Comic-con 2008
This year I finally got my crap together and made arrangements to attend Comic-Con 2008. As I made the decision a bit
late in the game I was only able to acquire passes for Thursday and Friday. But this turned out to be a fine amount of
time to see and do most of what I planned to do at the Con. I was joined by my long-time friend and collegue Tony
Barrington, who made the drive up from LA.
WEDNESDAY (the trip to San Diego and the eve of Comic Con)
My trip included getting on a plane in Kelowna INT, with 2 connecting flights, before finally landing in San Diego.
(Kelowna > Vancouver > Denver Colorado > San Diego). The trip went off with no major hitches and the planes I
travelled on were fairly spacious which was a nice surprise (even though I still flew Economy). Denver's airport is
probably the best laid out airport of all the airports I've been to. The only hiccup in the whole trip was my plane from
Denver to San Diego being delayed about 2 hours. No big deal though. Finally touched down in San Diego at about 11
at night. Tony had already been there a few hours cause of the flight delay. After some amusing happenings with the
airport parking lot ticket machine and watching what looked like a re-inactment of the "Mr. Bean" episode with the
parking lot toll booth by some guy in a truck we finally exited the airport and made our way to our Hotel.
This hotel turned out to be predictably ghetto (it was the only thing I could find reasonably close to the convention
center with only 3 weeks before the Con to go). The hotel's WiFi connection was the embodiment of awful. The funniest
part was how the lobby receptionist told us to just "leech off of the neighboring Day's INN hotel's connection. This was
met with rather sad results. A connection slower than 56k which liked to drop frequently... oh well.
We ordered what might be the most lackluster pizza I've ever consumed. It took an hour to us. Tony tipped the guy 19
cents. The guy exclaimed in a heavy Indian accent "NINETEEN CENTS?! YOU GOTTA BE KIDDING ME MAN!".
Fun times. I roughly went over our gameplan for what we were going to try and do at the Con tomorrow. Sleep took us.
THURSDAY (first day of the convention)
We (predictably) made the mistake of trying to drive ourselves to the Con. This involved engaging in the equivalent of a
mosh pit with automobiles, and spending 2 hours trying to find parking. We finally found a lot with space. Since we
were so far from the convention center we chartered one of those little bike-rickshaw things. We began filming with a
camera we commandeered from Tony's roommate Dan Cooke. Dan was going to try to go to the Con as well but was
unable to in the end. We finally reached the convention center. I spotted Canada's "Space Channel" filming their
coverage of the Con outside. We first had to enter the convention center and get our day passes. We had planned on
attending the 20th Century Fox Panel in "Hall H". But by the time we had found our parking, entered the center, and
acquired our passes it was already half over. The line for the event stretched what was probably thousands of feet.
Was kind of a downer since Keanu Reeves and Jennifer Connoly were there talking about the upcoming "The Day the
Earth Stood Still" which they star in, and Mila Kunis and Mark Wahlberg were there to promote the "Max Payne" film
adaptation. Oh well, can't expect to see every amazing thing at Comic Con (there's a million amazing things going on
simultaneously at every waking moment). So we decided to try and get Mick Foley's autograph. We ended up waiting
over an hour for him to show up. He was caught in traffic. He finally showed up and was as awesome as we expected.
Mick is Tony's idol. So this made the Con for him. I'm not a huge wrestling fan, but if I had to pick a favorite wrestler it
would without a doubt be Mick Foley and his "Mankind" character persona.
After the Mick Foley signing we made our way to other sections of the autograph area. Thats about the time we spotted
another pro wrestling superstar... Chyna.
I don't want to be mean here, but man she wasn't looking too hot that day. We showed up and said hi and explained we
had already spent our money on Mick Foley and we were sorry, but we thought she was awesome. She faked being
good-natured.
I spotted a few other celebrities. Notably Richard Hatch from Battlestar Galactica. I got some brief footage of him
signing.
After this we tried to get into the Red Sonja panel (with Robert Rodriguez and Rose Mcgowan) but predictably we were
late for this as well. Shot some crappy footage through the doorway, of the panel.
We decided at this point that we should finally go visit our friends' booth. These friends I'm referring to are of course
the people behind entertainment super-site Newgrounds.com and indie-game-dev-warriors The Behemoth.
