Another Year, Another Comic Book Convention.
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Today marks the start of “New York Comic Con.” I’ll be in attendance this evening and all weekend, as I have been for the last five years, not as a fan but as a “professional,” a very kind acknowledgement by the convention’s founder, Lance Fensterman, that I’ve been published for 20 years now. I am not rich, and certainly not well known outside of my medium.
The world of comic books is a rich and bizarre one. Today it is part transnational commerce, part entertainment, and partly art, although there was a (recent) time when it was judged uniformly as lacking any creativity or merit of any kind. Some, like the late Dr. Fredric Wertham even tried to blame juvenile delinquency and violence in children on comic books. As of 2010, comics characters of all types from Superman to Garfield have become the most successful brand extensions since the figures portrayed in the bible.
This weekend is a gathering of fanatics and readers, collectors and artists at the Javitz center in New York City. It will be crowded, wall to wall with people who love the medium I create in, as well as trekkies/trekkers, Star Wars fans, devotees of Tolkien, and various other outsiders drawn to the fellowship that their common love of particular genres of fiction has created. This is (after all is said, laughed about, and done,) a society. In past years, Id always felt estranged from the crowds, put off by their eagerness, and embarrassed by their enthusiasm, and when I was a kid, there were no girls at these things whatsoever (although it’s been noted that the very first Star Trek conventions were organized by exclusively female fans of Leonard Nimoy and George Takei in the early 1970s.) Only recently did I realize that my discomfort had more to do with the fact that I’d internalized the scoldings of my professors, the ridicule of my peers and replaced my own love, my own “fandom” with a kind of self-conscious reserve. I was never going to dress up as Captain Marvel, or Spider-Man, but why have I always looked down on the kids who did? Is it any sillier than some fat drunk bastard showing up to a Giants game in a Manning jersey? People at Comic book conventions don’t love the characters in their favorite titles any less than NASCAR fans love their favorite drivers: comic book fans tend to show it more, and by and large they’re not interested in appearing detached and “cool” about it.
Imagine if people still got this excited at gallery openings, at the premieres of sculpture, or at poetry readings? –When Mark Hamill (who in addition to portraying Luke Skywalker, also defined the voice of The Joker for an entire generation and now entertains millions as various animated characters on Metalocalypse and Regular Show) walks into a room at a convention, the response is deafening. That’s real love: undiluted, unmitigated and eternal. Why shouldn’t they show it?
I’m going to walk around the convention center this evening and try very hard to stamp out my ingrained shames and groundless misgivings about comic books, and take some pride in all those other fans whose only crime is loving something that I love too.
“Live long and prosper.”
-SJ
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I’m off to it guys.
Thanks for not making me feel like a nerd, which I guess is what this post was really about in any case.
I’ll post pictures after it’s all over.
-later y’all.
-SJ
no te aguites ‘mano we still think you’re a nerd but we love you in spite of it.
I’m a nerd and proud of it. Glad you’ve got my back. I may need tape for my glasses.
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Having known authors artists, and editors from all walks of fandom, there is definitely a hierarchy. It goes like this (correct me if you disagree SJ)
1. the famous (the authors, the artists, the people who were invited to speak on a panel)
2. The minions and dealers- those who are running the show, or selling in the dealer’s room
3. The hot chicks dressed like whatever skimpy anime heroine of the month is in vogue (I have been there)
4. The general fans (those who like to read sci-fi for instance)
5. The dorky young fans (you know the ones playing LARPS on the lawn outside)
6. The dorky old fans (filking in the Consuite)
7. The gamers
8. furries
“Is it any sillier than some fat drunk bastard showing up to a Giants game in a Manning jersey?”
Oh hell no. At least comic fans aren’t giving themselves skin cancer in the bleachers. And I’m willing to bet even the dorkiest gamer’s IQ is a standard deviation higher than the sports fan’s.
ROFLMAO!!
Okay, address all those comments to Mother Hen, C/O MMA.
@Mother Hen,
I’d say your list stands at many conventions, I’d revise it slightly to this in New York:
1. the Actors, like Hamill, Adam West, Julie Newmar are Gods in these places, and then the B listers of this universe like Eddie Muenster, then come the comic book pencilers (inkers are largely ignored), comic book writers have to be real superstars to get treated well, they never quite get their due even today, (*the panelists who are not creators i.e. editors, critics, business people sometimes get booed, you could even take them off this ranking almost)
2. “The minions and dealers- those who are running the show,” are not popular, and sometimes hated by the fans, but I leave them at number three because the are the equivalent of hollyood producers and can get you ejected at the wave of a hand.
3. Animators (They are worshipped, and maybe should be number 1 in terms of draw and “riot inspiration.” I caused a stampede last year because I just waved to Bruce Timm, who ran up a down escalator to escape a throng of screaming ten year olds.)
4. The gamers, video game companies and voice actors are hugely popular and represent a very different crowd who happen to intersect with comics fans.
5. film directors. People jump out of moving cabs just to take a picture with James Cameron or John Carpenter.
