The second of 5 parts continuing my interview with Booster Gold cosplayer Nicole (Demyrie).

BOOSTERRIFIC: When and why did you decide to dress as Booster Gold?

NICOLE: I first cosplayed Booster Gold at my first San Diego Comic-Con (2008), so it was something like a double-whammy of awesome to be able to sweep around the convention hall and see that he was actually quite popular! Last year (2011), I fixed up the suit and added his famous Disco Collar, then recruited my best friend as Blue Beetle II — THEN I felt I was really giving a portrait of the Booster I loved, arm-and-arm with Ted, wreaking havoc back in the JLI hey-dey.

My first itch to cosplay Booster came when I started poking around online and failed to find a truly inspiring cosplayer. No one (no man!) so far had embodied the glow of the character with a fitting wardrobe or demeanor, and so, to the chagrin of my unimpressed boyfriend, I launched into making my very first, terribly difficult super-suit.

It was TERRIBLE color-blocking that many pieces together on a first try, and I almost regretted the entire thing... and while I had a great time my first year, when my Beetle and I debuted together in 2011, everything was rewarded ten-fold!

BOOSTERRIFIC: Have your interactions with the general public been generally positive?

NICOLE: 1,000% positive! The entire experience really gave us a feeling of incredible community: when people saw us, it wasn't the verbal equivalent of checking off a box on a cosplay scavenger hunt. People got EXCITED. It was like we had turned over a rock and found this incredible wealth of fans who were thrilled to see a snap-shot of their "irreverent nineties" comic-book childhood, enacted by people who understood and loved the characters.

For example, I constantly high-fived fans in Booster Gold Fanclub t-shirts and generously offered to sign them for ever-increasing sums of money. I pretended to skip to the front of lines and every photo taken with my Blue Beetle was chummy and mischievous, like we had three slightly-evil-but-lucrative plans waiting on the backburner, and many older fans treated us with wonderful mock suspicion. We received many silly photo requests (which we were more than happy to oblige), and at one point, a fan lowered his camera, face screwed up. He couldn't stop snickering, then finally eked out, "You even have the grin!".

Point being, Booster is a loveable shmuck and a camera-hog and I have an indecent amount of fun being outrageous and shameless in his skin. He has to be my favorite cosplay thus far, if just because people love to provoke and engage him more than any other character. Would you play-harass Captain America for an autograph? Didn't think so.

Iron-Man, definitely. Cap, no. Booster, always, if I don't harass you first.

Thank you, Nicole. Check here for the first part of this interview. And check back next week, as there's plenty more to come.

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Obviously, cosplaying is popular with comic book fans. But what motivates someone to dress up like their hero at a public gathering, especially when that hero isn't the same gender as the cosplayer? The only way to find out is to ask, so that's what I did.

The following is the first of 5 parts of an email interview I recently conducted with Nicole, the very gracious and loquacious Booster Gold cosplayer better known in these parts as Demyrie.

BOOSTERRIFIC: When/where did you first meet the character Booster Gold?

NICOLE: My love of Booster Gold developed as a sort of illicit affair, as it was conducted under the nose of my boyfriend at the time. He actually introduced us, unknowing that my love for Mr. Carter would outlast our own hazy teenaged tryst!

But really, it was high-school, and my comic-hipster boyfriend managed to sway me from a diet of anime and onto western animation, DC-style, through the antics of Blue and Gold. He loaned me some old Justice League International trades so I could become just acquainted enough with happy, cheeky Booster to see him utterly destroyed/re-built in 52. Upon introduction to the JLI and I Can't Believe It's Not Justice League, I loved Booster and Beetle as a unit of dipwads, making trouble for everyone and laughing all the way... and then I retro-found Infinite Crisis.

Bwa-ha-ha-AWWWWWWWmanseriously.

BOOSTERRIFIC: Why do you think Booster Gold appeals to you? In what ways has the character inspired you, other than into putting on his clothes?

NICOLE: First of all, his clothes are incredibly comfy! Except for those goggles. Damn those goggles.

The facets of Michael that really hook me are his flaws, all of which hide a very, very squishy nougat-trauma center that I find far more appealing than Bats' psychosis. His troubled home-life and the abandonment he suffered work towards a very relatable character that jump-starts a life of heroism with an untraditionally selfish act and even more selfish intentions. Warm fuzzies and apple pie were not Booster Gold's MO for picking up that suit, which makes him interesting from the get-go, but the recent evolution and expansion that his writers have taken him through is just plain fantastic. His recent arcs have fleshed out a humorous-till-the-last character who struggles with guilt and feelings of inadequacy (see: Supernova!) and is eventually forced to hide his own maturation into a true hero in order to keep doing the thankless, dirty work of saving the world.

He's gritchy, hilarious, vain, frequently miserable and astoundingly generous when caught off guard. And, y'know, handsome.

