Epic Comic-Con Report: Friday
Yeah, I know, it's almost the end of September. I'm finishing my Comic-Con report anyway, goshdarnit!
Friday: Stargates, Dr. Horrible (NPH *and* Nathan Fillion!), and AVATAR!!! With bonus Kiefer Sutherland
Costume: Elizabeth's plum dress
We tried to be at the convention center by 10, but didn't entirely succeed. Dad and Sean were wearing Henry Sr. and Indy again, and Rogue was wearing Aragorn with the new chain shirt he made himself. We were almost to the convention center when we were accosted by FREE ICE CREAM! It was a promo for Eureka, and they had a whole ice cream truck parked on the street. They were giving out Drumsticks, yummmm. Ice cream for breakfast! Of course I promptly dropped a giant piece of chocolate coating between my dress and shift, where it immediately melted.
Dad and Sean went to find the Lego panel, and Rogue and I went up to Ballroom 20 to make sure we could get seats for the Gates panels. We found decent seats about halfway up, although the cameraman was blocking center stage. We discovered Angie sitting right behind us, although I don't remember if that was for SG1 or one of the later panels.
And then finally the panel started! They had the entire original SG1 team! Plus Ben Browder and Beau Bridges (BB and BB, ha!) and Brad Wright and Martin Wood, writer/producer/director types. ZOMG RICHARD DEAN ANDERSON YAY! MacGyver is getting old, you guys. But still awesome. He hasn't done much in the way of cons before, and you could tell, but he got more and more into it as the panel went on. He seemed to be particularly amused that the audience would cheer for just about anything any of them said. I really think he started saying random stuff just to see if we'd cheer for it.
As always, the panel was short on meaningful discussion but long on funny stories and cast interaction, which is really what we're there for, anyway. Amanda Tapping was sitting next to RDA, and except for her long brown hair, it was like Sam and Jack were in the room with us. RDA would say whatever came into his head, and AT would literally facepalm, and possibly try to rescue him from whatever hole he was digging himself into.
Mostly they talked about making Continuum, which had been screened Thursday night on the deck of the Midway. It sounded like they'd all had a jolly time, and I'm looking forward to seeing it. Stories I remember from the panel:
- Ben and Amanda telling their snow-angels-in-the-Arctic story again
- Everyone having a "pee buddy" in the Arctic, in case you froze to a piece of metal (and Michael Shanks volunteering to demonstrate right there)
- RDA wanting to drive the submarine they were filming on
- One of the actual ship captains giving RDA direction for his scene
- In answer to the quesiton "What are you working on right now?", RDA saying "My house," and everyone picking up on that. Ben: "I'm doing some contracting work for Rick." RDA, correcting him: "Subcontracting." Chris Judge: "I'm Rick's cabana boy."
- RDA being completely flummoxed when asked to give a particularly emotional episode for him, and finally coming up with one involving Charlie issues, because "Yeah, kids dying, that's emotional, right?" And then later for the favorite-episode question, he suddenly hollered "Ooh, I've got it, I've got it!" and said triumphantly, "The next one."
There were about a zillion more stories, but mostly what I remember was RDA. It was pretty awesome. When they announced that the panel was over, RDA didn't want to go! He made everyone come around to the front of the stage so people could take photos of all of them. "I bought a new outfit just for this convention and you can't even see the bottom!" he said. They also showed a promo for Sanctuary, and I really don't understand why AT needs to have a British accent in it. Or maybe they showed that after the SGA panel? I forget.
Anyway, the next event was a short panel on Stargate Worlds, the upcoming MMORPG. I skipped it to run down to the floor and see if I could get Rogue a Captain Hammer t-shirt, but they were sold out. Boo.
So then it was Atlantis! They had some more writer guys, plus Jewel Staite, Joe Flanigan, and Robert Picardo. I didn't watch S4 of SGA, so I was kind of lost with a lot of the stuff they discussed. They actually talked a lot more about the show and the writing than I expected, and I was certainly more inclined to watch the current season than I had been. RP talked about his character in an interesting way, and I'm sort of intrigued to see what he does with it, because I do enjoy him as an actor. But I still miss Weir, dammit, and it annoys the crap out of me to hear people say things like "But what will Atlantis do without Sam!?" She was there for one season! I think they'll survive.
