Illustrious 2011

[lullula]

So I've made it back from the wilds of Birmingham, where I spent the weekend sequestered in a large hotel with a large number of sci-fi fans. If you can't be bothered to read what will doubtless end up a long and rambling report, the short version is: I really enjoyed Eastercon.

The trip down was alright, straight across the A69 (except there was a massive fuck off traffic jam, so we skipped down the A689 as a detour) and then straight down the M6 (where there was also a massive fuck off traffic jam, blargh). Our Travelodge was just off the A45 and was easy enough to find, once you'd gotten lost and gone in entirely the wrong direction for a little bit. Aside from delays and drunken twats yelling about shattered ankles and cracked skulls at 3.30am, Thursday went quite well.

So Friday was the first day of the con, we all piled into a taxi which took us to the Hilton, where we stood in a long queue to register and get timetables/voting thingamajiggies. There were no freebies this year - surprising, but not wholly disappointing, since it meant less to carry around!

Apparently contrary to many people, I was quite impressed with the layout of the hotel. Everything was essentially on one level, the rooms were quite large and shit was easy to find. Plus, the fan lounge, bar and food hall were all nice spaces with plenty of places to sit down. Which, y'know, I happen to think is a good thing! I certainly found it better to get around than the Radisson last year, and as my Dad remarked, fewer stairs was a good thing. (AFAIK both venues are mostly disabled accessible, but I think the Hilton is easier, and certainly was for Dad who has some mobility issues.) There was an admitted problem with the majority of the rooms being way too hot, but otherwise I quite liked it.

The things I went to on Friday were:

Policing The High Frontier: A panel discussing how a reboot of a show called Starcops could work. I've never seen Starcops (I uh, didn't see that bit in the program v.v; ), but as a general discussion on a possible police procedural set in space, I found it quite interesting.

Opening Ceremony: The first OC I've ever been to! The AV at the start was nice (although I noted a general lack of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow throughout the rest of the con, woe). Otherwise, whatevs. It happened, I guess.

Military Uniforms In SF: Another interesting panel, a general discussion of uniforms, with interesting tidbits on historical, modern, SFnal uniforms and costuming tips.

Internet As An Alternative To TV: Not a lot of discussion, as such, but a lot of interesting points, and the very salient question of, why is it so fucking hard to give people my money? I pretty much agreed with all the things johncoxon said!

Space Over Time: Discussing the worth of a book when new science comes out that debunks the science in older books. Not exactly my cup of tea, since I don't read hard SF, and I don't read for the science in any case.

Getting Your Digital Fix: Pretty much what it says on the tin! Lots of nice talk surrounding digital entertainment and the devices around it. A couple of recs for good indie eBook sites - Diesel and The Wizard's Tower (I think? Cheryl Morgan's company, anyway).

And then Mum and I caught the end of the ceilidh - she had a nice dance, and I met and chatted with a nice guy named Tom, who told me about a couple of comic cons and was generally cool to talk to! Neat.

On Saturday, we stopped in at a Tesco's and grabbed drinks and sustenance (because the hotel's prices were ridic. high, even for a hotel =/), then made our way to the hotel (I may have gotten lost a little bit getting there, but in fairness anyone could confuse NEC Parking and NEC signs...).

Things I went to on Saturday weeere:

Empire of Earth: This was a presentation of Victorian SF, with a focus on military SF. It was really interesting, and although Marcus wasn't given a projector and could occasionally find it hard to decipher his writing, I think it was one of my favourite things this year. It was fascinating to hear about some of the predictions made and listen to just how similar some lit then is to today's military SF. His site, Forgotten Futures, has plenty of cool content including stories/novels published late 1800/early 1900. And I've just seen he put the talk up HERE, I haven't read it yet, but I suspect it's awesome ;)

Alternative Histories: A panel talking a bit about the tropes of Alt Histories, why they're so popular, and um. Other stuff. I remember enjoying it, and, as was common this year, all the panelists had cool contributions.

