Cosplay attendee in his costume, as Elim Garak
Elim Garak is a fictional character from the television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. In the series, Garak is an exiled spy from the Cardassian Union and a former member of the feared Cardassian intelligence group called the Obsidian Order. Garak was exiled to the space station that became known as Deep Space Nine and established a tailoring business there. While during most episodes of the series, he is indeed a harmless tailor, he sometimes wilfully or coincidentally plays a role in covert operations on the side of the United Federation of Planets running Deep Space Nine. Occasionally, other Cardassians warn Federation personnel that he is "a very dangerous man with a traitorous mind", but in general he plays a rather positive, though sometimes sinister role during the series.
Cosplay, a contraction of the words costume play, is a performance art in which participants called cosplayers wear costumes and fashion accessories to represent a specific character.
Cosplayers often interact to create a subculture and a broader use of the term "cosplay" applies to any costumed role-playing in venues apart from the stage. Any entity that lends itself to dramatic interpretation may be taken up as a subject and it is not unusual to see genders switched. Favorite sources include manga and anime, comic books and cartoons, video games, and live-action films and television series.
The New York Comic Con convention, is a celebration of comic books, graphic novels, sci-fi and video games, toys, movies and television. The convention brings together celebrities as well as fans of fantasy role playing, Comic-Con is the business of pop culture.