Comic-Con 2011 Report: Part 2

[corrielle]

Saturday – Fringe, Alcatraz, and the Cowboys and Aliens Saloon

On Saturday, we probably got in line for Ballroom 20 much earlier than we needed to, considering that the lineup went: Futurama/Simpsons, Family Guy/American Dad, Vampire Diaries, Fringe. We had a sneaking suspicion that the room was going to empty out a lot between the animation panels and Vampire Diaries, and then again after all of the Vampire Diaries fangirls left. (Nothing against VD fangirls… it's just got a very different demographic than the shows before and after it.) Anyway… Fringe was scheduled to start at 4:30, and we were in line by just after ten. We nearly got in to see the panel on Terra Nova, and I was kind of sad we didn't. It looks like it's going to be a fun sci-fi show. On FOX. Hmm. On second thought, maybe I'll wait until they've got a season under their belt before I get attached. We'll see.

We got in for the next panel after that, which was Futurama, and I wished for a second time this con that I could have traded brains with someone else. (caedhe this time… she loves Futurama, and while I have a passing knowledge of the show, she would have been able to enjoy it so much more.) I must say, though, that it was pretty fun seeing Matt Groening and one of the other animators have a good-natured "Draw Bender" contest with easels set up where the entire room could watch.

I… really wish I had written down more about the Family Guy and American Dad panels. Because they actually said some kind of interesting things about how the question of who understands Stewie shifts depending on the needs of the story, but Peter and Lois not understanding him is a constant, and how Klaus the Goldfish ended up having a German accent and not a French one. We also got to see an upcoming episode of American Dad. There was an evil Jacuzzi. That's all I'm saying.

Our prediction that the room was going to empty out before Vampire Diaries ended up being spot on, and Rae and I, who had been steadily moving closer to the front in between each panel, scored some very good seats.

I am… on the fence about whether or not I want to watch Vampire Diaries. On the one hand… it's vampires. I tend to like vampires, unless they're the Twilight variety. Also, listening to the cast and creator talk about the series was pretty fun… and it seems like there's a lot of interesting plot going on that doesn't revolve around which vampire the heroine is going to be romantically involved with, which is always nice. Oh, and I find the guy who plays Damon to be so strikingly good looking it's almost criminal. On the other hand… I've seen the last ten or fifteen minutes of the show several times while waiting for Supernatural to start and it felt… too juvenile for me to care. (Says the girl who's obsessed with a movie series based on a Disney ride. I know. I have my biases.) Who knows… maybe I'll borrow Season One from a person I know who owns it and give it a try. I hear there are lots of pretty historical flashbacks.

And then, finally, it was time for the Fringe panel. Everything was pretty standard at first. The actors and production folks were introduced, and I squeed a whole lot when they announced Seth Gabel, who plays Lincoln. (He wasn't on the list of expected guests in the program, so that was an awesome surprise…) That meant that by the time they were done… almost the WHOLE CAST was there. Walter, Olivia, Astrid, Broyles, Nina Sharp, Lincoln (no Charlie, though… *sniff*)… Even in the midst of having near-fannish heart failure from all of the awesome I was a little bummed that Joshua Jackson hadn't put in a surprise appearance as well.

After everyone was seated and John Noble had made me get all wibbly with his "Fringe fans are the best" speech, the moderator said, "You've all noticed that someone is missing here…" to which the audience yelled "PETER!" and one smartass yelled "PACEY!" which got the panel to laugh. They then said, in a very *winkwinknudgenudge* kind of way, "Well, some people have heard that the role of Peter has just come open, and we have some audition tapes to show you…"

What followed next was… a whole bunch of nerdy, famous, funny people reading Peter's lines and screwing up in amusing ways. I recognized Zach Quinto (munching on a sandwich the whole time) and Greg Grunberg ("I'm best friends with J.J… so this is just a formality, right?" LOL. "So… how about if we make Peter a mind reader?" Double LOL.) but there were all kinds of other funny bits from people I probably SHOULD know but don't. The guy who kept reading Dawson's Creek lines with Fringe words thrown in was hysterical.