Military SF TV: This actually started as a discussion on what makes a military TV show, and not a show where military is a handy shortcut for fit people with guns. I'm pretty sure there was other, equally interesting discussion going on, but I can't remember it... (why oh why didn't I make notes?)

SF Infrastructure and Engineering: This panel was a discussion on what technology we have, why don't we have certain other technologies, and the progress we could make if we were a command-economy ;) It was actually another of my favourites, because yes, we could do a lot of the things we read about in SF, but there are a variety of societal, monetary and legal issues that prevent us. I mean, we COULD have a huge solar array in space to produce energy, but it would also technically be a giant superweapon and that is somewhat frowned upon...

Dr Who: Essentially, EEEEEEEE OMG. I LOVE ILLEGAL STREAMS. I LOVE RORY. I LOVE YOUNG/OLD DOCTOR. I LOVE SCARY FOES. I LOVE EVERYTHING!

Pub Quiz: I suspect were I 20 years oder, I might have done better at this... Our team lost and came last... Alas.

And then we went back to the Travelodge, unfortunately, since we all (excluding Aaron) wanted to be up in time for the Easter service next morning.

Surprisingly, we did manage to get up in time and get there (despite Daddy falling over and doing his best impression of a turtle - only mildly funny since he'd tripped over at the Travelodge the day before =/). It was a lovely service, run by
dougs. Very much a sci-fi fan service, but very good nonetheless. I've never sung a hymn to a midi file before, but there's a first time for everything!

Following that, the items I went to on Sunday were thusly:

Outsider's View: FanFiction: When I saw this panel pop up, I was initially quite worried since I didn't want a repeat of last year's slash panel - "But why do you silly girls do something so badwrongbad?" (protip: because it's a) hot b) fun c) the only way to introduce queerness to a heteronormative media, and we're not all girls, fuckwit). But in actuality, it was a lot of fun! There was only one outsider there, who was very nice and asked intellilgent questions. I left that panel mostly feeling vastly amused that serious ficcers still apparently use FF.net. Not to denigrate, but haven't we all moved on, to the very least LiveJournal, if not A03 and beyond? (she says, still crossposting to her FF.net account, for the sake of an extra archive)

I didn't actually go, but I wish I'd been to the DWJ memorial, only I had to go pick up an irate Aaron, lol. Apparently it was good I didn't go to the DWJ thing since neither parents found it in any way satisfactory. Mentioning that all women were totally liberated with feminism and allowed to work isn't a good thing to bring up around my mum, who happens not to be quite so middle class and comes from about 3 or 4 generations of working women... But I digress.

Through A Gunsight Darkly: Another thoroughly interesting discussion on the connections between real life and SF wars.

Warhammer 40K; There Is Ony War: So I will say straight away that this was my favourite item for the whole of Eastercon - a majority of that is to do with Ian Watson who was the most immense voice ever and could probaby read the telephone directory to me and I woud roll around laughing. Otherwise, it was just really nice to finally watch a panel where it felt like the people on it were actual fans who were having just as much fun with it as us. I pretty much love the 40K 'verse, and hearing more about Black Library stuff was super awesome. And I have to say, James Swallow is a fucking decent guy, he signed Aaron's books and chatted with him on the Saturday, and then happiy signed his audio cd for me and Mum on Sunday and then gave us a copy of the sequel to the audio cd and signed that as well, so we can give it to Aaron as his birthday present! I guarantee he will faint and then run around the house squee'ing like the littlest girl ever (are we getting that I think JSwallow is fucking cool? Because he is, aaaaah).

Britain's New Nuclear Programme: I went in, sat for 5 minutes, and decided I was too hot, tired, and hungry to really pay any attention to it. So I went and sat in the car and ate pasties like a fat loner having a good time. *le shrug* Mum and Dad said it was fascinating though, but nothing is fascinating when you want to dismember people with your teeth.

