I Haven't Come Down Sick Yet

There was a Fanboy Expo convention in Knoxville this weekend, and since the rain graciously held off during the week, I didn’t have to work on Saturday. It felt like actors were a much bigger part of it than in other conventions I’ve attended, in comparison to the amount of comic book people. There’s really no comparison between the Artist Alley here and the one at Planet Comic-Con, for example. This was good in a sense for me, since it kept me from feeling entirely overwhelmed by having too many things to choose between, which was a real problem for me in K.C., where there were at least 20 different artists I’d like to have given money to. I still found plenty to buy, and reached that stage where I’m low enough on cash I’m arguing constantly with myself about what I can afford to buy. I mean, I would have gotten the keychain with King Kai’s logo on it, but not for 7 bucks. I have a perfectly good keychain already, you know.

Remarkably, my impulse decision to donate blood while I was there did not come back to bite me in the rear. I fully expected it to, since it was one of the first things I did, and it occurred to me partway through the bleeding (and did she have to set the tube on top of my arm, where I could feel the warmth of the blood that was draining away from me?)  it might not be a wise idea to spend the next 6 hours walking constantly through a loud place full of people a pint low. Oh well, I only got dizzy once, and that was when I stood up too fast after I spent a few minutes crouching against a pillar because my knees were tired.

I did buy some back issues, something I’ve fallen out of the habit of doing at conventions lately, preferring to save my cash for art, but there was at least one vendor with a large set of well-organized longboxes, and so I found a couple of issues of PAD’s Supergirl run I was looking for, and quite a bit of Sensational She-Hulk. I’m kind of kicking myself for not remembering to look for Birds of Prey (or buying more of the She-Hulk issues), since all the comics were a buck a piece.

There was a fellow at one of the tables, one of the ones selling homemade jewelry and such, when I looked at him, the description in my brain was “fat, grumpy cowboy Ian McKellen”. I don’t think it was a cosplay, just how he looked. There were quite a few cosplayers. At least 5 Deadpools, including one couple (I guess they were a couple, I saw them holding hands, could have been a joke, Deadpool self-love or something), where the young lady wore the standard costume, and the fellow wore the black and grey X-Force outfit. There was a really good Scarlet Spider I knew I had to get a picture of as soon as I saw it, and a couple of different groups of Ghostbusters (including a family of 4 with 2 little girls). Saw a Kamala Khan Ms. Marvel, which was nice. Lots of Adventure Time characters, saw both Pearl and Steven from Steven Universe (supposedly there were a couple of Amethysts, but I never saw them), a fair few Kim Possibles (Christy Romano, her voice actress, was at the convention) Claire Redfield from Resident Evil Code Veronica X (complete with a red jacket with the correct art on the back, she told me she had it airbrushed on there), a Scorpion from Mortal Kombat, who had the fight music set to play on command. That was a nice touch, though I would probably have that music play all the time in the background for me, or at least whenever I was feeling chippy. We might need to put a moratorium on letting non-Star Wars characters have lightsabers. I get Princess Zelda having one, saves her having to wait for Link to get off his Hero of Time butt and save the day, but there was an Indiana Jones with one, which, let’s try to be serious now, is completely out of place in that universe. I'm joking, but I think there was a Ring-Wraith with one, too. So everybody gets lightsabers now.

I don’t normally approach actors’ tables. I have no idea what to say, and approaching people I don’t know is possibly a bigger issue for me than needles. I definitely hemmed and hawed over whether to wait in line to meet James Marsters longer than I did about whether to give blood, but my friend met him at a Las Vegas convention in April and said he was really cool, and I own one of his band’s albums, so what the hey. He was pretty cool. It’s not like we had a long conversation, but he talked a little about why he enjoyed making and performing his own music, and when I mentioned I had a friend who DJed, and how the idea of getting up there would terrify me, he agreed it is terrifying, but I think that’s part of why he enjoys it? It’s an attitude I can understand in general, if not in that specific context. I sometimes force myself to do things which scare me, just to try and confront it. I don’t like needles, so give blood. I don’t like heights, go to the top of that fire tower.

Oh, and I mentioned I needed to get something to eat, because this was about 3 hours after giving blood and I still hadn’t done that, and his manager gave me a chocolate bar someone had given him. I had actually meant to phrase it in terms of asking where he’d gone to lunch (he had stepped away briefly to get lunch when I was about 6 people away, which gave me time to sit down), and I figured asking about convenient dining options might make good conversation? Though why I was doing that as I was getting ready to leave is beyond me, and it just went haywire. That said, that was really nice. Except now I feel bad I didn’t make it to the band’s show that night, but I just felt gassed by the time I got home. And, you know, clubs are not really my scene, though I imagine this one might have been more relaxed than at one of Alex’ shows.The volume likely would have been lower, and I doubt there would have been as many drunk people bumping into me. 

Missed opportunities aside, I did purchase some art. Alex Ogle has this nice ink sketch style that uses negative space, which is a technique I find interesting (Joe Quesada's use of it was one of the things that helped The Ray stand out in my mind), but haven’t ever managed successfully in my limited dabbling. So I bought a couple of prints (the Ghost Rider one was what caught my eye), and asked for a Deadshot, in the Marshall Rogers-designed costume. I think it turned out very well. Mandy Anders did a chibi version of Vance Astrovik in his Marvel Boy costume, levitating himself and Niels, Speedball’s cat. I only requested that perhaps Vance could be levitating something, she came up with Niels on her own, which was an outstanding choice. So that wraps up the Nicieza/Bagley New Warriors sketch hunt, a scant six years after I began. Criminey Pete. I picked up the first volume of Jamal Igle’s book Molly Danger, since I’ve heard nothing but good things online about it. The first read through confirmed that, which is always nice. That was about it. There were some other artists with stuff I liked, but I couldn’t afford it. Neal Adams alone had several prints I was interested in, I could have blown a third of my cash on him easy, but I like to spread it around a little more. Maybe next time.