Comic-Con '09 and related insanity...
Whee! Another year, another Comic-Con.
As I vowed after last year's grueling drive, I elected to take the train down instead. The round-trip tickets to commute down to San Diego for three days cost less than one night in the cheapest room available in the convention hotel block. Ah, the irony. *snerks* Of course, I still had to get up at an unholy hour to catch the first train of the morning, but getting to leisurely watch the early morning surfers at San Onofre and points south, instead of having my hands glued to the steering wheel for two hours, was sooo much less stressful. All hail the gods of Amtrak.
Sadly, I had to miss both the Legend of the Seeker and Trick 'r Treat panels on Thursday because they were too late in the day, and nothing seemed really interesting on Saturday, so those two days ended up being mostly 'wander around the Exhibit Hall and shop' days. Picked up a little bit of swag, got a mini double-poster for the SGA Fans' Choice Blu-Ray and SG-1's Children of the Gods Final Cut DVD; MGM was also giving out mini posters of the SGU cast, but I passed on those. Their Bluetooth/WiFi setup for sending people text alerts and offers throughout the con wasn't working either, apparently. At least, it wasn't on Thursday, and I didn't bother trying again Friday or Saturday.
So, to Friday. Even getting into San Diego a little after 9am and down to the convention center a little after 9:30 (and htbthomas will no doubt second the awesomeness of the SD trolley system), I was able to get into Ballroom 20 by 10am with a very nice seat in the second section back from the stage.
The SGU panel. The trailer they showed was actually pretty impressive... at least this time they didn't rip off Cloverfield with the camera work. (I understand it's already been posted online, so I guess most of you have seen it by now.) Most of the questions were directed at Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper, and most of what was said was the same shit we've heard already. They (especially Wright) actually started out with a lot of asskissing and gushing about how much they respect the fans, and how they wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the fans, blahblahblah. I guess someone pulled Wright aside and told him to not insult the fans' intelligence like he has in previous statements about SGU and the end of SGA. But somehow the dumbass cointoss joke line was thrown around again. *sighs*
A few of the highlowlights, not necessarily in the order in which they happened:
- A question was asked about the "strong women" of Stargate and SGU. Based on the answers, clearly the female cast members had only watched a bit of SG-1 to be indoctrinated into the 'Carter is God even when we write her like crap' cult, and lttle to none of SGA to see how badly the female characters there were wallpapered (Teyla), used as cannon fodder (Weir, Heightmeyer), shoved under the rug (Katie Brown, Laura Cadman), or turned into a cute sex object for the fanboys and shoved in our faces (Keller). And I cringed at how Ming-Na was all pumped up about Wray. Strong, intelligent, Asian lesbian. Yeah, let's see how many other clichés and minority flags we can cram into one token character. That is so going to crash and burn.
- They wanted to get back to Stargate's "roots" of being about ordinary characters thrust into extraordindary situations. Which on the surface sounds fine, but then they added to that with a comment about getting away from the characters all being superheroes, supergeniuses, super everything. Gee, so in one sentence they just dissed Sheppard and Beckett (super ATA gene), Teyla (super Wraith sense), McKay (supergenius), Ronon (super badass), Weir (super diplomat turned super Replicator). No wonder they got rid of SGA.
- The real kicker was a question on SGA's premature cancellation; Wright claimed it wasn't premature, they'd had a good run with five years on the air for SGA and ten for SG-1, and we did good, really, yaddayaddayadda. Give me a break. If the show is cut off at the knees before finishing up the stories that already have irons in the fire (Weir and the Replicators, renegade Asgard, that cliffhanger at the end of Enemy at the Gate, just to name a few), then it sure as hell was a premature cancellation, you dimwit! Or maybe you just wanted to shove SGA under the rug instead of admitting you screwed up with it, hmm?
- Poor Robert Carlyle. He got into SGU because he wanted to do something different than what he'd done before. I've got a bad feeling he's going to end up as disillusioned as Joe Flanigan was at the end of SGA. The bit with Carlyle hiding behind his hands in response to the declaration that the SGU cast were all convention virgins was probably the funniest thing that happened at the panel.
So yeah, the SGU panel left me feeling... wanting.
