I arrived in New York City after a four hour bus ride from Boston. The nice thing about taking the Bolt bus is that it drops you off along 35th street. I found my hotel, the New Yorker, right across the stop. I managed to get a good night sleep, despite turning in at 1AM. I missed out on the first day because by the time I only bought a three day badge when the four day badges were sold out. I woke up bright and early to cosplay as my 1980s variation of Pinkie Pie. I dashed out of New Yorker hotel to the convention center. The walk from the New Yorker to the con was a quick ten minutes. It was easy to figure out – just follow the crowd.

Those of us with our badges were herded like cattle into the waiting hall. The dealers hall opened up at 10AM. There already were huge crowds ready to storm the dealers hall. I decided to just chat with fellow nerds also in line. People were very friendly and this was something I’m not used to seeing at conventions I normally attend on the west coast. After waiting for about an hour in line, the dealers room was open and people were going in by the droves.

The Block

I decided to check out a different section of the dealers hall – The Block. This section is about the size of your standard dealers hall. It was right next door to the main hall. This was like an advanced version of artist alley. This is where you can find make up supplies, wig supplies, and even pose with replicas of classic movie cars. This is also where the giant Adventure Time display was held. What I enjoyed about The Block was the a Nendroid gallery. The display had almost every single Nendroid made to date – including the Idolm@ster Nendroids. I ended up picking up a few cutie mark pins from The Five Wits. The other unique thing about The Block is that there was a section for fan podcasts. All I could think was Jared, Miguel, and Stan having a booth to promote BizWorld of Sports.

Artist Alley

Because I have been having a growing appreciation for Artist Alley, I decided to find where it was. New York Comic Con took over the Javits Convention Center. At first, I thought The Block was the Artist Alley. As it turns out, Artist Alley was on the North side of the convention center. It was a bit of a walk and you had to fight through the crowd, but it was well worth it. Artist Alley was different from the typical artist alley’s I have been to at anime conventions. Not to say that was a bad thing, but this is where you could meet your favorite comic book artists.

It was here I shook the hand of Toshio Maeda, godfather of modern hentai. We had a straight conversation of the aesthetics of bishoujo characters. He was also selling prints from his hits, La Blue Girl and Legend of Overfiend. I also met Bill Willingham, the creative mind behind one of my favorite comics, Fables. He was signing posters for fans. I also passed by a few artist tables that had familiar character designs – most of them I was not quite familiar with their work since my knowledge on comic book artists is still limited. However, the artist alley was a great place to meet your favorite artists – and believe me, there were a ton of them!

My Little Pony: Meet Ups Are Magic

New York is also home to BroNY Con, a convention for fans of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Likewise, there was a pretty good Brony and Pegasister turn out for New York Comic Con. Fans of the series met in the basement lobby by the food court. I accidentally discovered this after literally turning around. The meet up was a part cosplay photoshoot and part just Brony’s hanging out. The cosplay gathering was fairly small compared to other MLP meet ups I have attended. I was dressed as Pinkie Pie…as well as a handful of other girls.

The rest of the meetup consisted of people just hanging out and making plans for lunch. However, it was interesting observing the gathering from the sidelines – the girls wanted to get their photos taken and trade friendship bracelets, while the guys staggered around and danced to Gangnam Style.

Dealers Hall

The dealers hall was really huge. It’s not as massive as San Diego Comic Con’s, but it was Anime Expo’s dealer’s hall times two. The dealers hall had everything – comics, steampunk accessories, alternative fashion, anime, and vintage toys. For me, the dealers hall was discovering that lost part of childhood. I was happy when I saw a booth sell generation one My Little Pony, Rose Petal Place, Strawberry Shortcake dolls, Jem dolls, Care Bears, Lady Lovelylocks, and more. There were those, “Take my wallet!” moments.

There was a huge presence of anime dealers. For as long as I have been going to California conventions, this was also the first time I’ve seen some of these dealers. I was surprised to find Idolm@ster keychains and blind bags when I hardly see any Idolm@ster merchandise on the West Coast. I found booths that sold Suite Pretty Cure keychains and plushies. There was definitely something for everyone. My favorite takeaway was the Hip Hop Candy booth that sold custom Lolita themed fragrances. Seeing that I had to stock up on lotions, perfume, and candles, I decided to buy a few things from them.

However, the only downer about the dealers hall that it was mostly cash only. The Javits Convention Center was notorious for horrible cell phone reception and WiFi connection. There were a lot of places that preferred cash over plastic. If you plan to spend money in the dealers hall, bring cash with you.

The convention winded down when the dealers hall was closing up. While there was programming going on in the panel rooms, everyone pretty much vacated Javits once the hall closed up. The night life programming did not seem quite appealing to me, so Becky (Epic Cosplay) and I decided to go to Times Square.

Times Square

If you are visiting New York for the comic con, there is definitely time to see Times Square in the evening hours. If you are lucky, you can see cosplayers also wander around Times Square. This was Becky’s first time in Times Square. First, we went to this Brooklyn pizza joint where we split a large meat lovers type pizza. There were a few cool and nerdy places to check out – the mega Toys R Us is definitely one of them. We went through the girly section to look at new Barbies and Monster High dolls. We also visited the Hershey store to find some unique flavors of chocolate not sold anywhere else. Finally, we went to the Disney Store which had more Disney merch than World of Disney in Anaheim. I broke down and decided to get a Lucifer (Cinderella) plush because it was soft and fluffy.

The nice thing about Times Square is that it is within walking distance of Javits and most of the convention hotels. I originally thought it would be better to take a cab or the subway, but it’s a very easy and safe walk – even if you’re wearing classic Lolita from Innocent World.

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