So it begins...
COMIC CON: DAY 1
(The prequel previous post is here. Since it's been a ridiculously long time since Comic Con at this point (over a month, DAMN), I'm relying on a combination of my lame memory and the notes I took while I was there. Anything I saw is doubtlessly all over the internets by now, but I'll warn for TV show spoilers if they come up.)
Comic Con tip #1: Sleep is for the weak. LINE UP EARLY. I was already drifting into sleep deprivation after five days of travelling (give or take a few time zone changes), but getting up at 5:30 AM turned out to be a smart choice. When I got to the convention centre at 7:00, the line-up was already wrapped around the back of the building, through a few narrow alleys, all the way down to the waterfront.
The District 9 van was parked outside.
The doors opened around 8:30 for people to go inside and get their passes. The line actually moved pretty quickly once it got going, with lots of Comic Con staff and security people herding us in the right direction. Things weren't TOO crazy on the inside. Yet.
Nothing much was open until 9:30. I spent the downtime sitting in the lineup for the exhibit hall, going through the complementary bag of swag that came with my pass, and browsing the lists of vendor booths and panels. It was also prime time for seeing the first wave of people in costumes.
The exhibit hall: sane for, oh...ten minutes or so before becoming the obscenely crowded clusterfuck that it would remain for the rest of the con.
The exhibit hall is absolutely HUGE, and crowded wall-to-wall with everything you'd ever want to geek out over. The booths ran the gamut from intensely awesome to lulzily ridiculous. There were tiny independent comics trying to get their name out there, industry giants showing off, artists selling sketches, and even a cross-section of popular webcomics. There were booths selling everything from comic back-issues to Cthulhu jewellery to Ghibli merchendise. Most of the booths were giving away free swag. After a few hours, you were bound to have collected a bag full of business cards, buttons, free comics, and postcards. And several ginormous tote bags to carry it all in. Even after a few hours of wandering around, I'd barely explored 1/3 of what the hall had to offer. And there's always a reason (or ten) to come back to booths you've visited before. There's always people showing up to do signings. There's always events and contests going on somewhere. There's always something you missed the first few times around. There's always new stuff coming and going and being given away. So I ended up fighting my way through the crowds and costumes pretty regularly over the course of the next four days.
OH THE COSTUMES. Comic Con tip #2: ALWAYS HAVE YOUR CAMERA HANDY. You never know what's going to come along next.
Avatar, I think.
The Rainbow Batman?
The Darth Vaders were outnumbered only by Storm Troopers, Rorschachs, and Jokers.
Gambit and Rogue.
Alice and the Mad Hatter. The Hatter was going around asking people if it was their Unbirthday.
El Santo?
One of many Doctor Horribles.
Wonder Woman and a very lucky Storm Trooper.
One of several Deadpools wandering around.
It was fun just to wander and take it all in. There were a million things to see and do, but I think the Marvel booth was my favourite.
Not only did they have a cool theme (the women in suits handing out Stark Industries business cards were a nice touch), they also had tons of events going on. Every time I wandered by there was a trivia contest, drawing contest, autograph signing, costume contest, preview... All awesome, even the stuff I wasn't familiar with. And they had the most kids with cute costumes showing up.
AWWWW.
Of course, there was plenty of other random cool stuff to be found. Like the display of repainted Stitch figures.
And Storm Troopers. The zombie and tutu ones are my favourite.
Toy previews at the Hasbro booth. The hero and villain My Little Ponies cracked me up.
EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!
Castle Greyskull. But...WTF, He-Man is wearing armour? BLASPHEMY!
Of course, not everything is is worth an "OMG!", or even a second glance. The Heroes booth was basically just a big ad for whatever ugly Nissan car NBC is whoring out to this season, plus a few generic booth chicks in cheerleader outfits and a screen looping the season 4 promo. Lame, NBC. (Apparently the carnival outside the convention centre was advertising for Heroes too. Maybe I would have waked away with a better impression of THAT than the massive booth fail.)
And speaking of fail... Why the lame t-shirt selection, Comic Con vendors? A lot of the shirts I wanted didn't come in anything except Comic Book Guy sizes, and the "girl shirts" were just pitiful. I'd like a superhero shirt with something on it besides "ZOMG I WANT TO MAKE OUT WITH SUPERMAN!" or Wonder Woman yelling about girl power. I had to go to the webcomic and niche booths just to find any decent girl-sized tees. Penny Arcade provided. So did the Cthulhu booth. Cthulhu looks great in tank top form.
I only got to see a fraction of the exhibit hall before it was time to go to my first panel. Just for comparison, this is what the crowd in the hall was like by the time I left.
A few more costumes on the way to the panel room.
