DRAGON CON 2011 PART 1:
Alright there’s so much for me to talk about with the con that I’m going to try to split it into 2 blogs. The first being to make up for last Fridays blog that I missed because I was at Dragon Con and couldn’t post a blog. The second one will be for this weeks actual blog that I’m supposed to post.
In this first one I will talk a little about what Dragon Con is and then about the panels I went to. The second blog will take up the rest of what I did at the convention like the “walk of fame”, “artist alley”, the vendors, and all the people in costume.
A LITTLE ABOUT THE CON:
Dragon Con for those that don’t know about it is a convention that is held in 4 hotels in downtown Atlanta, GA. This convention hosts celebrities from some of the most popular television shows that are currently airing, to some that are no longer on air yet remain popular, old shows that not many know about, new shows in the same category, movies, and pretty much the stars that we the fans would like to see. Though it’s more than just the celebrities sitting in a room with each other signing anything that’s put in front of them. There’s also all the authors that show up, the vendors, all the cool items that can be bought, the music, the panels that answer some burning questions we have, the waiting on elevators and not minding that much (at times), and one of the best things ever, the costumes.
It’s a really wild, fun, and exciting experience that has so much going on that even after 5 days of being there I still didn’t have enough time to do all that I wanted to. That’s just how huge this convention is. And before you start thinking that this isn’t something that you might enjoy I would say that’s probably untrue (unless you don’t like crowds). Dragon Con is not a convention that’s specific to one main thing other than being fun. A lot of my friends thought that I was going to a comic book/science fiction related convention that wouldn’t hold anything interesting for them. Well, yes there is a lot of that going on at the con but there are also all the authors of books, the panels that have to deal with science (real science not the laser bouncing off a light saber science though that’s there also), there’s also robotics, and with all the celebrities there I can’t see how there wouldn’t be at least one celebrity there that even a skeptic wouldn’t want to see, I mean after all, if you’re watching tv and movies then you have to have someone you would like to meet and there’s a chance they might be there.
At any rate that’s what Dragon Con is about, fun and experiencing something that only happens in that atmosphere. And that brings me to this weeks blog, my experience at the 2011 Dragon Con and oh what an experience it was.
I won’t talk about the everything that I did, saw, heard, and bought there (well maybe bought will be an exception because I only got a few items) because I would be typing for a very long time and I don’t think anyone wants to read that much. So here I’ll give a run down on some of the more fun experiences that I had, including having some photos (and a picture might say a thousand words but with some of these even a thousand words won’t be enough).
So have fun reading this (I hope) because I had so much fun being able to do it to write about it.
THE PANELS:
The panels are where the celebrities, authors, and other guests to Dragon Con sit in a room filled with all us fanboys and fangirls talking about everything and anything and answering questions. These panels go on from early morning to night and happen in all the host hotels each hour of the day. Some are smaller where walking up a few minutes after they have started can still have a seat or two still free for you to sit on and some are so large and popular that getting in line even an hour and half before hand don’t mean you will get a seat.
In fact there were 2 panels that I was not able to get on because they had so many people waiting in line for them that I didn’t get a seat. It was actually the first panel that I wanted to go to that I wasn’t able to get a seat at. But that's not what I'm going to talk about and I'm not going to talk aboout all the panels because of 2 reasons, 1 not enough time to write it all down, 2 this is a comic book blog so I'll only talk about the comic book related panels, and well Carrie Fisher.
WALKING DEAD PANEL:
Another panel I went to was for the show The Walking Dead (it’s actually filmed there in ATL and surrounding areas. I was really looking forward to this panel. How could I not want to be at this panel that’s the cast of a great show about zombies (ok they aren’t actually called zombies on the show but instead are called “walkers”) that’s based off a comic book of the same name.
The table consisted of these cast members, Jon Bernthal, Laurie Holden, Steven Yeun, Chandler Riggs, Addy Miller, and Madison Lintz. This panel was both great and not so great.
With the not so great it started off a little late because they got stuck in traffic. Now the thing about panels is that if it says it is from 4-5 it’s from 4-5 no matter if they guests walk in at 4:50, you just get a 10 minute panel.