Jewel got some Firefly love (and a huge roar from the people waiting for Dr. Horrible), which seemed to surprise her. She said that Keller is more difficult than Kaylee in the technobabble aspect, because on SGA they actually expect her to say certain exact lines, where on Firefly the props guys would come round with a box of tool-looking things and say "Pick one," and Joss would tell her to go monkey around with the engine. She also said she was tired of being kidnapped in the woods, and one of the writers said, "Well, in fairness, we film in Vancouver. There's not a lot of other places to kidnap her." And I said, "I really don't think it's the woods that's bothering her so much as the kidnapping." They also kept mentioning The Shrine as a particularly good upcoming epsiode. (I didn't watch it. Was it good?)
And then after that was DOCTOR HORRIBLE!!! YAAAY! Dad and Sean came up to sit with us; they had come in during SGA and sat in the back. They had everyone there, Joss and his brothers Jed and Zack and Maurissa Tancharoen (fiancee of Jed) and NPH (!!!) and Nathan Fillion and Felicia Day and the guy who played Moist who was on Studio 60. (Rogue wanted to go up and ask him to do his Nicolas Cage impression.) It was *such* a fun panel. They had all clearly had a blast working together, which you'd hope, since they did it for free. Almost everything I remember from this panel was NPH-related:
- Demonstrating his difficulty remembering the patter parts of Brand New Day: "...fuck." And then apologizing five minutes later for swearing, after he read that he wasn't supposed to.
- Explaining how they filmed the stomping-through-the-city slow-mo bits-- first they tried to do it where he would stomp normally and sing a sped-up version of Brand New Day so they could slow down the film later. "What did that sound like, Neil?" asked someone on stage, and he instantly started singing in a fast chipmunk voice. But that didn't work, so he had to sing normally and act like he was in slow motion.
- All the funny dances and weird stuff that Dr. Horrible does was just NPH goofing off, and they ended up leaving it in.
- Oh, here's one that's not NPH! Felicia Day was being apparently inattentive, and one of the guys prodded her, and she said, "Oh, sorry, I'm Twittering under here," which of course they all took inappropriately, and it became a running joke for the rest of the panel.
And so much more funny stuff happened, but I can't remember it all! After the panel was over, Rogue and I went back down to the booth for our shift. It was still pretty quiet, and we had more than enough people there. I played with the remote-control R2D2 to amuse myself. Also to entice people to buy it!
Our shift ended at four, and we decided to go plant ourselves in 6CDEF to assure ourselves of seats for the 7:30 Avatar panel. There was already a huge line for the room, so we were pretty sure it was a good decision. They were doing a nice job of packing the room, and we were able to get in and see most of the Jim Butcher panel, which we hadn't even known was happening. I wish I'd gotten started with the Dresden Files earlier, because at the time I hadn't read a single one! So the panel wasn't as relevant as it could have been, for me. After Jim Butcher was 24 and then Prison Break, and at the break between each of the panels we were able to move a little further up in the room. I was also texting back and forth with Angie and Rachel the whole time-- they weren't in the room yet and were worried about getting in for Avatar, but they did make it eventually.
I don't watch 24, so again, not much relevance for me. But Kiefer Sutherland was there! There was one really funny question, where some guy came up and asked why Jack Bauer says "Dammit!" all the time, and could Kiefer please yell "Dammit, Cameron!" at him. And Kiefer pushed his mike away, drew in a big breath, and hollered "DAMMIT CAMERON!!!" right at the guy, which was absolutely hilarious. He's a good sport. I also don't watch Prison Break, and the only thing I know about it is that people are obsessed with Michael and Dr. Sara. The Michael actor guy couldn't come, but Dr. Sara was there and she is TEENY TINY. Also, the guy who plays Lincoln mentioned that his kids watch Avatar, which got a huge cheer from the mostly-Avatar audience.
