Comments on: What is this costume from?

Question: What is this costume from?

wanderingmind — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 12:07:05 -0800

What is that Chinese big-sleeves/baggy-pants costume/outfit/character archetype called?

Examples are Hsien-Ko from Capcom's Darkstalkers games, and Mousse from the Ranma series. Where does that outfit come from, and why does it seem to be associated with martial artists who pull blades out of apparently nowhere? Is there a real historical group of people who do/did this?

By: chunking express

chunking express — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 12:37:23 -0800

A coolie?

By: PurplePorpoise

PurplePorpoise — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 12:43:02 -0800

The Japanese outfit for martial arts practice is called a Gi.

A coolie is a Chinese worker/labourer. The conical hats are typically identified as Coolie Hats.

By: artifarce

artifarce — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 14:38:53 -0800

The examples wanderingmind gave are not wearing gis. At all.

By: agropyron

agropyron — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 14:40:58 -0800

Maybe if wanderingmind could find an image of some sort..
Mousse from Ranma?

By: wanderingmind

wanderingmind — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 14:51:46 -0800

Sure thing. Here's Hsien-ko; the freakishly huge claws in place of her hands are not, strictly speaking, part of the outfit. If anything, her design should be taken as an exaggerated version of the costume I'm talking about. Here's one of Mousse showing off his ability to stuff just about anything into those sleeves, and another slightly more sedate one showing off the set of knives that seem more usual for him (and seem to have the same origin as Hsien-Ko's claws; hers are just more stylized).

By: MegoSteve

MegoSteve — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 17:05:02 -0800

Does it even have a name? (Another example... Ziyi Zhang's dance with the drums from the movie House of Flying Daggers.)

By: mr_roboto

mr_roboto — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 17:28:13 -0800

I think pien-fu might be the name of the outfit in question. I'm not sure, though.

By: Big Fat Tycoon

Big Fat Tycoon — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 19:34:11 -0800

Those are two completely different styles of outfit. Big sleeves were in a variety of Chinese clothing styles from various dynasties. To my eye, the Hsien-ko style seems a bit like the eunuch uniforms from the Qing dynasty (see here) and the second Mousse image looks like a vaguely Ming dynasty influenced style.

By: artifarce

artifarce — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 20:47:27 -0800

Good call, I asked a male Chinese friend who's into martial arts and he also pointed me to this board discussion about han-fu (also pien-fu, apparently), the wikipedia article about such. I guess a more modern version of this is the male cheongsam, or Da Ma Gua (oh... from the Qing dynasty as Big Fat Tycoon referred).

By: artifarce

artifarce — Mon, 17 Oct 2005 20:50:50 -0800

Also, read down on this page to the part on the Cheongsam in films. That sort of approached the archetype you were referring to. Maybe an archetype that's more recent, but drawing on past martial "fashions"? Using large sleeves for concealment (whether of weapons or one's body) has always been a tool in martial arts. Even the hakama (worn on the lower body) serves the same purpose.

Hopefully these links are what you were looking for.

By: selfnoise

selfnoise — Sun, 23 Oct 2005 19:58:39 -0800

One fabulous example of this, btw, is in the movie "Iron Monkey". The evil mastermind has a unique and violent application for those long sleeves.