Long Beach Comic Con is in their seventh year at the same old place. Since then, organizers of Long Beach Comic Con have made a secondary event in spring called Long Beach Comic Expo as well as a few events in New Jersey. Stan and Deb, our site contributers attended for the Firefly and Con Men events on Saturday. Granted, Saturday was the busiest of the two days; this brought in lines. Additionally, Long Beach Comic Con did not use the actual convention center. They used the arena side of the convention center. This made it difficult to control the larger crowds and everything felt more packed in. Panels were in the basement of the performing arts center; same location as Long Beach Comic Expo. A decent fit for a small con like Anime California that took place at Long Beach previously, but not for something the size of Long Beach Comic Con.
Holy Bleep Batman or Censorship and Animation by Jared
This panel brought in four veterans of animation to talk w\about broadcast standards and practices. The discussion brought up the importance of the rules and how the biggest issues tend to come from overly nervous networks and inept consultants. Several stories were told about how things they didn’t see as dirty were called dirty by the management and how some episodes had to be changed for silly reasons. It was an interesting panel and it also explained why we had all those silly after episode ‘knowing is half the battle’ PSAs at the end of 80s and 90s cartoons. This was a great panel that explored a subject that is rarely discussed.
DC Comics Gathering by Eri Kagami
This cosplayer meet up was held at 2:30PM on the stairs to the performing arts center. The nice thing about utilizing the Long Beach Convention Center is the variety of urban architecture suitable for super hero and villain shoots. Originally, the meet up was supposed to take place at 2PM on the dot, but was moved to 2:30 to accomodate for the Batman: The Animated Series panel. Jared and I were wearing Constantine and Zatanna for Saturday. We've never done a DC Comics cosplay meet up. Obviously, there were a ton of Harleys and Jokers of different variations present. There was a general group shot followed by inhabitants of Metropolis and Gotham. The only pairing shots consisted of Joker, Poison Ivy, and Harley. Con Woman Photography organizined the DC Comics gathering; being a veteran of anime convention cosplay meet ups, I admired her active delivery in getting everything organized and together that made the gathering run efficiently.
Beginning Cosplaying by Eri Kagami
Though I consider myself a veteran cosplayer (Class of '99!), I attended the Beginning Cosplay panel to support my cosplay colleague, Crystal Rose. This panel included cosplay creators such as Beer Money, Clarissa Metall, and Hiro Creations. Panelsits suggested taking sewing classes at JoAnn's (or bother a friend). They also talked about other costuming basics such as storing cosplay. Crystal talked about using postal boxes to store bits and pieces. Beer Money and Hiro talked about using plastic storage bins. Beer Money also talked about creating armor out of craft foam. The nice thing about this panel that it was very positive and encouraging. While the panelists also covered haters and getting into cosplay for the wrong reasons, they covered some robust topics for newbie cosplayers that I would not think about covering. Most panels will talk about crafting how to's and basics. This one covered everything from getting started with different material, attending conventions and dealing with drama, and cosplay maitenence.
Dealers Hall by Eri Kagami
The dealers hall entrance was on the arena side of the convention; very simillar to Long Beach Comic Expo. The dealers hall was much more cramped this year; there were a lot more artists, cosplayers, and voice actors invited this year. Certain areas that seemed larger and spacious were in smaller spaces. I liked that the Columbia Space Expo returned to not only do panels, but also run some interactive and educational exhibits for aerospace nerds of all ages. I liked some of the prop booths for photo ops - there were a few from Star Trek, V, and Doctor Who. The same single issue dealers that sold collectable comics were there. However, I do miss seeing booths that had a variety of graphic novels. I get that Harley and Deadpool comics are in season, but I also wanted to see more IDW titles and obscure stuff. I was also disapointed that there were no more food vendors (ie: beef jerky) in the dealers hall because the Long Beach Convention Center has stopped the sales of outside food and discourages eating outside food within the convention center. The dealers hall needs a larger space for next year; I'm not sure how large exhibit space is in Long Beach, but even Anime Expo in 2001 and 2002's dealers hall felt larger than Long Beach Comic Con 2016. There's a lot of things going on in the dealers hall that you could spend your whole day there, but it's really time to get larger space or start moving things like the space expo to a larger ballroom.
The Video Games by Jared the Greek
The grand battle returned with a slightly more ‘blue’ attitude than before featuring many innuendos and brutal insults. This is a stunt show that crosses The Hunger Games with video game characters. Ideally, the audience votes for their favorite heroes and those votes affect the show, but with the very low connection speed or outright lack of connection most of the votes didn’t seem to make it through so characters who were popular with the audience didn’t survive due to lacking votes. This made for some unexpected twists, but it also seemed to bum out the audience as crowd favorites like Commander Shepard and Scorpion went out in the first rounds. However, this show is done at many different events so. Give it a shot if you want to see a fun stunt show.
Costume Contest by Eri Kagami
The costume contest took place on Saturday evening. Contestants can sign up at the convention and get craftsmanship judging. I attended as an audience member this time; I did not enter this year. This year, the show was hosted by Chad Hatter and Art Rhapsody. They were a pretty funny pair and kept the audience entertained. Opening and halftime act was done by the Library Bards; this duo was very reminiscant of Donnie and Marie Osmond if they were singing parodies of top 40 songs set to geeky references. This got laughs from the audience and caused people to pull their cell phones out for the slower, ballad-type songs. The contest had 42 entries; each contestant did a walk on across the stage set to pre-selected music (Oh Yeah by Yello, the Mahna Mahna song, etc). Highlights included Invader Zim, Gyrados, Legolas, etc. Cash prizes were given out to Best Sci Fi, Best Anime, Best Villain, etc. Top prizes included even more cash prizes and a Bernina machine to the lucky winners of Best in Show. The show was judged by Stella Chuu, Maid of Might, and Vegas Power Girl. Surprisingly enough, the judges took about five minutes to decide on who the winners were; all the Library Bards had to do was perform one song and it was settled. The cosplay contest ran rather quickly; by the time the show was over, the convention area was pretty empty.
Of course, organizers were encouraing people to check out some of the local after parties at the Federal Bar and Hilton. Because we had to drive home, we decided to get some rest and have a late night dinner at a ramen bar in Torrance. Long Beach Comic Con Day One invited some mixed feelings. While it was nice meeting comic book cosplayers and running into people we had been acquainted with during Long Beach Comic Expo, this year seemed fairly mixed. Let's see how day two turns out...
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