After Prison Break, a decent number of people left, so we were able to get six seats together in the second row of the second section, directly in front of the screen. Very respectable seats. Angie joined us, and Rachel, who also had Donna and her son with her. I think they may have come to regret sitting with us, because I was very, very squeeful through the whole panel. And loud. And fangirly. My utter glee with the entire experience could not be contained.
OH MY GOSH YOU GUYS. Seeing the finale with that crowd was everything I had hoped for. It was *awesome.* They had made these little animated drawings of Bryan and Mike to introduce the finale, and I think what they were saying was funny but it was pretty hard to hear. And watching those two episodes, hearing all the cheering and clapping, the reaction of thousands of fans who all love this show-- awesome. I love those kinds of fan experiences. I didn't even mind the ship-warring that seemed to be happening at the front of the room.
After the finale was over, Bryan and Mike came out. They talked a bit, and they took some questions, I think at the end, and they showed the results of their fan art contest and I squealed when they showed The Rise of Wang Fire and there was a very fast and very disorganized costume contest of sorts. But they all paled in comparison to "Book 4: Air; Chapter One: Forbidden Love," which was basically a video where they had taken a ton of fanart of various ships (but mostly Zutara) and animated them so the characters' mouths moved, and then proceeded to skewer all the shippers by having Katara leave Aang and hook up with Zuko, but then discover they were totally wrong for each other, and it ended with "I never should have doubted the will of Mike and Bryan." I'm doing a really bad job of describing it; you can watch it here if you're so inclined. (It is somewhat "saucy," as they put it during the panel. If you know small children who watch Avatar, don't show it to them.) It was HILARIOUS but also WILDLY UNCOMFORTABLE. I've never seen show creators who seem to enjoy poking their fandom with sharp sticks as much as Bryke do.
Sadly, the panel could not go on forever. :( But! As we were leaving, they gave us free Avatar T-shirts! Score! And luckily for us, we were very close to the exit doors, so we were able to get out without too much fuss. Then we went downstairs to go wait for Dad and Sean to pick us up, since they'd gone home earlier because they were tired and hot. And that was the end of Friday!
Friday: Stargates, Dr. Horrible (NPH *and* Nathan Fillion!), and AVATAR!!! With bonus Kiefer Sutherland
Costume: Elizabeth's plum dress
We tried to be at the convention center by 10, but didn't entirely succeed. Dad and Sean were wearing Henry Sr. and Indy again, and Rogue was wearing Aragorn with the new chain shirt he made himself. We were almost to the convention center when we were accosted by FREE ICE CREAM! It was a promo for Eureka, and they had a whole ice cream truck parked on the street. They were giving out Drumsticks, yummmm. Ice cream for breakfast! Of course I promptly dropped a giant piece of chocolate coating between my dress and shift, where it immediately melted.
Dad and Sean went to find the Lego panel, and Rogue and I went up to Ballroom 20 to make sure we could get seats for the Gates panels. We found decent seats about halfway up, although the cameraman was blocking center stage. We discovered Angie sitting right behind us, although I don't remember if that was for SG1 or one of the later panels.
And then finally the panel started! They had the entire original SG1 team! Plus Ben Browder and Beau Bridges (BB and BB, ha!) and Brad Wright and Martin Wood, writer/producer/director types. ZOMG RICHARD DEAN ANDERSON YAY! MacGyver is getting old, you guys. But still awesome. He hasn't done much in the way of cons before, and you could tell, but he got more and more into it as the panel went on. He seemed to be particularly amused that the audience would cheer for just about anything any of them said. I really think he started saying random stuff just to see if we'd cheer for it.
As always, the panel was short on meaningful discussion but long on funny stories and cast interaction, which is really what we're there for, anyway. Amanda Tapping was sitting next to RDA, and except for her long brown hair, it was like Sam and Jack were in the room with us. RDA would say whatever came into his head, and AT would literally facepalm, and possibly try to rescue him from whatever hole he was digging himself into.