Total sensory overload began to set in as we waded through the seas of amazing booths (both by mom-and-pop type
companies, and names as big as Marvel, DC, ABC/Disney, 20th Century Fox, Paramount etc) until we finally located the
Newgrounds/Behemoth booth. I was impressed not only by the booth itself but also it's placement. It was right next to
Funcom and XBOX. At the booth were 4 foot statues of the Castle Crashers characters (from the XBOX Live Arcade title
of the same name), HD screens attached to game pods that let convention-goers play the hell out of said game, a huge
flag displaying famed Newgrounds-associated characters, and a storefront selling tons of amusing items. I walked up
and introduced myself first to Dan Paladin (aka "Synj"), who I've known online for over half a decade, and worked on a
project or 2 with even. Of all the experiences I had at Comic-con, one of the best was simply meeting dozens of people
I've only known in the cyber-realm before. Whether it was Tony, or even Tom Fulp (creator of Newgrounds). I noticed
Tom standing to the side of the booth, so I made my way over and introduced myself via my business card. Over the
next half hour Tony and myself had a great time talking shop with Tom, goofing around on the webcam they had setup
at their booth, and playing Castle Crashers. I even bought some Castle Crashers figures and a Penicorn (the latter
caused quite a collective laugh attack from many at the booth when I brandished it in front of Tom's face, the webcam,
etc)
At the booth we met up with many fellow Newgrounds users, such as voice actress supreme; Rina-chan, and a fellow
who went by the name of Crow Clock. With Crow Clock making us three we eventually departed from the NG booth and
made our way to the food court area (we hadn't eaten anything that day). We managed to find chairs and sat down for
the first time in what was probably 7 hours. I video-taped costumed-oddities and lovely costumed-babes as they
passed by. After our short rest we went back into the sea of booths and continued to take it all in. Notable booths were
the Sci-Fi Channel (a giant strangly shaped shimmering plastic landscape), MGM (which featured James Bond's actual
car as part of a promotion for the upcoming "Quantum Of Solace" Bond feature film), DC's booth which featured the
Owlship built for the forthcoming 2009 "Watchmen" movie. We checked out booths by some of the biggest videogame
publishers on the planet. I was sure to talk to representatives about publishing and give them my card (as I'm currently
planning a full-length game for consoles). Konami were especially friendly and I had a great time talking game design
and pitching my game to Konami's Senior Public Relations Manager, Jay. I also talked to some game producers at
Sony's booth who were equally as friendly and interested in my concept. Square/Enix were super cool to, but
predictably mentioned that they typically work with their own internal properties instead of outside licenses.
It was almost 7pm and about time to leave as the convention was closing down for the night. So we walked back to the
car, and drove to the hotel. Tony ordered us Papa John's and it was substantially better than the previous night's
pizza...
FRIDAY (2nd day of the convention and night of the Newgrounds/Behemoth release party for
Castle Crashers)
We did the sensible thing this time and got ourselves a cab. The cab driver was an amusing character who could have
been an Al Pacino impersonator. He noticed us filming and asked what it was for, so we told him we were in the online
entertainment industry and this was for our site(s)/youtube. He then told us if we filmed HIM he'd "f***ing kill us". We
assured him his footage would wind up on the cutting room floor...
Among some of his other colorful comments was a question he directed towards us in regards to if there's FREE
websites featuring "girls going crazy and getting naked". We gave him some recommendations.
After arriving at the convention center and saying goodbye to our surly driver we made our way to the lineup for Warner
Bros "Watchmen" Presentation/Panel. We got there on time for once and after getting our seats in the massively huge
Hall H, and waiting for over an hour for the actual show to begin, we were treated to the coolest experience of the Con
yet. Exclusive footage of the new film, presented by none other than Director Zack Snyder (director of "300"), and the
entire cast. I got some footage of Mr. Snyder and some other stars such as Billy Crudup (actor in films like "Almost
Famous"). For those not in the know, Watchmen is one of the most acclaimed and legendary graphic novels ever.
