WonderCon

Just got back from WonderCon 2005. Disappointed this year, despite the star-studded line-up. Actually, that was part of the problem.

This con has gotten too big for its britches. It used to strike a nice balance, busy but not overwhelmingly so. Now, it's a little like San Diego but on a smaller scale. That means trouble maneuvering the aisles, saying, "excuse me", every five minutes, and putting up with the stink of fanboy.

This year had some big names attached to it - Alex Ross, Kevin Smith, Brian Bendis, Geoff Johns, Bone creator Jeff Smith - and I brought a hefty stack of books to be signed. Unfortunately, I wasn't the only one, and most of the signings faced incredible restrictions. Wristbands were given out at 10 for autographs with Ross and were long gone after we got there around 12:30. Other celebs and artists held a random drawing for autographs and were limited to a couple hundred autographs. One of the few people who did things the old-fashioned way was Kevin Smith, who signed at the View Askew booth almost all day with his partner-in-crime, Jason "Jay" Mewes:




It didn't help either that Bendis was sick and unable to attend.

After only a few minutes, when it became apparent I wasn't going to get anything signed, I went back to the car and emptied out my bag. Then we did some shopping the rest of the day. I picked up a cool Nintendo controller pencil case, and Rhonda and I got Evangelion cell-phone straps (she got EVA-01, I got EVA-02). Rhonda also bought a wooden practice sword for fifteen bucks.

In fact, I was doing real well on spending until we hit the Drunken Master booth. These guys are at all the cons we go to, and I always walk away having bought something. This year, I finally caved and bought the Korean Battle Royale Director's Cut I always covet. And I was about to escape with just that when my eye caught the John Woo Collection box set, right next to the A Better Tomorrow Trilogy box set! No way I could pass those up.

Oh well, I just got my tax refund.

Rhonda and I took a trip over to Artist's Alley to meet Tony De Zuniga, a Filipino artist who lives in Stockton. Recently, they ran an article about him in the Record (if someone has it, send me a link, I couldn't find it), and he started up a restaurant in Stockton's old Chinatown. His restaurant, The Islands, is supposed to have a lot of comic art, so we'll have to check it out next time we're in town. I looked through the pages of his comic art (some Batman, some Conan, some Daredevil, some Thor) and really wanted to buy some, but we just didn't have the cash. (I think if he still had some X-Men pages we would've been hitting up the ATM, though.)

We hit up the Fantastic Four panel with Julian MacMahon, the guy playing Victor Von Doom. He was a pretty funny guy, patronizing the fanboys who asked him some rather odd questions. The trailer and clip they showed from the film did little to change my opinion, which is that I hope it doesn't suck but I'm not holding my breath.

I did get lucky right before we left. Rhonda noticed someone writing on some of the books at the CBLDF booth, with his back to the large crowd surrounding the adjacent Kevin Smith-lovefest. It was Jeff Smith, and he signed the new full-color Bone TPB for me, the only book I got signed at WonderCon this year.