Tagged: San Diego Comic-Con

Michael Davis: The Black Hollywood Shuffle

ICONThe image of Icon to the left was on Arsenio Hall’s Facebook page last week. There’s a funny story behind that. Well, its funny to me.

I like Arsenio. I like him a lot. I’ve met him a few times but we are by no means boys. Whenever I see him I’d like to think he remembers me but I think he’s just being polite. Each and every time I run into him, what strikes me is how polite and straight up real the man is.

Polite, straight up and real is raised to another level by a woman of his staff. What level? Putting it as politely as I can, she’s a straight up bitch, for real.

That level.

I was invited to the Arsenio show some months ago. Guests on the show that day included Don Cheadle and Billy D. Williams. It’s fair to say each have earned countless distinctive accolades but some praise could easily apply to both. Each is respected as wonderful actors from a legion of fans. They get the sex symbol nod from others and many only see two cool as fuck badass mofo’s.

Every geek and nerd sees little or none of that above noise. They don’t see Don Cheadle and Billy D. Williams hardly or at all. It’s War Machine and the greatest Black Science Fiction character to ever grace the big screen, Lando Calrissian who they see and that’s who I saw when I made a beeline for Billy D’s dressing room.

So, there I was talking some, down right, up right, San Diego Comic Con and Black Panel smack to Billy, his manager and agent both who knew of the panel and me.

That was cool.

Billy knew me also, well kind of. Each time I see him at some event or party, I tell him if he attended The High School Of Art & Design, my school, instead of the much inferior High School Of Music & Art, he’d be a successful artist today. Instead of having to fall back on that “acting” bullshit. No, I never mention I know he’s a successful painter, which would ruin a running joke nearly 20 years old.

But I digress and every time I do, Peter David gets a check a angel gets his wings and more readers get sick of reading that.

Where was I?

Where I was, about to finalize plans to honor Billy D at The Black Panel, was his dressing room, invited in by Mr. Williams himself. Then, she who would have been named but I’m not without mercy, entered and that, as they say, is all she wrote.

No idea what her title was for the show but she seemed like she was the senior, Self Hating Unhappy Negro – or SHUN. SHUN ignored my backstage credentials, ignored Billy’s agent’s assurances I was invited to be there, and in no uncertain terms told me to leave Mr. Williams alone. I tried to talk to her, Billy’s agent tried even Billy tried. She refused to believe I was not some lowly actor out to sweat Mr. Williams.

Waving a finger a hair away from my face she informed me I was one more sentence away from security being called. She was about one more inch from me becoming that nigger, but I decided against it.

No clue how I walked the fuck away without another word. I was so fucking livid I had to get out of there as my heart was racing and I’m sure my blood pressure was dangerously high and, honest to god, I felt my head was going to burst a blood vessel.

I left the building but by the time I reached my car someone from the show called my cell hoping I was still on the lot. It seems someone told SHUN who the fuck I was and just what the fuck I was there for in the place. Hint: it wasn’t to stalk Billy D. No idea to this day who I talked to but for their trouble they received a fuck you so loud it shattered the last bit of shield my brain was using to ward off a migraine and I didn’t care.

This level of pissed is rare. Even for me.

This was a big deal. You may not see it as such but yes, yes it is. Not for most reasons you would think I think. All my wrath and indignation is not towards this woman, my anger has little to do with her or what she did to me.

My anger is rooted in Black Hollywood and our rush to destroy what little we have.

Many in Black Hollywood, forget we are Black in Hollywood and I’m about to remind them.

End of Part 1.

 

Michael Davis: The Great New York Con

I’m from New York.

I’m a New Yorker who has lived the last 20 years in Los Angeles or LA, as it’s commonly called. LA is where my life is now; driven here quite literally by an offer I couldn’t refuse.

