Geez. I don't even know where to start.

Last weekend I attended the Wizard World Comic Convention in LA. Except it wasn't in LA. It was in Long Beach. I had to state that fact, because I gotta represent da LBC, yo! Haha. I'm so bad at ghetto talk.

This was the first year that Wizard had a convention in the LA area, and you could kind of tell. DC comics didn't have a conventional booth, it had a couple tables that formed a box. Crossgen, as well as Marvel, were non-existent. The hall was about half the size of the hall used for the Chicago 'con.

I had talked to some of the people at the booths, and they told me that a lot of people held back since it was the first year, and they didn't know how the crowd would be. I guess they were afraid that the 'con would be a dud. It was to be held on two days with a three hour preview night on Friday.

But when the place was packed on Friday night, they knew that this would be a big 'con in the future. When we got there, the line to get in was the length of the whole convention center. It was crazy!

The downside, however, was that there were too many people for too little things. There were lines everywhere for this and that, and companies had unusually long lines, since the other publishers weren't there to take up the slack.

So I had a good time, not a great time, but a good time. There just wasn't enough for me to be interested in for three days. The panels were OK, but there wasn't the variety of programming that I'm accustomed to. The lines for everything were crazy, and I didn't have the patience or interest to wait in them. But it's the first year, so I'll cut them some slack.

But there were some highlights to the weekend....some more interesting than others. Me and the girls had a lot of good laughs. Usually at my expense, but I don't mind being the whipping girl. So here's the more memorable moments...

Celebrity Encounters

There were a couple celebrities there, and we got to meet a couple of them. I think one of my favorites was meeting Noah Hathaway, who I had the biggest crush on when he played Atreyu in 'The Neverending Story'. Although the picture isn't that great (he was talking as the picture was taken) he's aged pretty well.

We also met:

- David Carradine - who is really really old. Like a carcass sitting on the chair old. But he was nice enough to take a picture with us and gave us a couple grunts of hello. It was pretty surreal.

- Ken Foree - from Dawn of the Dead. He called us the smelly girls during the whole 'con, because as I passed by him to take a picture with Noah, he caught a whiff of my perfume. Since the actor area was in a high traffic area, we passed by him (and Noah) often.

- James Marsden - OK, I forgive him for being in the X-Men movies. He was just amazingly charming and cute. How can you not like those dimples? We didn't have much time to chat it up, though, since we were actually in line to meet him, unlike the others.

Seeing Familiar Faces

One thing I love about going to a 'con is that every year I meet someone new, or make a new friend. This year was no exception.

- Of course, the people at Aspen were as wonderful as can be. Liz was the best and it was great to see her again. I didn't want to bug them too much because the booth was packed the whole time. There was always a line and the issues were selling really fast. But I got a chance to say 'Hi' to Mike during the panel. We passed by Frank as we were walking around, and he stopped by to tell us how the 'con was going for them. I also got a chance to chat with Talent at the booth on Sunday, he's a sweetheart! It was nice to re-introduce myself to Mark and Koi, the newest additions to the Aspen family, who I think I had met last year when we went out once. I didn't get a chance to meet Christina, but I hope she's in Chicago because I'd love to ask her some questions about coloring. I'm sure that Peter and the rest of the team got a good laugh watching me at the booth across playing the dancing game on the I-Toy. I didn't know they were watching, and I was forced to play. I felt like a dork afterward! But thanks to everyone at Aspen, who have always made me feel like I was a little more than just a fan.

- Also got to see Mike Wellman of Atomic Basement again. I'd venture to say that he's one of the first people I got to know at these things, and he was so cool when I came out to LA on business a couple years ago. Nice to see he's still involved with comics. Buy Gone South!!!

- We talked to the ultra-huggable Tone Rodriguez for a bit, who sadly told me that he might not be doing any more 'cons. We took one last picture together, but he said he'll try and make it to Chicago. He's the best, man!

- I had a couple brief convos with Mark Brooks, who this year, like Talent Caldwell, has become 'Mr. Popular'. Nice to see his career really taking off. If you're reading this, I apologize for not coming back to your table like I promised! I had to take the girls to the airport! Mark put a bit of terror into me when we were talking...

