Balancing act

There's a new costume wearable hitting the market soon: Games Workshop announced that it's releasing its first official Warhammer 40,000 helmet will be coming soon. It's based on the one worn by Lieutenant Demetrian Titus in Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine II, and it'll retail for $169. It's expected to ship sometime in December 2025 or January 2026. (Thanks to subscriber Mark W. for the tip!)

The helmet is a 1:1 scale replica from the game, and it's designed to be worn: it has padding on the inside and features LED lights, and the company specifically notes that it's designed for display or to "enhance" a cosplayer's costume. It also comes with a display stand that features the Adeptus Astartes insignia as well as an Ultramarines purity seal. Preorders will get you a shirt, too.

According to the company, it'll be produced by a toy manufacturer called JoyToy, known for their 40k action figures, and it's apparently the first in a lineup of other Warhammer helmets in the pipeline.

It's a neat-looking helmet, and while Games Workshop has produced legions of tiny plastic space marines and their foes over the decades, I'm a little surprised that it's taken them this long to branch into products aimed at the higher-end costume and cosplay world. I've seen people cosplay as the massive Space Marines over the years, and they're impressive costumes to behold.

This particular release is a solid indication that film, television, and game studios are increasingly aware that there's a growing market for pieces specifically to high-end collectors and cosplayers. But it's also a stark reminder that the cosplay world exists in a weird, legal grey area, because its practitioners are using the intellectual property that someone else owns, and that the growth of this market could bring some uncomfortable friction between the companies that own the intellectual property and the cosplayers that dress up as the characters from it.

Cosplay has for much of its existence largely been confined to fans with a do-it-yourself mindset, making their costumes from scratch, while the only costumes studios were really interested in producing were cheaper Halloween costumes for children. That's changed enormously in the last 20 years; as cosplay has become a more widely known and accepted hobby, companies have recognized that there's a growing market for not only better Halloween costumes, but for adult collectors and costumers who're looking for costumes to wear or pieces to display from their favorite films, TV shows, or games.

High-end wearables and prop replicas have been around for decades, but they've mostly been limited to a smaller collector's market. Companies spent far more attention producing action figures that they could sell by the truck load than a much smaller number of more expensive items to grownups with deeper pockets.

Starting in 1977, mask maker Don Post produced a range of officially-licensed helmets from Star Wars, including a deluxe line of screen-accurate pieces in the late 1990s. Others like eFX and Master Replicas produced similar offerings in the 2000s. These were mainly designed for display but were wearable in theory, and enterprising cosplayers found that these products were either more accurate or readily available than their fan-made counterparts, and would incorporate them into their costumes accordingly.

In 2013, Hasbro launched its Black Series product line, starting with detailed 6-inch action figures for collectors, and expanded its offerings in the years that followed to lightsabers and 1:1 scale helmets, starting in 2015 with Kylo Ren's helmet. (Here's a pretty comprehensive list of the releases thus far.) At the same time, a company called ANOVOS began producing its own lineup of wearable Star Wars costumes. (It has since gone out of business, and a new company, Denuo Novo, has taken over their products and some of their licenses.)

Other companies have gotten in on the officially licensed wearable market over the years: EA released a limited edition of its 2016 game Titanfall 2, and included a replica Vanguard Pilot Helmet that I've seen cosplayers wear. (I have one, it's pretty cool). Jazwares released a Deluxe Master Chief helmet alongside Halo Infinite in 2021 (and another one earlier this year). Hasbro has also released a variety of helmets (and props) from the different franchises in its portfolio, including the Power Rangers, Marvel, Transformers, and others. And earlier this year, Burgschneider, a German-based clothing company, announced that it was producing a line of licensed costumes from J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings saga.

In some ways, this is a really cool thing to see. Where fan-made props are often creations based on a designer's interpretation and measurements, officially-licensed products can take advantage of a company's IP, basing them directly on the costumes and designs from the films/TV shows/video games to produce something that's exact (or really close) to what you see on screen. And as official products, they're often readily available through traditional retailers, rather than through the unofficial markets that cosplayers have long relied on.

As such, they can be a good way to add a component to one's costume: helmets in particular can a difficult part to nail. They're often the most iconic or recognizable part of a costume, and even if you don't want to pull it off the shelf and add it to a costume, they're components that could be stripped down, modified, or repainted as part of the process.

While various companies have worked to produce helmets, props, and entire costumes to fans, this is a difficult market to break into. For decades, cosplay has been a largely DYI enterprise, largely because of necessity (if fans wanted something, they'd have to make it themselves because there were no alternatives) but also because the hobby isn't just about wearing a costume, but the entire process of building one. That ethos is ingrained in the costuming world and as such, it instills a mindset that prizes creativity and curiosity, as well as a lot of pride in the final product. I don't subscribe to the mindset that a bought costume is any less valid than one that you build from scratch, but there is something of a punk rock-like mindset of "fuck you, I don't need you to give me permission or tell me how to build this" at play here.