Despite the often-racist policies of City Hall and its Choke-An-Unarmed-Black-Man-to-Death police force, NYC will always be my home. Every New Yorker will tell you that the city becomes part of you. There’s something about growing up in New York that taints your view of any other city. When New Yorkers leave New York, they may move, but they don’t relocate.

My body may live in LA, but my heart and soul still reside in New York.

When the towers fell, I spent the entire day on the phone with Denys Cowan. We were both in LA less than 10 minutes from each other, yet we were so shocked and heartbroken about our city that neither one of us could muster the brainpower to think to go to the other’s home.

The offer I couldn’t refuse was made by Motown, who left Detroit in 1970 and has operated from Los Angeles ever since. I made a case to keep my main offices on the east coast and Motown agreed. I so loved my city, I endured a weekly flight to LA, and I absolutely hate to fly. After a year I was told to move the business to Los Angeles.

I did, but kept my NYC residence and have that still. I was not happy leaving my cherished city and made no secret of my dislike of all things Los Angeles when I arrived.

My New York egotism is seldom, if ever, modified. Undoubtedly a wise thing to do in many situations, but I can’t seem to make that leap no matter what the setting. I once proudly wore a New York Knick hat during a game between the Knicks and the Lakers played in Los Angeles. Not a big deal – any die-hard New York fan would do that. However, I wore my Knick hat to a Laker game while in Magic’s Johnson’s suite.

But wait, there’s more: I did this during the time I ran a division of Magic Johnson Entertainment.

I worked for the most famous Los Angeles Laker of all time, yet there I sat wearing my Knick hat.

You can’t get much more New York or more stupid than that.

20 years after LA made me leave NY, my answer is the same now as it was then when I’m asked to compare New York and Los Angeles. New York is the greatest city in the world and LA stands for Lower Alabama.

New York is also home to the New York Comic Con (NYCC), billed as the largest pop culture event on the east coast. I’m sure that’s true. It’s a huge and impressive show to be sure. Held at New York’s Javits Center, the convention sold out this year doing “San Diego Comic Con numbers” according to Business Insider.

That’s extraordinary.

What’s even more extraordinary is that NYCC has been around just nine years, and SDCC more than forty. It’s no wonder-people are comparing NYCC to SDCC. When you throw up those kinds of numbers in that short amount of time, you’re a major playa, no doubt about it.

Before, during, and especially after this year’s show, the word coming out of the Big Apple was that SDCC is done.

The king is dead, long live the king!

My dear friend Lucy Valerio, who knows full well of my doings at SDCC, told me a good friend of hers said, “San Diego Comic Con has jumped the shark.”

I wondered two things: had this expert on all things pop culture ever been to Comic Con? Secondly, was Lucy high? I bet her friend was, or he was drinking the Jim Jones Kool-Aid hype social media is selling.

Most don’t know I also have history with NYCC, and believe it or not, I had a small hand in helping them established themselves when they started. Long story short, they reached out to me and I put them in business with two major companies they were unable get to.

After doing so, I was asked to bring The Black Panel to NYCC and I did. So imagine my surprise when the next year, I’m told The Black Panel did not fit the criteria, although I had an open invitation to bring it back anytime I wanted.

The Black Panel has been profiled in the Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The New York Times, and Entertainment Weekly, to name but a few. The panel been invited to major universities, film festivals, and just recently Japan.

Damn, that must be some fucking criteria.

The woman from ReedPop, the NYCC promoter, who informed me could not have cared less about my open invitation to bring the panel back, nor did she care about what I had done for NYCC.

Fast-forward seven or eight years and the NYCC has put up some extraordinary numbers, but were not really SDCC numbers. They count ticket sales as people. In other words one person buys two tickets that counts as two people. Nevertheless, their numbers were damn impressive and they did sell out.

That sell out and those ticket sales are going to be the first thing ReedPop, the company behind the NYCC, will show future strategic partners, investors, advertisers, exhibitors, and attendees, and they should – those numbers are an incredible achievement, and as any CEO in corporate America will tell you, numbers don’t lie.

