Good Morning Semantinkerers!

One week from today, the fine folks of San Diego will explode in nerdgasms as San Diego Comic Con International 2010 descends upon the down town area. While (almost) every comic convention has a floor filled with comic books, toys and other generally geek-tastic displays, what sets the SDCC apart from it’s competitors is the huge number of panels that they provide, as well as the great quality of the panels. With the programming for Comic-con being announced last week, I thought I would devote this week’s Comicopea to some of the panels that I am most geeked up about. Let’s take a look:

THURSDAY

DC COMICS WRITERS UNITE!: This panel gathers up some of DC’s biggest writers, past and present (some of the writers included are JMS, Denny O’Neil, Paul Levitz, and the always awesome Gail Simone) and has them wax about the craft of comic book writing. Writers always make for a great panel, and this panel has some of the all time greats.

DANNY ELFMAN: While people might complain that SDCC has moved too far away from it’s comic book roots, panels like this make me disagree with that argument. What other convention would feature one of the greatest composers of our generation looking at his career? My guess is none. Plus, Elfman did the score for 1989’s Batman, so he belongs at a comic convention anyway.

DIGITAL COMICS NOW!: This is the kind of panel I seek out as a publisher. Panelists include the CEOs of several digital comics apps discussing the future of comics in the digital market place.

THE EXPENDABLES: A panel devoted to what will surely be one of the bloodiest, most violent movies of the year? Count me in.

FRIDAY

THE WALKING DEAD: A sneak peak at the upcoming AMC show based on the Kirkman comic. All the preview images I have seen for this show have me interested, despite not being a big zombie nerd. I will be there to let Frank Darabont wow me into watching.

DC FOCUS– GRANT MORRISON: Normally I am not into the single person spotlight, but Morrison floats around on a cloud of ideas which I would like to see in person. Also, the panel promises “glimpses of what goes on in the mind of Grant Morrison as he crafts some of the world’s most thought-provoking comics”. If we get to look inside of GM’s head, that might be the most interesting show of the weekend.

THE JOSS WHEDON EXPERIENCE: Whedonites are some of the most rabidly loyal fans out there. The idea of seeing a room full of them with Whedon in the room tickles me. Oh, and Whedon is pretty awesome as well.
SATURDAY

WARNER BROTHERS PANEL: I don’t imagine you will be able to get into this one unless you start waiting the night before. Movies showcased include GREEN LANTERN, HARRY POTTER & THE DEATHLY HALLOWS, and SUCKER PUNCH. If you can get in, it should be a blast!

KICKSTART YOUR COMIC: I am always looking for new ideas, so this panel, focusing on expanding market share should be interesting to me (and probably about 10 other people).
SUNDAY

JACK KIRBY TRIBUTE: Everyone loves the King. Yeah, the guy behind the look of the Fantastic Four, The New Gods, The X-Men, The Eternals, and so much more. The idea of getting to see a bunch of his work while guys like Marv Wolfman and Kurt Busiek talk about his impact sounds like an awesome way to spend Sunday Morning.

CBDLF LIVE ART JAM: Artists on panels don’t usually work. They aren’t the eloquent speakers that writers are, and they tend to get sidetracked. However, in the live art jam you get to watch some pretty awesome artists (Tim Seeley and Ale Garza to name a few)  battle to see who can make the coolest pictures, and it’s for a good cause. Win and Win!

I should also point out that for every panel I mentioned here, there are probably another five that I didn’t mention that sound amazing. There is really something for everyone at SDCC. If you will be down for the con next week, make sure you take some time to head out to a panel or two, just make sure you plan for a line on the bigger panels. Thanks for stopping in folks, I’ll see you next week!

Salutations Semantinkerers!  This is Ben and James once again reporting from the first annual Long Beach Comic Convention!

Well, we expected Saturday to be a busier day than Friday, and it definitely was.  More Costumes.  More attendees.  More poor planning!  Wha– Huh?  That’s right.  I’m afraid that Saturday was a great deal less impressive then Friday, though I would still put the entire convention oodles (that’s right, “oodles”) above many others.

Apparently Japan has a different version of Star Wars.

I don’t know. Mr. Wolff wins.

Looks better than Nick Cage’s version.

Bad. Ass.

