Once Upon a Geek

Hey gang - Over 400 of my DragonCon 2008 pictures are now online!  You can view them on my Flickr account, ”Once Upon a Geek”, in the set labeled “DragonCon 2008″.  Or simply visit the site by clicking here.  You can download these to your computer in a variety of sizes; most go as big as 1280×960.  

Additionally, you can view my pictures at THE UNIQUE GEEK photo gallery.  My pictures at THE UNIQUE GEEK max out at 640×480. In addition to my pictures, there are also about 200 other DragonCon photos from my fellow Unique Geek members. 

Enjoy and feel free to post your favorite or least favorite photos!

SATURDAY

As I write this blog entry, I’m realizing just how seriously crammed-full Saturday was.  What a blast of a day!

We survived the night packed like sardines in our room.  There was myself, Serv, Race, Jon, Ravenface, and Shockwave all sharing “Harvey Dent’s Room”.  It was a little cramped.

After showers, Jon, Race, and I headed down for the parade.  I was shocked at the number of people present for the parade.  I heard later there were roughly 3,500 people there just to watch the parade.  Wow! Here is a video I took of the spectators all lined up to watch the parade.  For whatever reason, it came through on YouTube somewhat jumpy (sorry about that).  If you can’t view the embedded video, click here to be taken to the Once Upon a Geek YouTube page.

The parade was particularly good this year too.  They did the right thing and started it off with bagpipes and a Cobra battalion!  Also worth mentioning was the impressive number of superheroes in the parade this year.  Finally, I really liked the “Vote Zod” presidential campaign; that was funny.  Overall the parade was very entertaining and well worth the time.

After the parade, I dashed over the Torchwood panel.  I was shocked to find only a small crowd and that I could walk right in and get a great seat.  By the time the panel started, it was a packed house of approximately 1,600 people.  The panel featured Gareth David Lloyd (Ianto), James Marsters (Captain John on ‘Torchwood’ and Spike on ‘Buffy’), and Anthony Lewis (guest starred as Tommy in one episode of ‘Torchwood’).   Not really any spoilers for the next season, but they were a funny group with interesting anecdotes.  It was discussed that next season would only be five episodes long.  The only real glimmer of leaked information was regarding the new cast members of the show.  It was asked if two new people would replace Tosh & Owen.  Gareth David Lloyd responded by saying there would actually be more than two people added to the cast, but it was unknown how many of them would continue on after next season.

James Marsters shared a neat story about how he got injured during filming (cut his leg pretty deeply), but didn’t tell anyone.  Finally once he started bleeding through his costume, he quietly let John Barrowman know about his injury.  Apparently Barrowman called in a doctor to the set who patched Marsters up in secret without anyone else aware.  All the panelists agreed that Barrowman is larger than life.  He is apparently a never-ending source of energy and you can’t help but love the guy.  Not surprisingly, Lloyd and Marsters addressed the issue of kissing Barrowman (as both have done so on the series).  They didn’t think it was a big deal and the point of the scenes was not to be a “gay scene” but a “romance scene”.  Marsters was pretty outspoken about how enjoys creating controversy over his performances.  Anthony Lewis got to share his “romance” story also.  He had a bedroom scene with Tosh.  Turns out it was filmed the same time as the bedroom scene with Adam (from a later episode).  So basically Lewis and the actor playing Adam took turns in the sack with Tosh; there was some macho high-fiving over this on the set.  The actors also addressed questions about other projects, dream projects, and their musical bands.  At one point, Gareth David Lloyd was even asked to rap for the audience.  I took a brief video of this and will try to upload it soon (the sound quality was terrible on it).

After the Torchwood panel, several of us met up at Hooters for lunch.  It’s become something of a tradition for us to go to Hooters for lunch at least once during DragonCon.  Good food, good company, good… well, y’know.

Then I went over to the Brit Track in the Sheraton (new hotel for DragonCon this year) for a session on Doctor Who.  This time it was our friends over at NeedCoffe.com versus the Whoniverse.  Lots of good banter and discussion on the various Doctor Who franchise series.  I even won a DVD copy of “Timelash” for answering a trivia question correctly.

I’m really not sure what day this was, but I ended up in an elevator at one point with Avery Brooks (Captain Benjamin Sisko on ‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’).  He seemed nervous around the crowds and appeared to have some difficulty walking.  I’m not sure what the deal was, but I heard rumors ranging from old age to drunkenness.  Who knows.  Regardless, I felt a little sorry for him.

