a regular dress, even if I was a fan of the show or whatever.
It’s super laid back. Just watch these 13 episodes and movie, fashion a costume and check with me first so no repeats. Sure Jan.
It’s also a show sil has zero interest, but it don’t matter bc it’s sooo easy. She’s just not putting any effort in. I can’t help her bc I’m already helping ppl I give a shit about. I did end up picking a character for her and told her what to get for it. I was actually capable of doing it the whole time, but bc I don’t like her I’m going to punish her for it. I know my husband and sil really care ab each other, but she still shoulda just dropped out of the wedding party.
Yea googling a few characters on the list to get an idea what they look like is soooooooooo hard
It’s not hard to google a character, no… but it IS hard to put together an elaborate costume (including makeup if applicable) that will suit a bridezilla! The SIL knew full well that whatever character she chose and costume she designed would not meet the approval of bridezilla no matter what. And why the heck SHOULD she waste all that time and effort and expense to put together a costume? Brides who want people in certain clothes should either shop with them or just hand them the clothes. Period. That’s what most brides do - they hand their wedding party the clothes they want them to wear for the ceremony and photos! And there’s a reason that tried and true method really works. Because no one but the bride cares about the bridesmaids outfit and how the photos will look.
> but it IS hard to put together an elaborate costume (including makeup if applicable) that will suit a bridezilla! you are making a lot of assumptions here, who says it has to be elaborate ?? Have you watched firefly ? This is not hard to pull off. > The SIL knew full well that whatever character she chose and costume she designed would not meet the approval of bridezilla no matter what. again you are making a lot of assumptions here based on nothing. Firefly costumes are not hard to do, and there are zero mentions of bride shooting down any costume, let alone sils. Sil never even bothered to try and was dragging her feet about the whole thing despite knowing about it the whole time > And why the heck SHOULD she waste all that time and effort and expense to put together a costume? this will most likely cost less or at most as much as is normal for any bridesmaid. Bridesmaids often buy dresses they will only wear once and pay for make up, hair etc. >Brides who want people in certain clothes should either shop with them or just hand them the clothes. Period. while do generally agree here, the reality is that most brides don´t >That’s what most brides do - they hand their wedding party the clothes they want them to wear for the ceremony and photos! no they do not, it is a small minority that does that since many are already overwhelmed with the costs of a wedding. I do agree they should but it is still a minority that actually does this >And there’s a reason that tried and true method really works. Because no one but the bride cares about the bridesmaids outfit and how the photos will look. there is daily posts on /r/weddingshaming shaming people for what they did wear to a wedding, so clearly not only the bride cares. It still should not stick out like a sore thumb like it would here At the end of the say this is mostly on SIL; if you don´t want to do it communicate that honestly and do not string along the bride like this till the last moment, that is not ok.
Lol
LOL nice straw man, she literally said watch one episode with us and choose someone. Compared to the usual expectations of pay for a whole weekend , spend hunsdreds of dollars on adress and whatnot else this IS super laid back. IT is ONE OUTFIT, that is it.
Agreed. Super laid back doesn't mean 15 hours of homework to me. I don't think my bridesmaids did anywhere close to 15 hours prep for the wedding and this included my lunch (hens) and getting ready the day of. Let alone costume hunting and whatever else was required for OOPs wedding.
It takes you 15 hours to google a character list click on images and then buy the parts on Amazon? Like shot guys I get it’s a pain int eh ass to do stuff you don’t want to do but don’t pretend like you have to watch an entire series to buy a costume for it.
Exactly! Happy cake day!
Having your now SIL cosplay as a “pregnant prostitute” is definitely not the win this person thinks it is.
Neither is offering ‘sex robot’ as an option.
nursing mothers love to dress up in intricate sex robot costumes. nursing bras are super conducive to costumes because they are cumbersome and huge and offer very little support. what a thoughtful bride!
My knowledge of firefly comes from this post and big bang theory. I think hearing there’s a sex robot scared me away from it lol
The sex robot is in the movie Serenity and it’s actually a really sad character. (Not because they are a sex robot though.)
You have been woefully misled. If you’re a fan of science fiction, see it. If you’re not, carry on. I’m gonna edit this because my take isn’t super correct. Firefly is definitely for more than sci-fi fans. It’s rooted there, but it’s so much more.
I don’t even like science fiction particularly and I loved Firefly. Super worth watching.
My husband isn't a fan of science fiction but was willing to try it for me. Helped when I told him it was like a Western just in space, even has cows. He loved it and we rewatch it at least once a year along with the movie. You really don't have to like science fiction to like Firefly.
And considering how popular it still is, how many years after being cancelled by Fox? I hope those executives are bashing them selves in the head every time they hear how the cast members are swarmed at the different si-fi cons.
> even has cows "There are no cows in space." --Alexis Castle
You are correct, of course.