Mostly they talked about making Continuum, which had been screened Thursday night on the deck of the Midway. It sounded like they'd all had a jolly time, and I'm looking forward to seeing it. Stories I remember from the panel:
- Ben and Amanda telling their snow-angels-in-the-Arctic story again
- Everyone having a "pee buddy" in the Arctic, in case you froze to a piece of metal (and Michael Shanks volunteering to demonstrate right there)
- RDA wanting to drive the submarine they were filming on
- One of the actual ship captains giving RDA direction for his scene
- In answer to the quesiton "What are you working on right now?", RDA saying "My house," and everyone picking up on that. Ben: "I'm doing some contracting work for Rick." RDA, correcting him: "Subcontracting." Chris Judge: "I'm Rick's cabana boy."
- RDA being completely flummoxed when asked to give a particularly emotional episode for him, and finally coming up with one involving Charlie issues, because "Yeah, kids dying, that's emotional, right?" And then later for the favorite-episode question, he suddenly hollered "Ooh, I've got it, I've got it!" and said triumphantly, "The next one."
There were about a zillion more stories, but mostly what I remember was RDA. It was pretty awesome. When they announced that the panel was over, RDA didn't want to go! He made everyone come around to the front of the stage so people could take photos of all of them. "I bought a new outfit just for this convention and you can't even see the bottom!" he said. They also showed a promo for Sanctuary, and I really don't understand why AT needs to have a British accent in it. Or maybe they showed that after the SGA panel? I forget.
Anyway, the next event was a short panel on Stargate Worlds, the upcoming MMORPG. I skipped it to run down to the floor and see if I could get Rogue a Captain Hammer t-shirt, but they were sold out. Boo.
So then it was Atlantis! They had some more writer guys, plus Jewel Staite, Joe Flanigan, and Robert Picardo. I didn't watch S4 of SGA, so I was kind of lost with a lot of the stuff they discussed. They actually talked a lot more about the show and the writing than I expected, and I was certainly more inclined to watch the current season than I had been. RP talked about his character in an interesting way, and I'm sort of intrigued to see what he does with it, because I do enjoy him as an actor. But I still miss Weir, dammit, and it annoys the crap out of me to hear people say things like "But what will Atlantis do without Sam!?" She was there for one season! I think they'll survive.
Jewel got some Firefly love (and a huge roar from the people waiting for Dr. Horrible), which seemed to surprise her. She said that Keller is more difficult than Kaylee in the technobabble aspect, because on SGA they actually expect her to say certain exact lines, where on Firefly the props guys would come round with a box of tool-looking things and say "Pick one," and Joss would tell her to go monkey around with the engine. She also said she was tired of being kidnapped in the woods, and one of the writers said, "Well, in fairness, we film in Vancouver. There's not a lot of other places to kidnap her." And I said, "I really don't think it's the woods that's bothering her so much as the kidnapping." They also kept mentioning The Shrine as a particularly good upcoming epsiode. (I didn't watch it. Was it good?)
And then after that was DOCTOR HORRIBLE!!! YAAAY! Dad and Sean came up to sit with us; they had come in during SGA and sat in the back. They had everyone there, Joss and his brothers Jed and Zack and Maurissa Tancharoen (fiancee of Jed) and NPH (!!!) and Nathan Fillion and Felicia Day and the guy who played Moist who was on Studio 60. (Rogue wanted to go up and ask him to do his Nicolas Cage impression.) It was *such* a fun panel. They had all clearly had a blast working together, which you'd hope, since they did it for free. Almost everything I remember from this panel was NPH-related:
- Demonstrating his difficulty remembering the patter parts of Brand New Day: "...fuck." And then apologizing five minutes later for swearing, after he read that he wasn't supposed to.
- Explaining how they filmed the stomping-through-the-city slow-mo bits-- first they tried to do it where he would stomp normally and sing a sped-up version of Brand New Day so they could slow down the film later. "What did that sound like, Neil?" asked someone on stage, and he instantly started singing in a fast chipmunk voice. But that didn't work, so he had to sing normally and act like he was in slow motion.
- All the funny dances and weird stuff that Dr. Horrible does was just NPH goofing off, and they ended up leaving it in.
