From elaborate creations to cardboard costumes, Calgary Expo sparks inspiration, builds community

Ben Eadie doesn't go to comic conventions to meet celebrities, or to nerd out about a particular video game or film franchise.

He goes for inspiration.

"What I love is to see the costumes that people have built, and how they've done it, the unconventional materials, and, like, the MacGyvering instinct of everybody," said Eadie, a props and special effects artist from Calgary.

"You see somebody that's got a really cool light-up jacket arm and you're like, 'How did you do that?' And they show me something that I didn't know, and it's like, 'Oh my god, that's amazing!'"

Eadie has created intricate movie sets and props for major Hollywood films, including Star Trek Beyond (2016) and Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021).

The Star Trek project required him to build giant rotating machines that looked and moved like the starship Enterprise while it was being attacked by alien ships. And he got to create all the fictional gizmos used to detect and capture ghosts in Ghostbusters, including proton packs, PKE meters and ghost traps.

He credits his childhood on a farm south of Calgary for his ability to invent, build and fix things.

"In High River, I spent a lot of time just monkeying around, and because of that, I have an innate sense of what works and what doesn't," he said.

"You know where you've got to put a bolt so that you can actually get at it with a wrench. And that kind of skill set is interestingly missing sometimes. There are a lot of people who can design things, but because they haven't put stuff together, they don't understand that it won't work that way. They don't have that practical know-how, the visual and doing-stuff-with-your-hands mechanicalness of it."

Wandering through the crowds at the Calgary Expo gives Eadie a chance to admire and inspect the often elaborate cosplay costumes and accessories that have become the norm at comic cons around the world.

"It's the builds and how they did it, and, you know, the story behind it," he said. "The literal blood, sweat and tears behind each costume is always so amazing."

Fan costumes are on full display each year at the POW! Parade of Wonders, a Calgary Expo mainstay that draws thousands of participants and spectators into the city core. This year's parade on Friday, April 25, has a new route through the Beltline to the BMO Centre, and will include surprise appearances by some of the celebrities attending this year's convention.

Strathmore cosplay guest and judge Autumn Desjardins went to her first Calgary Expo in 2012, at the age of 12. She and her friend thought dressing up was a requirement to get in.

"We thought it was a rule," Desjardins recalled. "So we built these costumes, and I made the Ash Ketchum Pokemon costume from Value Village, and put all these pieces together, and since then I was hooked," Desjardins said. "It was game over, this is what I was going to do."

In the years that followed, her costumes grew increasingly intricate.

"I'd go to my mom, and I'm like, 'Mom, how do I use a sewing machine?' And she's like, 'I don't know how to use a sewing machine, so we're going to figure it out together!'"

Desjardins, now 25, has won dozens of awards for her cosplay creations, and has represented Team Canada several times at international competitions, even placing second in 2024 at the MegaCon in Orlando, Fla.

She loves learning new skills as part of her builds, be it woodworking, or sword-making, but says it's just as important to share those skills and ideas with others.

"In Calgary, specifically, we have a community that's being created where at the end of the competition, people will trade their build books with other competitors. This is something I've only seen in our area, that people will trade, so then they learn off of these other costumes they've seen. It's so cool, and it's such a good community-building thing."

But that willingness to talk shop and share tends to be a feature of the broader cosplay community, she notes.

"You worked so hard on something that someone asks you one question and you want to go on a half-an-hour tangent about how you built it. Because a lot of us take a lot of pride in what we've built as well. And we want to share what we've done, and what small details you might miss, and 'did you notice this detail from Episode 6 that I added in?' All these little things. And so it really opens itself up to being a community of sharing and learning from others and building up one another, rather than being competitive and secretive and tearing people apart.

Eadie emphasizes that, even though the innovation he sees is inspiring, any costume is just fine by him.

"It doesn't have to be super amazing, either. I remember being at one of these cons with a couple of friends, and there was this one costume that was cardboard. It was rough. It was a great try, but it wouldn't make a movie scene. And (my friends) were kind of giggling at it, and I was mad. And they were like, 'Why are you so mad?' And I was like, 'Do you see a smile on that person's face? Because that is what this is about. This isn't about you, and what you see. This is about their escape, and the fun they've had, and don't you dare take that away from them.'"

'An escape where you can be you'

Positivity and acceptance are a key part of comic convention culture, says Eadie, a father of two teenagers. Both are neurodivergent and LGBTQ, and they revel in dressing up to go to the expo, he adds.

"And if you're a little bit weird or quirky, it just plays into the character," he said. "So they suddenly are not holding this shield up in public around themselves. They become them. I'm actually kind of tearing up about this. It's an escape where you can be you.

"Whether you're neurodivergent or neurotypical, it doesn't matter," he added. "If you can escape into these things, it's so liberating. If you do these long stares and have to sit in a corner to breathe, that's part of the character, and that's cool. And nobody questions it. And that's lovely." 

The 2025 Calgary Expo runs April 24-27 at Stampede Park, with celebrity Q&As, photo ops, panels, workshops and demos.

Confirmed VIPs include the cast members from Back to the Future, Twilight and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Alicia Silverstone, John Boyega, James Marsters, Helen Hunt and Nicholas Hoult.

Friday morning's Parade of Wonders kicks off at 10:30 a.m. in Haultain Park with a new route, travelling east on 13th Avenue S.W., then south on Centre Street and east on 17th Avenue to the BMO Centre.

Most celebrities taking part in the parade are being kept secret until the parade, but Peggy the Dog from Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) has been confirmed, as well as honorary parade marshals Jyoti Gondek, mayor of Calgary, and Loki, Dog Mayor of the Culture + Entertainment District.

The Parade of Wonders is being hosted by CBC Calgary's Anis Heydari and Jenny Howe.