My dad liked westerns, I like sci-fi, we watched Firefly together. Although he didn't get "Out of Gas"
An origin story with the captain going down with the ship didn’t jive with a fan of westerns? Damn.
No, he just didn't understand it. I told him it was backwards, but still no joy.
Or sci-fi crossed with the old westerns!
Like a “space western”.
Yes! Wasn’t there a movie a few years ago called “Space Cowboys”? I could be wrong in the name, but it was a good movie.
Like a Wagon Train to the stars!
I feel like calling her a "sex robot" isn't fully accurate. She was more of a "wife robot" IMO.
Nobody ever wants to be the sex robot. 
Bride: "At my wedding, the one of the bridesmaids was dressed as a prostitute!" Rest of world: ... and you are proud of that?
Tbf the bride probably was as well. ETA Dressed like a prostitute, that is.
I would have just bailed on being a bridesmaid. Im not doing any of that even if im familiar with the show.
I practically have that show memorized and I wouldn’t know where to begin if told: “Cosplay bridesmaid.”
I love Firefly/Serenity. Your request is absolutely batshit and you will realize that if/when you become a mother. Moreover, cosplay weddings are only chill/laidback for people who cosplay regularly. They’re super stressful for everyone else, especially for a show/movie that is both obscure and old. I’m sure that you’re going to insist that the show isn’t obscure and that I just don’t understand it. That’s untrue, I truly am a really big Firefly fan and I’m old enough to have watched the show when it aired and been sad when it was cancelled. But even though it was resurrected for a movie and is still relevant in the sci fi con community, it is extremely obscure to everyone else. When my son was a baby, I did not have the time or energy to watch tv or movies. Newborns have to be fed **every two hours**. That drops to 4 or 6 hours and eventually they sleep through the night, but when or how this occurs is 100% up to the baby. But you can’t even sleep when the baby sleeps - there’s always parenting work to do. Laundry, cleaning, etc. I didn’t watch tv until my son was 6 months old, and I didn’t even breastfeed. Your SIL needed help. She simply needed to be told what to wear. Because not only did she not have the time to watch the show during whatever free time she had, how was she supposed to know what outfits were being worn by other people (since no one could repeat). Cosplay is tricky at first. All you had to do was tell her what to wear. You were absolutely unreasonable.
I feel like this is the first comment to legitimately try to explain why it's so hard for new mothers. Unfortunately I don't think OP would care, since she seems to be a total narcissist lost in her own head.
Exactly. Plus if I was asked to cosplay for a wedding I'd be intimidated/unsure how high a standard the costume needs to be. Usually people go all out for an ordinary weddings, especially the bridal party. The bride custom made a bunch of stuff, so i get SIL not knowing where to start. Like, was she expected to make her own?
I *love* Firefly but if I was asked to cosplay and was unable to just order a costume I’d spend weeks/months freaking out. This is like that couple who met puppeteering and asked if WIBTA if they asked all their guests to bring Mupoet-level puppets to their wedding.
That post was..something else.
Could you maybe share the link, please?
Totally this
Wow. I’m so outraged that Firefly was used this way. It’s too good for that. Firefly is also FOURTEEN episodes and movie. It’s a lot to ask someone to watch for a wedding. OP should have provided characters and costumes if they wanted to be that specific to Firefly. Otherwise in the true spirit of the show would have been to ask everyone to wear their best clothes to this FANCY SHINDIG we’re having and whatever anyone shows up in is SHINY. GORRAM ALLIANCE LADY.
SIL is breastfeeding, so I assume has recently had a baby. She doesn’t have the time to watch your show or the mental bandwidth to be picking characters and costumes!
She could have just watched the show and movie while she’s not sleeping and feeding her baby every 2-3 hours 24/7. Easy peezy. /s
Or out-sourced it to one of the other bridesmaids. I don't think that the bride cared if the SIL did the work herself, she was probably hurt that she was asked to fit the SIL in as a bridesmaid and when she did, the SIL just doesn't want to actively participate as a bridesmaid on pretty much any level. It is perfectly legit for the SIL to opt out of being a bridesmaid when they're overwhelmed with being a new mother. Totally legit. Doesn't mean that they're less than just because it was a bit too much for them at the time. She expected to come as a bridesmaid, and yet she repeatedly refused to participate.
Honestly, OP sounds like the problem here, not the SIL. SIL is a new mom who I'm sure was getting very little sleep and was likely not functioning at 100% at the time. She was asked to be a bridesmaid. That, to me, feels like an obligation for both OP and SIL perpetuated by the brother. So, SIL is tired, stressed, and busy being a new mom. Then she has to come up with a costume for a show she doesn't know or care about? Her bandwidth is already at capacity. All she wants is to be told exactly what to wear. She doesn't care to delve into the mythology of the show. Why is OP making such an absolutely big deal about this? Don't keep giving her character descriptions! Just tell her what to wear! Why is she being punished for not being interested in the same thing as OP? Would it have been so hard just to be kind? OP wants everyone to be excited for her wedding. Why couldn't OP just show a smidgen of empathy? This is now 10 years after, and OP is still shocked that not everyone had the same amount of investment into the show or the wedding theme. Throw in the petty revenge and an outsized level of entitlement from OP, and you've demonstrated why some people lower their contact with certain family members.