Written in the 1980s by shamanaic comics master-writer Alan Moore, it is a gritty and arresting tale about realistic
superheroes (a revolutionary concept at the time) in an alternate real-world, taking place in 1985 as the Cold War
reaches critical mass. Being a fan of the novel and most of Alan Moore's work and seeing how Hollywood typically
ruins and defiles his comics when translating them to film, I was more than a little skeptical of the film. But after seeing
the footage I must say I'm warming up to the idea of a Watchmen film. They got the right cast, the right
costumes/makeup, the right look, and they even retained the 1980s setting (thank god they didn't make it about the War
on Terror). Oh and it was shot in Vancouver. We'll have to wait till 2009 to find out if it becomes the first film to do Alan
Moore justice or not...
After the Watchmen panel we attended a TV writers panel which featured the writers/producers of "Lost", "Pushing
Daisies", "Chuck", "Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles" etc. Virtually no spoilers were dropped by Damon
Lindelof/Carlton Cuse (Lost masterminds) but that wasn't a shock. They did offer some incite into Season 4's production
which was interesting, and there were more than a couple entertaining moments. We had to leave early to catch the
next big presentation in Hall H though... the film adaptation of "The Spirit"... this panel featured director Frank Miller
(creator of comics like "300" and "Sin City" and a personal hero of mine) and actor Samuel L. Jackson. Yes, that's
right... Sam Jackson in the flesh.
This was an awesome panel which featured highly entertaining long-winded incites and anecdotes by Frank Miller, the
appearance of many of the film's cast (I was disappointed by Scarlett Johansson's absense though... also Eva Mendes
was slated to appear but couldn't at the last minute), and of course Samuel L. Jackson wise-cracking and hamming it
up. They showed quite a bit of footage along with the actual trailer. Highlights included an under-water scene featuring
Eva Mendes and an awesome fight scene between the villainous "Octopus" (Jackson's character) and "The Spirit"
(played by [] who was also present at the panel). Myself and Tony got a huge kick out of this scene as it involved the
two rival characters battling it out in a decidedly mucky, muddy, and murky environment, beating the crap out of each
other with ridiculously surreal objects such as a giant wrench (which the Octopus nails the Spirit in the crotch with).
Near the end of the clip the Octopus makes a surprise attack after momentarily disappearing by smashing a toilet over
The Spirit's head, resulting in it being stuck around his body. The Octopus utters a soon-to-be classic line: "Come on!
Toilets are always funny!"
After "The Spirit" panel wrapped up we made our way to the Sails Pavilion to get Katey Sagal's autograph. She is
probably most famous for the role of Peg Bundy on "Married with Children" and Leela on "Futurama". She turned out to
be really down-to-earth and cool. We next turned our attention back to the convention floor and it's seemingly
never-ending sprawl of booths. Tony bought an "Ugly Doll"(TM), we visited the Mcfarlane Toys booth (among many
others), took pictures of us with booth-babes, and visited the Newgrounds booth again. We visited DC's booth and
cashed in a ticket we were given at the Watchmen panel for a free Watchmen t-shirt.
We finished off the day at Marvel's booth, where they held their "Super Happy Fun Giveaway Hour" for the last hour of
the convention. We ended up getting free Iron Man comics from this dude on a stage with a bunch of boxes full of free
stuff (other people got free video games and even an Iron Man statue...).
As the convention was closing for the day we made our way back to the Newgrounds/Behemoth booth where we met up
with Tom. A group of us led by him made our way out of the convention center and through the streets of San Diego to
the location of the Castle Crashers release party. I can truthfully say it was the best party I've been to yet. Video
games, awesome people (many of whom I'd only known online for years prior to this), food, and a free bar. Between
meeting up with old and new friends alike such as FrostedMuffins, Krinkels, Luis Castanon, Dan Paladin, John Baez,
and Rog from I-mockery.com, we also found time to smack pinatas and play Castle Crashers on a huge projector. After
the party winded down a small group of us capped off the night with a trip to a local San Diego bar. I was pretty drunk at
this point so it's a bit of a blur honestly. After saying goodbye to Tom, myself and Tony hailed a cab and returned to our
hotel. I passed out over the leftover pizza from the previous night...
All in all, Comic-con was an amazing experience. I'm definetly kicking myself for taking this long to attend, and Tony
and I have agreed that this will be a regular thing from here on out. I'm considering a Diverge Creations booth at some
point as well... Enjoy the pics and the forthcoming video footage!
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