Finally, one person said something like, "If I can't be Peter, I can be an Observer…." And a person off camera said, in a bored, slightly annoyed voice, "We've already cast that part." Cut to someone standing against a grey screen in the quintessential Observer suit and hat, with the brim down, so you can't see his face. He looks up at the camera, and it's Joshua Jackson. The crowd laughed and cheered at the same time. (I think I was managing to do both at once…) And the room got even louder when he actually came out onto the stage still wearing the grey suit and fedora.

He sat down next to John Noble, and the questions got underway. There was some joking about Joshua not being sure he had a job this year, what with Peter not existing and all. Then, the very first fan question was along the lines of the one that I think Rae would have asked if she had been able to get in line. It went something like, "Since Peter didn't exist… how did he father his his and Faux-livia's child?" To which Anna Torv leaned forward, smiled cryptically, and said, "The question is… is there a child?" which made the entire audience go "Ooooooh…." And the producers grin like Cheshire cats and keep completely quiet.

At one point, someone asked a "What's going to happen with…" question, and one of the producers gave one of the most respectful, eloquent answers I've ever heard to that type of question while still dodging it. He basically said, "Look, I wish we could tell you everything right now… we love you guys… but we think it would be doing you a disservice and spoil the experience of the show for you. So, we're probably going to do better answering questions about things that have already happened or giving insight then about what's going to happen." I thought that was classy… it respected the fact that fans LOVE the show and come to con and to the panel to find things out ahead of time, to get little tidbits that you can't get anywhere else, and it suggested options for what they could talk about, which I thought was really smart of them.

After a couple of questions, the conversation turned to Anna Torv's Leonard Nimoy impression when Olivia got possessed by William Bell, and the moderator said, "At another con, I embarrassed Anna by having her do her Bell-liva voice. I promised her I wouldn't do that here. So I'm going to ask if someone else in the cast would like to do it." And after a lot of the audience shouting various cast members' names, Lance Reddick (Broyles) ended up with the slip of paper that had the line he was supposed to read. And… his impression was scarily good. Yeah. Broyles, doing Olivia, doing William Bell. How much do I love Comic-con? A lot.

Other highlights included:

John Noble talking about having a soft spot for Walternate and not really finding him to be all that "evil," and Joshua Jackson looking all offended and saying, "He shout my wife in the head!"
John Noble: "That hasn't happened yet! That was in 2026!" Josh Jackson: "He WILL shoot my wife in the head!!" *snerk* Amazing Peter and Walter actor moments are amazing…

Seth Gabel talking about how Our-Side Lincoln was a lot like him, and how warmly the cast had welcomed him as a regular. *OMGFLAIL Lincoln is a regular on the show now. FLAILSQUEE* This is probably old news to a lot of people, but it's the first I heard of it.

Joshua Jackson gloating about how not having a double in the other universe gave him a lot more free time than the rest of the cast.

Blair Brown talking about her ideal version of alternate-Nina (Alternina?) wreaking havoc somewhere in the Other Universe.

After the producers were like, "DON'T! SAY! ANYTHING!" during a conversation about Astrid's role in the new season, Jasika Nicole singing "Astrid has a gun…"

A really interesting discussion of how the flashback episodes help to give the events of the show an emotional context and resonance they wouldn't have had otherwise, and about how the flashback eps sometimes completely re-contextualize certain characters and events. (I think the show has done a fabulous job with this, by the way…) They also said that the sliding back and forth in time the way they do is definitely something they plan to continue to do as it suits the needs of the story.

John Noble joking about how it's ironic that he's the one who's been the closest to naked, considering all of the amazingly beautiful people on the cast…

Joshua Jackson having a total "Peter apologizing for Walter" moment during a discussion of the first version of the pilot they sent to FOX… which apparently would have entered John Noble into the "Captain Tightpants" club. Joshua reading the "Some audience members might be under 18" line from the back of the namecards? Priceless.

