Halloween falls on a Thursday this year, which means one thing: Frederick High students are excited to express their creativity by wearing costumes to school and showing them off to their friends. While not any costume will fly at FHS, students (and staff, for that matter) are encouraged to go all out. But what should you wear? Costumes are clothing after all, and just like regular fashions, some outfits are hot and others are not.

Luckily, there’s a great tool to figure out what costumes are popular this year: math. Using data from Google’s Frightgeist site (which tracks the most searched costume ideas), the Spirit Halloween store blog, and the best-selling costumes for men and women on Amazon (as of writing), here’s a rundown of what are this year’s hottest Halloween outfits… and if you can wear them to school.

The Dreaded Dress Code

Before looking at the trends, you need to know what costumes don’t belong at school. While you may not be wearing your normal school clothes to Frederick High on Halloween, that doesn’t mean the FHS Dress Code doesn’t apply. While the normal dress code is very lenient (basically, it says you need to wear clothes), there are some specific rules to keep in mind for Halloween:

• Cover yourself: Like any other school day, you need to wear clothes that cover traditionally private areas (nipples, pubic area, and the gluteal cleft). Some costumes use sheer fabric, so make sure that no one can see these areas through your costume. This applies to all genders—sorry boys, but no bare-chested gladiators allowed. You also have to cover your feet with some kind of footwear; while slippers aren’t normally allowed as shoes at FHS, they’re okay on Halloween.
• Face time: You must be able to be easily identified when at school, so you may not wear full face paint or costumes that obscure your face (like a morph suit). If your costume has a full face mask, you can bring the mask with you, put it on for a minute to show your friends, and then remove it.
• Keep your costume on: As you go about the school day, your costume should not fall apart and leave pieces behind. Make sure that any wigs are secured to your head and that any fake blood is dried and won’t leave a smear when you leave your desk. Oh, and no glitter.
• Make sure you can learn: The primary job of a student is to sit in a desk and learn, so make sure your costume allows you to do that. This means no inflatable costumes. This also means that if you have a class like PE that requires you to dress out, you should be able to change at school. If your costume or an accessory to your costume becomes a distraction in class, a teacher can ask you to change.

  

• Keep it appropriate: There are other school policies in place that affect the type of clothing you can wear at FHS and that includes Halloween costumes:
  • The drug-free campus policy means that your costume may not depict or promote drug culture, alcohol, or tobacco use.
  • The gang activity rules mean you cannot dress like a gang member.
  • The safe campus policies prevent you from bringing fake weapons as accessories for your costumes or wearing any costume item that could be used as a weapon (e.g., a Freddy Krueger glove).
  • The general code of conduct for students prevent you from wearing a costume with obscene language, a costume that implies sexual activity, or a costume that depicts obscene bodily functions.
  • The discrimination and harassment policy prevents you from wearing anything that discriminates against a certain race, faith, ethnicity, gender, or other legally protected class or that could be seen as a threat to a protected class (e.g., a Ku Klux Klansman). While someone may dress as a gender other than their own, they must do so respectfully. These rules extend to controversial or threatening figures: you aren’t allowed to dress like Adolf Hitler or Jeffrey Dahmer or any other figures classified under this policy.

For Women: Cartoon Characters, Funny Feelings, and Goth Girls

When it comes to women, animation is in this year. According to Frightgeist, Pomni, the neurotic clown girl from The Amazing Digital Circus, is the fifth-most popular costume across the US, and Velma from Scooby Doo is the top trending costume in Colorado. Three of the top best sellers on Amazon are Evee from Pokemon, Helen and Violet Parr from The Incredibles films (the costume is essentially the same for both), and Harley Quinn.

One particular animated movie is over-represented on the Frightgeist list: Inside Out 2. People are apparently vibing with these emotions, as Joy is the 21st most popular costume on Google’s list, Anxiety is 15th, Disgust is 13th, and sweet little Envy is 6th. These costumes are especially popular among young girls, only being outranked by Red from the latest Descendants film (which is #7 on the overall Frightgeist list but only comes in kid’s sizes at Spirit Halloween).

The only other franchise to dominate the Frightgeist list as thoroughly as this summer’s Pixar sequel is another sequel. Goth girls and Halloween go together like peanut butter and jelly (which is why Wednesday Addams and the teens from Monster High have been reliable best sellers for the past five years), so this fall’s Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has inspired a lot of looks. The Frightgeist list contains mother Lydia Deetz (#23), grandmother Delia Deetz (#16), and netherworld ex-wife Delores (#4) while daughter Astrid‘s Marie Curie dress is selling out at several Spirit stores.