*IZ STEALTHY*
That's the second-biggest Jigglypuff I've ever seen.
My first panel was Wonder Women, a discussion about women and female archetypes in pop culture. I thought for sure I'd have to line up to get in, but I got there early enough to just walk right in and sit in on the latter half of the panel before it. It was for some animated movie with Chris Pine that I wasn't familiar with. Robert Picardo was there, which warmed my little Trekkie heart.
The description in the Wonder Women panel blurb was "Basically, a discussion with women who kick ass." It delivered. The guests were Eliza Dushku, Signorney Weaver, Zoe Saldana, and Elizabeth Mitchell. They were asked about their past roles in movies and TV, about groundbreaking female roles in sci-fi and genre media, and were just awesome in general. (I liked the Q&A question about why Hollywood seems to have trouble writing decent female characters. The four of them pretty much hit the nail on the head: movies try too hard to write "female characters", rather than focussing on writing decent characters who just happen to be women. WORD, ladies.)
Sigorney Weaver is a classy, kick-ass woman. I loved all her answers for all the moderator's questions. Especially when she said that it's up to "all of you" to challenge stereotypes and push for progress in pop culture, because Hollywood is always behind the times and never takes the first step. You rock, Sigorney Weaver.
After the panel was over, I stopped by a panel-in-progress about the folklore and myth of DC superheroes. Interesting enough, but I'm not much of a DC person, so I only stayed for part of it before I left to walk around some more.
You can't go anywhere at Comic Con without stumbling across a photo op or ten. Like most of Organization XIII (plus a token Naruto).
Or some Final Fantasy characters.
Or a couple of Silk Spectres.
Or fairy godmothers granting wishes.
Hey, if you're going to wear a fursuit, it might as well be cosplay.
I loved these guys. They even had a Nurse Chapel.
Monster makeup demonstration.
Lego Boba Fett.
DC's next crossover?
Down in the exhibit hall, I ended up wandering through the webcomic booths for a while. They were clustered together away from the industry and indie comics, but it didn't take long for the webcomic ghetto to become one of my favourite spots on the floor. Partly because I got to meet the authors of some of my favourite webcomics, like R.K. Milholland of Something Positive. Also because it introduced me to one of the other awesome things about Comic Con: SKETCHES. When I went by the Penny Arcade table, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins were doing free sketches for anyone who wanted them. I'd brought the sketchbook I bought at the art supply store the day before, so I took it out and asked for a zombie sketch.
After that, I was pretty much hooked on collecting sketches. I've always loved getting pictures from my more artistically inclined friends, and Comic Con was full of fantastic artists taking every request under the sun. I left the webcomic ghetto with a half dozen zombie sketches from the likes of Penny Arcade and Cyanide And Happiness, and a mission to collect as many as I could before the end of the con.
So...yeah, Comic Con tip #3: BRING A SKETCHBOOK. Autographs, sketches, killing time in lineups, making Free Hugs signs... There's a million reasons you might want big pieces of blank paper handy.
I kept forgetting the fact that so many awesome people were there in the flesh. When I passed by one of the tables, I did a double take when I saw that it was Doug TenNapel, the creator of Earthworm Jim and writer of many fantastic graphic novels. I went over to his table, and ended up chatting with him about his work. He told me he'd corrupted an entire generation of kids with Earthworm Jim (LOL), and I told him how much I loved his graphic novels, especially Creature Tech. It's one thing to enjoy a comic, but it's a whole new experience to get to meet an artist you admire and tell them how much you love what they've created. He was also nice enough to do a zombie sketch for my collection. Thanks, Doug. :)
My Sylar doll came along for the trip, so I took him by the Heroes booth for a photo op.
Near the end of the day, I headed upstairs to meet up with ibroketuesday, cookie_simone, and barkinmad. Weirdest thing about meeting people you know online: trying not to call each other by screen names. We headed over to Seaport Village for some dinner, and much lulz were had discussing internet stuff and fandom wank. (Oh SPN fandom, never stop being hilariously batshit.)
If that weren't enough for a first day at Comic Con, we ended up going out for ice cream with some of cookie_simone's friends...and David Lawrence. Yeah, that David Lawrence, A.K.A. The Puppetmaster from season 3 of Heroes. I came to Comic Con hoping to go to the Heroes panel, but I never expected to meet one of the actors. Let alone over ice cream. He and his girlfriend were lovely people to hang out with. And good sports, considering the circumstances. We were at the ice cream place for an hour or two, and at least three groups of people came up to ask David for a picture. I got a few myself before we parted ways.
I'm sure most of the people at the table that night have LJ accounts, so... Thanks to everyone who made such an awesome evening happen, and making my first night at Comic Con so memorable.