Originally, I had planned on camping out in Ballroom 20 all day, but Michael Dougherty was signing copies of the Trick 'r Treat art book at noon, which meant I'd have to leave and miss out on the BSG/Caprica panel. Sorry Galactica, but Sam in his burlap sack mask and orange footie pajamas owns my soul. As soon as SGU was over, I hoofed it down to the Exhibit Hall and parked myself in the DC Comics booth to get my book signed. And Dougherty wasn't alone; he was also joined by Breehn Burns, who did the concept art for the movie, some of which appears in the book. Yay! They were also handing out lenticular cards of Sam and preview copies of one of the stories from the graphic novel. They totally should've been handing out Halloween candy. Just sayin.' :P
Then I headed back upstairs to get in line and back into Ballroom 20 for the 24 panel at 2:15. I got in line at 12:30 and made it in by the skin of my teeth with only a couple of minutes to spare. Sitting in the very back section. But I got in! *happy dance*
If the SGU panel felt like a stolid funeral march, then the 24 panel was a rockin' party. The screams and cheers for everyone, from the producers to the veteran cast members to the newbies, was insane! The new season will be kind of coming full circle, as it was described, back to some of what we saw in Season 1. Jack survived his brush with death by bioterrorrism (well, duh!) and is, well, happy. Reconnecting with Kim and his granddaughter (awwww!). But, of course, Bad Guys Out to Destroy the World suck him back into the game by threatening the signing of a peace treaty. CTU is back (with a really wicked looking new set), and Chloe's working there again, except that since she's been out for a while taking care of her son, she's now playing catch up. And Katee Sackhoff is playing Chloe's boss! Hee! Though Katee did say she wanted to carry a gun and felt weird without one after playing Starbuck for five years. *cracks up*
I know 24 ain't everyone's cup of tea, but I was really struck by the difference between the SGU and 24 panels. When the producers of 24 say they respect the fans, they mean it; you can tell by how seriously they take their jobs and how they're not afraid to take responsibility for screw-ups. Case in point: Brannon Braga. Who quite openly said "I'm the one who killed Star Trek" and that fellow producer Manny Coto is "the one who saved it." Damn. Now that's balls, people. Too bad the producers of SGA couldn't stand up and make a similar declaration about their mistakes with the show. Another really telling comment came from Kiefer Sutherland, who was speaking about his involvement in the process for coming up with the story for each season: writers write, directors direct, and actors act. Basically, that everyone does their jobs and they do them well. So no one needs to step in and ask for this, or suggest that, etcetera. Contrast this with the situation on SGA, where certain actors were so disenchanted with the lack of character development and story that they were knocking on the writers' room door with suggestions, which were either ignored or altered so much to be unrecognizeable.
And remember that question from the SGU panel about strong, intelligent women? A similar question was asked in the 24 panel about how all the women (including the usually danger-prone Kim) were all very much kicking ass and not being damsels in distress last season, and how great it was. Yes, it was great. And I can't wait to see what they pull off next year.
Now, to catch up on the flist... *smirks*
As I vowed after last year's grueling drive, I elected to take the train down instead. The round-trip tickets to commute down to San Diego for three days cost less than one night in the cheapest room available in the convention hotel block. Ah, the irony. *snerks* Of course, I still had to get up at an unholy hour to catch the first train of the morning, but getting to leisurely watch the early morning surfers at San Onofre and points south, instead of having my hands glued to the steering wheel for two hours, was sooo much less stressful. All hail the gods of Amtrak.
Sadly, I had to miss both the Legend of the Seeker and Trick 'r Treat panels on Thursday because they were too late in the day, and nothing seemed really interesting on Saturday, so those two days ended up being mostly 'wander around the Exhibit Hall and shop' days. Picked up a little bit of swag, got a mini double-poster for the SGA Fans' Choice Blu-Ray and SG-1's Children of the Gods Final Cut DVD; MGM was also giving out mini posters of the SGU cast, but I passed on those. Their Bluetooth/WiFi setup for sending people text alerts and offers throughout the con wasn't working either, apparently. At least, it wasn't on Thursday, and I didn't bother trying again Friday or Saturday.
So, to Friday. Even getting into San Diego a little after 9am and down to the convention center a little after 9:30 (and htbthomas will no doubt second the awesomeness of the SD trolley system), I was able to get into Ballroom 20 by 10am with a very nice seat in the second section back from the stage.
The SGU panel. The trailer they showed was actually pretty impressive... at least this time they didn't rip off Cloverfield with the camera work. (I understand it's already been posted online, so I guess most of you have seen it by now.) Most of the questions were directed at Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper, and most of what was said was the same shit we've heard already. They (especially Wright) actually started out with a lot of asskissing and gushing about how much they respect the fans, and how they wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the fans, blahblahblah. I guess someone pulled Wright aside and told him to not insult the fans' intelligence like he has in previous statements about SGU and the end of SGA. But somehow the dumbass cointoss joke line was thrown around again. *sighs*
A few of the highlowlights, not necessarily in the order in which they happened:
- A question was asked about the "strong women" of Stargate and SGU. Based on the answers, clearly the female cast members had only watched a bit of SG-1 to be indoctrinated into the 'Carter is God even when we write her like crap' cult, and lttle to none of SGA to see how badly the female characters there were wallpapered (Teyla), used as cannon fodder (Weir, Heightmeyer), shoved under the rug (Katie Brown, Laura Cadman), or turned into a cute sex object for the fanboys and shoved in our faces (Keller). And I cringed at how Ming-Na was all pumped up about Wray. Strong, intelligent, Asian lesbian. Yeah, let's see how many other clichés and minority flags we can cram into one token character. That is so going to crash and burn.