A discussion of diversity on the show… it came up that Alt!Astrid has Aspergers. (News to me… I always thought it was some event in her past that had really traumatized her and made her the awesome, numbers/probability Fringe Division member we see in the alternate universe, but having the official explanation is nice.) Anyway… they talked about how Astrid is unique among the alternates because most of her differences aren't because of circumstances or choices, but because of a genetic difference. And Seth Gabel was SO AMAZINGLY AWESOME and well-spoken with his addition to this… about how Astrid's "disability" ends up being an asset to her team. In the same vein, Joshua Jackson spoke really eloquently about Walter, and about how from the outside, he looks like a crazy, washed up old man whose value isn't readily apparent.

Some speculation about why Walter sent the machine back in time, and why he didn't, as the moderator put it, "Just include a handwritten note! 'Dear Peter….'" Heh.

At the end of the panel, they brought the lights up, and the cast members asked trivia questions. The prize? A "Save Peter" t-shirt. (I've looked online for pictures of what those looked like and haven't found any yet…) Showing just how much he loves his fans, Joshua Jackson actually physically took his hat off to the fan who knew the answer to Jasika's insanely hard question about Astrid's sandwich. It was adorable… and OMG Anna Torv's English accent is beautiful… and her "Americanizing" her pronunciation was hilarious.

All in all… I think this might have been my favorite thing I did all con.

I don't usually do this… mostly because I ask myself, "Why go through the trouble of writing con reports if I'm just going to link to the Youtube videos at the end anyway?" but this was too much fun for me not to share. The actors are genuine, sweet, and have fantastic chemistry, the fan questions are intelligent and well thought out, and it's just a fun panel to watch. Here's Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and The Peter Auditions.

When the panel was over, Rae decided that she'd had enough of sitting in Ballroom 20 for a while, and she went to wander around the con on her own for a while. Me? I sat right where I was and stayed for the panel on yet another J.J. Abrams show that's starting in January called "Alcatraz." The premise? History says that Alcatraz closed and all of the prisoners were transferred off of the island to other prisons. But really, they disappeared. One night, every single person on the island—guards, prisoners, everyone—gone. Cut to the present, and one of those prisoners reappears, not having aged a day, with a ticket off the island in his pocket. They showed the entire first episode, and I'll admit I'm intrigued. It cut between events happening now and things that happened in the past that have bearing on what happens now in and interesting way, the escaped prisoner was just sympathetic enough to be engaging, but the show doesn't let us forget that he's not a good guy… And Sam Neil is just cryptic enough to make me wonder what his deal is. He's the Alcatraz guard who was off the island that night (turned secret government agent) who has been waiting for this to happen for years. The other main characters are a detective whose family has a history with the prison, and a writer who's a specialist on the history of the island. Anyway, I'm definitely curious about where they're going with this.

When that panel was over, I found Rae, and we went back to Old Town for our now-yearly dinner at Berta's the fantastic little South American place we discovered last year. This year, I had some sort of mean in this rich sauce with a hint of mint in it… *kisses fingertips* perfection. And our waitress remembered us from last year! That was awesome, and we chatted about Wheel of Time and various other fantasy novels and geeky things.

After dinner, we decided to go back to the general area of the convention because estelofimladris and scifichicx were going to have drinks at the Cowboys and Aliens saloon and asked us if we wanted to join them. I wasn't sure I wanted to take the trolley all the way back to the Gaslamp district, but how often does one get to have a drink in an awesome bar decked out like it's the Old West? Not very.

One of the neat things about Comic Con is that a lot of the businesses in the area get into the spirit of things, and various studios and companies temporarily take over restaurants and bars. So, I got to sit around with some people I love, surrounded by clapboard and flickering lanterns, and have a drink (and itching to play poker, which I am terrible at) all we needed was an out-of-tune saloon piano, and it would have been perfect. ;-)



Sunday – Glee, Supernatural, and Doctor Who

All four days of Comic Con, I'd been going back and forth as to whether I wanted to try to get into Hall H on Sunday morning. I am a fan of all three shows that were going to be there, though I'm not current on any of them, and getting into Hall H when anything at all popular is going to be in there is always dicey unless you're willing to camp out.