As such, the growth of this particular segment of the entertainment merchandise industry brings up some existential concerns for the cosplay world. Companies like Lucasfilm and Games Workshop have historically been protective and litigious over the use of their intellectual property and as they and other companies increasingly cater toward collectors and cosplayers by developing and providing officially-licensed products, how will their attitude towards their fandoms change? Will they begin to crack down on the makers who produce their own costumes or set up elaborate rules and regulations that could stifle those communities?

Cosplay, IP, and studios

I’m on Planet Money’s The Indicator!

Transfer OrbitAndrew Liptak

I recently talked about this on Planet Money's podcast The Indicator: for decades, cosplay was something of an underground thing. For much of its history, it was confined to a small group of fans who attended conventions, and for a while, when studios saw fans making their own props and costumes, they didn't hesitate to send them a C&D.

When I interviewed him for my book, Replica Props Forum owner Art Andrews told me that the mid-1990s was a pretty scary time, and that he began attending the product licensing conventions that were taking place in Las Vegas, and got to know the people in the field. "We eventually developed a relationship where they understood that we weren't trying to screw them: we love their properties, and they're trying to promote it. That changed the way they dealt with us."

Since then, studios like Lucasfilm, 343 Industries, and others have worked with fans, forming something of a symbiotic relationship, recognizing that enthusiasts are a good way to promote their brands, and that undue pressure from above can be counterproductive. As a result, cosplayers have been cast in official productions or in high-profile events.

But there are other instances where they pass down some heavy-handed edicts or outright C&D notifications. In June 2016, Paramount announced a series of onerous rules for Star Trek fans wanting to make their own fan films and this week: just as Games Workshop announced the release of this official, wearable helmet, cosplay 3D modeler and shop Galactic Armory revealed that they had received a cease-and-desist notice from the company, prompting them to take down all of their Warhammer 40k-related files. Owner Aaron Hughes told All3DP that " this is our first C&D we’ve received, and we’re going to fully comply with their requests." I don't think that Galactic Armory is working with any ill-intent here: they were producing things because it had generally been permissible to do so until the environment changed.

Games Workshop didn't respond to All3DP's requests for a comment, but the timing doesn't feel like a coincidence. The company is known for being particularly aggressive in protecting its intellectual property rights, once going as far as to take down works that used the term "space marine."

Fan makers and cosplayers do exist in a weird legal gray area: we are fundamentally using someone else's intellectual property, and while some companies have permitted this at low levels, as they work to build new product categories that have previously been filled by unofficial fan works, we're bound to see more of these sorts of conflicts between makers and studios.

This isn't an instance with gray area: Galactic Armory was producing a product for sale for which they didn't license the underlying intellectual property, and I think that it's important for the people who are responsible for creating those stories, characters, designs, and world should be able to benefit from the fruits of their labor.

I don't think this'll be an all-or-nothing thing: plenty of studios have figured out how to balance the passions of their fan community while also ensuring that they're protecting their IP from exploitation: the most productive relationships seem to be ones where they can work with fans and fan communities by setting up some basic rules and expectations. But as Attorney Meredith Rose pointed out in that episode of The Indicator, "Could all of these companies turn around at any point and say, 'you know what? We're not doing this anymore,' yeah, they could do that."

I don't know if that's the case here with Games Workshop and the Warhammer 40k fan and cosplay community, but I do think that any sort of top-down demand that fans and cosplayers should only utilize licensed products for their costumes would be a bad thing: it'll limit the creativity and problem-solving skills that cosplayers develop as they build their costumes, and it'll mean that an IP holder views cosplayers as another tool in their promotional toolbox, rather than a member of an enthusiastic community.

These sorts of demands also won't work in the long run: if a fan wants to make a prop replica or a costume, they're going to go make it if they're super passionate about it. But onerous rules and regulations could steer people away because it's just too much of a hassle. In a lot of ways, the lighter touch that companies like Lucasfilm have utilized towards cosplayers has helped the community flourish and grow – something that certainly helps their brand in the long run.

In this case, I have to imagine that you'll still be able to find the files to print up your own Space Marine helmet and armor if you know where to look or know the right people. And if you want to forgo the trouble of printing up this one particular piece, there's now a version of the helmet that you can toss into a shopping cart. Hopefully, companies, cosplayers and makers will continue to work towards maintaining a positive and well-intentioned balance that works for everyone: one that allows IP holders to foster their fan communities, makers who aren't trying to overstep their bounds, and fans to continue to celebrate the stories they love.