I also ended up in a different elevator with Michael Hogan (Colonel Saul Tigh on the new ‘Battlestar Galactica’). He was a really nice guy, talkative, and very up-beat. I’m glad I got a chance to meet him, regardless of how brief it was.

Of course throughout the day I was snapping pictures of various costumes.  I think I’ll wait and do a separate post just on the costumes of DragonCon 2008.

Around 5:00pm, Michael Bailey, myself, Ravenface, and a few others made our way over to the infamous “Marvel vs DC Jeopardy” session.  Comic book trivia has become quite a passion of ours at DragonCon.  I was fortunate enough to land a spot in the top three last year.  This year marked the 10th anniversary of comic-related Jeopardy at DragonCon.  Van Plexico of AvengersAssemble.net and his right-hand man George were once again the hosts.  They were plagued with technical problems, but still managed to put on a good show.  Sadly none of the Unique Geek folks managed to make it to the final three.  However, that may in part be because of the elimination process this year.  Let’s just say that those in the back of the room had a distinct advantage when answering elimination questions.  Unfortunately, we all sat in the front. 

After another round of Chick-Fil-A, it was time to head to NeedCoffee.com & Quick Stop Entertainment’s “Nuts on the Road: Gonzo Sound & Vision” film festival!  This was the big moment most of us had been waiting for!  After no film fest in 2007, we were anxious to partake in the wacky hijinks once again.  This year did not disappoint.  The first 300 people in the door were greeted with exclusive “Stark Industries” poster tubes.  When expanded, the poster tubes looked quite a bit like a rocket launcher.  They were really cool!

This party started at 10:00pm and went until around 4:00am.  The whole gang from NeedCoffee.com was there (several of who also two-time as members of THE UNIQUE GEEK).  Something new for the film festival was an opening band, “Paul and Storm“.  These two guys are hilarious!  I enjoyed them so much I bought there CD on-site that evening.  Here is a YouTube video I found of these guys from a show they did in Pittsburgh.  They did the same opening number.  If you can’t watch it via the embedded player, check out the video by clicking here.  Funny stuff!  Then go to their website, www.paulandstorm.com and give them your money.  They deserve it!

Also on hand was Dana Snyder (voice of Master Shake on ‘Aqua Teen Hunger Force’ and other cartoons), along with Dr. Forrester and TV’s Frank from Mystery Science Theater 3000.  After the opening music number, the film festival got cranking with bizarre and hilarious videos.  During the breaks tons of swag was given out and a great time was had by all.  I personally passed out from exhaustion during the show and eventually left for my room around 3:00am.

Another day, another great adventure.  More tomorrow…

The good news is that I survived DragonCon.  The bad news is that I’m having trouble re-acclimatizing to regular life.  After being completely immersed in geekdom for four straight days, it’s a little hard to suddenly be transported from the wild to “civilized” society.

I had a fantastic time!  This was definitely one of the best years I’ve had at this convention!  Over the next few days I’ll try to cover my madcap adventures at DragonCon 2008.  Of the 500 pictures I took, a little over 400 were worth keeping.  I should have them uploaded to my Flickr account soon.  I also have a couple videos I plan to upload for your viewing enjoyment.  A few of my friends that typically attend DragonCon didn’t come this year.  Hopefully these blogs will help fill them in and possibly encourage them to attend next year.

With the convention over, I gotta say that if I see one more lame Joker/Joker Nurse costume I’m going to freak out.  Apparently dressing like the Joker is the new black.  Sheesh.

FRIDAY

The flight from Tallahassee to Atlanta went great.  I caught up with Serv and we immediately went to Moe’s in the airport.  I know, airport Moe’s?  Can’t possibly be as good as a regular Moe’s, right?  Well, they don’t have Moe’s where Serv lives and he was jonesing for it pretty badly. I’m confident that if he didn’t eat Moe’s within 20 minutes of touching ground in Atlanta he would have suffered some kind of seizure.  An alternative may have been to mainline some Chick-Fil-A (which they also don’t have in the great white north), but Moe’s did the trick.

After lunch, we caught up with another friend from THE UNIQUE GEEK, Jon, then we all rode the MARTA from the airport to Peachtree Center.  Next we checked into our hotel, room 2222; we referred to it as “Harvey Dent’s room”.  Turns out the Executive Lounge we were counting on for meals was closed starting Saturday for renovations.  Major suckage.  That just resulted in more Chick-Fil-A for Serv, so I guess it all worked out.  After rendezvousing with a long-misplaced friend, Race, we headed to registration to pick up our badges.  I was thrilled for my friends as I watched them zip through the line and pick up their badges within mere moments.  I, however, was lucky enough to wait 45 minutes to get mine!  Yay!  For some ridiculous reason, every person whose last name starts with “M” showed up at the same time.  The slowness of the “M” line was aided by the DragonCon staff member running the line with a broken arm.  My friends were kind enough to wait for me, laugh at me, and take pictures.

