Emily's musings on her first San Diego Comic-Con

Well, my daughter survived her first Comic-Con experience -- in fact, I think it's safe to say she really enjoyed herself, and so did her roommate Colleen, who attended Comic-Con with Em. I asked Em to write up something about their trip, and this is what she sent me, along with all of the photos. -- PL

The Wrath of Con

After months of planning and anticipation, our journey to our very first Comic-Con began very early Thursday morning. We left LA around 2 am, and with hardly anyone on the road, made it to San Diego a little after 4. Since we had been following Twitter updates about the Con, we were not totally shocked to see a line wrapping around Hall H when we arrived at the Convention Hall around quarter to 5 in the morning.



Almost a thousand people were already in line for the Friday New Moon panel: Some were sleeping on air mattresses, some had miniature flashlights and copies of the Twilight books...we even saw one party that had brought their own hookah to the line.



Three Starbucks trips later, we got into another line to get our Thursday badges. This one wrapped around the convention center and extended down the edge of the marina.

Finally, around 11 am, we were herded into Hall H and found seats around the middle of the hall, although there were still two more panels to watch before the New Moon panel began at 1:45. The Disney 3-D20panel showed clips from A Christmas Carol and Tron, but of course the most exciting moment was when Tim Burton surprised the audience by bringing Johnny Depp onstage during the Alice in Wonderland panel. When the Summit Entertainment panel brought the cast and director of New Moon onstage around 2, the screams were deafening.








Even though we were sleep deprived and had been waiting for almost ten hours, I have to say, the clips they showed definitely made it more than worth the wait! It was fun seeing the cast, and listening to their thoughts on the movies, but the clips were really the amazing part. Instead of just showing a trailer or some random part, they showed full clips of two pivotal scenes from the movie. Can't wait to see the movie in November!

After the panel, we checked into our hotel and had dinner with the Mirage team before getting some much-needed rest.

On Friday afternoon, we headed back to the convention center for the TMNT Panel. Thankfully we didn't have to camp out for hours to get in this time, but it really put things in perspective for me to see so many fans lined up for the panel, much like we had the day before. The energy and enthusiasm of the crowd was amazing, and all of the panelists (Gary Richardson, Kevin Eastman, Steve Barron, Scott Mednick, Galen Walker, Matt Leunig, and Llyod Goldfine) did a great job! I even got a little teary-eyed when they first started playing the music and the interview clips came on screen.



Of course, Friday night was the big TMNT 25 party and debut screening of "Turtles Forever". I have to echo everything my dad wrote about the movie in his previous entry... it really was amazing!



Saturday and Sunday were spent mostly wandering around the Exhibit hall...I still don't think we saw everything! We were tempted to buy the Twilight dolls, but resisted in favor of two old school TMNT posters which we will frame for our apartment ("Leonardo Leads" and "Raphael: Cool but Crude") and two t-shirts, a TMNT "Drug Free is the Way to Be" and a "It's Clobberin' Time" with the Thing.

Overall, it was a great, crazy weekend. San Diego is beautiful, and the Convention was ridiculous and so much fun... hopefully we will be back next year, now that we are officially Con veterans. It was great to see the Mirage crew, and to meet all of the many other people who have worked on the Ninja Turtles in all their various forms. And of course, it was a pleasure to meet some of the fans as well!

Cowabunga!
-Emily & Colleen


Here are some more photos from Em and Colleen's first Comic-Con:

Em with the "Turtle Documentary" crew



Em with Stan Sakai



Colleen and Em with Ernie Reyes, Jr.



Mirage dudes with Turtles



Em and Colleen with Turtles