My first Comicon ever… With pictures!

Just to get through the random stuff first: Stuff we saw in our travels around San Diego. The Naval Base picture was taken especially for my parents, who specifically warned me that San Diego was near both Tijuana and a Naval Base, lest my innocent sensibilities be offended by something. The banner just shows that just about everyone in S.D. was getting into the whole comic book thing… at least, when it came to marketing. Finally, a truly wonderful license plate. The Decepticon decal right next to it is the perfect touch.

I flew out to LA early Wednesday morning, and from there, my friend Ki and I drove about two hours down to San Diego. We got in around 4:30-ish, just in time to grab our pre-reg badges and hit the convention floor. A couple of pictures of the San Diego Convention Center. You can’t really see from these pictures how massive the lines to get in and register were. Massive.

The floor was equally massive - incredibly overwhelming - and also impossible to get a proper picture of. Add to that the press of bodies and throw in several people in large, awkward cosplay, and you get something that treads a thin line between pure amazing and a fiasco. Normally, I hate being so close to people, hate it with a vengance, but I was willing to bite the bullet for Comicon.

Never really watched Heros, but I was a bit excited about the Golden Compass, ever since I went to the site and found out that my daemon was an Ocelot. And then a cat. And then a gibbon. And then a cat again. Actually. I’m gonna try to pick up His Dark Materials Omnibus (the trilogy which contains The Golden Compass) the next time I get the chance.

Lots and lots of previews and sneak peaks for things. Very happy to see Trials and Tribulations and Harvey Birdman, both courtroom drama games from capcom. We got to play a bit of Birdman, and I gotta say, it was satisfying. It was like playing through an episode of the show, and Lord knows I like living vicariously through cartoons. Neil Gaiman was at comicon as well, and though I didn’t get to meet him (like all the other celebrities at the Comicon, the lines to see him were unholy. You had to win a raffle ticket just for the chance to stand in line to see him.) I was happy to find out they were doing a movie of Coraline, one of my favorite books by him. Not sure if its live action or not (i’m hoping for some trippy Dave McKean style animation), just very happy its coming out next summer. The last one is a chalk drawing that was started on Wednesday and finished on Sunday. Its a promo for another movie Gaiman is working on, Beowulf, and looks pretty cool when viewed through the concave lens set up nearby.

More stuff off the floor: There were tons of cosplayers on the floor, some professional and some not. Also, like fifty billion Slave Leias (including one who was about 2 years old…) which just seemed like the worse choice of cosplay to make, since the floor was kept at roughly the same temperature as a meat locker. Unfortunately, no Chewys.

The Futurama stuff is for the upcoming movies (Huzzah!) that are coming out. We went to an amazing Futurama panel with Matt Groening, David X Cohen, Billy West, Katie Segal, John DiMaggio, et al. They did a table reading of a Futurama comic and talked about whats in store for the series. It was worth it just hear Bender again. *sniffle*

And yes, thats me with Megaman… Yeah.

More cosplay. The first is from the Planet Terror. That is indeed a load bearing muzzle. Spiderman interviews Bender, and I resist the urge to push over Pokemon.

More displays off the floor. I’m a fan of FullMetal Alchemist, and Al’s always been a favorite character, so I was happy to see the full size statue. The R2D2 is an actual remote device that was scooting along the alleys, and apparently also picking up free handouts. Speed Racer’s Mach 5 and the Resident Evil bike: Self Explanatory.

I saw more movies in the last four days than I have in possibly the last 6 months. We weren’t allowed to take cameras into the advanced screening of Shoot ‘Em Up (which I did anyway, but only because I was too lazy to run back to the car to drop it off), but there wasn’t much to take photos of anyway. I did, however, take pictures at the DVD pre-release screening of 300 at Petco Park. The cast of Blade Runner was there, pushing the Final Cut DVD which is coming out soon, and Frank Miller came out and gave us all some good advice. Despite the fact that the JumboTron wasn’t as jumbo as its name implied, the whole experience was pretty cool, with everyone “HOO”-ing along with the movie, waving cardboard shields and thunder sticks.

Last but not least, a smattering of all the cool people I met at the con: Loading Ready Run made it down to the convention to show everyone How to Talk Like a Pirate, and I found the guys back in Artists’ Alley. I stopped to talk for a bit, and discovered that Bill is absurdly tall.

Also back in Artists’ Alley was Todd Nauck, artist for Young Justice, which I used to read regularly. Admittedly, I only started reading it, because I was attracted by his art. I was pleased to get to talk to him, and he drew me a picture of Impulse. Win!

Of all the amazing luck I had at the con, this was probably one of the most perfect examples: 250 Limited Edition Comicon versions of the DVD cover of Hot Fuzz were raffled off, along with the chance to get them signed by Nick Frost. The line for the raffle went out the autograph hall, wrapped around a couple times outside, and ended up… I don’t know where. I lost track of it after a while. Good thing I won, eh? The guy on the far right giving me a totally WTF look and signing the cover is Edgar Wright, who directed and co-wrote (with Simon Pegg) the movie. I particularly liked the humor and double-back references in the movie, so huge props to him. Even if he is giving me the WTF look.

Finally, my last reserves of super-geekery were used up on Sunday, when I plucked up the courage to go back to Steve Purcell’s booth (yes, back. I had gone there once before for an autograph and a drawing and a poster. I left, flustered enough to forget that I hadn’t paid for the poster, then sheepishly went back to pay.) I think by that time, he was a bit wary of me, but he was still extremely nice. Ahhh, I’m such a dork.

And thats about it. Maybe later I’ll add some scans of the autographs I got, like some creature drawings from Andrew Bell and a picture of our favorite fruit violator from Penny Arcade by Mike. But right now I’ve posters to put up :)