Mark: Hey, I checked out your blog the other day. It's cool!
Me: What? My blog?
Mark: Yeah. I was doing a vanity search. I looked up my name and came up with your site.
Me: Are you serious?
Mark: Yup. Listen, if you put any artists name on your site, they're gonna find it. We're always looking up our names on the internet!
Me: For some reason, I find that mildly terrifying! Good thing I didn't say anything mean!
Mark: Nah, you said good things, and you put up the sketch that I did.
Me: Ohh...ok.

So yeah. If you're doing a vanity search, 'Hey Mark!'

- We stopped by Jay Company Comics to get some goods, and Jay (if that is his name) immediately recognized us and said hello. He's such a great guy, and it's nice seeing him year after year. Then we stopped by the other table that they had and said hello to Mama Jay. She is the sweetest woman ever. When she saw us, she immediately recognized us and said, 'Ohh, hey girls!' and then turned to me and said, 'So, did you get married yet?' It's so amazing that she remembered such a thing! Then she did her 'I've seen you girls grow up! It's so wonderful!' After 6 or 7 years of going to comic cons, I guess you could say that she's seen us grow up!

- Got some great sketches from Ryan Odagawa and Sean 'Cheeks' Galloway. Ryan was great, he drew me a great picture of Psylocke, and later drew me Princess from Battle of the Planets. Sean fooled around in his sketch of Psylocke, and it turned out rather....interesting. So then he promised me that he would sketch another pic for me, so he got up early in the morning to sketch a pic of Psylocke riding a hippo. It's the cutest!

The Triplets of Long Beach

So we were talking to Tone, and he was telling his friend not to disturb him because he was with his triplets. We got a little laugh out of that. As we were about to leave, a fan who was waiting to Tone turned to us and said, 'Excuse me, can I take a picture of you? I've never seen triplets before!' I looked at him and said, 'Um, we're not triplets.' Which is obvious if you see the three of us. And he was like, 'Well, can I have a picture anyway?' Weirdo!

The Incredible Mr. Smith

Though Jason Mewes was there for his alotted signing time, he was supposed to be with Kevin Smith. However, Kevin was stuck in LA traffic, and missed the time. I guess they told people to keep their tickets (that they needed to get an autograph). After Kevin had his panel later that day, they reformed the line. And instead of having the people go through the line and coming up to a table to get a signature, Kevin actually went up to people in line to sign autographs, take pictures, and just talk to people. I was really impressed with this gesture. He really took his time and made sure that he got to talk to everyone.

Fine, fine, fine, Kevin Smith, I'll go and see Jersey Girl.

Oh, and if you missed it, you can get my "Dirty Sexy" Jason Mewes story here.

The CBDLF SAT Sketch-a-Thon

One of my mini-highlights was watching the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund auction. They had some popular artists like Talent Caldwell, Judd Winick, Amanda Connor, Mark Brooks, Ale Garza, etc draw their least favorite character to draw. Then they all swtiched papers and drew their favorite characters. And the theme was 'Compromising Positions'. So you had Spiderman on all fours and a fat Batman behind him going, 'Hmmm'. Or Hulk taking a dump as Namor is in the shower singing Air Supply. Or Spiderman handcuffed to the bed as The Pro is ready for some kinky electric torture.

It was really cute to watch them concentrate so hard on making these sketches, since they wanted to do as many as they could during the allotted time. It was like they were taking the SAT's. But you could tell they were having a great time just being goofy.

The sketches went from $20 to about $120. My top bid was $30, didn't get anything. But it was fun to raise my hand a couple times!

Hmm...that's all the stories that I remember. It seems like it was so long ago!

Pat, you owe me big time for going to the 'con and not giving me a heads up. Especially since we were at the same panel and I didn't even know!

Anyway, here's some of my favorite pictures...

Click here for my Wizard World LA Gallery

Wizard World Chicago, here we come!!!

Posted by Yano at March 26, 2004 12:50 AM

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