Besides female versions of the male costumes in our next section (notably Deadpool and Betelgeuse), two popular costumes–specifically, the #1 and #2 most searched female costumes according to Frightgeist–don’t quite fit this trend. The most searched costume for women is the green and yellow tracksuit and ballcap combo worn by Australian breakdancer Rachael “Raygun” Gunn at this summer’s Olympic games. While Raygun completely bombed her Olympic contests, she became one of the year’s biggest memes. The second-most searched female costume is CatNap, one of the cuddly-turned-demented Smiling Critters from the online horror game Poppy’s Playtime. CatNap debuted in January with the release of Chapter 3 of the indie horror game as the main antagonist of the chapter and drew a large fan following.

For Men: Marvel, Maniacs, and… Munchies?

While superhero costumes are falling out of fashion, the pair of Deadpool and Wolverine are the #1 duo costume for men, with their popularity boosted from their successful buddy film. Wolverine is also #14 on the overall Frightgeist list and the second-most popular costume in Colorado. A couple other Marvel mainstays have made their way on the list: Gambit is #17, no doubt on the back of Channing Tatum’s performance, and Dr. Doom is #8, mostly boosted by being the top costume for boys this year (another Marvel character, Kidpool, is #2).

As always, supernatural killers from the big screen are also popular costumes for men. While Freddy Krueger, Jason Vorhees, and Scream‘s Ghostface are Halloween staples every year, Spirit Halloween’s numbers show that they are being outpaced by the new spook on the block: Art the Clown from the Terrifier series. With Terrifier 3 pulling in the largest box office so far this month, the murderous mime and his ghost girl friend from Terrifier 2 are very popular this year. Don’t expect the Miles County Clown to make an appearance at FHS though since full-face makeup is against the Halloween dress code.

Sadly, Frightgeist’s top costume for men is both sold out at Spirit Halloween and would violate Frederick High’s must-show-your-face rule: Shrunken Head Bob, the breakout character from Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. So fans of Bob need to either settle for one of the many different Betelgeuse costumes available at Amazon or Spirit Halloween or try for the #2 most popular costume for men… a Chipotle burrito.

That’s right: a burrito is the second-most desired costume for men this year.

This costume is part of a trend of popular fast food and snack food brands becoming bestselling costumes. Not the mascots of these brands like Colonel Sanders or Chester Cheetah, but the foods themselves: Spirit has an entire food costume section now where dudes can dress like a bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, a can of Mountain Dew, and different flavors of Kung Fu Boba Tea. The Chipotle collection is more than just the burrito: there are costumes for the restaurant’s to-go bag, water cup, napkin, and fork.

Couple and Group Costumes: R-Rated Movies and G-Rated TV

A strange pattern has developed for couple and group costumes this year: the most popular sets feature characters from R-rated horror and action movies or family television series. On the harder side of things, the aforementioned Deadpool and Wolverine take the Frightgeist top spot while Joker and Harley Quinn (specifically the pair from the much maligned  Joker: Folie a Deux) are bestsellers on Amazon. Killer dolls Chucky and Tiffany (or Chucky and Lady Chucky) also remain very popular pairs at Spirit Halloween.

At the other end of the spectrum, the top group costume according to Spirit Halloween are the characters from the hit children’s show Bluey, which aired its final episode earlier this year. A close second are the gang from the Scooby Doo franchise, followed by Super Mario characters and the roster of feelings from Inside Out 2 (in addition to the female character costumes already mentioned, Anger is the third-highest trending men’s costume on Frightgeist). Rounding out the top picks for groups are the characters from Sesame Street and the gang from The Wizard of Oz.

As couples go, other top costumes are Velvet and Veneer from last year’s Trolls Band Together (#2 duo costume on Frightgeist),  Janet and Rita from Bluey (#3), Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable (#6), Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde from Zootopia (#7), Max and Roxanne from A Goofy Movie (#8), and Regular Show‘s Mordecai and Rigby (#9). Outside of all the generic food costumes (like peanut butter and jelly or chip and salsa), Spirit Halloween’s most popular couples costumes not already mentioned are Woody and Buzz (or Jessie) from the Toy Story films, Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy from Spongebob Squarepants, Jack Skellington and Sally from A Nightmare Before Christmas, and Lilo and Stitch.