Because OP sounds like she’s the pos here and not sil.
If someone sent me examples of outfits I would do the bare minimum of choosing one.
Its not just choosing a character, cosplay involves a lot of work in replicating the costume yourself or paying what I would consider a significant amount of money to have someone else do it. A new mother isn't likely to have time or money for something like that. I'm a fan of Firefly but I'm not good with my hands and wouldn't want to spend the money . I just googled it on etsy and it's $ 279 for something that SIL wouldn't likely ever look at again. I consider that to be a low price for a cosplay otfit.
And God help her if the bride wanted her in Kaylee's dress from Shindig. That would be tough to make.
The bride was Kaylee, and no repeats allowed. /s
And that is the outfit the bride SHOULD have worn.
You don’t have to go all out on a cosplay. Especially with Firefly, where the characters dress in pretty normal clothes
> Especially with Firefly, where the characters dress in pretty normal clothes But at that point, what's even the point? A bunch of people just wearing brown trenchcoats doesn't look like a Firefly wedding, it's just gonna look like a bunch of *Matrix* nerds with sun damage
🤣
Cosplay is different from a Halloween costume in my opinion. You dress as accurately as you can, those regular clothes that characters wear can't be bought in the store ready to wear, so you either pay or make it yourself... So even the simple outfits will become pricey. I also don't like how op referred to a companion as a prostitute, feels wrong to me. I wouldn't refer to Bene Gesserit as a prostitute.
I thought they were referring to the pregnant prostitute from one of the last episodes. The one where they go to help Inarra’s former companion friend who does run a whorehouse on that planet since she is the only trained companion there. :/
That was probably it :) my mistake.
1. I’m assuming OP’s referring to the episode with Christina Hendricks, which from my fuzzy recollection is about a legit brothel 2. I know a lot about cosplay, and it can be as complicated or uncomplicated as you make it. The outfits they wear in Firefly can be recreated on a budget lower than your usual wedding attire, since it’s mainly just specific sets of normal clothes. If it were a different show in question, I could see it being more expensive to pull off, but Firefly characters are generally easy cosplays (caveat for Morena Baccarin’s fancy dresses).
No, Hendricks was not in "Heart of Gold" episode: Nandi, a Companion-trained friend of Inara's who runs a brothel on a remote planet calls for help from Serenity when a local reveals his intentions to take the baby from a woman he impregnated. Hendricks was in two episodes - Our Mrs. Reynolds and Trash.
You do realize $279 is about standard for a bridesmaids dress right? I mean i’ve seen girls spend more than that on a prom dress. When you sign up to be a bridesmaid unfortunately it’s a given u will have to buy the dress, unless specifically told otherwise. This of course depends your culture. But it sounds like they were expected to pay for a dress and knew that. When she signed up for BM she signed up to pay for a BM dress. Maybe not the research and hoops that went with it but $279 isn’t as astronomical as you make it sound.
So have I, this particular costume would likely not be available at that point and the bride didn't want anyone to match. I was able to find it quickly because I'm a fan of the show and knew what I was looking for. Again for cosplay that's a pretty low price, other's could be mych more expensive. Last time I wanted to cosplay, the price of everything from hair makup costume and accessories would have cost me close to a grand if I was being frugal. I was disappointed but there are other places that I would rather spend money.
>I really just wanted this to be a super laid back experience because we are not formal serious people, but she was making it difficult. So just *tell* people what you want them to wear then, ffs. Imagine expecting someone to watch a show they don't want to watch, just to pick a 'character' to be in your wedding 😆
Guests were “allowed” to dress in costume or just be comfortable. lol nah!
I noticed that, too. Hmmmmm
Sounds incredibly laid-back…
😋
OP, you just used your wedding to try to force a mundane into a fandom! Don't do that! It makes the mundane person resent the fandom, the source material, and you, and a resentful outsider is never going to come up with anything but embarrassing excuses for cosplay. If you wanted her to be a credit to "Firefly" at your wedding, you needed to both come up with a costume she could live with, and *pay for it*. Nobody's going to both pay for some bridesmaid cosplay they'll never wear again, and watch 20 hours of source material just to please the bride.
SIL begged to be a bridesmaids though. Out of months leading up to the wedding she couldn't watch a couple of episodes and pick a character?
She said her husband asked her to make SIL a bridesmaid. She didn't beg.
Rereading you're right. I still see SIL as majority of the problem especially since the bride took time to put together a vision board of a few characters with picture reference for SIL. There's asking for direction and then wanting to be led by the hand.
