COMIC CON 09 - DAY ONE (THURSDAY)
One thing that has impressed me thus far is the incredible diversity of people at the convention is the incredible diversity. One would think that at an event like this, you’d be surrounded by the stereotypical comic book nerd, with weight in one extreme or another, skin that rarely, if ever, has seen the light of day and a nasal sounding voice. The people I’ve seen here miles and miles more interesting than that. Young, old, men, women, and people of every nationality and ethnicity. Additionally, you get a full sampling of people from across the nerd spectrum. At one end, the begrudging wife or boyfriend, dragged to the con by their significant other and fans in regular clothes. In the middle, fans in shirts of their favorite fandoms (the category I fall into) and fans in moderately simple and costumes, such as Imperial Officers from Star Wars or the “off duty” crew uniform from Battlestar Galactica. At the “slightly mental” end of the spectrum live the nerds in full on spandex, leaving little, if anything, to the imagination and one gentleman I saw in full zombie regalia who was so completely in character that he refused to speak in English and was attacking people at random.
When I first arrived, I met a man named Neil, who wore very short shorts, and his wife, whose name now eludes me. They were both from the UK and his wife was a long term sub. While in line, we discussed education, and how I’m out of a job and the general suckiness of the state of education in the United States and California in particular. They let me know that while things were not quite that bad in the UK yet, they felt that it was inevitable that it would get there, which was at one refreshing and frightening.
After a while, we were informed that we were actually in the wrong line to get in, since all of us already had our badges, and in this case, you definitely need your stinking badges.
I then headed to the Masters of the Web panel, which had a variety of people from movie blogs, including Devin Faraci from CHUD.com, Ryan Rotten from shocktilyoudrop.com (who I believe is sitting across hall from me as I write this - on Saturday), and other journalists from IESB.net, aintitcoolnews.com, and movieweb.com among others. Like an ass, I showed up really early for the panel. While early is generally a good thing to be, I got to this panel by eight, and the panel itself didn’t start until ten.
The panelists all wore Twilight shirts, I’m hoping because they all feel the same way about those fucking movies that I do: that they’re utter bullshit and they are only fueling drug habits, and making Pedo Bear happy. They talked about a wide variety of topics including terminology (blogger vs journalist), their relationships with the studios, ethics in their reporting (with particular attention paid to those who visited the Wolverine set). It was really interesting to hear, especially in regard to my own ambitions as a writer. The consensus among all of them was that if you want to write about film, don’t wait to get a job or get published, just write. Most of them also mentioned that it took anywhere from seven to ten years for them to make any money, which makes me think that I definitely need to get my teaching job back and then find a way to create a day with more hours so I can fit in writing, reading, and working out into everything else I try and get done in a day.
In the second half of the panel, Kevin Monroe (the director who was moderating the panel) brought out Brandon Routh, Sam Huntington, and Anita Briem, who you might recongnize as Jane Seymour in The Tudors or from the recent remake of Journey to the Center of the Earth. Mr. Routh still looks very much like Superman, which is another way of saying that he has a fantastic body. They showed some very brief footage from the film (not an actual trailer), which seems to come across as something like a darker Men In Black with a Southern twist.
The film, titled “Dead of Night”, is based on the Italian “Dylan Dog” novels. Dog is a sort of paranormal private eye working in New Orleans, where, logically, things like vampires, zombies, and werewolves are just trying to go around with their lives. Hijinks, horror, and heroics ensue. Based on the very brief footage I saw, it looks like a fun ride.
After that, I headed down to the G4 booth to get in line for a signing with Alison Haislip, one of the show’s correspondents. I waited in lnie for a good thirty minutes, as the line wrapped around all four sides of the booth and then some. I was behind a couple, and we talked of nothing of real significance. After waiting and waiting, I finally got my wristband, which would not ensure that I got an autograph, but that I got a wristband, so that’s cool.
I wandered around the convention hall, seeing people wander, some determinedly and some without direction at all. I found myself in the Artist’s Alley section and looked at all of the art for sale. It was good times.