Those numbers are reason enough people are listening to the loud voices proclaiming NYCC as the new king of pop culture events.

Numbers don’t lie, but those voices are. Those voices are lying like any husband when asked, “Does this dress make me look fat?”

“No honey bunny.” That’s the lie hubby will tell his spouse.

“No Porky, you’d look fat in any dress.” That’s the truth he’s smart enough to keep from his wife.

The NYCC is a well attended comics and pop culture convention. SDCC is a world-famous pop culture event on a whole other level. Put another way, it’s akin to comparing Jay Z and your cousin Sal who likes to rap.

The numbers NYCC put up this year are undeniably great numbers for attendance to their show. However, the selling out SDCC is assured, not to take anything away from New York, but those are easy numbers to put up for San Diego. The show has sold out completely for over a decade and is still growing in ticket requests.

But, being the new king of pop culture is about a lot more than ticket sells.

More than attendance revenue, SDCC is a pop culture mecca, a place fans from all over the world must visit at least once in their life. Like any Super Bowl city hundreds of thousands of people come to San Diego without tickets. Some hope to somehow attain tickets once there, but for most, just being in the city where Comic Con International is being held is the goal.

The City Of San Diego is number 11 on the 20 most visited cities by international visitors and number 10 on the Forbes list of America’s most visited city. Clearly New York is on both those lists, but I’m damn sure the City of New York will not build new hotels and new convention centers (plural) to keep the NYCC show there.

Undoubtedly, because of Comic Con’s financial impact, San Diego would want to keep them happy by any means necessary. By comparison New York is much bigger and has much more to offer than just one event, True, but just as true, long before SDCC became the monster it is now, San Diego was already one of America’s top tourist destinations.

The economic significance of the SDCC on the city is not measured just in yearly revenue boost but in future investments and growth in the city. The worldwide importance of SDCC is not just a boon to San Diego, but to America as well. SDCC more than any other event in the 21st Century has cemented America’s place as the pop culture capital of the world.

That kind of clout is not what puts SDCC at another level. I was just pointing out the difference between Jay and cousin Sal.

NYCC is a for-profit business. Nothing at all wrong with that… except, in my opinion, in the world of geeks. To look at geeks simply as paying customers at a geek convention is no way to build a pop culture dynasty the likes of SDCC. A recurring issue to many fans and pros is the less than pleasant way convention personnel deal with fans.

To be fair, ReedPop is not running the Javits Center and has little or no control over how Javits security talks to and otherwise deals with fans. But Reed picked the venue, and year after year this seems to be a recurring topic.

SDCC is a not-for-profit educational organization run by a bunch of geeks, and in the world of comic book conventions, geeks rule. The people at SDCC are in the business of conventions, but they are not a convention business.

SDCC Mission Statement:

Comic-Con International: San Diego is a nonprofit educational corporation dedicated to creating awareness of, and appreciation for, comics and related popular art forms, primarily through the presentation of conventions and events that celebrate the historic and ongoing contribution of comics to art and culture.

Regardless of my past dealings with the convention, I want NYCC to succeed. It’s in my city and they are good for the industry. They and every other pop culture event have a ways to go before they can claim to be on a par with SDCC. For my money, Stan Lee’s Comikaze is the convention with any hope of ever doing what SDCC has.

The SDCC show is a pop culture worldwide happening generating much more than revenue and at its core are the fans, geeks, nerds and growing the industry.

This above all else is why Comic Con International: San Diego is on a different level.

A level that the New York Comic Con is, as of yet, nowhere near.

 

Martha Thomases: Doing The Comic Con-Con

Knitting YarnThere was one point at this year’s New York Comic Con when I almost said, out loud, “Do you know who I am?” That’s because I was having trouble getting my badge.

