Con Report: CGS Super Show 2013
Us working on comic pages a con sketches for ACen at Super Show 2013. Photo by way of Don Smith's camera phone
Just in time for us to leave to another con (next weekend’s Chicago Comics & Entertainment Expo, or C2E2 to the masses - which we're featured guests at - woooooo!), here we are with a quick recap of what had in previous years been among our very favorite conventions ever: The Comic Geek Speak Super Show! This little con with big heart, put on by the crew of the CGS Podcast, had grown to be something far more than just a place to check out comics and comic creators. They had a hiatus last year, merging with the Wild Pig show in New Jersey, but returned again mere weeks ago to bless beautiful Reading, Pennsylvania with their majesty. Would the show hold on to its reputation and dear place in our hearts? Read on for the tale.
Aya and Razer by Adam
Alas, poor Super Show! We knew him, Readers: a convention of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath born us on his back three times; and now, how abhorred in our imagination it is! Our gorge rims at it. Here hung those art jam pieces that we have drawn upon we know not how oft (three times). Where be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? (Okay, there was still a song - and it was really good!) Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar?
Times have changed, and Super Show hath changed with it. While we will speak no excess ill of the show, for we had fun with friends and colleagues alike, we must carry to you the truth of our experience. And ‘twas a two-sided experience thus. As had been written so many long years prior, and we could not say better ourselves: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
Hinata and Kankuro - an adorable ship from the land of Naruto by Comfort
We set up our table on Friday, talking briefly but happily with Jamie D, Shane, and Murd. The show floor looked good, there were a lot of great creators set to be on-hand, and a lot of old friends of ours. That night, we met up at the Third & Spruce Café for the pre-show party. There was no Art Jam Piece this year, so we didn’t have any major drawing to do. Instead, we went ahead and finished the last bits of work on the two pre-show commissions we had. It was a nice evening, though more sparsely attended than previous years. Consequently, we were able to knock off early and get some sleep.
Us at 3rd and Spruce, doing what we do best - drawling our little hands off! Photo by Ian Levenstein
Roomies for the weekend were Bryan J.L. Glass and his ever-adored wife Judy, Drew Gaska, Chandra Free, and their lovely assistant Katie. We had two adjoining rooms, though we didn’t have one of those great “party doors” to open up between us. Instead, we patted on the walls back and forth in something that was either elaborate Morse code or really bad freestyle Stomp.
Chun-Li by Comfort
Saturday was day 1 of 2, and here’s where things dipped. Super Show is a con put on by a tremendously popular online podcast about comics and comic culture. It has always been a gathering place where fans from around the world (literally - people have travelled far and wide to be there) get together in fellowship and community for a blast of a weekend. But this year, due to a number of factors out of anyone’s control, that core audience didn’t show up. Most of those who did were actually the pros behind the tables.
The result was a very low attendance primarily made up of newcomers who didn’t know much about comics, knew less about the podcast, and were just looking for something to do on a weekend. While it’s great to get yourself in front of new people, it isn’t a great way to make sales. Consequently, we made less at this show than any con since maybe 2006. Less than a third of the sales we made at the last Super Show in 2011. That wasn’t anybody’s fault directly, it was more a terrible confluence of a lot of outside dynamics coming into play at once. We don’t blame CGS, but it did hurt, and we feel the obligation to always shoot straight with you, fair and true readers.
That isn’t to say there wasn’t some fun to be had. Comfort sat on a great panel about Web Comics, which you can listen to here. Photo by our good friend Ian!
The attendees that did come were delightful. A guy was walking around, pulling his daughters in a big wagon. A girl had Batman and Robin socks with little capes on them. There were a lot of families with young children, which is always nice to see at a comic show. Gotta get that next generation into the medium! Hook ‘em young, we say.
But again, their newness to comics meant a wild shift in what we were selling. Where previously the show had such a hardcore majority audience, we sold a lot of comics, a lot of prints of X-Men, Green Lantern, Justice League, Avengers and the like, and a lot of commissions. With an audience who doesn’t know much about comics or cons also didn’t know about getting commissions (so we sold almost none) and didn’t know about our books, or comics in general, and weren’t sure about spending money on them (so we sold almost no comics). The prints we did sell were primarily anime and manga related - stuff you see on Cartoon Network like Bleach and Naruto, or our Doctor Who and Star Wars prints.
Good crowd, but they didn’t know what they were coming for and so weren’t ready to spend much money. And there weren’t enough of them to make up for that lack. But what was almost enough to make up for it was the surprise appearance of our good friend Marvin! He hadn’t told us he was coming, so we were delighted by his sudden arrival.
Black Cat Sketchcard and a Scout (for our good friend Marvin) both by Adam
That night we went out with all our roomies and Marvin and had a really fun meal. Well… the meal was okay; it was the conversation and the friends who made it fun. Just to be clear and all. There was a lot of talk about the last Twilight movie, Animorphs, the pointlessness of starfish, pedophiles, pedophile bears, pedophile bear salon chairs, and Kids These Days.
Sunday was even drier. We used the time to work on pages for the juggernaut-sized Rainbow in the Dark #9. Adam was on a Quick-Sketch panel which was a TON of fun. We wish we could do those at every show. We finally got a chance to talk with some of the CGS guys who had been too busy to get around much prior to the end of the show, which was nice. And that was pretty much it.
Adam showing off his Wonder Woman holding a kitten piece at the Quick Sketch on Sunday. Another image that comes to us by way of our good friend Ian!
So what can you say about a con that was once among your favorite experiences all year? Is it a matter of unfair expectations? Possibly. After all, the show has gone through a lot of changes and a pretty rough year, and they’re still picking up the pieces and plotting their future to some degree. That the show worked as well as it did is a testament to their determination.
Adam cleaning up our table space at the end of Super Show
For all the fun we did have, and for all the good people who were there, we can’t pretend that it was the same show it had been. Hopefully they can get that spark back. Hopefully the strength and majesty can return, if not in the way it was before then in some new package. We hope to see it happen. Until then, we still hold the dream of Super Shows past close to our hearts.
Until next time-
Comfort & Adam