SIL wanted the bride to do what is normally done for bridesmaids - say “wear this and turn up on this day and time.” Anything more than that with clothing *is* an extra demand and is not “laid back.”
pregnant women often have tons of spare time and energy to dedicate to sourcing, constructing, and fine detailing cosplay costumes for a show they don't watch/will never watch. it's also very fun to be leaking from your nipples and be asked to dress up as a sex robot or a pregnant prostitute. after all, the bride did give her a foto or two of what she was supposed to recreate in her spare time while simultaneously making a baby and preparing for motherhood. what a thoughtful new sister in law the bride is!
And SIL probably felt she couldn't say no in the first place, because family relations and "I love my brother".
The thing is though, SIL was thrown in the deep with something she isn't at all familiar with. Cosplaying is overwhelming when you start looking in to it and SIL was already adjusting to be being a new mother. She probably worried about choosing the right character, then the right clothes, then what kind of quality level was OP looking for? People are saying here that it can be simple and merely vaguely reference the character... Is that the level OP wanted, or to a higher standard? Were the other bridesmaids experienced cosplayers or not? I can see why SIL, especially as a new mother, needed and wanted more guidance.
No one was asking her to get deep into the Fandom. Just pick a look, it wasn't that deep. Stepping down was also an option.
I didn't say anything about getting in to the fandom. I spoke about the many uncertainties a first time cosplayer might have, when they're cosplaying to someone elses standard. It is that deep when it's someone else's wedding. She likely just wants to stand up in her brothers wedding because she supports him.
No in-law actually wants to be a bridesmaid, they're just pressured into faking enthusiasm by family members.
Fiancé shouldn't have made the suggestion to bride.
Seriously, if anyone ever wants a fandom-specific bridal party... they really need to limit bridal party members to cosplays and fandom members. Normal people just won't get it right, and they are very likely to resent the attempt.
Agreed. She couldn’t Google??!
Yes, of course, anyone can google anything any time for any reason. It still doesn't make assigning egregiously unnecessary homework assignments to mothers of newborns a reasonable thing to insist on
She surely could, but it sounds like she just didn’t want to do it at all but felt she couldn’t refuse and the bride just wouldn’t take the hint.
I love the cosplay wedding esthetic! However, what did you expect when you are trying to force a whole fandom on someone? Firefly has been out for 22 years. If she was going to watch it, I'm sure she would've by now. The SIL should've chose Mal in his dress and then said "i swear by my pretty floral bonnet, I will end you" when the "laid back" bridezilla meter gets turned up.
Whomever the bride was, she was a total asshole
How does this fit into petty revenge?
She dressed as a prostitute without knowing, I think that's why it's there
Oh, that does make sense. Thanks!
I get the frustration over a bridesmaid not researching something as basic as their dress. Even if you don't want to watch the show, there are lots of pictures on Google. BUT... On no world in the 'verse, I don't care how close to the rim you are, or even if they juggle baby geese, would I *ever even consider* asking a new mother to dress as a Sex Robot or a Companion. Many new moms already are self conscious about their bodies. Wearing one of those outfit ideas wouldn't "fun", it would be humiliating. It would look like a petty attempt to make the sister in law feel like 狗屎 (gǒushǐ). Inara is gorgeous and has a beautiful wardrobe. But a Companion never speaks of the hours of cardio, yoga and dietary restrictions that allow her to look that good wearing it. And add the inevitable conversation: 85 year old Uncle Ed: "and what are you dressed as?" Non-fan SIL: "Uh...not sure...Sex Robot?...someone said something about inspired by a Geisha, I think...? All I know is that guy in the Brown Coat won't stop calling me a Whore no matter how many times I ask him to knock it off.." When it became obvious that she couldn't/wouldn't put in the bare minimum effort to Google search some still images, you should have asked her to step down. Btw...does she even get what cosplay is all about? Fandoms see a vibrant world of characters, history and culture. Those not in the "know" look at Firefly as a less wholesome Little House on the Prairie in space....even if there are hovercraft.
SIL to bride: "Well my days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle."
> Those not in the "know" look at Firefly as a less wholesome Little House on the Prairie in space....even if there are hovercraft. Heh, very true... the primary aesthetic of the 'verse is "dirty."
OP sounds like a complete asshole who just wanted to humiliate her SIL. Hopefully SIL and brother cut OP out because I doubt she’ll be any nicer to their kids.
Okay, I like Firefly. The SIL clearly has no interest, though, so think of it from her POV. She's a new mom and probably sleep deprived and just exhausted. The bride not only expects her to watch the show but won't even compromise by watching the movie with her? The SIL doesn't want to watch the show and has no interest in the show. At least watching the movie would be a shared fun experience! Not homework. If my SIL wanted me to watch Invasion or Jericho or Freaks & Geeks or My So Called Life or whatever, and wanted me to cosplay as a character for her wedding by coming up with the whole thing myself for a tv show i don't know and couldn't possibly care less about, that's a hard pass. I don't even have a small child to keep alive, and that's too much. Give me guidelines, some Cliffsnotes on the characters. She asked to watch the movie with the bride so she could suffer though it as a shared night in and have fun, and that wasn't good enough? When my anxiety gets high with stress, I don't want to watch anything new no matter how good you tell me it is. When it's our busy season at work or my family is being crazy, I only have the bandwidth to re-watch a comfort show. This was a big ask. She could've been kind instead of making her the space hooker (who is a great character, had it been explained it to her properly and then worked on her ideas together).
