Report from San Diego Comic Con 2002
Seattle, August 5, 2002. So we just got back from Comic-Con International: San Diego. I anticipate a full week of recovery time. The Con is not only a full-on assault on the senses, it’s also pretty physically demanding just getting from place to place on the enormous convention floor. I haven’t found any official attendance numbers yet, but I would not be surprised by any estimate up to 90,000. It was (in my best South Park "Tweak" voice) INSANE! The exhibitor area was a half-mile end-to-end, carved into over sixty aisles of booths featuring comics, toys, manga and anime stuff (lots of that), movie tie-ins, artwork and artists, animation stuff, books, memorabilia and more. Almost every booth had something to grab you, whether it was a wall of $1 million worth of vintage comics that no collector has ever seen in person, or celebrities ranging from Peter "Chewbacca" Mayhew to animator Bill Plympton to the latest Playmate of the Month dressed as Sailor Moon and handing out free hologram key-chains. Many attendees come in costume. There were enough stormtroopers to staff a complete clone army; Klingons in full battle regalia, swinging Bat’leths to clear a path for themselves through the aisles; all sorts of Elves, Hobbits and wizards, muppets, samurai, Roswell aliens, etc. It may sound wacky, but in context it makes perfect sense.
Upstairs – for those who made it that far – were panel discussions on every subject you can imagine, sneak previews of movies featuring unannounced surprise appearances by cast members, gaming tournaments, Japanese anime running round the clock on three screens, a complete Star Wars fan film festival, slide shows on classic SF paperback cover artwork, and even a live edition of the Comedy Central kitch game show "Beat the Geeks" (the official corporate Geeks lost, badly – they were no match for the real thing). The main programming went from 10-7 each day, but then at night were the various awards ceremonies, parties, costume contests, film marathons, club meetings, dinners and general mayhem.
My consort and co-conspirator Eunice and I arrived on Wednesday, early enough to squeeze in a few hours of traditional "recreation" (hanging around the pool, stuff like that) before the festivities got underway. The Con has begun featuring a "preview night" from 5-8:30 so that full four-day attendees could register and have a look at the goods without having to cue up in annoying crowd-control pens on Thursday morning. Last year it was pretty makeshift – most exhibitors were still setting up, no artists or guests bothered to attend. This year there were 9,500 people and everything was in full swing. Three and a half hours was barely enough time to walk half the convention floor, even with the aisles mostly clear. There was a profound sense of awe in the room about the size and scale that this thing had reached.
On Thursday – usually a light day for attendance – the place was nearly full. Most people do their serious shopping on Thursday to beat the weekend rush and get to the dealers before prices go up. If you ever go, bring about double the amount of money you think you’ll spend. There is more STUFF here than you can possibly imagine. 1979 Boba Fett original figure, new in box? Someone’s got it. Uncut sheet of Wacky Pack trading cards from 1974? Someone’s got it. Original cover art to Amazing Spider-Man #49 from 1966? Someone’s got it (for a bargain price of only $22K!). "Federal Men," the ridiculously obscure 1946 one-shot reprint of old Siegel and Shuster pre-Superman strips? Yup, someone was selling it and I actually bought it (well come on, when was I ever going to see another one?). Somewhere underneath of a twenty-foot pile of empty containers from the neighboring booth, we found our friends Peter and Carolyn Bickford taking orders for the new edition of ComicBase – my single very slim writing credit in the comic business. Yes indeed, there’s something for every obsessive collector under the sun, all in one gargantuan room.
Eunice is a member of a group called Friends of Lulu, dedicated to increasing the presence of women in comics. Thursday night was their annual party and awards dinner, hosted in a nice ballroom on the top floor of a nearby hotel. FOL is a great place to rub elbows with many of the coolest people in the business. It’s also one party I would not miss if I were single. Afterwards we went out for a few drinks in the hip "Gaslamp District" of San Diego with my old friend from high school Steve Stein, who was also in for the Con. One of the cool things about the Big Weekend is that the city of San Diego is overrun with freaks, geeks and comic book crazies. Toe-headed southern California jocks and their bubble-blond girlfriends are shocked and horrified to discover that their favorite hang-outs are suddenly full of unwashed lunatics arguing Star Trek trivia and playing Magic cards at the bar.
On Friday, we attended a panel discussion that was supposed to feature Stan Lee being interviewed by Kevin Smith. Unfortunately, Smith (a Con regular the last few years) couldn’t make it, so Stan the Man put up with inane questions from a panel of clueless assholes. Still, Stan Lee is always worth seeing, and this is probably not the first time he’s been publicly questioned by idiots.
That night was the Eisner Awards – the comic book equivalent of the Oscars – where the entire industry turns out to honor the best work of the year. Like the Oscars, the ceremony takes forever because there are awards for EVERYTHING, everyone needs to be introduced, all the nominees get applause, and then the winners all thank everyone. Unlike the Oscars, the man that the Eisner awards are named for – comic book pioneer and genius Will Eisner – is still very much alive and present to hand out the awards. He even won one himself this year. Well sure – can you imagine losing an award named after yourself? Or, as a judge, voting for anyone other than Will Eisner to win an Eisner award in a category where he’s been nominated? The event is usually followed by a party, but we were so tired that we went straight back to the hotel.