However, when my alarm went off at 6:45 on Sunday morning, I asked myself, "How often are you going to get to see a current Doctor and his companion at con?" Not very often. And even if I didn't get in for Glee, I knew that my chances of getting in for Supernatural and Doctor Who who were very good.

By the time I got in line just before eight, it already snaked through all of the tents and across the street. I was lucky enough to get in it before it started snaking around the grass in front of the hotel. That meant that when the line started moving, I was under shade pretty quickly. I got VERY close to getting into the Glee panel at the very beginning. I was probably within a hundred people of it. As the panel started, they were letting people in twenty at a time and letting them stand in the back as they counted very carefully and made sure that they didn't do anything that would make the Fire Marshall angry with them. So, while I didn't get to see any of the video clips the Glee folks brought, I did get to see most of the panel where the actors and writers were talking,, and I'm really glad I did.

First of all, Darren Criss is adorable in person. I think that some of the things that made me grin most were when he had to translate from the "fannish" for the writers and other actors. For instance, one person asked if people preferred… "Bartie" or "Britana," I think it was, and when everyone else looked really confused, he leaned into the mic and said, "For those of you who aren't up on the pairing names, that's 'Brit/Artie' or 'Brit/Santana,' guys…" It was super sweet.

And speaking of Brit/Santana, the writers had a lot to say about their relationship. Apparently, they threw in the line about the two of them being together in the first season as a throw away, funny line and didn't mean to make anything more of it, but then, two things happened. First of all, there was enormous fan reaction to it, and second, they realized that they had two incredibly talented actresses on their hands who deserved to have the storyline. From what they said, it appears they cast Brit because she could dance, and Santana because she was a very pretty face in the chorus. As they discovered how talented those two girls are in other ways, they got more and more time. It was… neat to hear that. I like the idea that sometimes writers don't really know which little things they do are going to get big and take their characters in new directions (no pun intended) that they had never thought of going in.

The other thing the writers/creators talked a lot about is the fact that several of the "main" kids were rumored to be leaving the show after the third season. What the creators said in the panel is that while the characters will be graduating, that doesn't necessarily mean that they are going to be leaving the show. Just because they aren't at McKinley high any more doesn’t mean that they can't still be part of the story. They were pretty clear that they wanted the show to track with real time, and they didn't want their characters to be eternally in high school. I kind of respect that. It opens the door for new characters to take center stage while still having old ones back for recurring roles. If they play their cards right, Glee could run for years like this. And they don't even have to resort to the excuse of "Timelords regenerate" to explain the actor turnover. ;-)

As the Glee panel was winding down, I decided that it would be a good idea to run to the restroom before the panel officially ended so that I could avoid the rush and so that I could spend my time between panels finding a decent seat, not waiting in line. Turns out that's one of the smartest things I did all weekend, because I didn't have to wait in line at ALL, and when I came out, I was standing RIGHT by the section closest to the front, and there were a whole bunch of seats that had just emptied out. I snagged one of them (easy to do since I was just one person), settled in, and contemplated my incredible good luck.

I really wish I had written more notes about the Supernatural panel, because I have the general impression that it was very worth attending. However, my notes mostly read, "LOL curmudgeon Bobby…" so they're not much use to me as I write this after the fact. (I was mostly busy playing "OMG my zoom kind of works well enough to take pictures of people the screen aren't focusing on! WHEE!") Here's what I do remember…

The first thing they did was show a clip from an upcoming episode that Jensen directed, which featured none other than Jewel Staite as an old friend of Sam's who is having some problems that are right up the Winchesters' alley. Jewel looked lovely, and we got some flashback to when Sam and her character were younger, too… I'm anxious to see the rest of the episode, now!