Here’s why I’m glad I didn’t:

  1. It’s a dick thing to say, the kind of thing that proves a person is self-absorbed to the point of obliviousness.
  2. I might have made a mistake when I registered, so the trouble might have been my fault.
  3. This had happened the day before. I am willing to bet that George Clooney didn’t ask if anyone knew who he was. At all times, I aspire to be at least as well-behaved as George Clooney.

Still, it’s an indication of how much things have changed in the short life of this show that I needed more than my smiling face to get in.

I understand that, with more than 150,000 people expected to attend, that it can be difficult for the staff to keep track of everybody. Unlike their other New York consumer show, Special Edition, NYCC is packed to the rafters.

There was a time when very few people wrote about comics, and I knew all of them. Even now, there aren’t that many people who write about comics every week. The (probably overworked and underpaid) person at press registration treated me like I was some kind of scam-artist trying to put one over on her.

Compare this to the way my pal, David Glanzer, says that San Diego treats press (and they get an even bigger crowd):

“I know press registration is a very difficult area. Heavens knows we’ve had our issues in the past. However we’ve actually received criticism for who we consider for press credentials. The truth is we have always considered independent press and bloggers/podcasters as our mainstream press. They are the ones who write about us throughout the year (not always positively LOL) while the bigger outlets really only tend to write about us once a year or so. The independents reporters have been with us since the start and they really still are the lifeblood for our publicity.”

The Javits Center is simply not designed for this many people. I mean, it’s not that well-designed to start-out with. Unlike, for example, the San Diego convention center, this has rather narrow hallways, and the exhibition floors are not close together. Under the best of circumstances, one must do a lot of walking. In this case, it’s nearly five Manhattan blocks (about a quarter mile) from one end of the building to the other.

When you add 150,000 people, it’s easy to create anxiety.

Still this year’s event seemed to run more smoothly than last year’s, at least according to initial feedback. There were lots of signs saying, “Cosplay does not equal consent,” and, while I don’t know if they make any difference (I’m not in costume), they made me feel more welcome. Perhaps in a related event, there seemed to be just about as many women in attendance as men.

The Mary Sue had a room for Geek Girls, which was a lovely respite in a sea of bodies. The room had signings and press materials, but also comfy chairs and books to read, and a crafts table to make friendship bracelets. I sat for a while with my knitting, talking to strangers about what they wanted to see and do. Truly a delight. I only regret that, by talking about it, I’m probably encouraging it to be more crowded next year.

Here are my suggestions to make this a better show:

  • Find a bigger venue, or additional venues. Not only was the exhibition floor jammed, and Artists Alley jammed, and various panel rooms jammed, but the hallways were always jammed as well. I didn’t go to any panels because there were lines everywhere and I was overwhelmed trying to figure out which mass of people were lines for which rooms.

The Javits Center is not designed to hold so many people. It was designed – poorly – for trade shows, not mass media events. More space would permit some room to breathe.

  • Set up special areas for cosplayers to change and to pose. It’s annoying to stand on line for half an hour to use the ladies room only to find that the stalls have been full of people changing, not peeing. Similarly, a lot of the clog on the show floor is people posing for pictures and expecting traffic to stop.

If there were special rooms set aside for changing, and special areas for pictures, then cosplayers and their admirers would have enough room to enjoy themselves, and traffic would flow more smoothly.

I don’t mean cosplayers should be segregated. I love seeing them randomly in the crowd (and on the subway). They make the event much more fun.

  • Now that fans are getting the message that harassment is not acceptable, can we teach them other aspects of crowd etiquette? For example, if you want to stop and talk to a friend, please step to the side. A bunch of people having a conversation in the middle of the aisle blocks the flow of traffic.

Maybe stop-lights at major intersections? I don’t know. I just want to be able to walk with a normal gait, instead of pivoting at a moment’s notice.

  • In general, we should remember that we are all humans in this together. Pay attention to your peripheral vision, people.

I get very short-tempered in crowds, but then I’ll see someone I know and be happy again. Klaus Janson talked with me about the blueberries at the Green Market. I brought the world’s most delicious matzo to fellow ComicMixer Marc Fishman and the Unshaven boys. I saw all kinds of creative new ideas for comics and illustration.

