Your 2007 San Diego Con Update



Notes and Observations About or Caused by Comic-Con International, Taking Place July 26-29 (With a July 25 Preview Night) in San Diego, California

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1. Wearing your costume on Preview Night is hardcore; wearing your costume on the flight to San Diego is NERDCORE.

2. You know you've been coming to the same hotel for a lot of years when the Director of Security remembers your name.

3. I mean, it's bad enough that you remember it's the same Director of Security.

4. The limit for the pool at my hotel is 147 people. So: 147 is fine, 148 and the pool falls through the floor.

5. The big comics-related news so far is that Paul Pope is taking his much liked science fiction-y career-maker THB to First Second, who will release it in 2009. A few things pop out about that announcement. First, a projected 1200 or so pages seems to me to indicate a lot of comics yet to come in the promised ending. Second, First Second is planning things out until 2009, so I guess they must be okay. Third, it's going to be color, with the colorist First Second has been using on books like Laika, which I find interesting. Fourth, google around for the press release. Paul Pope is the only cartoonist in North America who could get away with comparing his own action science fiction epic to Akira and not make everyone hate him. I say that with admiration. An oversized duluxe edition to follow collecting all three planned books should be impressive.

6. The best comics I was handed last night were Livon Jihannian's funny mini-comics sketchbook Ordinary Fieldbook and that new booklet of Jordan Crane's postcards. I'm actually going to buy one of the Crane sets to keep as a book, it's so attractive.

7. If I overheard the people at the Fantagraphics right, Linda Medley has released an enormous amount of work over the last several months. (Kim Thompson wrote in to object to the word enormous to describe a comic coming out every six to eight weeks; I thought the word appropriate given the long interruptions in production in Medley's career and the general rate of production for alt-comic books right now.)

8. I saw and talked to Scott McCloud. I didn't see his family, which supports my theory that they left him on that tour back in October and Scott has been blogging in all of their voices since. Anyway, he had nice words for the webcartoonist R. Stevens, even dubbing him one of the more important and connected members of that entire community.

9. Jeff Smith's Art of Bone apparently had its genesis as an art catalog for a show that didn't happen. Now that it's come out as its own (and I think very impressive) hardcover, there will be a exhibition, and a separate art catalog. This kind of turn of events is not surprising if you follow Smith's career.

10. The booth I like best is the Image Central booth, weirdly enough, although most people on Preview Night seemed fascinated with a) wherever the freebies were, and b) the big box with Iron Man or whatever in it at the Marvel booth. Anyway, I liked the Image booth because of its ring of creators, which kind of emphasizes what that company's all about in a way the more elaborate and editor/PR people mazes of the other big companies kind of show what they're about.

11. Not comics: I spoke to a TV writer while I was in line. The thing she likes best about CCI? The TV people are happier and much less guarded than at TV-focused events. The thing she likes least? The physical difficulty in getting from one place to another.

12. The press and pro registration lines were so smooth I think we can start talking about them as a past hardship in the Old Man walking through the snow to get to school voice. Of course, we won't be exaggerating how much they sucked.

13. I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of stuff.

14. Elvis Road is beautiful if you lay it out from end to end, as Buenaventura Press has at their booth.

15. The cartoonist Jason Miles says he saw someone buy a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 in cash.

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For coverage of general comics news outside the convention and for differing views of the convention itself, I recommend my peers at ComicMix.com, Publishers Weekly, Journalista, The Beat, Newsarama, Comic Book Resources and The Pulse. Groups of photos from the show can be found here.
 
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