SDCC 08

Let's have a few words about San Diego Comic Con.

Wednesday night highlights:
- Grabbed a copy of Channel Zero from Brian Wood.
- Berated by Brian Azzarello for not posting more on Standard Attrition.

Thursday highlights
- Got sketches from Geoff Darrow

- Hit the J. Michael Straczynski writing panel, which was a good jumpstart for the con. Got me in the right headspace of "student" instead of "fanboy."

- Caught the last half of DC's Superman panel. Now I know everything about Krypto the Superdog, and I'm a better person for it.

- Caught the Xmen panel with Fraction, Jason Aaron, and a bunch of other X-creators. Axel Alonso and Brubaker were AWOL. Takeaways: I have no friggin' idea what X-men is about anymore. I took copious notes for my buddy Don who could not attend. We went over the notes later, and we both agreed that they were unintelligible. Something about... superheroes... we had never heard of. Although Jason Aaron's new supervillain in Wolverine who can punch people in their soul sounded like a good idea. That was the only point that hooked me during the entire hour.

-Entertainment Weekly did a panel on comic book Visionaries. It was the nexus of all comic book worlds contained within one room. Grant Morrison, Colleen Doran, Mike Mignola, Matt Fraction, Jim Lee, John Cassaday, and Robert Kirkman. It had the potential to wipe Southern California off the map, but overall it was a disappoinment. The moderator was a kid, and her questions were inane. If she was familiar with any of the creators' material, it wasn't apparent. It degraded into long uncomfortable pauses and nervous joking. The one flash of insight came from Grant when he discussed how superheroes are the only future-oriented American archetype, while cowboys, gangsters, etc. are all past-oriented. Worth it to see them all in the same space, but a missed opportunity.