I LOVE being a redhead, and one of my favorite things about it is using my hair as a centerpiece in costumes and exploring red hair cosplay ideas. Cosplay as a redhead is quite easy – there are a multitude of characters primed and ready for gingerfied costuming.
How does this differ from our list of Halloween costume ideas for redheads? Cosplay (in my estimation) tends to favor source material from the geekiverse (particularly anime/manga and videogames), whereas regular costumes derive more from general knowledge.
Also, while Halloween costumes are pretty occasion-specific and often involve scary (and/or lazy) elements, cosplay can be worn to cons throughout the year and usually involves a fair amount of effort in putting the ensemble together. As such, it may benefit you to read both lists in order to get a full list of costumes together.
Regina from Dino Crisis. It might sound random, but she’s a cult redhead favorite and since it’s a bob, it’s easy to pull off. This unitard isn’t too far off from hers.
Chibi Chibi from Sailor Moon. Finally, a costume meant for short people!
Julia Crichton from Full Metal Alchemist: The Sacred Star of Milos. They finally introduced an FMA redhead!
Queen Beryl from Sailor Moon. Playing the villain can be so much fun. A sheer panel added to this purple maxi base dress would be a great beginning to the look.
Rayne from Bloodrayne. The hair is the least of your concern in pulling this off.
Sakura Kinomoto of Cardcaptor Sakura. The kawaii count here is high. The good news is, she changes clothes a LOT, so you have some creative wiggle room. Petticoats are always a must, though.
Nariko from Heavenly Sword, but this takes a lot of red hair.
Amelia from Trigun: Badlands Rumble. Hawtt.
Joanna Dark from Perfect Dark – highly underrated game. Worth a whole system purchase.
Cutey Honey. Good luck with the top.
Knuckles from Sonic. I know he’s more red colored in general, but I’d love to see a fantastic humanoid version of this.
Lina from Slayers. Totally classic with a badass cape.
Poison Ivy from Batman. Strategically placed horticulture for the win. You can buy one and modify it if you chicken out on the whole leaf-shaped-pasties thing.
Ranma Saotome from Ranma 1/2.* Talk about genderbending!
Oerba Dia Vanille from Final Fantasy XIII. I know they totally just recycled “the bubbly one in shorts” thing FF loves to do, but Vanille still makes me squee.
Rias Gremory from High School DxD. Devilishly hot.
Himura Kenshin from Rurouni Kenshin.* Proof a cartoon can be ultrahot.
Mystique from X-Men. You can just wear a blue jumpsuit so you don’t have to rock body paint like Rebecca Romijn or Jennifer Lawrence.
Satella Harvenheit from Chrono Crusade.
Jessica Hamby from True Blood. Works well for real gingers with dental issues. A Merlotte’s shirt never hurt.
Radical Edward from Cowboy Bebop.*
Sally from A Nightmare Before Christmas. To blue-skin or not to blue-skin — that is the question.
Shirley Fenette from Code Geass.
Misty from Pokemon. Best for fairly short red hair and skinny girls who aren’t afraid to wear Daisy Dukes. A yellow sleeveless crop is simple enough to round up.
Jessie from Team Rocket on Pokemon, if you like bad girls better.
Yoko Kurama from Yu Yu Hakusho.*
Black Widow from The Avengers. If you can rock a pleather bodysuit like Scarlett Johansson, you really owe it to us to do so.
Fuu from Samurai Champloo. Sunflower perfume = bonus points.
Claire Redfield from Resident Evil 2. Bring a sexy Leon with you too – or maybe a Brad Vickers to trail eerily behind you.
Flay Allster from Mobile Suit Gundam SEED. Quistis hair is surprisingly hot on a redhead!
Ginny Weasley from Harry Potter. Witchy woman! A V-neck grey pullover, white collared shirt and tie, and you’re almost there.
Marida Cruz from Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn. Dude, I used to watch a lot of Gundam. Don’t judge me.
Magenta from Rocky Horror Picture Show– make the banister lucky!
Or Columbia, if your hair is cropped and you like gold hot pants.
Reno from Final Fantasy VII.*
Mary Jane Parker (nee Watson) fromSpiderman.
Jean Grey / Phoenix from X-Men. Flame on! Oh wait, that’s a far less interesting character from a way worse series.
Leeloo from The Fifth Element. If you’re brave, drop the orange rubberband and go straight bandages. And invite me.
Asuka from Neon Genesis Evangelion. ULTIMATE. The hair pins are key.
Ygritte from Game of Thrones. Hard to spell, nice to look at.
Kasumi from DoA (Dead or Alive). Good luck getting that bounce effect, unless you have Denise Richards’ chest circa Wild Things.
Red Sonja. This is old school now and will earn you major cred.
Dana Scully from The X-Files. Skepticism and a pantsuit. Rawr.
Risa and Otani of Lovely Complex – image via alarzy
Dawn. By Joseph Michael Linsner. If you don’t know, look it up.
Risa Koizumi and Atsushi Otani from Lovely Complex. Redhead couple costume = cute overload!
Willow from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Alyson Hannigan’s finest hour.
Carmella from Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust. This is like, cosplay max-level.
Amy Pond from Doctor Who. A redhead through time!
Malon from The Legend of Zelda. The most underrated Zelda chick (she’s pretty much number 3, given how many people think Link is a girl [named Zelda]).
Barbara Gordon / Batgirl from Batman. I know Alicia Silverstone might be confusing you, but she WAS actually a redhead.
Erza Scarlet of Fairy Tail. Omg so many costume options!
April from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Redheads normally look like clowns in yellow, but not this one…
Yoko Littner from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. More the cherry red and ultra-sexy cosplay variety here.
Nami from One Piece. For the sexy-but-natural-ginger variety of cosplayer.
Princess Nakaba from Reimei no Arcana (Dawn of the Arcana). Gorgeous and whimsical.
*Gender-bending is in, in cosplay and elsewhere. (And it’s always been part of anime culture.) Open your mind and consider a costume or red hair cosplay ideas outside of whatever gender you identify as, or switch the gender of your favorite character and reinterpret it for extra fun.
I’m sure I missed many red hair cosplay ideas, so tell me what I didn’t include in the comments below!
omg EPICCCCCCCCCCC
lol, thanks! Great name. 😉
Umm…Sakura Kinomoto has brown hair. -.-
I think you can add Taiga from Toradora. An other cute cosplay for short girls. And Koko from Golden Time 😉
And Pyrrha Nikos from Rwby
Hey great list, but the “if you have rack” or “if you are skinny” is so 2016, people can cosplay at any size mmkay?
Totes fair! It’s worth noting that this post was written in 2015, a time when I was less “woke” 🙂