First year conventions are difficult to review due to the usual “first time jitters” but they are easy to talk about because there usually is very little to do. This convention was very fun for me due to being able to hang out with friends and the memories it brought back to me. However, there were some problems with this convention that could easily be solved by next year.

Long Beach Comic Con was small, but that can be a good thing sometimes. The convention was small enough to allow me to run into several friends and hang out with them. Perhaps one of the best thngs about this con was the hang out time. I like hang out cons, they give you time to show off what you picked up at the dealer hall and they allow you to trade stories with people. The social aspect of conventions is often the part most over looked because it cannot be produced by the staff it is produced by the attendees.

Something that comic cons are well known for is the dealer hall and this convention did not disappoint. The dealer's hall had a good amount of booths featuring everything from comics to figures to clothing to wrestling. The wrestling ring in the dealer's hall was quite a surprise to the Scarlet Rhapsody team, but it is one of the aspects of Long Beach Comic Con that made it such a memorable convention. As usual there was a good line of booths featuring stars from television and movies selling autographs to all the fans. I did not expect a first time convention to have such a strong dealer's hall (as many multi-year conventions do not), but the dealer's hall made Long Beach Comic Con stand out even on the first year.

One of the weaker point of most first year conventions is the panels. Long Beach Comic Con was not an exception to this rule. There were not many panels per day and the panels they did have did not interst the team much. There is potential for great panels at Long Beach and it is likely we will start seeing those stronger panels next year.

Another weakpoint for the convention was the lack of additional programming. Though a masquerade or music video contest would seem out of place at Long Beach Comic Con it would be nice to see something big and flashy. Wrestling was a good start in this direction, and we hope it will return net year, but we would like to see more main events at this convention.

Long Beach Comic Con brought back many memories for me. Not only memorrires of my first Anime Expo (which was at Long Beach), but also memories of going to local sci-fi cons as a kid. When I was growing up I used go to the bi-yearly sci-fi cons in Los Angeles. Long Beach reminded me of those cons and brought back happy memories of meeting Bert Ward, watching the cast of Mortal Kombat do some stunts, and meeting awesome Klingon cosplayers. It was nice to return to the Long Beach Convention Center and I hope to do so again next year.

Overall the team enjoyed going to Long Beach Comic Con. We will return next year in hopes of seeing it reach the potential the convention has. If there are any cooments, questions, or complaints feel free not to e-mail me at: Jared (at) scarlet-rhapsody.com.

1. Back in Long Beach, good times
2. Let’s all go to Zombieland!
3. What do you mean Adam West isn’t here?
4. Maids…
5. I’m still broke
6. Wrestling, nice addition
7. There was so much more I wanted to buy
8. Looking forward to the next one
9. Note to self: Keep moving forward
10. Such a nice change from the usual anime cons
11. Going one step beyond…

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