So they were a little late making the panel shorter than what I would liked it to have been. The second thing was that they were wore out from having to do the job of creating the show that I want to watch more of, which is actually fine with me, at least I know the show is still going to air. But mostly it was the kids that I could have done without. Oh sure they are part of the cast, they had some funny comments and answers, but for the most part they seemed to be talking just to be talking, which is also ok kind of but a lot of time what was being said didn’t make sense with what was asked or supposed to have been the topic.
Though the up side was getting to hear answers to questions like why was the zombies called “walkers” instead of zombies. Which that was answered by saying that in the world that the Walking Dead exists in there was no knowledge of what a zombie is, they didn’t exist, the word didn’t exist, the idea of a zombie didn’t exist, so the show has no zombies, they have walkers. Also seeing the shocked expressions on Laurie Holdens face when she heard some of the things that the kids where saying or when Jon Bernthal cussed.
CARRIE FISHER PANEL!!!
That’s right, I was in a panel where it was Princess Leia herself talking and oh boy does this woman know how to talk. I was shocked (in a good way) at how open she was about herself and just in answering questions about her personal life. She was also the coolest of all the stars that I saw at the panels. With one girl that stood up she asked if she could have the card that had Carrie Fishers name on it and she had the girl walk up to the table to get it and then she gave her a kiss (yep I was jealous). When she first came out on stage the very first thing she did was jump up on the table and wave at us all. That was both amazing and scary because I was like please don’t fall Leia, I don’t want to be at that panel. She would answer about anything that was asked, well actually she did answer everything that was asked, and she answered it without any modesty. I’ll post a short video of the panel here soon but I will have to edit it first because when I say that she was open to talking that includes talking about some things that might not be appropriate to post in my blog.
Carrie Fisher is such a character that I was glad that I had stood in the ling that was an hour and half before her panel and it was going from bottom floor of the hotel to the outside and then wrapping around the block and further. Though I was up close, I was outside, but close enough that I was not too far from the front.
STAR WARS THE CLONE WARS PANEL:
This panel was so totally great that it’s really hard to talk about it. Other than Carrie Fisher this was another panel that I was really looking forward to because it feature the voices of Ahsoka by Ashley Eckstein, Yoda by Tom Kane, and Chewbacca by Peter Mayhew. Jango Fett voice and played by Temuera Morrison was supposed to have been there but he was not. The other actors thought he was coming, even said that he was on his way over but he never showed up.
Though it didn’t matter because listening to these 3, especially Peter Mayhew who it was my first time getting to be in a panel with him there was just great stuff.
Though let me just skip to the best question that was asked, what was their thoughts on who shot first? Tom Kane instantly said of course Han shot first, that was also Ashley Ecksteins answer, but it was Peter Mayhew who gave the best answer in saying, “I don’t know, I was looking down at my drink at the time and didn’t see”. Man this was a great answer.
Tom Kane did some of characters that he voices, but mostly it was Yoda he would break into, which was so awesome. It was also really cool to hear about how he was a fan of the movies before doing the voices for them and that when he went to his first Star Wars Celebration convention that he was a fanboy himself while getting to meet all the original cast. Peter Mayhew was a really funny guy even though he didn’t say much, which I think is what made him so funny because he was that one liner kind of guy and picked his moments.
What was fun and cute was how there were some kids there that had come up to ask Ashley Eckstein about Ahsoka. One question was if Ahsoka loved anyone, this was a little girl that asked this, and Ashley said that she loved her friends and loved Anakin as a brother. Another was asked how dirty did she get when she fought those big lizards. This was so funny because the kid asking was just a little guy who was at the age that he believed that Ashley was Ahsoka and had really fought those lizards and he just wondered how dirty it was.
Sadly though these where the only panels I went to that where comic related. There where more that happened but I couldn't get to them all because of time and space. It's really hard to decide on which panel I wanted to go to because some of the ones like the inside the artist studio or the hour with Steve Dillon and Bob Burden and the many others also happened at the same time as ones like the Walking Dead, Back to the Future, Star Wars, and even the editing, and other film related panels I went to. So yeah, though there where a ton of panels going on with comics these where the onlys ones I got to hit up, which leaves next year for more to go to.
But this is the end of part 1.