Here’s the deal:

Ben and I awoke with great zeal, excited to continue what started on Friday as a wonderful time.  We went to Ghettobux, wrote our blog, plotted out the various panels we would attend, and were heading back towards the Long Beach Convention Center by 10:30am.  The first thing we did upon our arrival was find the new artist-friends we made the day before.  First was Lord L Mesa, who had a throng of peoples awaiting his attention and still found the effort to give us a smile and warm greeting.  We gave Lord a copy of Mythoi and let him go back to doing his thing after a brief conversation.  On our way to the next drop-off, Ben ran into none other than the great Mark Waid!  Ben seized opportunity and chirped a bit about the book in Mr. Waid’s ear and he asked if he could have a copy (of course, we gave it to him)!  Geeking off of that encounter, we made our way to Joel Gomez who opened Mythoi without hesitation and gave some instant (and appreciated) constructive criticism.  Finally, we dropped the last freebie issue off to the mighty Doug Mahnke, who had no time to open or look at the book but asked to get back to us soon.  It may sound small, but as an independent writer/artist who grew up reading these guys, it means the world to Ben and I to have these guys read our stuff.  It’s an honor.  Really.

Well, with our hearts all aflutter we trudged around the rest of the convention floor which was much, much fuller of freaks, geeks and other forms of fandom than the day before.  We killed some time perusing various booths (taking notes for one of our own some day…) and then followed the wall of celebrities off the floor to the panel rooms above.  This is when things when sour(ish)…

The first panel we went to was the writer’s panel, presented by Aspen.  In the program it says that Jeph Loeb, David Wohl, JT Krull, Scott Lobdell, and Jimmy Palmiotti.  Unfortunately, only the first three showed up (still an honor for fans like us).  Apparently Mr. Lobdell has Swine Flu and Mr. Palmiotti was called to another panel.  Ben and I were understanding and shrugged it off — the might that did show up was still beyond worthy of our attention.  The panel was excellent.  As a writer I took notes as these masters delivered various tips and tricks to the audience.  This was the best panel and earned an “A” for the day.

Writers = “Directors”

Ben and I grabbed lunch at Island’s across the street (try the new chicken sandwich with fried onions — awesome) before making our way to the next panel of the day: editing in comics.  Promoted to be speaking in this panel were Matt Gagnon, Rob Levin, Scott Dunbier, and Matt Hawkins.  Dunbier no showed for one reason or another, and Hawkins was replaced by another Top Cow editor whose name escapes us at the moment, but was awesome and informative.  Once again, it was disappointing to not see who you allotted time for, but the panel was almost as good as writing, and may only have been lacking in audience questions, which was partially our fault.  Overall, we give this panel a B+.

Editors = “People who do everything else”

At this point in the day, Ben and I snuck away for a quick meeting with some investors.  After an hour on the phone, we hustled back to the convention to join in on the Art Panel, which featured Joe Benitez, Dustin Nyugen, Mike Choi, Ale Garza, Philip Tan, and another gentleman whose name escapes us because we are terrible audience members (maybe Micah Gunnell).  The artist panel was interesting.  It wasn’t bad, but the information presented wasn’t incredibly helpful to Ben (an editor), or I (a writer).  We had hoped that by attending the panel we could learn more about the artistic process, but really only learned about the types of music (or lack thereof) that the artists listen to, what types of pencils and/or inks they use, and what inspires them to work.  The answers to these questions were all case specific and changed artist per artist.  The panel was unhelpful for us, but probably great for fans.  Unfortunately, it felt more like a personal panel interview then a panel about the artistic process — to be fair, I again blame poor audience questions.  B-.

With two out of three panels not delivering what was promised via program, Ben and I made our way to the final event of the day:  Thomas Jane’s premiere of “Give Em Hell Malone.”  We weren’t bitter, but I would be lying if I said we weren’t a little bummed.  We walked into a very empty room at just fifteen minutes or so before showtime to meet Thomas Jane and a couple of his buddies setting up the Playstation 3 that (we assumed) would be gracing us with his latest cinematic adventure.  Unfortunately, after waiting until ten after the scheduled showtime, Thomas Jane announced to less than 100 people that we would not be seeing “Give Em Hell Malone,” but would instead be watching the black and white version of “The Mist.”  Don’t get me wrong, “The Mist” is a great film, but this iced the let-down cake for Ben and I so we trudged off with our heads down and left the rest of the theater to enjoy their time with Mr. Jane.  To be fair, Thomas Jane seemed very bummed that he couldn’t show his film, and Ben and I are sure it wasn’t his fault.  You’re still the sh*t, Thomas — we love you!

Back at our hotel room, Ben and I got all cleaned up and decided to attempt and retake our hopes from the night by attending Mark Waid’s party at our new favorite Long Beach Bar, The Auld Dubliner.  It wasn’t very busy when we got there around 9pm, so we found a table, grabbed some beers and played a game of Scrabble.  By the time the game was over the occupancy had tripled and the band was playing loud.  At one point we were stampeded by a bachelorette party for a young lady who loved to dance.  It was a great night full of drinks, talks, laughs, and eventually, great sleep.

Day 3, here we come…

James and Ben