Guns Of The Future: This was actually another fun panel, mostly because of one of the panelist's 'hard ipad cover' which when flipped open, was a motherfucking automatic handgun, hell fucking yeah. I don't know a lot about gun technology, but this was still a very interesting discussion!

Sex, Love or Money; What's Modern Vampire Fiction Really About? A cool panel, and the first all female panel I went to, which was probably remiss of me. Lots of discussion about what vampires represent (otherness, either racially or sexually), and ended with a very thoughtful comment that since we've neutered and normalised our vampires, zombies are so popular and scary since they can't be tamed.

So then Dad, Aaron and I sat around in the bar discussing shit, and Mum went to another panel. I got to take note of the really cool costumes that have come out this year. Lots of steampunk, and one in particular was so cool - essentially a Victorian shoe shiner, with some steampunk-y elements (I think...? I could be wrong and it was a straight period costume, IDK I suck) ETA found some pics of the costume I mean, here and here, see what I mean? Neat!. I thought it was pretty clever, especially since it's true - were we honestly in a Victorian future (....you know what I mean), most of us wouldn't exactly be airship pirates...

Anyway, to Monday. Once again we arrived waaaay early, and Mum and I walked through the bluebell wood that connects the Hilton to the NEC. It was very pleasant, and there was a lovely lake :D But the NEC was sooooo weird when it was completely empty and shut up, aside from one Newsagent.

But you don't care about that! So here're the things I did on Monday:

Adult Animation Does Not Mean Pr0n: This was kind of interesting, but not very focused, and not really what I expected or wanted from the panel. I'm thinking that actually, something along these lines with more focus on indie animation, animation mostly not made for children-but-which-adults-enjoy (i.e. specifically mature) and perhaps a look at more anime might be cool next year. IDK though, does anyone really want to hear me gush about Vimeo, Tokyo Godfathers and Cowboy Bebop? lolno.

Nuke From Orbit - It's The Only Way To Be Sure: Or, the panel that I went to because the name STILL makes me laugh. Another generally interesting panel, discussing various ways to mount an invasion of a sentient species, whether by fucking everything up and allowing a new/specifically induced biosphere to grow up, or by colonisation. It was mostly interesting, although the insistence that we should pony up and take over the universe rather than let that happen to us was rather dull.

Where Are All The Non-Soldiers? This wasn't so much what I expected, and was more a long talk on logistics, and the things that happen when you fail to take supply etc into account. I'd rather expected a talk on the specific lack on support characters (nurses, suppliers, manufacturers) in SF, but it was a lot more general than that. Still, there were quite a few interesting points made.

World's Worst Superhero: I actually helped run this one! It was a kid's item, and the person organising couldn't do it, so Mum and I helped the lady who ran it in her stead. I love kids, and a good example of why is that the superhero we created (by committee) was a radioactive chicken brain with a beak, that made decisions very slowly, that turned into a tree at the slightest sign of danger, that glowed in the dark, had a nemesister, led the Just As League (Just As Good As The Justice League) and exploded. But only once. I got to draw it, and I have to say drawing brainzzzzz and colouring in with crayons? My very favourite thing in the world. And then me and some of the kids played with that catch game where you use velcro discs to get the ball. Exhausting, but fun!

And then it was all over, and we went home! I slept nearly the entire way, haha.

Some final thoughts on it all:

I liked the venue :)

I liked the 1.5 hour item length - the extra half hour was immensely useful!

Most panels weren't quite as advertised, but on the whole very interesting nonetheless.

Tesco is so much cheaper than hotel food it practically hurts, hahaha.

The Dealers room was good! I got 4 books, 2 necklaces (one of which was this, isn't it fucking awesome?) and 2 t-shirts :D

I really want an iPad.

Next con plans are Nemacon in June - an anime con in Middlesbrough, and then probably Novacon in November, and then possibly Thought Bubble - a comic thing (con? massive dealers room? something else? IDK) in Leeds. I'm excited :D

Also hahaha why did I get this up before my MCR post? *sob*

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