- Oh, here's one that's not NPH! Felicia Day was being apparently inattentive, and one of the guys prodded her, and she said, "Oh, sorry, I'm Twittering under here," which of course they all took inappropriately, and it became a running joke for the rest of the panel.
And so much more funny stuff happened, but I can't remember it all! After the panel was over, Rogue and I went back down to the booth for our shift. It was still pretty quiet, and we had more than enough people there. I played with the remote-control R2D2 to amuse myself. Also to entice people to buy it!
Our shift ended at four, and we decided to go plant ourselves in 6CDEF to assure ourselves of seats for the 7:30 Avatar panel. There was already a huge line for the room, so we were pretty sure it was a good decision. They were doing a nice job of packing the room, and we were able to get in and see most of the Jim Butcher panel, which we hadn't even known was happening. I wish I'd gotten started with the Dresden Files earlier, because at the time I hadn't read a single one! So the panel wasn't as relevant as it could have been, for me. After Jim Butcher was 24 and then Prison Break, and at the break between each of the panels we were able to move a little further up in the room. I was also texting back and forth with Angie and Rachel the whole time-- they weren't in the room yet and were worried about getting in for Avatar, but they did make it eventually.
I don't watch 24, so again, not much relevance for me. But Kiefer Sutherland was there! There was one really funny question, where some guy came up and asked why Jack Bauer says "Dammit!" all the time, and could Kiefer please yell "Dammit, Cameron!" at him. And Kiefer pushed his mike away, drew in a big breath, and hollered "DAMMIT CAMERON!!!" right at the guy, which was absolutely hilarious. He's a good sport. I also don't watch Prison Break, and the only thing I know about it is that people are obsessed with Michael and Dr. Sara. The Michael actor guy couldn't come, but Dr. Sara was there and she is TEENY TINY. Also, the guy who plays Lincoln mentioned that his kids watch Avatar, which got a huge cheer from the mostly-Avatar audience.
After Prison Break, a decent number of people left, so we were able to get six seats together in the second row of the second section, directly in front of the screen. Very respectable seats. Angie joined us, and Rachel, who also had Donna and her son with her. I think they may have come to regret sitting with us, because I was very, very squeeful through the whole panel. And loud. And fangirly. My utter glee with the entire experience could not be contained.
OH MY GOSH YOU GUYS. Seeing the finale with that crowd was everything I had hoped for. It was *awesome.* They had made these little animated drawings of Bryan and Mike to introduce the finale, and I think what they were saying was funny but it was pretty hard to hear. And watching those two episodes, hearing all the cheering and clapping, the reaction of thousands of fans who all love this show-- awesome. I love those kinds of fan experiences. I didn't even mind the ship-warring that seemed to be happening at the front of the room.
After the finale was over, Bryan and Mike came out. They talked a bit, and they took some questions, I think at the end, and they showed the results of their fan art contest and I squealed when they showed The Rise of Wang Fire and there was a very fast and very disorganized costume contest of sorts. But they all paled in comparison to "Book 4: Air; Chapter One: Forbidden Love," which was basically a video where they had taken a ton of fanart of various ships (but mostly Zutara) and animated them so the characters' mouths moved, and then proceeded to skewer all the shippers by having Katara leave Aang and hook up with Zuko, but then discover they were totally wrong for each other, and it ended with "I never should have doubted the will of Mike and Bryan." I'm doing a really bad job of describing it; you can watch it here if you're so inclined. (It is somewhat "saucy," as they put it during the panel. If you know small children who watch Avatar, don't show it to them.) It was HILARIOUS but also WILDLY UNCOMFORTABLE. I've never seen show creators who seem to enjoy poking their fandom with sharp sticks as much as Bryke do.
Sadly, the panel could not go on forever. :( But! As we were leaving, they gave us free Avatar T-shirts! Score! And luckily for us, we were very close to the exit doors, so we were able to get out without too much fuss. Then we went downstairs to go wait for Dad and Sean to pick us up, since they'd gone home earlier because they were tired and hot. And that was the end of Friday!