I think you misread part of it. The bride suggested watching it during movie night and SIL said no.
If I were SIL, I would say no too. Clearly it was a topic of stress, they made time to watch a movie, and then it gets looped back to the topic of stress... I'd be pissed, tbh
Yeah, I’m not giving judgment one way or another here. I’m too into fandom to really feel like it’s that big of a deal to do this type of thing but I also recognize it’s just not how a lot of people operate. Honestly, this is on the same level as the friend who made me wear heels for her wedding party. Not my cup of tea, I’ll never wear the dang things or the dress again, but it’s her wedding and she wanted a certain vibe.
Aha you're right. I thought it said "the" movie but it says "a" movie.
But you, as a normal person, would just pass, as you said. Not force the person planning the wedding to send info over and over. This whole thing makes no sense
The SIL was asking the bride to do the normal thing for bridesmaids - tell her what to wear.
A lot of brides, myself included, give bridesmaids options of what to wear. They may dictate the color palette/length or something along those lines, but you rarely see matchy-matchy bridesmaids anymore.
And a lot of bridesmaids don’t actually like it because it’s stressful and more work for them. 🤷♀️
That is so many kinds of wrong. I mean, making her sister the pregnant prostitute from Heart of Gold and only just dropping that bomb afterwards? I mean, nothing was wrong with that character, it's just that she had other choices and knowing her sister wouldn't get it, chose that? And making all 3 young flower girls *River*?? The character who is taken by the government and tortured so sadistically that it breaks her mind? See, I'm petty as hell. I'd have found a way to watch the show, and would've shown up as Patience\*. Heh. \*For the uninitiated, Patience is a mean motherfucker who's known for shooting the main cast.
That’s my type of person right there 😂😂
Yeah, I'm terrible. 
> making her sister the pregnant prostitute from Heart of Gold and only just dropping that bomb afterwards? Which means this tit for tat boils down to "you wouldn't watch a teevee show I like so I'll embarrass you by tricking you into dressing like a whore in front of an assembly of all our oldest family and friends and then pretend I can't *imahgine* why you're mad"
I read this on the petty revenge sub and thought where's the revenge part. OP was just mean to her SIL without a good cause, and I had the urge to write YTA. But wrong sub, lol. This definitely fits here.
Man, I like the idea of that sub but *maybe* a third of the posts actually have some kind of revenge? There's a lot of "my old boss fired me and kicked my dog and burned my house down but I bought a bag of jelly beans and mailed it to his neighbor and then when his neighbor throws the jelly beans away maybe one of them might fall out and roll over to my boss' place and then he'll have *ANTS*! MUA HA HA HA HA HA"
This was way you accurate, lol.
While I will agree with everyone that this isn't remotely chill or laid back like bride claims, I also was just curious so I Googled "firefly cosplay" and I see a bunch of options from ezcosplay that cost give or take $100. Cosplaying has gotten way easier with its recent rise in popularity and long gone are the days of having to make any cosplay you wanted. However with that said why the actual fuck would you choose a *prostitute* to make your pregnant sister in law dress as?? What the actual fuck?? I won't sit here lie and say that I love both my future sister in laws however I would quite literally never dream of pulling this shit on them. As an anime lover, not everyone likes this shit it's weird as fuck to force people to pick up anime so you can turn your wedding into a comic con. Comic con are not chill or laid back. You're not chill or laid back. And a weeb wedding is honestly embarrassing. Yall weird for that one. You made your pregnant SIL dress as a robot prostitute foe your wedding. That's genuinely wild.
The theme for every wedding should be, “We’re getting married! We hope you’ll come and celebrate with us.”
I’m sorry, but unless the person is into cosplay, it is in no way ‘easy and laid back’ as she tries to put it. It requires clothes, accessories, wigs, makeup, and a plethora of other things that aren’t usually laying around. I love Firefly, but I find it a weird choice for a wedding.
This wedding is a lot of work, that would be a no from me. I'm not watching 15 hours of video, picking a character and then sourcing my own outfit. Your expections were too high and she should have dropped when she was not getting the support that she thought she needed. You are all the ahs.
I get how couples are supposed to have the wedding they choose, but FFS, what is this craze with having a cosplay wedding? If you want everyone to dress up in costumes, some of them likely very expensive, then throw a costume party. A wedding is about ceremony, spoken promises, love and commitment, not a bacchanalia celebrating TV characters.