I got back in line for the signing about an hour prior to the actual time, which was lucky for me, as the line not only grew to the same size it was originally, but it then somehow doubled in size and wrapped around the booth a second time. Again, more and more waiting. I met Ms. Haislip and she wrote “don’t’ do drugs” on the headshot picture she gave me, she said it was good advice for a person named Manny. While I assumed it was because my eyes have still not gotten all the way better, she read the confusion on my face and clarified that she was a Dodgers fan. At least she knows her audience. But in the brief time that I met her, she was very, very sweet. She’s also pretty short - shorter than me even, and I’m about 5”6. I’m thinking she’s around 5’4”? I only posted the picture that was taken on my phone, because the one that was taken with my mom’s camera (which she still hasn’t realized that I’ve taken) revealed two things: first, I blinked and second, I look like a pregnant man, and I need to eat one grape a day and beat the hell out of myself at the gym when I get home.
Because the line and process for Ms. Haislip was pretty lengthy, I didn’t have time to go down to see the Assassin’s Creed II panel, so I headed over to the line for the LGBT “Tipping Point” comics panel, which was supposed to discuss the state of LGBT representation in comics. Among the panelists were Greg Rucka, author of the soon to be released “Whiteout” and the man who has brought us the lesbian Batwoman and The Question, and Marc Andreyko, author of the Manhunter series. A “surprise” guest was author Perry Moore, who wrote the novel “Hero”.
I was pretty turned off by a lot of Moore’s behavior at the panel. He was very shamelessly promoting his book, having no less than three copies of it in front of his name. Additionally, he was trying to cite various examples of perceived homophobia in various comic issues, and most of the other panelists, especially Rucka and Andreyko were calling him on his bullshit. While I am not versed in comics myself, I could tell from Rucka’s and Andreyko’s responses that Moore was taking a very “forest before the trees” approach to his examples, which is easy to do if you aren’t really versed in the material, since one issue of a comic is rarely ever indicative of the themes or ideas about a character in the entire run of a particular story. The fact that Moore wouldn’t really back down from this point, along with the fact the he kept interjecting with these tangential comments about Showtime potentially greenlighting his “Hero” show in the coming weeks and about his life really irritated me and did more than irritate some of the panelists. I was surprised that no one flew across the table to throttle him right there.
Apart from the drama of the panel, what I got from it was that though we still have a long way to go, the fact that Detective Comics has a lesbian superhero as its flagship is really saying a lot, but seeing more gay men in these kinds of roles is something that we will have to wait for. The wait for Transgendered characters seems to be even longer, unfortunately.
After that, I decided to head home, as I was feeling pretty tired and the idea of walking a half an hour in the dark wasn’t particularly appealing.
enjoy.
When I first arrived, I met a man named Neil, who wore very short shorts, and his wife, whose name now eludes me. They were both from the UK and his wife was a long term sub. While in line, we discussed education, and how I’m out of a job and the general suckiness of the state of education in the United States and California in particular. They let me know that while things were not quite that bad in the UK yet, they felt that it was inevitable that it would get there, which was at one refreshing and frightening.
After a while, we were informed that we were actually in the wrong line to get in, since all of us already had our badges, and in this case, you definitely need your stinking badges.
I then headed to the Masters of the Web panel, which had a variety of people from movie blogs, including Devin Faraci from CHUD.com, Ryan Rotten from shocktilyoudrop.com (who I believe is sitting across hall from me as I write this - on Saturday), and other journalists from IESB.net, aintitcoolnews.com, and movieweb.com among others. Like an ass, I showed up really early for the panel. While early is generally a good thing to be, I got to this panel by eight, and the panel itself didn’t start until ten.
The panelists all wore Twilight shirts, I’m hoping because they all feel the same way about those fucking movies that I do: that they’re utter bullshit and they are only fueling drug habits, and making Pedo Bear happy. They talked about a wide variety of topics including terminology (blogger vs journalist), their relationships with the studios, ethics in their reporting (with particular attention paid to those who visited the Wolverine set). It was really interesting to hear, especially in regard to my own ambitions as a writer. The consensus among all of them was that if you want to write about film, don’t wait to get a job or get published, just write. Most of them also mentioned that it took anywhere from seven to ten years for them to make any money, which makes me think that I definitely need to get my teaching job back and then find a way to create a day with more hours so I can fit in writing, reading, and working out into everything else I try and get done in a day.
