Comic Con 2009 (it's a long one...)

A few weeks ago Bryce and I embarked on our first Comic Con experience. Friends of ours had been before and always talked about how fun it is, so we rented a hotel and bought the 4 day pass and decided to give it a try. Our friend Rebecca came in from Arizona for the weekend and since she'd been the year before, she was like our own personal tour guide!

We really had NO idea what to expect when we got there and I don't think anything could've prepared us. Below is a picture of people lined up for some panel or viewing or something, I'm not even sure what, but the line was incredibly long as it was for a lot of things over the weekend.

There were LOTS of people dressed up, but this is the only one I managed to get a picture of. I wasn't bold enough to ask people to stop and wait while I pulled out my camera.

We took the trolley up from our hotel everyday, which saved us tons of time, money and aggravation dealing with all the people down there.

This is the convention center, it's even bigger up close!

Here are a couple of pictures from the exhibition floor, this doesn't even to justice to how BIG and CROWDED this place was... I don't think I can express that enough.

There was a booth on the floor that was doing film make-up demonstrations, it was really cool.
We all know how I feel about Angel!
One of the first panels we went to on Thursday was a retrospective look at Battlestar Galactica, it was moderated by Richard Hatch (below) who was a part of both the original and new versions of the show.
Friday rolled around and this was the day I'd been waiting for since we bought the tickets. There was going to be a panel for one of my favorite shows, Bones. Since it was in one of the bigger room (see picture below) we decided to get in line early (about 9:30 a.m.) and sit through the earlier panels in the hopes of getting a good seat when the Bones panel started (at 3 p.m.) I know, crazy, right? But it sounded like a good idea, and I wanted to be as close as possible when David Boreanaz came out for the panel.
The first panel of the day was Stargate Universe, which we had no interest in when we got there, but by the time the panel was over, we decided we'd give the show a try when it comes on in the fall. The next panel was for the new show, Caprica, which is kind of a prequel to Battlestar Galactica. The three people below are the creators of Caprica and writers for both BSG and Caprica, Ron D Moore, David Eick and Jane Espenson - three people I totally look up to in terms of writing and creativity!
After the Caprica panel was The Big Bang Theory, which we also didn't know anything about, but decided to check it out after the panel was over. After that was 24, which I've never watched before, but am intrigued by after hearing about what is going to be happening in this upcoming season. I may not go back and watch all the other seasons, I may just jump right in with this one.
A couple of pictures of Jack Bauer.
Starbuck, Katee Sackoff, is going to be on 24 this season.
Then, the moment I'd been waiting for. The moment I'd been sitting in the same chair for like 7 hours waiting for... the Bones Panel. I was SO excited, and even now as I type this, it's a little hard to think about... They announced Emily Deschanel, Bones, and Hart Hanson, the shows creator... and then there was a pause, and the room was just waiting for them to say his name... David Boreanaz and then they said it... "We're so sorry, we have some disappointing news" - I think the entire room gasped at the same time. I thought to myself You have GOT to be kidding me! They went on to explain that David couldn't make it, but he did record a video message for us all. A VIDEO MESSAGE?! As if that was suppose to make it alright?
Bones Panel.
To make up for the disappointment, we were able to see the Dollhouse and Joss Whedon panel. He's another creative mind I think is brilliant. We got to see an unaired episode of Dollhouse, which was fun.
Joss and a few of the Dollhouse cast members.
Straight from Dollhouse we headed over to get in line for the Riff Trax panel. This was one of the only things Bryce was really excited about in the course of the entire weekend, so we were suprised to get there over an hour before the panel started and the line was snaking all over the place. In order to stem confusion, the person at the end of the line held a sign, like so:
We were among the last 20 or so people who were let into the panel, I was scared for a minute we weren't going to get in and then I was going to feel really bad. They did a live Riff Trax of a short film called "Shaking hands with danger" and I don't know if I've laughed so hard in a really long time!
Saturday we woke up and headed over for the Glee panel, much to our excitement the showed us the season premiere which will be airing next month. It. Was. Hilarious!! For any who haven't seen the pilot, we have it saved on our DVR and would welcome any excuse to watch it again!
More Glee!
After Glee, we headed over to see Ray Bradbury, who's turning 89 this month! I haven't read any of his books (yet) but Bryce has and thinks he's pretty good. His panel (which was mostly just him) was fun, he went on a little rant about how we need to divert money from 6th, 7th and 8th grades and give it to Kindergarden and 1st grades because that's when we can have real impact on kids. He thinks Calvin & Hobbes should be in charge of our children's education (because he grew a love for reading and writing from reading comics when he was little.) It's not a bad idea, if you ask me!
One of the last highlights of the weekend was seeing Stan Lee, one of the biggest names in the comic book industry. We were headed to a panel Bryce wanted to see (The Evolution of Comics, or something like that...) and we got to the room early and they let us in to the ending of the panel before and there he was, sitting on the little stage, it was cool.
We didn't end up going to see anything on Sunday, nothing really seemed that exciting and we were pretty exhausted. It definitely wasn't a trip meant for relaxation, but we had lots of fun and would probably look into doing it again next year... if anyone's interested in joining us, let me know!