BURNING THAT COMIC CON OIL IN 2011!!!

Welcome back CRAZIES!  It's Week 2 of our 2018 COMIC CON COUNTDOWN and we are plowing right into this thing!  With so many great memories to look back on, it's very hard to sort out a select few for posting, but I've done my best at selecting and think y'all will get a kick out of these pics!  But first, I'd like to take a moment to remind folks of something important happening this Friday...

As I mentioned last week, I have framed art available for the Team Cul De Sac Art Auction this friday, June 15, at HeroesCon in Charlotte.  There will be MANY great pieces of art on sale and all for a very worthy cause: Sending Parkinson's Disease straight into the fires of Mount Doom!  Details of the exact when and where of it all can be found on the Team Cul De Sac Blog, as well as their corresponding social media pages.  I thought I'd take a moment today to describe the inspiration behind this year's piece.  For those who never read the comic (And seriously, you're missing out if you haven't!), Cul De Sac is the tale of a little girl named Alice and the wacky situations she and her family and friends always manage to get themselves into.  Among the running gags is her neurotic big brother, Petey, who isn't sure if one of his classmates, a bespectacled boy named Ernesto, is real or not, despite almost EVERY other character having encountered Ernesto at some point.  I felt it'd be funny if Ernesto, who did address his realness in the comics, pointed out to Petey that his own sister's antics are far more surreal than his own habit of popping up out of nowhere.  Indeed, Alice had a wacky streak to her, which is what made her such a lovable character to begin with.  I do hope this piece finds a good home and brings in a nice bid.  I was and still am a great admirer of Richard Thompson's work.  It's an honor to contribute.

And now, it's time to head back to a not-really-that-much-more-simpler time.  The year was 2011, the place was the San Diego Convention Center and the event was Comic Con.  Hold on tight to your Superman Underoos folks.  We're hitting the ground running!  Enjoy...

Got a very rare shot here: Comic Con Load In!  Hard to say exactly which hall it is, but if I had to guess, it's the back of Hall E looking diagonally towards the left to where Halls D and C meet.  Booth placement hasn't changed much from 2010-on, so along the front of the halls in this pic (From left to right) is where the Shonen Jump, Lucasfilm and Hasbro booths would be.  I took this pic seven years ago and the columns are blocking the hall signs, so sorry in advance for not being able to exactly place things.

I believe its a rule for getting a badge that you HAVE to take a pic of the logo banner through the center of the circular column support.  Frankly, I got so many of these, I could make a coffee table book out of them!

What better way for a father and son to bond than through cosplay?  The family that cosplays together stays together!

Speaking of fathers and sons, The Jones' decided to stop by and find the greatest treasure of them all: A secret path into Hall H!  No word on if they ever succeeded.

My first year as a pro, so I decided to wear a tie for the occasion.  Sadly, not everyone agreed with my fashion statement!

An all too sad reminder of why you don't cast Nicholas Cage in a superhero movie.  This was actually the first year that the famed Gaslamp Quarter got in on the festivities.  It's only gotten bigger since with 5th Avenue being shutdown completely and many restaurants getting in on the act.  There are even some hidden and not-so-hidden offsites dwelling within!  Also a great spot to score swag and get some great cosplay pics for those who couldn't get badges!

Adventure Time made it's presence felt in 2011 with several impromptu parades!  Although Cartoon Network premiered the show at the con the year before, 2011 was the first year they really did anything with it at comic cons.  By then the show had become a hit, so it made perfect sense to do so.

San Diego Comic Con brings out the mariachi in all of us!

Another con tradition: Quailman!

Cheetara!  This one's for all the old school Thundercats fans. We'll always have the memories and the DVD boxed sets.

It was one and done for the Hub Network Experience in 2010, as 2011 made way for what is now a proud Comic Con tradition: The Nintendo Lounge!  For seven years now, Nintendo has rented out the San Diego Ballroom of the Marriott next door to the Convention Center and turned it into a gamer's paradise!  And best of all?  It's all 100% free!  No badge needed!  And believe me, I know people who DO have badges that miss the entire con just to hang out in here!  Nothing's set in stone yet, but all sign's point to the Lounge coming back for 2018, so keep an ear out!

The steps between the old and new sides of the Convention Center.  Sometimes it's a great spot for cosplay pics, sometimes, it's a great spot to catch a break.  In recent years, security's curbed access to it, so not just anybody can hang around there anymore, sadly.  Still, you can usually find a great cosplay or two, all things considered.

HE HAS THE POWERRRRRRRRR!!!

Since Solo: A Star Wars Story recently came out, I thought Sci-Fi legend Billy Dee Williams would be a great dude to end this week's post with.  Not sure how much he wanted for autographs, but it was likely way the hell beyond my budget for that year!

And that was the year 2011 for Comic Con.  Honestly, it wasn't one of my better shows as my health had taken a pretty severe nosedive in the weeks leading up to it.  Thankfully, things started turning around for me afterward, but it was a tough week to get through.  Even though offsite events had started the year before, 2011 was really the first year that San Diego Comic Con as we presently know it happened.  The Nintendo and Xbox Lounges both debuted that year, the Petco Park Interactive Zone debuted that year, albeit much smaller than it would come to be, and the Gaslamp Promotions also began in 2011.  I felt it was a very kind gesture on the part of all these various companies and studios to give some free entertainment to those who couldn't get in.  I've said it many times before and feel it's even more true now as the free offsites grow in number and scale: There is so much to do outside of the con that you really can make a week of it without a badge.

And that's all she wrote for this week.  We'll be back next time with a visit to Comic Con 2012, but minus any potential time-traveling ramifications!  Until then, take care and I'll catch y'all later!