After a brief visit with Ravenface & his brother Shockwave, I made my way to a comic book related track.  This session was an examination of various “don’ts” for comic writers featuring Peter David, Mike Baron, and others.  There were some great recommendations as well as anecdotes.  Heard a great suggestion to embed Google Image links into your comic scripts to provide the artist with photo reference examples of what you are trying to explain.  Neat idea!

After the comics panel, I went hunting for photo opportunities and trolled the dealer’s rooms.  During the course of the first day, I took about 175 pictures.  Michael Bailey, Race, and I wandered the dealer’s room together looking for ways to spend obscene amounts of money.  Then from an unknown artist, I commissioned a sketch of Blue Devil battling Doctor Fate.  The sketch isn’t complete yet, but I should get it within a week or so.  The pencils he showed me looked awesome!  I’ll be sure to post an image of that drawing here when I get it.

I swung by the NeedCoffee.com panel, “They Did WHAT to My Favorite Book/Fandom?”  Fun panel with good crowd interaction.  I was lucky enough to win a Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker action figure “Father’s Day 2-pack”.  Too funny! Around this time we connected with Ron & Holly from THE UNIQUE GEEK and their other siblings.

Finally, after a late-evening run to Chick-Fil-A, we settled in for a night of Chez Geek, booze, and chatting.  We don’t get to hang out very often as a group, so we had a fantastic time ripping on each other and enjoying each others company.  Sweet, sweet slumber finally overtook us around 3:00am.

Great first day!  Wonderful to see friends again and have so much fun!  I’m sure I’m forgetting things, so there may be addendums throughout the week.  More tomorrow…

Assuming all is well with air travel, I should be in Atlanta by 10:30am!!!  Me and 30,000 of my closest friends all weekend long!  Check out the DragonCon website for details on the event!  Here are a few snapshots of me at previous DragonCons.  To see a gazillion (yes, that’s a technical term) DragonCon photos, be sure to visit THE UNIQUE GEEK Photo Gallery by clicking here!  Talk to you soon!

I can’t freakin’ wait until Friday!  DragonCon 2008 is shaping up to be a fantastic convention!  Loads of panels I’m interested in, great times to look forward to with friends, celebrities to see, and funds to be dropped in the dealer room.  Can’t wait!  Be warned, I may miss a day or two of blogs next week due to “Post-Con Culture Shock”.  This is a condition we all suffer from after being deeply immersed in geekdom for four days, and then forced to return to the hell that is called “the real world”.

This past Sunday we recorded THE UNIQUE GEEK issue #76 featuring the usual gang discussing the upcoming festivities at DragonCon.  Be sure to check it out!

As usual, I will be attending the upcoming Dragon*Con convention.  If you’re not familiar with it, Dragon*Con is the largest multi-media, popular culture convention focusing on science fiction and fantasy, gaming, comics, literature, art, music, and film in the US.  Dragon*Con 2008 will be held Labor Day weekend (August 29 - September 1, 2008) in Atlanta, GA.

Several of my buddies from THE UNIQUE GEEK will also be there.  We’ve started a Dragon*Con countdown over a THE UNIQUE GEEK website.  The countdown is basically daily lists of things to keep in mind and pictures from Dragon*Con’s past.  Check it out!

And if you’re thinking about going to Dragon*Con, drop me a line! 

Anyone else getting anxious about Dragon*Con this year?  I can’t wait to be immersed in all the geeky goodness.  The celebrities, the pseudo-celebrities, the panels, the costumes, the dealer rooms, staying up late playing games, the crowds (yes, even the crowds can be fun), and just generally being a complete geek for three or four days.

For those of you that don’t know, Dragon*Con is the largest multi-media, popular culture convention focusing on science fiction and fantasy, gaming, comics, literature, art, music, and film in the US.  Dragon*Con 2008 will be held Labor Day weekend (August 29 - September 1, 2008) in Atlanta, GA.  Many of us folks from THE UNIQUE GEEK are regulars at this event.  You can see my photos from the past few years on my Flickr page.

I’m getting jazzed about going!  Anyone else?  Are you going or not?  Feel free to comment.

 The Irredeemable Shag