And then …

Some oblivious person with a backpack swiped against me hard enough to rip my sweater. My beautiful, one-of-a-kind hand-knit sweater.

Didn’t he know who I am?

 

The Point Radio: AGENTS OF SHIELD And All Things Marvel

We are back with the cast of AGENTS OF SHIELD to talk about how they planned ahead for the events which unfolded in CAPTAIN AMERICA WINTER SOLDIER and what it is like to live, eat and breathe all things Marvel. Plus we start our coverage of New York Comic Con with a preview of some treats you’ll find at the show.

We will be back early this week (Wednesday) with another podcast right before we hit the show floor. And if you can’t make the show, we are carrying LIVE video feeds from NYCC at our website, GetThePointRadio.Com starting on Thursday. Don’t miss a minute.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE on ANY mobile device (Apple or Android). Just  get the free app, iNet Radio in The  iTunes App store – and it’s FREE!  The Point Radio  – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE  – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

Marc Alan Fishman: San Diego – How It Feels To Not Go

My name is Marc Alan Fishman. For eight years now, I have been an active comic book writer, artist, letterer, and publisher. For six years, my company Unshaven Comics has peddled our wares in the artist alleys at dozens of conventions. From the small, such as Kokomo, Indiana, and Orland Park, Illinois, to the large, like C2E2 in Chicago, and the New York Comic Con, we’ve put thousands of miles on our cars in an attempt to break-in to the industry we love nearly as much as our kin. But in all our travels, the furthest west we’ve sauntered was Minneapolis this past spring.

We’ve never been financially viable enough to venture to the Valhalla (or perhaps Ragnarok) of comic book conventions. The San Diego Comic Con is a nearly week-long mecca of geekery. For a small operation such as ours, it stands to dream that selling in the same fabled halls that stars and nerds alike flock to, could lead a sale of The Samurnauts to future fame and glory. Oh, how the mind races at the thought! But with each passing summer, those daydreams dissipate as the deluge of news coats my social media feeds. And here I sit, in the wake of yet another SDCC, ruminating on what it feels like to not be a part of the central hub from which our industry grows from. In short, it feels both amazing and frustrating.

It feels amazing because I’ve little doubt that amidst the choked-with-nerd floor-space there’s a frantic energy that isn’t conducive to how Unshaven Comics does business. We’ve parlayed busy cons, but I have a sneaking suspicion as fans fight for line position to see the Avengers assemble, or catch a sneak peak ten-second look at a movie not debuting for another calendar year there’s little desire to open one’s mind to a brand-new not-known comic, and even less among those few of the 130,000 attendees that are old school fans who are there (gasp!) for the actual comic books the show was originally built around. So I ask rhetorically: how easy is it to grab the attention of them when the entire show is one massive press-conference after another?

When every news outlet, blog spot, and nerd-based industry member is there first and foremost to get the scoop – and leak footage for click-baiting articles – on the stuff that gets them click-throughs, link-backs, and ad impressions… where does that leave artists in the alley? And when the alley itself is studded with industry veterans with well-known names and pedigrees… I say once more with bearded fervor: what chance do three Chicago kids with no known fans west of the Mississippi going to do to garner attention short of faking a medical emergency? Hmm, maybe that’d be a great hook. But I digress.

Simply put, it feels amazing to miss the SDCC because it means I can sit peacefully at home with the Unshaven till in tact. I can sift through all the news releases, teasers, and interviews at my leisure. I can do all of this and smell fresh as the morning dew. Those people in line waiting for a chance to get Chris Hemsworth to wink at them? Maybe not so much.