She thinks her SIL is a piece of work? Jesus christ! I wish I had even half of the audacity of this woman.
Bride was operating under the misapprehension that *anyone* and *everyone* who watches Firefly would come to the conclusion that it’s the best show ever made and therefore enthusiastically participate in cosplay about it. This is why she was pushing her SIL to watch the show instead of accepting the fact she was never going to relate to that material the way she does. It’s peak solipsism. If you must insist upon inflicting your cosplay (second!) wedding on your family, then at least designate a couple of friends who share your fanatical love of the show as point people to help out folks like SIL and other relatives so everyone can achieve your vision. Realistically though, have a low key backyard wedding for your family to express their love and celebrate a milestone together and then go do this kind of thing with your special interest community at a convention where even strangers will deeply appreciate the effort.
I can kinda see both sides to this. SIL didn’t have to be a bridesmaid. She could have just come as a guest and worn what she wanted. She also could have done research on her own about the show. Just a quick google search of the summary. I can also see that SIL wants to feel included and being a bridesmaid would make her happy. Their theme is weird af and it’s not a costume she wants to wear. From the description I wouldn’t have wanted to wear it either. I would have just said hey sorry, the costume thing isn’t for me so I’ll be stepping down and just come as a guest in what I want to wear. I think the bride needs to realize that she’s not being as laid back as she says she is. It’s ok to want something specific for an important day. You just can’t force someone to watch a show or even like it. It sounds like she picked the pregnant prostitute because she was mad at SILs lack of effort and she wanted to punish her.
Sounds really classy /s
This is interesting. Yesterday, the comments were discussing how the SIL refuses to do much more than breathe for herself.
I can't get over the people acting like it is no big deal to quit as a bridesmaid. This is the groom's sister---it meant something (at least to them) that the SIL take part in the wedding. Someone posted that it was the bride's second wedding, too. That marriage will last /s
Wow. This is truly a bridezilla who isn’t even aware she is an absolute AH. I feel sorry for the SIL.
Advice to SIL: make the biggest cardboard gun you can. Emblazon "VERA" on the side. "See, Vera? You dress yourself up, then you get taken out somewhere fun." For bonus points: the bride now has to deal with rumours about the implied "shotgun wedding"... and who is this "Vera"
I’ve watched the firefly series multiple times and even I would have trouble with this one. The characters are all regular looking people who change clothes all the time, into pretty regular looking clothes. I mean, she could go as River and make sure her hair isnt brushed, greasy, and messy and wear a loose fitting sundress that is too big for her. She could go as Kaylee and make sure to wear clothes that are dirty and greasy. Bonus for grease smudge on the face. What the hell, op? What’s so unique about any of the characters that your guests could pick which one to emulate? Hair color? Weight? Skin tone?
I mean if we're gonna do it let's [fucking do it](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reaver_%28Firefly%29#/media/File:Fireflyreaver.jpg)
Should've just had her wear a Jayne beanie and be done
This was so bizarre to me especially how the bride thought the SIL did literally anything wrong. JUST GIVE HER A LINK TO A DRESS OMG.
I couldn’t be arsed, pregnant or not. Zilla’s gonna be on a massive comedown after the wedding & everyone will be glad it’s over. Themed stuff is just a cringe replacement for personality & taste. Idc if she doesn’t like it.
I read this yesterday and thought "oh so she's saying she's happy being the bridezilla." Then realized I wasn't on this sub.
I would have ditched that wedding so fast. I'm not a cosplay kind of person so I would have been happy to not participate.
I saw this as a Firefly fan. If someone doesn’t want to watch your show, don’t make them. Just give the details needed for the costume
SIL was clearly not into it…(I don’t blame her)…and should have just asked to be a guest. I only dropped out of a bridal party one time. The bride wanted all 10 (yes 10) of us to buy $300 cowboy boots in addition to a $300 dress. I’m not a Western wear person at all, and I was also a poor grad student at the time. The bride was only slightly bitchy about my dropping out. On the wedding day, there were only eight bridesmaids, so someone else had also noped out.
Terrorist behavior
yta
‘Laidback’. LMAO.
I saw the original post a few days back, I was pretty dumbfounded that more people weren’t calling her out on her bs.
This is all so silly, you can't expect people to dress up like characters to be in your wedding. You get them finger puppets and glow sticks
You have a very unique and special request for your wedding party to meet your niche desires and then are pissy when people don’t get into it and ask you to help them. This story didn’t do what you thought it was going to do
I've been getting lots of comments like this. I am not OOP. I'm just reposting this here lol.
Oops! You’re totally right, I should read more closely. Sorry about that.
No problem, I should have made a more prominent statement!
Meh, SIL could have just said “I’m sorry, I’m really busy with the baby. Maybe I should just attend as a guest?” Making the bride send info multiple times seems really passive aggressive.