- They wanted to get back to Stargate's "roots" of being about ordinary characters thrust into extraordindary situations. Which on the surface sounds fine, but then they added to that with a comment about getting away from the characters all being superheroes, supergeniuses, super everything. Gee, so in one sentence they just dissed Sheppard and Beckett (super ATA gene), Teyla (super Wraith sense), McKay (supergenius), Ronon (super badass), Weir (super diplomat turned super Replicator). No wonder they got rid of SGA.
- The real kicker was a question on SGA's premature cancellation; Wright claimed it wasn't premature, they'd had a good run with five years on the air for SGA and ten for SG-1, and we did good, really, yaddayaddayadda. Give me a break. If the show is cut off at the knees before finishing up the stories that already have irons in the fire (Weir and the Replicators, renegade Asgard, that cliffhanger at the end of Enemy at the Gate, just to name a few), then it sure as hell was a premature cancellation, you dimwit! Or maybe you just wanted to shove SGA under the rug instead of admitting you screwed up with it, hmm?
- Poor Robert Carlyle. He got into SGU because he wanted to do something different than what he'd done before. I've got a bad feeling he's going to end up as disillusioned as Joe Flanigan was at the end of SGA. The bit with Carlyle hiding behind his hands in response to the declaration that the SGU cast were all convention virgins was probably the funniest thing that happened at the panel.
So yeah, the SGU panel left me feeling... wanting.
Originally, I had planned on camping out in Ballroom 20 all day, but Michael Dougherty was signing copies of the Trick 'r Treat art book at noon, which meant I'd have to leave and miss out on the BSG/Caprica panel. Sorry Galactica, but Sam in his burlap sack mask and orange footie pajamas owns my soul. As soon as SGU was over, I hoofed it down to the Exhibit Hall and parked myself in the DC Comics booth to get my book signed. And Dougherty wasn't alone; he was also joined by Breehn Burns, who did the concept art for the movie, some of which appears in the book. Yay! They were also handing out lenticular cards of Sam and preview copies of one of the stories from the graphic novel. They totally should've been handing out Halloween candy. Just sayin.' :P
Then I headed back upstairs to get in line and back into Ballroom 20 for the 24 panel at 2:15. I got in line at 12:30 and made it in by the skin of my teeth with only a couple of minutes to spare. Sitting in the very back section. But I got in! *happy dance*
If the SGU panel felt like a stolid funeral march, then the 24 panel was a rockin' party. The screams and cheers for everyone, from the producers to the veteran cast members to the newbies, was insane! The new season will be kind of coming full circle, as it was described, back to some of what we saw in Season 1. Jack survived his brush with death by bioterrorrism (well, duh!) and is, well, happy. Reconnecting with Kim and his granddaughter (awwww!). But, of course, Bad Guys Out to Destroy the World suck him back into the game by threatening the signing of a peace treaty. CTU is back (with a really wicked looking new set), and Chloe's working there again, except that since she's been out for a while taking care of her son, she's now playing catch up. And Katee Sackhoff is playing Chloe's boss! Hee! Though Katee did say she wanted to carry a gun and felt weird without one after playing Starbuck for five years. *cracks up*
I know 24 ain't everyone's cup of tea, but I was really struck by the difference between the SGU and 24 panels. When the producers of 24 say they respect the fans, they mean it; you can tell by how seriously they take their jobs and how they're not afraid to take responsibility for screw-ups. Case in point: Brannon Braga. Who quite openly said "I'm the one who killed Star Trek" and that fellow producer Manny Coto is "the one who saved it." Damn. Now that's balls, people. Too bad the producers of SGA couldn't stand up and make a similar declaration about their mistakes with the show. Another really telling comment came from Kiefer Sutherland, who was speaking about his involvement in the process for coming up with the story for each season: writers write, directors direct, and actors act. Basically, that everyone does their jobs and they do them well. So no one needs to step in and ask for this, or suggest that, etcetera. Contrast this with the situation on SGA, where certain actors were so disenchanted with the lack of character development and story that they were knocking on the writers' room door with suggestions, which were either ignored or altered so much to be unrecognizeable.
And remember that question from the SGU panel about strong, intelligent women? A similar question was asked in the 24 panel about how all the women (including the usually danger-prone Kim) were all very much kicking ass and not being damsels in distress last season, and how great it was. Yes, it was great. And I can't wait to see what they pull off next year.
Now, to catch up on the flist... *smirks*