I don't think they've ever had this many cast members all at con. It was the Winchesters, Castiel, Bobby, and Crowley. I think that Jim Beaver and Mark Sheppard snarking at each other kind of made my Sunday afternoon.

One of the moments I really remember was Jensen talking about playing Dean, and about having a long-standing rapport with the other actors in the cast made it easier for him to take risks and do some really good acting. Then, he said something to the effect of, "It was hard playing opposite soulless Sam, though… because… that's not Sam. That's not who I'm used to playing off of." It was one of those moments where I got a sense of just how much an actor connects with a character I love… because there was a lot of Dean in his voice and his body language when he said it.

Also, I think I grinned a little when Misha Collins joked that he'd been waiting his whole life for someone to write him a God role. *snerk*

At one point, a fan asked about some of the weapons the boys have in the trunk of the Impala, and why they never use them. Specifically, he asked about the ninja stars. Jensen's response was something along the lines of, "Yeah! Why DON'T we use the ninja stars? And the rocket launcher?" *stares down the table at the writers* I'm holding my breath for ninja star use in at least episode next season now.

They showed the gag reel, as they usually do at Supernatural panels I've been to, and that was fun. Someday, I'll have to convince lady_entropy17 to bring her DVD's of the most recent season over so I can watch the episodes I missed.

The last panel of the day, for me, was Doctor Who. I may not be caught up, but I am so glad that I went. Mat Smith was, again, absolutely adorable, and Karen Gillan was wonderful and sweet and darling. I think that British actors from things like Doctor Who and Torchwood are always surprised at how big they are here in the US the first time they come to something like Comic Con. They're used to being a national fixture in England, but they always seem pleasantly surprised that they can fill a huge room to overflowing with a bunch of Americans who are excited to see them.

Someone asked the "favorite Doctor" question again, and I have to admit that my admiration for Karen went up a bit when, after the requisite "oh, they're all lovely…" business, said something to the tune of, "But if I had to choose… Chris Eccleston." Good choice, I thought. I love me some Nine.

Another fan asked them who they'd choose, living or dead, to write an episode (which was a really thoughtful question, I thought…), and several people brought up the fact that it would have been fun to have Roald Dahl write for the Doctor, if he was still living. I have to agree. It would have been mad, but it would have been awesome Another "favorite" question was one, asked by someone in a Dalek costume with the voice-distorter, about which type of Dalek was Mat's favorite. He said the stone Dalek was awfully neat, and I have to agree.

In answering another question about how much influence he had over his wardrobe, Mat told about how he'd had the coat he wears in his closet at home, and he brought it in because he liked it. And now he doesn't have his coat he likes for everyday use any more. Because it's Eleven's.

I've said this before, but seeing actors geek out over other fannish things is about my favorite thing ever. So… when someone asked Karen Gillan about what she liked about con… her answer amused me. Basically, she apparently had gotten to meet Brent Spiner and take a picture with him, which made her really, really happy because she adored TNG and Data. And when she was done telling the story, Mat added something like, "Yes, and weren't you telling all of this for quite a while to Will Wheaton?" And Karen laughed. It. Was. So. Cute. I can hardly speak.

One of the really interesting things they talked about was how the actors all know different secrets that the others don't, and apparently Alex Kingston (River) knew her character's real identity for a long time before anyone else did. That must be killer trying to remember not to tell the people you're working with ON THE SHOW about something that you know and they don't. Also in the category of "fun extra tidbits" is the fact that there is a manual on flying the Tardis that they handed Mat when he got the part. Karen had to read it too, since Amy sometimes helps fly the thing. How cool is that?

Finally, I remember something asking them about why they keep killing Rory, which prompted someone on the panel to make the obligatory South Park reference and got a lot of laughs. Also, I don't remember who said this, but the words "Because he dies so prettily…" were spoken by SOMEONE up on that stage. Again, I have to agree that he does do a bang up job with death scenes… but that doesn't mean that they need to keep giving them to him! :-P

Doctor Who has always been really good about bring NEAT preview stuff to Comic Con. This year was no exception. They showed a trailer for the upcoming back half of the season. In fact, they showed it twice. I could try to describe what all went on in it from my fuzzy memory, or I could just show it to you.