NEXT: Excelsior!
(The prequel previous post is here. Since it's been a ridiculously long time since Comic Con at this point (over a month, DAMN), I'm relying on a combination of my lame memory and the notes I took while I was there. Anything I saw is doubtlessly all over the internets by now, but I'll warn for TV show spoilers if they come up.)
Comic Con tip #1: Sleep is for the weak. LINE UP EARLY. I was already drifting into sleep deprivation after five days of travelling (give or take a few time zone changes), but getting up at 5:30 AM turned out to be a smart choice. When I got to the convention centre at 7:00, the line-up was already wrapped around the back of the building, through a few narrow alleys, all the way down to the waterfront.
The District 9 van was parked outside.
The doors opened around 8:30 for people to go inside and get their passes. The line actually moved pretty quickly once it got going, with lots of Comic Con staff and security people herding us in the right direction. Things weren't TOO crazy on the inside. Yet.
Nothing much was open until 9:30. I spent the downtime sitting in the lineup for the exhibit hall, going through the complementary bag of swag that came with my pass, and browsing the lists of vendor booths and panels. It was also prime time for seeing the first wave of people in costumes.
The exhibit hall: sane for, oh...ten minutes or so before becoming the obscenely crowded clusterfuck that it would remain for the rest of the con.
The exhibit hall is absolutely HUGE, and crowded wall-to-wall with everything you'd ever want to geek out over. The booths ran the gamut from intensely awesome to lulzily ridiculous. There were tiny independent comics trying to get their name out there, industry giants showing off, artists selling sketches, and even a cross-section of popular webcomics. There were booths selling everything from comic back-issues to Cthulhu jewellery to Ghibli merchendise. Most of the booths were giving away free swag. After a few hours, you were bound to have collected a bag full of business cards, buttons, free comics, and postcards. And several ginormous tote bags to carry it all in. Even after a few hours of wandering around, I'd barely explored 1/3 of what the hall had to offer. And there's always a reason (or ten) to come back to booths you've visited before. There's always people showing up to do signings. There's always events and contests going on somewhere. There's always something you missed the first few times around. There's always new stuff coming and going and being given away. So I ended up fighting my way through the crowds and costumes pretty regularly over the course of the next four days.
OH THE COSTUMES. Comic Con tip #2: ALWAYS HAVE YOUR CAMERA HANDY. You never know what's going to come along next.
Avatar, I think.
The Rainbow Batman?
The Darth Vaders were outnumbered only by Storm Troopers, Rorschachs, and Jokers.
Gambit and Rogue.
Alice and the Mad Hatter. The Hatter was going around asking people if it was their Unbirthday.
El Santo?
One of many Doctor Horribles.
Wonder Woman and a very lucky Storm Trooper.
One of several Deadpools wandering around.
It was fun just to wander and take it all in. There were a million things to see and do, but I think the Marvel booth was my favourite.
Not only did they have a cool theme (the women in suits handing out Stark Industries business cards were a nice touch), they also had tons of events going on. Every time I wandered by there was a trivia contest, drawing contest, autograph signing, costume contest, preview... All awesome, even the stuff I wasn't familiar with. And they had the most kids with cute costumes showing up.
AWWWW.
Of course, there was plenty of other random cool stuff to be found. Like the display of repainted Stitch figures.
And Storm Troopers. The zombie and tutu ones are my favourite.
Toy previews at the Hasbro booth. The hero and villain My Little Ponies cracked me up.
EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!
Castle Greyskull. But...WTF, He-Man is wearing armour? BLASPHEMY!
Of course, not everything is is worth an "OMG!", or even a second glance. The Heroes booth was basically just a big ad for whatever ugly Nissan car NBC is whoring out to this season, plus a few generic booth chicks in cheerleader outfits and a screen looping the season 4 promo. Lame, NBC. (Apparently the carnival outside the convention centre was advertising for Heroes too. Maybe I would have waked away with a better impression of THAT than the massive booth fail.)
And speaking of fail... Why the lame t-shirt selection, Comic Con vendors? A lot of the shirts I wanted didn't come in anything except Comic Book Guy sizes, and the "girl shirts" were just pitiful. I'd like a superhero shirt with something on it besides "ZOMG I WANT TO MAKE OUT WITH SUPERMAN!" or Wonder Woman yelling about girl power. I had to go to the webcomic and niche booths just to find any decent girl-sized tees. Penny Arcade provided. So did the Cthulhu booth. Cthulhu looks great in tank top form.
I only got to see a fraction of the exhibit hall before it was time to go to my first panel. Just for comparison, this is what the crowd in the hall was like by the time I left.
A few more costumes on the way to the panel room.