Which of course leads to why it’s so frustrating that I’m not there, nor have I ever been. The other side to the sword I wield cuts hardest when I realize I am only a spectator and not a shareholder. And to mock the size of the crowds is only to hide the desire to be in front of them. Even if the tides draw fans from the alley away to the exhibitors, there’s simply too many opportunities amidst the show-goers to not catch a few on our hook. And while the economics of it all likely falls no where near profitable when one considers the price of the table, transportation, shipping of merchandise, not to mention meals and other sundry expenditures… a sale to someone new is a sale to someone new. Unshaven Comics exists because of that conceit.

And while I’d lament that it’s not fair to pitch when you’re sitting next to a convention colossus like Katie Cook, much could be gained through smart networking and the camaraderie earned by being table neighbors. Simply by existing alongside those whose work we covet, creates a recognizability to those in power who work their way around the alley. Over the course of our businesses life, we’ve pushed issues on Dan DiDio, Ross Ritchie, and even Mike Gold. Of course, none of them said anything to us after purchasing the issue, but we figure it’s because they’re still in awe. In short: missing the con means missing the sale. And when that sale is the most likely to reach those within the industry we want to sell to? It’s a missed opportunity.

And what lamentation about San Diego would it be if I didn’t mention having to miss out on the Black Panel, and all of the sundry Michael Davis-related ventures. Having only known the Master of the Universe via e-mails and shared column space, I’m at a loss having never shaken his hand in person. And I say this not in jest. In every instance that I’ve been able to break bread with a fellow ComicMixer, it has been a memory saved for the archives. To miss out on San Diego, is to miss out on seeing people I’m honored to call friends.

And with that, so ends this little aside. Another year passes, and San Diego reverts to the whale’s vagina it’s known to be (don’t flame me, Ron Burgandy said it himself). Will Unshaven Comics ever make the journey out yonder to be amongst the gilded nerditry? As loyal Cubs fans utter, the motto remains:

There’s always next year.

 

Dennis O’Neil: The Elevator Compulsion

  • News
  • July 31, 2014

So there I was, in an elevator, being stared at by these huge faces. What or who were they? Well, okay, they were elements of an advertisement trying to get me to consume something – a cable television show, I believe – and if I watched that show it, in turn, would try to persuade me to consume something else. A car? A soft drink? A set of videos that would reshape my aging corpus into a mesomorphic splendor that would make Mr. America shudder with envy? All of the above?

And what the heck were ads – big ads – doing in a hotel elevator, anyway? But, as Hunter Thompson might have said, cazart! Could these visages be, not adverts, but deities? I mean, they were outsized and their gazes did not waver and doesn’t that remind you of someone/thing – a cosmic entity, perhaps? And if so…why were they staring at me like that?

Aieee…what did I do, oh mighty avatars of whatever you’re avatars of and please forgive me for not knowing? Did I not consume enough? (In your infinitude, please remember that my wife and I paid almost fifty bucks for breakfast this morning, but maybe that wasn’t enough?) Then, woeful wretch that I am…did I have a thought? And if I did so transgress, must I wear sackcloth and ashes, or will a Duck Dynasty t-shirt suffice?

Well, maybe these hallucinatory musings were prompted by our watching Noah on the in-room video gadget. (We’re old! What did you expect us to do after dinner, go clubbing?) Or…maybe they weren’t hallucinatory. There is a certain justification for thinking this because the other thing in the elevator that your average Luddite might question was a small television screen mounted just above those face-bearing doors, where it was hard to miss if you were looking forward and it was never turned off. Granted, it was displaying The Weather Channel, which has been a favorite of mine for decades, a destination whenever I, uh…want to know about the weather. But The Weather Channel does run commercials and that makes it at least partly about consumption and money and that, dear auditors, brings us to the finger-wagging portion of the discourse. (By the way, “finger-wagging” is in the dictionary, so spare me accusations of stealing from Stephen Colbert.)

