I have been going to Comic Con since the mid 80s when I moved to Southern California. Before that I was a regular at the Creation Cons in NYC. I have been presenting at Comic Con since the turn of the century. Every year in gets bigger and bigger and more all the same meaningless crap. It has got to the point that I have been thinking more and more about just giving it a miss.
First off, the brand-new smart idea to sell reserved parking under the convention center a year in advance so no one can get into the convention center parking unless they committee a full year before Comic Con just major sucks ass. Comic Con has taken another big step into total commercial whoredom.
Thursday as I am waiting outside Hall D for the doors to open after pro registration. I get the pleasant company of a 8 months pregnant 17 year old unwed idiot and her 2 idiot friends. How do I know she is an idiot? She is 17 and knocked up. Birth Control, come on, nobody told you about that? How hard is that? She is wearing a bandoo with her pregnant belly hanging out. Her friend is trying to tease up her hair so she will look kind of like a Troll Doll. And the two of them are trying to think up the name of the character that some fan guy is dressed like. Hint: the Mad Hatter you mindless bimbos. “He is from Willie Wanka and his name is Captain Hat!” “No, no that’s not his name.” The final proof, she is smoking a hand rolled no filter cigarette with Bugler tobacco. I wanted to hit her up side the head. “You idiot, you are damaging you kid! It is going to come out a stupid as you!”
Gods, these are the fans. No wonder Comic Con has been dumbed down. I look through the program book and the panels are all white bread stupid and dumbed down even further this year. The ones that are not stupid are set against each other so that you can only see maybe one or two good panels all convention. They have moved the Anime festival off site and now they are asking for tickets at the door. You use to be able to just pop in and set down.
I walked by the old U.S. Grant hotel on Sunday. The place where Comic Con started. The place I first went to Comic Con. All I could feel was sad. Comic Con is harder to live through each year and I get less out of it every time.
Somebody actually stabbed somebody over a seat in Hall H. Gods I miss Comic Con when it was about comics and not Hollywood money. I use to do silent animation screening and forbidden animation screenings. There use to be funk, there use to be fun, now it has to sell, sell, sell. There was a time when you could talk to somebody about subjects that the 9 to 5 world didn’t know about. Now it is all buzz for the next popcorn movie. Comic Con’s big success is its greatest failure.
So why do I still go? It is getting harder every year to answer that question. I see friends and former students. But it is like a class reunion with a hundred thousand idiots from the dumb kids’ grade school crashing the party.
Didn’t I have any fun at Comic Con? Yes I did, but it was about seeing the people, the friends who were sharing the discomfort and mediocrity with me. I got very little out of Comic Con itself. And that is not right.
I saw Tom Yeate and Ron Randall and other Kubert students. I talked to Jim Rivers from Obsidian Games a former student of mine from 10 years ago. Ran into Bill Plympton and had a good talk. Reconnected with Aaron Vanek, a director I worked with 11 years ago.
I saw a guy who took such pleasure in first pretending he was on my side in a power struggle and then knifing me in the back, back about 3 years ago. Said turn coat member has ballooned up to twice his size in the intervening years since his spectacular betrayal and I am truly trying really hard not to be too happy about that fact.
Talked to Fred Ladd, always good to see Fred. But I talk to him on the phone all the time. Talked to Lavar Burton, a big supporter of IndieCade. He was really cool and humble. When I introduced him to my kids he said “Hi, I’m Lavar.” Like he was really unaware of the fact that every kid in their age group already knows him form Reading Rainbow.
Saw former students in from New York, students from Fullerton and students from Laguna. Saw David, the AV tech guy who ran all my panels and presentation back in the days when panels where a reason to come to Comic Con and they gave the presenters custom chocolates after a panel. Are these short bits of social interaction spaced out across the 5 days of madness and mediocrity still enough reason to come to San Diego each year? Just barely. Would they be a reason to go to L.A. or Los Verges if Comic Con really moves? L.A. maybe but Hollywood would have even a bigger grip so I would really have to think about it. Verges, no way, never under any circumstances.
