Having attended six San Diego Comic Conventions at this point, I found it fairly easy to groove along with the crazed hordes, outlandish booth displays, and astounded first-timers in order to have as much fun as humanly possible and pick up the few items I was looking for. This was actually to be the first SDCC I attended where I had a legitimate weekend pass, so I figured I’d get in plenty of time in the dealers’ room and attend of a few of the big-name/big-deal creative panels I usually skipped and simply read about when I was back at home.

As luck would have it, I managed to pick a year where there wasn’t much big-name stuff to cover. Or, more to the point, there’s nothing I’m prepared to get too excited about. But I’ll pretend to be enthused for your sake, faithful reader! Yee haw!

Me eating a hearty breakfast of taco bell friday morning, after sadly discovering Taco Bell won't carry the baja blast mountain dew soda anymore. *sadness*

V for Vendetta panel

This one I wanted to attend because Natalie Portman was going to be there, and because V for Vendetta is, in my blasphemous opinion, the only worthwhile and interesting thing Alan Moore ever wrote. Sure, Watchman is a fully realized world teeming with characters and an impressively and very tightly plotted story, but I think it’s fairly over hyped and too cynical and depressing to be enjoyable. Therefore, it is lame. Believe it.

V for Vendetta, however, is cynical and has a few depressing moments, but is much more interesting (especially to rebellious youth such as myself) and optimistic than the rest of Moore’s oeuvre. That said, I have less faith in the film adaptation than I did for The Matrix Revolutions the moment the end credits of The Matrix Reloaded began to play.

I wish I could say the footage of V for Vendetta made me second-guess my doubt, but I can’t. See, I couldn’t get into the panel. I went to get into Hall H and there was a huge line. I figured, okay, I’ll let all these idiots get in and then I’ll come back, because with the multiple huge screens in there I can stand at the back and I won’t care. But then I came back and there still a line. I don’t know if people were psyched to see film footage or Portman, but all I know is I didn’t get in until after Portman had left the stage, after they had moved on to some other stupid movie (either the next Harry Potter or maybe The Fountain), and after they had given out all the V for Vendetta’s Guy Fawkes-inspired replica masks that V wears in the film. Great; no wonder I was finally able to just walk right into the place without having to stand in a line. Maybe I’ll just buy the $200 DC Direct resin mask? Maybe not.

Battlestar Galactica panel

I think I’ve seen about two hours total of all the new Battlestar Galactica mini-series and ongoing series. I do like what I’ve seen, though. What’s really bizarre is that Katee Sackhoff is a cool Starbuck in it, because I remember seeing her in the otherwise-awful Halloween: Resurrection and thinking “Wow, she’s hot and cool in an unusual way, and that probably means I’ll never see her in anything again.” Wrong! Yay for Katee Sackhoff and yay for me!

The Stargate SG-1 panel with Ben Browder, Beau Bridges, Christoper Judge, and Amanda Tapping

Furthering the theme of bitter disappointment that was beginning to run through this year’s SDCC, Katee was stuck in traffic or something and didn’t attend the portion of the Battlestar panel I saw. But all the other actors were pretty cool, so that was okay. That Baltar guy has really cool hair. And who knew the guy who plays Apollo has a crazy accent in real life? Whoa! They talked about stuff I didn’t understand, and so when I started to feel hungry I just left.

There is a happy ending, though: later I was standing at the Sci-Fi Channel booth when all the Battlestar cast came in for a photo-op and meet-and-greet with raffle-winning fans, and the cast walked by me. More importantly, Grace Park (who is hot) walked right by me, and then when I went over to a volunteer to get a free breath mint container with “Stargate SG-1” printed on it, Katee Sackhoff came in and we had significant eye contact. Wow! I think it was more the cool shirt I had on than anything me, but that’s life.

That’s also half the fun of the SDCC: you pass celebrities on a fairly regular basis and only occasionally know it. Bruce Campbell passed within two inches of me and we exchanged smiles, and I encountered John Landis on about five different occasions (though I consistently forgot to thank him profusely for the greatness of Animal House. Stupid me!).

Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis mega-panel

This was the one my mom was like “Take some pictures at!” because she loves Stargate Atlantis. They had the SG-1 panel first, but it was funny because I snagged a seat in the second row of the HUGE room (hint: just boldly stride up to the front of any auditorium or lecture hall, because you never know who had to leave to go the bathroom, leaving their vacant seats for you to take) so I was able to see all the Atlantis people come in and wait and watch the SG-1 until it finished.

They didn’t really anything to share of interest on either show: it was more to talk about “Ooh, Ben Browder is dreamy!” and “Amanda Tapping has a huge chest thanks to childbirth!” Which is fine by me, except for the Browder part. Well, who am I kidding? Ben Browder is dreamy. It is funny that Jason Momoa, the guy with dreadlocks who is joining Atlantis, is really, really tall. That’s probably pretty cool. And the guy who plays McKay on Atlantis is a big Doctor Who fan. That’s always cool to hear about anyone!