Research has shown that people primed with thoughts of money, even subliminal thoughts, tend to be more selfish than their peers who aren’t thus primed, and aren’t we lagging in science and technology and such brainy stuff and couldn’t a culture of non-cooperation be partly to blame? I mean, aren’t selfishness and lack of cooperation at least fraternal twins? And that television set: don’t continual distractions such as this deprive us of opportunities to heed whatever small interior voices are trying to generate doubts or stimulate curiosity? I don’t know. But no harm in asking.

Think I’m being grumpy now? Then don’t get me started on the plane trip!

TWEEKS: Making the Tough Decisions for #SDCC

HARLEY-QUINN-INVADES-COMIC-CON-INTERNATIONAL-SAN-DIEGO-1-We know this is totally a #FirstWorldProblem, but getting one’s schedule set for Comic Con is really stressful.  With the SDCC app and an Excel spreadsheet in hand, we’re scurrying around the San Diego Convention Center right now in search of scoops (of probably both ice cream and news), but here’s a look at hard tween geek choices that had to be made and some very cool activities downtown.

Martha Thomases: That San Diego Con

San Diego CosplayIt’s that time of year again. All the cool kids are getting ready to go to the San Diego Comic-Con. And by “cool kids,” I mean people who are younger, stronger and more patient than me.

Every year, I kvetch about Comic-Con. And every year, I kind of want to go. I mean, not go to the Comic-Con that will actually take place. I want to go to the Comic-Con of 1993, when I was an important part of a major publishing company and everyone kissed my ass and I could get a table at the restaurant of my choice at the time of my choosing.

I would also like a unicorn, but that’s another column.

Anyway, this year, what I mostly regret is the opportunity to meet my future husband, Chris Hardwick, who is podcasting his program from San Diego all week. Not only would I enjoy meeting him, but I’d like to see the look on his face when he realizes we are fated to be. Either delight or horror, it would still be a treat.

Which, in a roundabout way, brings us back to a subject that has concerned this column all year: The changes women make to pop culture, and the way pop culture is adapting to women.

You may recall my previous columns on the subject (here, for example), that women at comic conventions have a problem with sexual harassment. By which I mean, men and boys harassing them. It’s a big enough story that even non-comics news sites cover it.

Many people want SDCC to prominently post its policy on sexual harassment on signage around the convention, so that offenders cannot claim they didn’t know they were doing something wrong. Others would like to make the policy more specific. Here’s what it currently says, according to the website:

“Attendees must respect common sense rules for public behavior, personal interaction, common courtesy, and respect for private property. Harassing or offensive behavior will not be tolerated. Comic-Con reserves the right to revoke, without refund, the membership and badge of any attendee not in compliance with this policy. Persons finding themselves in a situation where they feel their safety is at risk or who become aware of an attendee not in compliance with this policy should immediately locate a member of security, or a staff member, so that the matter can be handled in an expeditious manner.“

For more about the various arguments, here, in a nutshell is the debate.

Now, I love David Glanzer with all my heart and soul, and there is no doubt in my mind that he is completely devoted to making Comic-Con a fun and educational event for all who attend. I understand that he wants to make everyone who comes to the show comfortable, and this includes families with young children, who might be spooked if they see signs warning about sexual harassment. He might also think it puts ideas in the heads of kids who want to show how great they are at this rebel stuff.

Still, I respectfully disagree. I think it’s entirely appropriate to say that, because of incidents at other shows, SDCC wants to assure everyone that they are committed to a safe and friendly show. And I’d make a big deal about meeting with law enforcement before the show starts, so that if crimes are committed on-site, there is a system in place to get rid of the criminals who assault women and others. For all I know, they do this already. Still, I’d make sure everybody knew.

And, as I’ve said before, I’d have more women as special guests and expert panelists. It’s not easy to stop people in comics from seeing women (real and fictional) as simply sex objects. One step to fix that would be to feature them as talented professionals.

Which brings me to the next huge show on the horizon, New York Comic-Con. It’s still a long way off in convention time, but they’ve started to announce guests, which gives us a hint as to what the programming will be. So far, they have announced a dozen guests in the comics category, and two of them are women. That’s better than last year, when only ten percent of the guests were women, but not by much. I should note that there is also one literary guest announced, and that is Kim Harrison, who is female.

