This blog is going to be my personal highlights from the
Calgary Entertainment expo, in no particular order.
First off, VIP is totally worth it. We bought VIP early in the year before any
big names were announced and I must say it is very much worth it and it
completely changes the experience.
Normally you spend a lot of time in line at the Con, and because of this
you really can’t do everything. When you
are a VIP though this is a lot less of an issue, the only time you miss things
is when schedules of photo-ops and panels start to conflict. Otherwise you really can see just about
everything and if you are interested in doing that, it is worth the money. On a personal note, even though I paid for it
and was within full rights to move to the front of the lines, I would still
apologize to people around me for cutting in.
I have been in the lines, I know how long the wait can be, but most of
that guilt gets scrubbed away when you get your autograph.
A lot of people will dress up for the con, but this year you
couldn’t see more than ten people or so without seeing someone in costume and
when you think about how many people were at the show… 52,000. That is a lot of
costumes and it was great to see. There
were a lot of creative ones, a lot that had a lot of hard work poured into
their creation and most significantly a lot of team costumes. X-men, all the power rangers, even a steam
punk version of the Justice League.
There were an astonishing amount of sensational costumes, see the pics
below for examples. If you haven’t heard
of the 501st, they are a group that accepts members that have Star
Wars costumes film grade or better.
These costumes are complicated too.
It can get so warm in the get ups that they have onboard fans, and
coolers and power packs to make them all work in keeping the person
comfortable. So many of the works were
really impressive
In the second day morning panel I realized that Max Brooks isso
awesome. First thing he did when he got
to the panel is counted out how many empty seats were at the head table of the
panel, and then counted out seven people standing along the walls and got them
to sit next to him at the panel. He was
very intelligent, very quick on his feet and really funny. If you haven’t read them yet, read World War
Z and the Zombie Survival Guide. They
are very well written and very serious books about the impending zombie apocalypse, and about the global scale of an outbreak.
The TNG panel was a lot of fun too. There is so much that I can say about this
but instead I will toss in some references from some of the participants. But I will go to say it is a very classy
show. They hired a big band to play
while everyone shuffled in, they put together a video with interviews from
other Star Trek cast members and guests at the Emerald City Convention to kick the event off. It was great seeing the cast, they were all
very touchy feely and I have to say that Wil Wheaton stole the show. He was prompted by a question his good friend
Aaron Douglas asked him and well you can see it all here…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zvb8HEO6Koo
Copy and paste the link
Speaking of Aaron Douglas he came too for the second year in
a row. His booth was a bit empty but I
think he came to hang out with Wil and cause he enjoyed the Con last year, or
at least I hope he did. He was stuck
wearing a LA Kings Jersey cause he lost a bet about Vancouver taking the
Playoffs with Wil. Aaron is a great
guy. So funny, so approachable, just a
genuinely nice guy. During the photo op
with him Katee Sackoff and Richard Hatch he stopped everything to take a
picture of my T shirt at the time. This
shirt…
Stan Lee is someone you wish was your grandpa. He is somewhat stuck in the sixties in terms
of how it is he talks. He talked a lot
about the characters he created and about the thought that was put into it,which wasn’t about making a deeper meaning but done to make things more
interesting. He explained how the hulk
was made green because of the ink available at the time. They were originally thinking of a grey but
it printed different time and on issue one you can see this. Green printed good, and was a bit of a
different color so green was the color they decided to go with for the
Hulk. It was a lot of fun. This is what going to the cons is about,
seeing your pop culture icons as people.
Something that surprised me was a last minute addition to
the media guests. It looks like when at
another comic expo in Seattle, the Calgary Crew was able to convince the Phelps
twins to come to the Calgary con weeks later.
The Phelps’ are the two gingers that play the twin Weasley brothers in
the Harry Potter films. I never paid
them much mind at the con, but something I found I did mind was the very long
line of individuals looking for autographs.
The line of muggles clenching Harry Potter Hardcovers and Boxsets of the
movies snaked around half of the media area getting in the way of a pretty main
thorough fare. In truth these muggles
likely wouldn’t have come to the Calgary con otherwise, but hopefully after
waiting in that long line they spent some time enjoying the explosive nerdiness
all around.
One of the things that first brought me to the con
was my buddy Big Mike a few years back.
Him and his wife Heather are good friends and in general enjoy having a
couple to share their nerdy adventures with (Weird Al concert, the cons, Steve
Martin Blue Grass), and they too were out there with us in force this year
too. Now Mike has a rather large bro
crush on Wil Wheaton. Loves the work he
does in audio books and his books, his career on Star Trek, and even in the
Secret of Nym. Mike actually got three
photo ops with Wil, and I can’t say as I blame him, Wil has carved out a career
of being a nerd ambassador as it were, through promoting intelligent sci fi,
roles on Big Bang Theory and table top
board games. Two ops with the family,
and one with him all to himself. His
wife, who is an amazing knitter got an idea with Mike to knit a particularly
terrible sweater Wil used to wear on Star Trek, and that has since been
immortalized in the internet character Sparks McGhee
http://sparksmcgeeadventures.tumblr.com/ , for their lil
Elli. When we first happened upon the
two on Friday, Heather just started the sweater, when their op on Sunday came
around the miniature sweater was done…
I have to give a shout out to Adam Baldwin, he was a real
treat to have. He loves cigars, so when
I met him I made sure to give him a nice Cuban.
He talked to us about how he was looking forward to a good steak, which
considering his large stature is no surprise.
I missed some of his panel due to the lock out (will talk about next
time) but he is really an actor that is very physical, likes getting into the
roles and enjoys the fans. Very
friendly, very respectful and all around
happy to be there.
Part of the fun of the cons is listening to these successful
people, hearing about their lives which are very different to the most of folk,
and hearing about the things that have made them successful. In a lot of instances the role that made them
successful isn’t little more than a job they took, which is unfortunate to say,
but at the very least they took this role and made the best of it and made
something amazing. The thing that I love
to see, is the ones that love the work, love the roles and in a very real way
become the characters themselves. The
ones that love their jobs as much as we love them in the roles, those people
are what really make going to the con worth every damn penny. It may seem absurd to some, paying for
autographs, and pictures but that’s what brings them out and in truth they
appreciate the support just as much as we appreciate seeing them.
Now I can really go on and on, and on… and on about the
Con. But I realize I have hit page three
on this one so I must stop. But my point
is that at the comic con there is so much to see, do and experience that
writing a blog in this fashion to share the complete experience I had is far
too extensive to do. I do hope this
highlight reel and the very small amount of pictures(You could spend the whole
day taking photos and not get everything!!!!) have helped you too enjoy my
experience at the con.
Next up the upsides and downsides of this year’s con.
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