*IZ STEALTHY*
That's the second-biggest Jigglypuff I've ever seen.
My first panel was Wonder Women, a discussion about women and female archetypes in pop culture. I thought for sure I'd have to line up to get in, but I got there early enough to just walk right in and sit in on the latter half of the panel before it. It was for some animated movie with Chris Pine that I wasn't familiar with. Robert Picardo was there, which warmed my little Trekkie heart.
The description in the Wonder Women panel blurb was "Basically, a discussion with women who kick ass." It delivered. The guests were Eliza Dushku, Signorney Weaver, Zoe Saldana, and Elizabeth Mitchell. They were asked about their past roles in movies and TV, about groundbreaking female roles in sci-fi and genre media, and were just awesome in general. (I liked the Q&A question about why Hollywood seems to have trouble writing decent female characters. The four of them pretty much hit the nail on the head: movies try too hard to write "female characters", rather than focussing on writing decent characters who just happen to be women. WORD, ladies.)
Sigorney Weaver is a classy, kick-ass woman. I loved all her answers for all the moderator's questions. Especially when she said that it's up to "all of you" to challenge stereotypes and push for progress in pop culture, because Hollywood is always behind the times and never takes the first step. You rock, Sigorney Weaver.
After the panel was over, I stopped by a panel-in-progress about the folklore and myth of DC superheroes. Interesting enough, but I'm not much of a DC person, so I only stayed for part of it before I left to walk around some more.
You can't go anywhere at Comic Con without stumbling across a photo op or ten. Like most of Organization XIII (plus a token Naruto).
Or some Final Fantasy characters.
Or a couple of Silk Spectres.
Or fairy godmothers granting wishes.
Hey, if you're going to wear a fursuit, it might as well be cosplay.
I loved these guys. They even had a Nurse Chapel.
Monster makeup demonstration.
Lego Boba Fett.
DC's next crossover?
Down in the exhibit hall, I ended up wandering through the webcomic booths for a while. They were clustered together away from the industry and indie comics, but it didn't take long for the webcomic ghetto to become one of my favourite spots on the floor. Partly because I got to meet the authors of some of my favourite webcomics, like R.K. Milholland of Something Positive. Also because it introduced me to one of the other awesome things about Comic Con: SKETCHES. When I went by the Penny Arcade table, Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins were doing free sketches for anyone who wanted them. I'd brought the sketchbook I bought at the art supply store the day before, so I took it out and asked for a zombie sketch.
After that, I was pretty much hooked on collecting sketches. I've always loved getting pictures from my more artistically inclined friends, and Comic Con was full of fantastic artists taking every request under the sun. I left the webcomic ghetto with a half dozen zombie sketches from the likes of Penny Arcade and Cyanide And Happiness, and a mission to collect as many as I could before the end of the con.
So...yeah, Comic Con tip #3: BRING A SKETCHBOOK. Autographs, sketches, killing time in lineups, making Free Hugs signs... There's a million reasons you might want big pieces of blank paper handy.
I kept forgetting the fact that so many awesome people were there in the flesh. When I passed by one of the tables, I did a double take when I saw that it was Doug TenNapel, the creator of Earthworm Jim and writer of many fantastic graphic novels. I went over to his table, and ended up chatting with him about his work. He told me he'd corrupted an entire generation of kids with Earthworm Jim (LOL), and I told him how much I loved his graphic novels, especially Creature Tech. It's one thing to enjoy a comic, but it's a whole new experience to get to meet an artist you admire and tell them how much you love what they've created. He was also nice enough to do a zombie sketch for my collection. Thanks, Doug. :)
My Sylar doll came along for the trip, so I took him by the Heroes booth for a photo op.
Near the end of the day, I headed upstairs to meet up with ibroketuesday, cookie_simone, and barkinmad. Weirdest thing about meeting people you know online: trying not to call each other by screen names. We headed over to Seaport Village for some dinner, and much lulz were had discussing internet stuff and fandom wank. (Oh SPN fandom, never stop being hilariously batshit.)
If that weren't enough for a first day at Comic Con, we ended up going out for ice cream with some of cookie_simone's friends...and David Lawrence. Yeah, that David Lawrence, A.K.A. The Puppetmaster from season 3 of Heroes. I came to Comic Con hoping to go to the Heroes panel, but I never expected to meet one of the actors. Let alone over ice cream. He and his girlfriend were lovely people to hang out with. And good sports, considering the circumstances. We were at the ice cream place for an hour or two, and at least three groups of people came up to ask David for a picture. I got a few myself before we parted ways.
I'm sure most of the people at the table that night have LJ accounts, so... Thanks to everyone who made such an awesome evening happen, and making my first night at Comic Con so memorable.
NEXT: Excelsior!