As popular culture has an increasing presence in America, so do its various sub-cultures. One of such sub-cultures is the world of comic book fans known as cosplayers. Cosplayers dress-up and emulate characters at comic book conventions throughout the United States and the world—a practice known as cosplay, also described as costume-play. Despite the growing popularity of cosplay, little is known about this population. In this research, I set out to answer the following research question: why are women choosing to dress-up and embody these characters (the Gotham City Sirens) when they are often viewed as oversexualized. In order to answer my research question, I focused on women who chose to cosplay characters from the Gotham City Sirens – Catwoman, Harley Quinn, and Poison Ivy – who are frequently depicted in “glamorized” or hypersexualized illustrations. My data collection included participant observation, literature review, and semi-structured interviews. Recruiting participants from local Central Florida comic book conventions, I conducted 19 in-depth semi-structured interviews with the women cosplayers about their perspectives on the characters and their cosplays. My findings derived from the analysis of the interview narratives identified three emerging dominant themes – sexuality, body image, and personal identity. Based on this research, there is a concluding realization that empowerment and self-reflection are prevalent in women cosplayers. These are important findings because they are essential to the understanding of how gender identity is perceived in cosplay. When cosplayers connect with their characters on a personal level, often empowerment and self-reflection are the outcomes; due to the connection they foster with the character for the sake of performance.

I denna uppsats undersöks den visuella gestaltningen av Gotham City i regissören Christopher Nolans The Dark Knight Trilogy med hjälp av en komparativ analysmetod. De berättelser som utspelat sig i Gotham och Batmans relation till staden har genom åren givit den en viss karaktär. Gotham har framförallt varit platsen där brott begås och Batman bekämpar dem. Dessa karaktärsdrag har i ett antal filmer gestaltats av en mängd olika personer inom i stort sätt alla visuella medier som existerar, alla med sin egen vision av hur staden ser ut. I tidiga filmtolkningar så var gestaltningen av staden återhållsam medan den i senare gestaltats som en dystopisk mardröm. När Nolan tog sig an Batmans värld valde han istället att förankra sin vision i realismen. Men när trilogin ses i sin helhet blir det tydligt att gestaltningen av staden skiljer sig åt mellan filmerna och att varje film visar upp en ny sida av den. Med en syn på Nolans konstnärskap som grundar sig i auteurteorin men med urban studies som huvudsakliga teoretiska perspektiv undersöks i denna uppsats hur gestaltningarna av staden skiljer sig åt mellan filmerna, hur dessa skillnader påverkar vår uppfattning av staden och filmernas narrativ samt i vilket utsträckning gestaltningarna är ett resultat av Nolans vision.