Pennywise? Yawn. Chucky, Jason and Ghostface? Puh-lease. If you really want to send chills down someone’s spine this Halloween, your costume has got to be Karen.
So says Kamoras Costumes, the Etsy retailer which bills its new — and fast-selling — latex rubber “Karen” mask as “the scariest thing you can be on Halloween.” Retailing for $180, the handmade mask is a riff on the viral “Karen” archetype — typically, a white, middle-aged woman who wants to speak to the manager or call the police — that’s picked up steam over the past year thanks to a series of highly publicized incidents involving anti-mask protests and complaints against Black people. This “Karen” sports the trademark choppy haircut, with yellowed teeth caught in an angry snarl and eyes reddened to a monstrous effect.
It’s one of two masks created by Kamoras Costume designer Jason Adcock, the other (now out-of-stock) dubbed “Karen-19” and featuring a sickly pallor and what appear to be fiery boils — a dig at those decrying mandates to wear face coverings in public.
“She thought she was slick calling you all sheep and look what happened,” Adcock — who has not yet responded to Yahoo Life’s request for comment — wrote in an Instagram post of the COVID-19-stricken character.
And while what happens this Halloween is anyone’s guess as the pandemic puts the kibosh on activities like trick-or-treating and spooky shindigs, it’s pretty clear that Karen is poised to be one of this year’s most popular costume trends — and could even edge out Joe Exotic.
Amazon has T-shirts emblazoned with “I Need To Speak To The Manager” alongside a name badge marked Karen, along with spiky, asymmetrical blond pixie cut wigs branded as “classic minivan Karen mom.” (One wig style, from the retailer Rubie’s, appears to have been repurposed from its original life as a tribute to TLC star and mom of eight Kate Gosselin, whose former hairdo is often associated with the Karen meme.)
Those clamoring for a couple’s costume need look no further than the “I’m With Karen” T-shirt, or the “Karen 2020: America Needs a New Manager” style.
Should you want to commit to the full Karen latex mask experience, you’ll need to act fast; Etsy lists the item as “low in stock.”