6. “The general fans (those who like to read sci-fi for instance)” have morning panels dedicated largely to them, they tend to poke in and out of the convention and hang out in surrounding bars, which make a killing during these events.
7. “The dorky young fans (you know the ones playing LARPS on the lawn outside)” are playing inside too. They’re everywhere and seem to have the most fun and are the least uptight/argumentative. I’ve had young Comic book fans try and correct me about my own work. “Serenity Now.”
8. “The dorky old fans (filking in the Consuite)” also hitting the surrounding bars these days. These guys are complaining about everything and are generally to be avoided unless you really want your good spirits trounced. AND yes, there is such a thing as “knowing too much” about something.
9. “The hot chicks dressed like whatever skimpy anime heroine of the month is in vogue” are unfortunately generally plants by some marketing team and are recognized as such by attendees. The girl in the Wonder woman costume above is the only exception I know of at the New York Cons, she actually got harrassed by DC comics last year, allegedly because they’re afraid she looks better than whomever they’ll eventually cast in a movie and don’t want her photos floating about. She goes and takes lots of pictures of other costumed people for her blog.
9. “Furries” -We don’t have too many of them at the New York Comic Con since they have a lot of their own events yearly and are more of an exclusive sexual community, -and hell they might be the only people who meet up at Comic Con to get laid anyway so I sure as hell don’t see how they fit in.
-SJ
What a second there SJ!! Are you saying that the Comic book conventions are NOT a good place to get laid?
-I’m saying that going to a comic book convention to get laid is like going to an auto show to drive:
You’ll see some nice tail sections on display, but you ain’t gonna get a chance to take out any of it.
I should have noted that all the conventions I have been to have been in Oklahoma, Tennessee, Kentucky, or Kansas. We don’t get the Mark Hamill’s or the Todd McFarlane’s. Any girls dressed like princess Leia are the real deal, as the big companies don’t even bother to try to market to us.
By “gamers” I mean the lower echelon deodorant forsaking role-players. If we get one room devoted to running anime, we feel lucky.
I never had any problems getting laid at a Con, my problems focused on how not to.
Animators deserve worship. They are the big talent. We don’t see their kind around here.
Please don’t ever feel too nerdly. I’m a total geek. I feel a kinship with ya. Wish I was there! (This time I’d be going as Jabba though)
@Mother Hen,
so I just got back home from the end of “professionals” day, again, -no sexy double entendres implied.
I gotta head to a convention below the Mason Dixon line sometime from what you describe.
There were a lot of anime-oriented costumes, and today the big noise was about a new guitar-hero like game from UBI Soft where you dance instead play fake guitar: Honestly, when you see people playing it, it looks very cool.
I’ll try and upload pictures via cell phone tomorrow when things get out of control, i.e. Star Wars fans confront Star Trek fans. Should be a bloodless massacre.
“Except for those wandering minstrel singing furries”
yes, yes, I resemble that remark! LYFAO!
***hoping Tee isn’t pissed at me for being forthwith today!***
LYFAO
@Krell, Gwen,
There will be plenty of guys claiming to be druids as well. Generally during lunchtime on Saturday a skirmish will break out between the magicians (guys who admit it’s just a show) and the sorcerers and wizards (guys who live with their parents and insist they have real powers).
I’ve yet to see anyone strutting around with a lute, banging out tunes and skipping about, because that would be, you know weird.
See? there I go again, and I’m not even there yet.
These are fine, fine people.
At least my head or brow won’t get split open as it has at several hardcore shows over the years. At worst, I’ll be offended by some punk kid who will try to tell me about the Star Wars movies when he wasn’t even born in the 1970s.
-SJ
Have fun SJ and nice post.There are two excellent comics that I recently read, one called “Palestine” by Joe Sacco and the other traced Mexican-American history in the Southwest.
Anyone there wearing a hijab or kaffiyeh is probably a Joe Sacco fan.
Small world! I know Joe! We published some of his first work back in the 1990s in ‘World War 3 Illustrated’ before he took off big time.
I was introduced properly to “Cons” by MotherHen as I had before an attitude of smugness and superiority snottyness.
Still have all of those symptoms, ha ha, but discovered the conventions can be pretty cool.
Except for those wandering minstrel singing furries. No hope for them!
I’ve always wanted to go to one….! Great post SJ.
You’d love it Gwen. They are much more broader events in scope (Dungeons & Dragons enthusiasts, video game coders, extreme sports people) than they used to be especially since the movie studios started doing premieres at them, and you won’t find a more peaceful mob of people/fanatics anywhere. I’m heading over at about 4:30p Eastern time.
Have a ball, dude! Really, have fun Sandy. Wish I was there!
I’ll post pictures after it’s all done.
Could you introduce me to Wonder Woman?…Just a (perverted) thought…;-)
She’s a peach isn’t she? Goes every year. She’s about 6’3″ though.
Nothing wrong with being beautiful and 6’3″ as a midget I have always a thing for tall women.
as a fellow midget, what else is there for us? They’re ALL tall from our perspective: literally.