On Saturday morning while we were having breakfast in our hotel room, we saw the line forming to get into the convention center. The registration area for the Con is on the second floor, up a gigantic escalator at the end of a Disneyland-style serpentine rope line. In earlier years, the line on a busy day would extend outside and partway down the length of the convention center – a wait of approximately 45 minutes. Saturday morning, the line went the full length of the convention center, around the side, past the hotel adjacent to it, and all the way down the seaside boardwalk to the shopping center past our hotel – a distance of more than 1.5 miles. This was at 8:00 am, two hours before the doors opened. Eunice and I already had our badges, so we just need to wait until 10:15 and walk right in, but apparently some people were still getting their credentials at 1:00 in the afternoon. God help anyone who tried to park or drive anywhere within five miles of downtown SD.
Inside, insanity reigned. Guest celebrities were everywhere, everyone was in costumes, kids were screaming, music was blasting, dealers were keeping customers at bay with chairs and bullwhips, several popular artists were torn to pieces and their flayed skin was sold as souvenirs (highly collectable!) by enterprising merchants. We attended a series of panels upstairs, where the mayhem was at a slightly lower decibel level.
First we went to a discussion of the work of Steve Ditko, co-creator of Spider-Man, featuring several of his colleagues. Next was an interview of SF great Ray Bradbury by his longtime friend and one-time literary agent Julius Schwartz, a legendary editor at DC comics. Al Feldstein, the editor who "adapted" Bradbury’s stories in EC comics (initially without Bradbury’s permission) made a surprise appearance at which he dissolved into an utter puddle of fanboy admiration and tearfully thanked Uncle Ray for providing him with the inspiration to do his best work. It was a great moment to anyone with an interest in the history of science fiction, this was itself worth the price of admission. After that wrapped up, we stuck around to hear Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon discuss his upcoming new series (sorry, title escapes me for the moment, but it looks cool) and answer questions about new developments on Buffy and Angel. Joss looked a little ragged – probably because they had to smuggle him into the convention in a burlap bag for his own protection. We left when the questions became too embarrassingly fannish even for us.
Down on the floor at 4:30, it was impossible to move. The aisles were packed. There’s a rumor that the fire marshal was close to shutting the whole thing down – one of the largest enclosed spaces on earth, filled to capacity! Forget about subculture. We have arrived. We are everywhere!
Saturday night, Eunice and I attended a dinner hosted by a group called the American Association of Comic Collectors, which honors some of the old-timers who made it in for the convention. The dinner is a small affair – about 75 people – so there’s lots of opportunities to talk directly with the guests and the other attendees (many of whom are current artists, high-profile collectors and dealers). Remember that in the 40s and 50s, no one gave a shit about comics and it was something of an embarrassment to be involved in the industry. Many of the artists from those days still don’t realize that there are people who remember and appreciate their work, and every year, a few more are "discovered" by dedicated collectors and invited to attend Comic-Con as guests of honor. Most of these people are now over 70, living modest lives, and are suddenly plunged into this sea of mayhem and thronged by literally hundreds of people who praise their work, thank them for their efforts, present them with treasured copies of old issues, and ask for autographs and sketches. It must be quite an experience. Eunice and I sat at a table with a wonderful old fellow named Lew Sayre Schwartz, who had one of the most thankless jobs in comics history – ghost-drawing Batman stories in the fifties under the moniker of creator Bob Kane. After that, he left comics behind for a prosperous but anonymous career in commercial art and was genuinely shocked to discover that here, half a century later, he was being celebrated for work that he was sure no one but Kane had ever known he had done. To say that he and his wife were delighted would be something of an understatement. It’s pretty uplifting to share someone’s moment of happiness like that. After that was the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund party and more late-night partying and drinking with lots of cool people.
Sunday is a blur – a mad scramble to fill the last few holes in my collection and pick up a few more sketches from various artists. By mid-day, everyone – dealers, guests, attendees – is totally burned out. Brain-dead zombies shamble around the aisles. Pathetic once-human husks are draped lifelessly over folding chairs with eyes rolled back and drool trickling from their slack open mouths. Artists collapse suddenly at their tables, tumbling face first into half-inked pages on their drawing boards. Dealers, desperate to unload inventory, climb up onto tables and rasp out announcements of sales from ruined throats, or scratch ever-deeper discount notices onto chalk-stained blackboards. Oh, the humanity!
At 4:15, with a full 45 minutes to go before closing, we finally hit the wall. Realizing that we haven’t eaten in four days, we kick in the door of a nearby Mexican restaurant and fall on the terrified staff like half-mad animals. Outside, the waves of refugees begin to fill the streets. Imagine some newsreel of a flood in Bangladesh, except everyone is wearing t-shirts with Spider-Man insignias or X-Men, carrying poster tubes, and pulling luggage trolleys piled high with comic books and toys. Those lucky enough to have plane tickets make for the airports. Others lash their belongings to the tops of old jalopies or pack animals and join the long, slow procession up I-405. A few unfortunates perch on rooftops and make desperate leaps for the landing skids of circling traffic helicopters. When the Con is over, it is Time to Leave San Diego, make no mistake.
That’s the good thing about the Con. They give you a large enough portion that by the time it’s over, you don’t need to go back for at least six months. Then the Hunger sets in.. .the gnawing anticipation… the feverish longing… the horrible fear that the next con can’t possibly live up to last year’s… Oh God… how much longer do I have to wait? Fortunately, we are already registered for 2003. Eunice took care of that on Thursday morning.
12:43:56 PM 
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