The Stargate Atlantis panel

Veronica Mars panel

Veronica Mars is one of the coolest characters ever, and the show is a fabulous detective story. Especially for people like me, who grew up reading Encyclopedia Brown and liked the stories but also wanted a little more Sally Kimball action. They softened Veronica’s character near the end of the season to accommodate a (mostly) super-happy ending, but the entertainment and quality was consistent throughout, and that’s a plus. Kirsten Bell couldn’t attend, but all the guys were there, as well as Charisma Carpenter, who is joining the cast next season. Someone asked Carpenter who she would be playing, and she answered: “A bitch. In a bikini.” Awesome!

The only stuff they really mentioned show-wise was that Veronica is kind of back in the 909 lifestyle as the first episode rolls around (which might shed some light on who was at the door at the end: Duncan or Logan) and that what happens in the first episode will provide the season-long mystery that Veronica will grapple with, so expect more of the same from the second season of Veronica Mars. I’m not sure if Rob Thomas was kidding or not, but he also let out that Keith Mars will first be seen on Larry King Live talking about the book he wrote regarding the Lily Kane murder, so that the Mars family will have a little twinkle of celebrity when we see them again. Awesome!

Transformers

this wasn’t a panel. This was a big mock replica of Optimus Prime in big truck mode, and cleverly had a big black tarp covering most of it. But it was still fairly impressive to see it and go “Hey, that’s Optimus Prime in truck mode! Maybe they will pull it off!” At the roped-off Prime replica they were giving out free passes for a sneak preview of The Island that I figured might be fun, but when I got over to the theater more than a hour ahead of the showing the line was wrapped halfway around the block, and let me tell you: city blocks in downtown San Diego are huge. So I passed on that, went over to Horton Plaza for an early dinner, and managed (with some slight trickery) to get into a free sneak preview of Stealth. So I was happy.

Joe Flanigan and Rachel Luttrell from Atlantis looking cute

Superman Returns panel

I guess in the grand scheme of things, this was the biggest film panel of this year’s SDCC. You could argue that King Kong’s was bigger, with Jack Black, Naomi Watts, and Adrien Brody showing up for that one while it was just Bryan Singer at Superman Returns’, but as far as I’m concerned Superman is it. That is: I think Superman was the big news, even though I sincerely doubt the movie will be fantastic and don’t really care much anyway (I was always more a Batman guy).

But Bryan Singer was cool: clearly downtrodden from jet lag and the looooong flight from Australia, he fielded about 40 minutes or so of questions from geeks before he showed us the cobbled-together Superman preview that was so nice they showed it twice. And it was okay. With John Williams’ iconic theme playing and Marlon Brando’s dialogue playing over the action (Singer confirmed Brando would be briefly in the new film, but implied it might be a split-second or so), the action looked interesting, but seemed to suffer from the same sort of coldness Singer’s X-Men films did. Which isn’t to say the X-Men films weren’t fun comic adaptations, but they certainly powered down all the mutants and had villains whose grand plans were either (1) far-reaching yet somehow appeared to be small-scale in the execution (X-Men); (2) potentially globally-devastating yet curiously robbed of tension or any emotion at all, really (X-Men 2). That’s how Superman Returns looks.

A lot of Clark realizing the world has moved on in his absence, Lois Lane attempting to look like a strong Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter while being sabotaging by being portrayed by actress Kate Bosworth, Superman attempting to look like the Superman of comics glory while being sabotaged by an oddly-colored costume and by being portrayed by Brandon Routh (who looks okay as Clark but looks not very Super), and Lex Luther not having any lines or anything but looking cool, mostly because Kevin Spacey was willing to shave his head and just have fun with it. So on the downside, 95% of the Superman cast looks horribly miscast (whoever’s playing Martha Kent looks okay), Singer’s self-proclaimed loyalty to the Superman comics/cartoons/programs of the 40's and 50's apparently means shooting the film on sets that look very blatantly like film sets (think Dick Tracy), and the attacks on this film that claim it’s simply trying to emulate the Spider-Man series seem to have been validated by an over-emphasis on Lois’s conflicted feelings towards Superman and way too much James Marsden in the trailer as the father of Lois’ child (I don’t know if they’re married or just engaged).

In fact, Singer mentioned that while part of Superman Returns deals with the idea of if the world needs a savior or not and if it’s better for a potential savior to either leave forever after making his mark or never show up in the first place (interesting), another part of it is what happens when “old boyfriends come back” (not interesting). Keep in mind this is all based on a few minutes of footage that I saw and Singer’s comments, and filtered through my cynical and weird Superman appreciations (which is to say I liked the old Christopher Reeves films but don’t revere, and I remember liking Superman III [yikes!]). The upside: for attending, I got a free little pin of the new Superman logo. Woo hoo!

Such was another SDCC. By Saturday afternoon I was pretty burned out, especially as this certainly seemed to be the most heavily-attended con I had been to in my six years of attending. I think a lot of families and San Diego teenagers with nothing better to do just show up to check it out, which is great, but also furthers the emphasis of “pop culture” over “comic books” at the SDCC. Some people would say that’s a bad thing. But I say: whatever gets me the most free stuff! Anyway, if you ever plan to attend plan ahead to stay hydrated and don’t get too overwhelmed by hatred for gimpy humanity when you’re stuck in a non-moving sea of people checking out the life-sized Conan throne. I was so out of it I checked out and headed off to eat Fatburgers at Pacific Beach rather than stay to see a free set by Tenacious D, so that should let you know just how crazy the SDCC can make you. Still, I hope to see you there next year. It’s awesome!