Apr 27, 2014 15:58
I went to a comic book/pop culture convention called C2E2 yesterday.
One of my main objectives for doing this was to attend a panel featuring a few actors from the movie The Crow. It's one of my all-time favorites, and I thought it would be cool to hear them look back at the movie, 20 years after the fact. The panelists were Ernie Hudson, Tony Todd, and Michael Massee, who played the role of Fun Boy, and who also had the great misfortune of being the one involved in Brandon Lee's accidental shooting.
Massee's presence was a little concerning for me, because I know convention culture all too well from my years of participation, and I know there are A LOT of fucking awkward people (men and women both) who attend these things, people with poor filters and a strong sense of entitlement. The combo seemed like it could possibly lead to some really insensitive questions during the Q&A portion of the session.
As it turns out, I wasn't the only one anticipating the worst. The moderator, who was an awesome guy, got on the mic before the actors were brought in, mostly to hype the crowd for their arrival, but also to go over some ground rules. One of those being, "Don't ask a dickhead question." And for those not familiar, he provided context, explaining that Massee was NOT responsible for what had happened, and shouldn't be subjected to stuff like, "What's it feel like to kill someone?"
I was glad this was addressed, that everyone remained respectful. Once things started, it ended up being a really fun discussion (Tony Todd, by the way, is HILARIOUS!). But I was also really saddened by the fact that the moderator needed to lecture the room on this kind of thing in the first place. It speaks to one of the things I despise about most geek culture, the fact that it's known for being chock full of people lacking common courtesy and common sense.
It makes me embarrassed to identify with this world you know? Which is troubling, because at the same time fandom is something that defines a big part of who I am.
So it's like, where do I fit in, you know?