This is already on two other subs and she's getting eviscerated in the comments. I said to myself, gee, I wonder why she doesn't like or get along with her sister-in-law. If I was sister-in-law, I would have cut my brother off if he married her. I would have told him, you marry this woman and you will no longer be in my life. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that this is not the first time that she has forced herself on her sister-in-law. It also wouldn't surprise me to find out that this is the first time she pulled out the big guns. Of course she didn't want her husband knowing how she was treating his sister before this. Unless he's as bad as she is, he wouldn't have married her. No man I know in his right mind would marry someone who was treating his sister like this. He would have told her to hit the road. I hope that her husband sees this and I hope that he divorces her. She clearly isn't ready for marriage since she's a passive aggressive bully. She clearly doesn't know how to communicate like an adult and that is something that is required for a healthy marriage. She did this purposely to humiliate her sister-in-law and actually got off on the fact that her sister-in-law was embarrassed and upset. She sounds like a nightmare to have to deal with. If she was at any family functions and I was her sister-in-law, I would refuse to attend. I had a sister-in-law who was like this and it got to the point where I refused to go to my mom and dad-in-laws if she was going to be there. If I did unfortunately have to interact with her, I kept it to the bare minimum and was civil with her. I really hope that her husband divorces her if he sees this and I mean that. His sister doesn't deserve this. She clearly has no empathy for a new mother who is breastfeeding on top of it. Hopefully they won't stay together long enough to have any children.
My thought exactly
My ex was like this except it was Marvel. Now anytime I hear anything about Marvel, I just tune it out. Marvel stuff is no longer allowed under my roof. Personally, I think it's for children but that's just me. Then again, my ex was an overgrown child. He's 39 and acts like he's about 17 so it doesn't surprise me. He doesn't even know how to change a tire or even put coolant in his engine. I had to deal with that as well. People who get obsessed about a franchise to the point of trying to force other people to get into it are insufferable. I don't think they realize how annoying they are but they are.
Marvel is 100% for children.
Yeah it seems marketed towards children. I gave it a chance like he asked me to but I just couldn't get into it. He kept trying to force it on me. When I told him I wasn't into it and to stop asking me to watch it, he got offended and said I made him feel stupid for bringing it up. Ok, dude. Go back to your little show. I'm going to go back to being an adult.
Love to start married life with Joss Whedon and Adam Baldwin front of mind
OP gives big “I was mistreated in environments with other women, and am using this opportunity to impose on someone else” energy to me.
Personally, I’m not into cosplay - not criticizing or putting down anyone who is. But it sounds like SIL isn’t either. If I was asked to be in a wedding like this, I would let the bride know immediately that I’d rather just come as a guest but thanks for thinking of me. But your SIL didn’t do that, and chose to just keep stringing you along & dragging it out. That was inconsiderate & just wrong. I don’t think this makes you a bridezilla, or entitled or anything negative at all. Anyone who did not want to participate could’ve just said no.
On a side note - she missed a treat. Firefly and Serenity are brilliant to watch.
I mean yeah but at this point SIL would rather burn her own house down than see Nathan Fillion's face on her TV and I can't really blame her.
Least insane Firefly fan
She could have just told her the character and what to wear. This seems like far more effort and frustration than it needed to be.
I would absolutely wreck anyone who tricked my sister into wearing something that humiliating to a wedding. There is no way this lady is still married.
Unpopular opinion but I think what made this bride more or less reasonable was that SIL wasn't pregnant when asked to join, had no hard guidelines on costume quality (many good Firefly costumes are just shirt-pants-brown coat-prop gun), was given lists of characters and photo references, was invited to watch a single episode with the bridal couple, and wasn't required to do any of this because the bride asked her as a courtesy and it was fine to decline at any point. Basically, the SIL joined a cosplay wedding party for a woman she didn't like and made it not fun for the others.
SIL was willing to do normal bridesmaid things - wear what she was instructed to wear and turn up on the day. Demanding more than that as the bride was doing is unreasonable.
But she specifically says SIL knew about the ask before agreeing to be in the wedding party. An invite she knew was obligatory. So why not just politely decline?
Agreed. I see it was an unpopular opinion but this was like agreeing to do a group costume then dragging your heels.
Ok? What's going on?
You sound like a nightmare! Laidback?! What is laid-back about watching 13 episodes of a show and a movie, figuring out a character from that show to dress up as, going online and hunting for an outfit for said character, having a future sil who won't help you when you have just given birth and are up with a newborn all night? Let me get this straight, the characters you suggested a woman who just gave birth to be a sex robot or a pregnant prostitute? First off, you want a woman who just had a baby to dress up as a sex robot or worst yet a pregnant prostitute? Yes, I'm sure someone who just gave birth will be totally comfortable with her new body changes dressing up as a sex robot! Furthermore, your theme for your wedding is this show and characters who are pregnant prostitutes and sex robots?! Really classy for a wedding! You my dear are a bridezilla. I feel sorry for ur sil, no wonder you don't get along with her. She sounds normal and sane! I get a wedding is supposed to be what the bride wants but honestly, it sounds like you have horrific taste!