Not enough, but a step in the right direction.

So, if you’re going to San Diego, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair. Wait, wrong city. Be sure to have a great time. Bring me back stories.

And points.

 

The Tweeks Guide to How To Do San Diego Comic-Con Like A Native

sdcc-logoWe bet you didn’t know that the Tweeks are not only native San Diegans, but hard-core Comic Con vets having been attending since they were babies.  In this week’s video they bring you their kid’s guide to the con featuring where to go, what to eat, which panels to see, and where to visit if you weren’t able to snag a pass for all 4 days.

Mike Gold: Of Mice and Cheese

Gold Art 140416Like most businesses, we here at ComicMix have regular senior staff meetings. By “regular” I mean “every week or two” and not “structured.” Last week while we were working on our convention schedule (Glenn to WonderCon, Adriane, Martha, Emily, Evelyn and me at Washington’s Awesome Con, me at C2E2, etc. etc. and endlessly etc.), I wondered out loud “when does the so-called convention season actually begin?”

Adriane voiced Emerald City, in Seattle. Everybody concurred. Well, everybody but me. I suggested “New Year’s Day.”

OK. I’ll admit it. When it comes to comics conventions that have little to do with comics, I’m a bit burnt out. My first big show was Phil Seuling’s hallowed 1969 program in New York, I helped organize the Chicago Comicon and helped run it for its first ten years, and I represented First Comics, DC Comics, arrogantMGMS and ComicMix at approximately one billion shows. It’s possible that Martha’s actually done more of them. So when I parse out my time and energy, I prefer to be at comic conventions that actually have something to do with… you know… comic books. Go figure.

My favorite shows are MoCCA in New York, the Baltimore Comic Con in (you guessed it) Baltimore, and Heroes in North Carolina. These shows are nearly 100% focused on comics. There are others, to be sure, and Emily’s been telling us Awesome Con is, ummm, awesome. I’ll probably know first-hand in a couple days.

My least favorite shows are the big clusterfucks that have little or virtually nothing to do with comic books. At the top of this list, most certainly, is the San Diego Comic-Con. Often, I feel those folks who are interested in comics just get in the way of the autograph buyers and media gawkers. I have no idea how the show continues to justify its tax-exempt status: it’s been years since they’ve bothered with their well-advertised mission statement. And now that the nearby hotels and restaurants caught on to the show, San Diego is a very expensive way to spend the better part of a week.

The people at Reed Pop (New York Comic-Con and C2E2 in Chicago) might have been somewhat interested in the comic book medium when they started out, but now they’re jut a gaggle of San Diego wannabes. I get that: Reed is a business and the best way to make big money at a comic book convention is to load it up with media has-beens and almost-wases and treat the fans and comics dealers like afterthoughts at best. I live in New York and I’m from Chicago and I have a lot of work to do at both shows. But there’s this “diminishing rewards” thing going on, and I no longer attend either show on Sundays. Next week’s C2E2 is up against the Windy City Pulp and Paper Convention, and for those of us who are fans of old paper – including comic books – this is a far more entertaining affair. I’ve done a lot of business there as well, and I have a lot of friends that go there and not to C2E2. That’s where I’ll be a week from Sunday.

I will have been to about a dozen shows this calendar year, so forgive me if I act like my sphincter muscle seems like it’s set to 1000 pounds per inch. I’m a fan of many media, but first and foremost I’m a comics fan. I prefer comic book shows to autograph shows, and I prefer not wasting three hours standing in line to get into a desired panel.

I’m looking forward to Washington’s Awesome Con  this weekend, and ComicMix will be set up and in force. Drop by and say hello. Feel free to tell me I’m full of it and/or that you haven’t been to the San Diego Comicon but you’re dying to do so.

I know how you feel. I used to feel that way, myself.

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