When his time-cop series really forced him to figure himself out, I think the most poignant statement Booster makes is that he doesn't want to be Superman: he just wants to be needed. He wants someone to call on him with full faith that he can save them, believing that justice and the safety of the public is important to him. Basically, that his heart is in his job, which isn't a job but a calling. Unfortunately, he has made a literal career out of violating the trust of what a hero should be, so he's never going to get the full moral endorsement that Supes claims.

The recent Booster Gold series was action-packed and almost obscenely emotional (woo man-feelings! Ted's grave should be bursting with foliage, as often as Boost has watered it with his tears) and if I loved Booster before, those arcs officially obsessed me. Characters like Superman and Batman are iconic but I feel about as close to them as I do to Odysseus or George Washington. They've been reincarnated so many times, they're more metaphor than man, and thus are impervious even beyond bullet-proof skin. As a girl who was always more interested in the team-building comics of the Avengers/X-Men than the BLANK vs. BLANK fight-offs, Booster Gold put the human back into heroism for me. He offers an emotional insight into the costs of the business when he loses his sophomoric soul-mate and simply can't see why, if there are 52 Earths and aliens and magic and time-travel, he can't ever get him back. He's a tragic character who, when the cologne deal expires, really just wants one thing: to help.

... Seriously, can we just have Blue and Gold again? Wuughhh!

Thank you, Nicole. There's plenty more to come.

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The Justice League International Annual isn't due for another two weeks. While it might seem odd to release an annual to a series that has already been canceled, it certainly won't be the first time that this has happened to a Justice League title. Sixteen years ago today, DC published Justice League America Annual #10 more than two months after the series had been canceled at issue #113. Then, as now, Booster Gold took center stage.

The theme of the DC annuals in 1996 was "Legends of the Dead Earth," a series of tales about how the heroes of the DC Universe would go on to inspire humanity years after their own deaths. While many of the stories in these annuals could be considered unlabeled Elseworlds tales of an alternate reality, the Justice League story was heavily linked to ongoing continuity.

The story focuses on Captain Atom during one of his many unintentional trips through the quantum field to a future where Maxwell Lord's villainous schemes were oppressing humanity. (Sound familiar, Justice League: Generation Lost readers?) Lord has created a new JLI-inspired team called the Alliance that spend most of their time violently putting down "Trogs" bold enough to oppose Lord's tyranny. Whatever his original motivation, it becomes clear that Maxwell Lord has become corrupted inside former JLI-foe Lord Havok's robotic body (expanding on a plotline last seen in Justice League America #100).

The other original member of the JLI on the team is Michael Jon Carter. Refusing to be called Booster Gold, Michael acts as the team's field leader. Michael's position as Lord's right-hand man is fitting given that Lord had once hand-picked Booster to join his new JLI (as seen in Booster Gold #16). Michael is still something of a time traveler, having survived the intervening centuries by replacing his organic parts with mechanical imitations (a process begun in Justice League America #90). Wearing a prototypically Extreme! 1990s costume, this Michael exhibits a no-nonsense demeanor, increased power, and a warped set of personal values, even by Booster's admittedly questionable standards.

Before the story careens to its conclusion, it is revealed that Maxwell Lord is an evil megalomaniac who relives his past with living puppets based on his JLI template. Booster's motivations are never made clear, though Captain Atom expresses many uncharacteristically derogatory theories. Booster Gold fans are likely to be far more forgiving to our hero's actions.

Clearly a product of its era, this book is hardly the best annual in which Booster Gold appeared. Christopher Priest's story really doesn't make much sense, and Nick Napolitano's inks are especially unattractive. With the bar for annuals of cancelled series set this low, Geoff Johns and Dan DiDio won't have to do much work to top this effort.

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File this in the "It Could Be Worse" category: nineteen years ago today, Booster Gold debuted his first costume change in the pages of 1993's Justice League America #80. Doomsday had destroyed his original 25th century powersuit, and Blue Beetle graciously provided a replacement. It was... not good.

Unlike his current costume, this suit was intentionally designed by the writer and artist to be a disaster. Bulky, weak, and just plain ugly, this nearly useless powersuit was a means to demonstrate Booster's determination to be a super hero against all odds, even if it meant opening himself up to public ridicule and putting himself in mortal danger. Just think: once upon a time, costume changes were story driven, not editorial whims!

Thankfully, it didn't last long. The suit was replaced by a series of improvements until the original costume was eventually restored. There are many Booster fans who hope that this bit of history repeats itself.

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Booster Gold makes an appearance in today's Blue Beetle #11 as the hero trying to help Blue Beetle with his public image problem. In the online preview at Crave Online, Booster acts a lot like his Smallville interpretation, schmoozing with the television cameras for his own agenda, whatever that may be.

Buy this issue, if for no other reason than to support the fact that Booster's ridiculous DCnU notched headband has finally been discarded! That's enough to make Skeets happy! (Thanks to MetalWoman for the link.)

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