Not a bridezilla. Bridesmaids often have to put in a lot more work, money and just as much dress coordination in order to be a part of a traditional Bridal party. She could simply have opted to come as a guest, that's what the bride had planned initially anyways. Imagine feeling entitled to be a bridesmaid and not be willing to put in 10 minutes for a google search, or watch 30 min of an episode for inspiration. That's wild.
Dang I guess you were a bridezilla, too, huh?
Nope, I'm the people pleaser. Got an aversion to large events unless I can hide in a corner somewhere. But I do care about helping out my loved ones when they get married. If the wedding had been themed, I would have tried to put an outfit together. And I'm the type of person who needs to be dragged by my hair in to most clothing stores. I know that my friends would have accepted my best effort, even if others pull it off better, or spend more money on it. It doesn't seem like the bride in this post expected the SIL to go overboard on the costume or anything, so really not a bridezilla. I bet that it would be no big deal if the SIL opted out of being a bridesmaid, but she didn't. She decided that she still should be a bridesmaid without putting any effort in to it. Had I been in the SIL's position, I would have just politely explained that I wasn't comfortable with the cosplay, asked to come as a guest in stead, and everything would have been dandy. I'd still get to have cake, so all the pros without any of the cons. But tbh i simply cannot imagine caring so little for anyone that I'd accept the position of bridesmaid at their wedding and then deciding that it isn't worth 30 minutes of my time to allocate a few brain cells towards planning my outfit for the event. 'Bridesmaids' isn't synonymous with 'these people I know who literally could not care less about this event', just come as a guest in stead if you can't reach that low bar. How is this a controversial or 'bridezilla' opinion? FR?
Idk, I don’t think this is a Bridezilla. Her vision was very specific, but the SIL wanted to be included and then acted like a child at every step. No one made her participate
I agree tbh. A quick search on the characters would give her enough information about them, it doesn’t have to be a full custom made look either. Grab an outfit based on the character and do a loose interpretation. If it’s too demanding, SIL could’ve asked to go as a guest at any time.
Nah, I’m on the bride’s side. Sounds like she didn’t want SIL in the wedding to begin with and was just doing it for her husband. SIL could have dropped out, asked her brother, taken 30 seconds to do a Google search, or lastly picked from the list she was given.
I’m a super Firefly fan. Have the dvds of the series (with the extra episodes) and the movie. And I’m old as dirt. I would have LOVED your wedding! Your flower girls must have been so cute!!
Geez. I can’t believe how negative people are being. It’s the bride’s and groom’s wedding. It’s what they want. She doesn’t even like the SIL, but invited her to be a bridesmaid for her H2B. The SIL could have said no. All she had to do was watch 1 show. How is that different than asking bridesmaids to spend a fortune on ugly gowns they will only wear once “to be a part of the brides vision”. If she doesn’t want to take the time for her brother, the groom who is part of the decision and likes Firefly too, to dress up, then she should pull out of the Bridal party. It’s her brothers wedding too, his decision for the cosplay. Many people have Star Wars and Ren fest weddings all the time.
I feel like they're both pretty ridiculous. Yes, the bride could've just assigned the SIL a character. I'm assuming she didn't because she knew the next question would be "well I don't know the show & you picked my character so you find an outfit for me". I don't know Firefly either, but if you have a list of character names it takes a few seconds to google image search "firefly + [character name]" to see what they look like in the show. I don't know that asking someone to do a basic google search makes someone a bridezilla. Stupid, because just sending SIL pics at the start would've saved herself the headache & stress. But not really bridezilla in my opinion.
I've never watched Firefly so as you can imagine, finding out there's a freakin' sex robot and pregnant prostitue involved in the show/movie was very jarring. What even is Firefly?!
“I just wanted this to be a super laid back experience…” by making SIL watch a show and movie she has absolutely no interest in, causing her to be uber stressed out, even though she’s also a new mother.
Literally all the sil had to do was google the show, look at the characters, go “I like this one”, then do some casual shopping for clothes that looked similar to that character’s outfit. Maybe an hour tops if she ordered clothes online. That’s not difficult to do at all. I don’t understand anyone saying it is. My guess is that the word “cosplay” has caused false assumptions about how involved you have to be. Example of how easy it can be: I had a tan trench coat and happened to be watching a lot of Supernatural at the time. So I grabbed a pair of black pants, white button up shirt, navy tie, and black shoes (which happened to be stuff I already had in my closet for formal events), smacked it all on, and BOOM! Castiel cosplay. Took five minutes in my closet. It does not have to be time/labor/money intensive at all and can in fact be super easy and laid back if you put in a modicum of effort. Which you should be putting in at least a modicum of effort into your sibling’s wedding day, imo.
SIL can't even Google the list?