Halloween Costumes Reflect Pop Culture
Costumes represented a parade of popular culture hits. Kids could disguise themselves as Spider Man, Tinkerbell, Wilma Flintstone, Flipper, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, a witch, and as time went on, Star Wars characters, E.T., Flipper, even a Rubik’s Cube (with eyeholes and a painted-on smile). Some of the costumes depicted actual people (albeit a warped-looking, cartoon version of them). Children might dress as the Beatles, Elvis, or the Fonz from Happy Days.
The costume company made a few questionable choices, particularly when building costumes based on adult-level popular culture. There were years children could find costumes of Joanie Loves Chachi, Laverne and Shirley, or even Jaws and Alien, which peeved some parents. Alien was a dark science fiction horror movie and Jaws was about a killer shark. But Ben Cooper, Inc. were one of the biggest manufacturer of Halloween costumes and could afford a few misfires.