When the panel was over, I wandered over to the Exhibit Hall and found Rae at the Unshelved booth, where Rae finally got a "Will Work For Books" shirt, I got a book (and it's signed!), and I accidentally met Patrick Rothfuss, which was super epic. He was really funny and nice and sweet. I got a picture or two with him… a couple of them silly. And his idea. (Because silly pictures are very rarely my idea.)

We ran around the Exhibit Hall for a while longer after that and did some last minute purchasing, and when we were done, we found lynxgriffin and yamikonumber7 and the rest of that crowd, and on yamikonumber7's recommendation, we went to an Irish pub in the Gaslamp District. It. Was. Fantastic. I had a Harp shandy and a corned beef boxty. Now, I have never had a boxty before. What ended up arriving on my place was what we affectionately dubbed an "Irish burrito"—a flat potato pancake wrapped around delicious, falling-apart corned beef, cabbage, and onions. It was delicious. I think I've found a new "eat there once during con" destination.

We sat around the pub and talked to various people who dropped in to say hi, which meant that we were there for a long time. The good thing was that we missed the "Exhibit Hall closing" rush to get on the trolley. The bad thing is that we and everyone else from Con were all trying to go north up the I5 at the same time. It was a long drive home. But, eventually we got everyone dropped off safe and sound and came home to our new apartment and our very excited dog.



General Thoughts on This Year's Comic-Con

All in all, this was a good year. I'm getting to the point where it feels like I've got a routine down for con. I go to a lot of the same panels/events from year to year, but there are new panels to freak out over (like my newly discovered Fringe!love) and unexpected, interesting stuff like sneak previews of new shows to keep the years from blurring together.

The people who run the con made some smart choices this year. First of all, they put the Twilight: Breaking Dawn panel first thing Thursday morning. This precluded the problem they've had in years past of Twilight fans making it impossible for people to get into panels before Twilight. Extending the Ballroom 20 line was a good idea, too. If people are going to want to wait… have a place for them to do it in an orderly way. And we already know what I think about putting some of the extremely popular TV show panels in Hall H. However, I wonder if the lack of movie studio participation was what let them put TV shows in the con's largest space.

This really did seem to be an off year for movies for me. Usually Hall H is crammed with panels about films that I'm really excited about. This year… I wouldn't have stepped foot in Hall H if they hadn't made the smart move of putting Doctor Who and SPN in there. (By the way, SPN has certainly moved up in the world… I remember when they still put it in one of the smaller ballrooms, and fangirls were practically eating each other to get in. Then last year, I think it was in Ballroom 20… next year, maybe they'll have simulcast screens? That would just be a good idea in general, come to think of it…)

I was hoping for a fun HP panel, what with the very recent release of the movie, but there was nothing but a fan panel (that Jason Issacs showed up at OMG why didn't I go…), and I didn't see anything about any other WB movies in the schedule, either. Another disappointment was that there wasn't much of a Disney presence. I remember the year Dead Man's Chest came out… there was a HUGE display on the exhibit hall floor of the Pearl, and the panel ROCKED. This year, I was thinking that a fun panel would be a consolation prize for the soul-crunching desolation that PotC:OST put me through, but there was nothing.

A lot of really cool things seemed to be happening in the vicinity of con without being affiliated with it, exactly. There was Nerd HQ, where a bunch of my friends spent a lot of time, there was the South Park Village, and a ton of bars and restaurants that were "themed" for the con. I have to say… drinking a beer in the Cowboys and Aliens saloon really helped make my weekend. Hopefully, this is a trend that will continue. Because if it does, I may spend as much time near the con as at it next year.


And that's it for my Comic-Con 2011 report, folks!  See you this time next year.