In the second half of the panel, Kevin Monroe (the director who was moderating the panel) brought out Brandon Routh, Sam Huntington, and Anita Briem, who you might recongnize as Jane Seymour in The Tudors or from the recent remake of Journey to the Center of the Earth. Mr. Routh still looks very much like Superman, which is another way of saying that he has a fantastic body. They showed some very brief footage from the film (not an actual trailer), which seems to come across as something like a darker Men In Black with a Southern twist.
The film, titled “Dead of Night”, is based on the Italian “Dylan Dog” novels. Dog is a sort of paranormal private eye working in New Orleans, where, logically, things like vampires, zombies, and werewolves are just trying to go around with their lives. Hijinks, horror, and heroics ensue. Based on the very brief footage I saw, it looks like a fun ride.
After that, I headed down to the G4 booth to get in line for a signing with Alison Haislip, one of the show’s correspondents. I waited in lnie for a good thirty minutes, as the line wrapped around all four sides of the booth and then some. I was behind a couple, and we talked of nothing of real significance. After waiting and waiting, I finally got my wristband, which would not ensure that I got an autograph, but that I got a wristband, so that’s cool.
I wandered around the convention hall, seeing people wander, some determinedly and some without direction at all. I found myself in the Artist’s Alley section and looked at all of the art for sale. It was good times.
I got back in line for the signing about an hour prior to the actual time, which was lucky for me, as the line not only grew to the same size it was originally, but it then somehow doubled in size and wrapped around the booth a second time. Again, more and more waiting. I met Ms. Haislip and she wrote “don’t’ do drugs” on the headshot picture she gave me, she said it was good advice for a person named Manny. While I assumed it was because my eyes have still not gotten all the way better, she read the confusion on my face and clarified that she was a Dodgers fan. At least she knows her audience. But in the brief time that I met her, she was very, very sweet. She’s also pretty short - shorter than me even, and I’m about 5”6. I’m thinking she’s around 5’4”? I only posted the picture that was taken on my phone, because the one that was taken with my mom’s camera (which she still hasn’t realized that I’ve taken) revealed two things: first, I blinked and second, I look like a pregnant man, and I need to eat one grape a day and beat the hell out of myself at the gym when I get home.
Because the line and process for Ms. Haislip was pretty lengthy, I didn’t have time to go down to see the Assassin’s Creed II panel, so I headed over to the line for the LGBT “Tipping Point” comics panel, which was supposed to discuss the state of LGBT representation in comics. Among the panelists were Greg Rucka, author of the soon to be released “Whiteout” and the man who has brought us the lesbian Batwoman and The Question, and Marc Andreyko, author of the Manhunter series. A “surprise” guest was author Perry Moore, who wrote the novel “Hero”.
I was pretty turned off by a lot of Moore’s behavior at the panel. He was very shamelessly promoting his book, having no less than three copies of it in front of his name. Additionally, he was trying to cite various examples of perceived homophobia in various comic issues, and most of the other panelists, especially Rucka and Andreyko were calling him on his bullshit. While I am not versed in comics myself, I could tell from Rucka’s and Andreyko’s responses that Moore was taking a very “forest before the trees” approach to his examples, which is easy to do if you aren’t really versed in the material, since one issue of a comic is rarely ever indicative of the themes or ideas about a character in the entire run of a particular story. The fact that Moore wouldn’t really back down from this point, along with the fact the he kept interjecting with these tangential comments about Showtime potentially greenlighting his “Hero” show in the coming weeks and about his life really irritated me and did more than irritate some of the panelists. I was surprised that no one flew across the table to throttle him right there.
Apart from the drama of the panel, what I got from it was that though we still have a long way to go, the fact that Detective Comics has a lesbian superhero as its flagship is really saying a lot, but seeing more gay men in these kinds of roles is something that we will have to wait for. The wait for Transgendered characters seems to be even longer, unfortunately.
After that, I decided to head home, as I was feeling pretty tired and the idea of walking a half an hour in the dark wasn’t particularly appealing.
enjoy.