A Wonderful Time at Wondercon

Again

By Katherine Keller
April 1, 2007

Does the thought of San Diego Con-zilla leave you wimpering in a corner? (Do you miss what it used to be like?) Would you like to go to a con big enough to draw a diverse mix of industry pros and publishers and still meet a few movie and TV personalities?

If you answered yes to any of those questions, WonderCon is for you.

Friday: 3/2/07

After an uneventful trip into the Bay Area and freshening up at the hotel, Ralph and I, along with our friends Todd and Brandy and their son Chase, hit the Moscone Center.

WonderCon's growth has been so explosive these past three years that I've never attended it in the same place twice. This year it moved into the main Moscone Center — hooray! And, unlike last year, the dreaded Fire Marshall did not have to put a damper on the festivities.

Con staff quickly and efficiently hooked me up with a press badge, and after getting in to the floor, I touched base with friends at the CBLDF, Top Shelf, Oni, and Prism Comics.

I then ended up bumping into (and having a lovely chat with) Howard Chaykin, who ended up introducing me to Patrick McDonald (Mutts) and Glen Gold (Carter Beats the Devil). I was pleased and flattered to learn that Gold reads Sequential Tart. (Later in the evening at the Cartoon Art Museum, I got to have a very pleasant and insightful conversation with him, who in turn introduced me to Gene Colan.)

After we all parted ways, I wandered away and ended up in my home away from home — artist's alley. I stopped and said hello to several old friends and scored a few really cool sketches (including one by Trina Robbins) for the ST sketchbook.

Also, say what you will ~sigh~ about his art, but I'm going to have to give my "takes a licking and keeps on ticking" award to Michael Turner. The guy is bald from chemo, on crutches, and was clearly in some discomfort from time to time, but I saw nothing from him but grace under pressure and smiles and friendly words for his fans.

This year's con had an excellent programming track and I spent more time in panels than I usually do at cons.

Friday Panels

DC Nation Panel

This panel was largely a preview of upcoming DCU titles. I'll spare you the blow by blow recap, since that was done in-depth at other sites weeks ago.

I made Newsarama by asking the question.

Quote of the panel: "They stay the same. They're stuck in amber, that's the point!" — Judd Winick on superheroes.

Tony Harris Panel

This was an interesting to me, and I feel I got a good insight into Harris's creative process and personality. He talked of breaking in and how he got shredded at the Marvel booth early on and how that motivated him to try harder, but also pissed him off because criticism should always have a constructive element to it.

He also has turned down chances to storyboard and has cut back on cover work in order to allow himself to focus on Ex Machina, which is his true passion right now.

Quote of the panel: "If you can do believable dialog sequences, the action sequences are cake."

Saturday 3/3/07

I spent a good chunk of time on Saturday morning hanging out with Steve Lieber and talking about art and creativity. Steve also sold me three really beautiful Gotham Central pages. Really, I hadn't planned to buy art at WonderCon, but when faced with such temptation (and in my budget!) how could I refuse?

Saturday Panels

Gene Colan Panel

After seeing some of Colan's original pencils at the Cartoon Art Museum (so beautiful! so expressive!), I eagerly looked forward to this panel.

Like many Silver Age panels it was moderated by Mark Evanier, whose encyclopedic knowledge of the era makes it a real treat ... he knows how to ask questions to get the creators to reveal where the bodies are buried.

The panel covered a broad range of topics, from working with Stan Lee, to theories about page design and composition, the frustrations of looking for an inker who could really "translate" his pencils (this being before technology allowed cheap and speedy reproduction of pencils), and the fact that he would have liked to have worked more with Steve Gerber on Howard the Duck because it was so funny.

Quote of the panel: "Everything I've ever done in comics has been highly influenced by film."

Vertigo Panel

Though Brian K. Vaughn and Pia Guerra were in attendance, the main thrust of the panel was to talk about upcoming Vertigo projects.

Quote of the panel: "With great power comes great opportunity."

Matt Wagner Panel

This panel took place at the end of the day and pretty much ran until we were told we had to leave the building. Matt Wagner covered a wide range of topics: his creative process; his creations; the differences between his work on Mage, Batman, and Grendel.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of Grendel. Dark Horse plans to bring back many long out-of-print Grendel stories (the Comico stuff — finally!) and this push will culminate in a new eight part Hunter Rose Grendel story. Wagner said that he felt the new Hunter Rose story "needs to be something important, not just a caper." Behold The Devil will focus on the fact that Hunter Rose was an obsessive diarist, but we know that something caused him to rip several pages from his private journal. Behold The Devil tells that story.

On the subject of Mage, Wagner said, that yes, there will be more Mage stories, but he cannot write Mage until the spirit literally moves him.

When asked about working in film, Wagner replied, "Film isn't my medium." While he is heartened by the fact that Hollywood is no longer trying to "fix" the comics properties they develop, at the end of the day, it's just not his love or his passion. Later in the panel, he touched on why he loves comics so much, and why he finds the medium so compelling, when asked questions about his page design and layouts. "A panel is a panel, but it's also part of a page." From this he went on to say that a film happens to you but you happen to a comic, that comics are instinctual and interactive in ways that film is not.

Quote of the panel: "Mage is me looking outwards, Grendel is me looking inwards. Batman is me peeking in the neighbor's window."

Sunday 3/4/07

Sunday was almost entirely spent in panels with a few bursts of frantic running around to touch base and say my goodbyes. It's also the day I happened (shortly before the close) to bump into Peter Beagle and Connor Cochran (Beagle's manager). Ralph and I ended up buying three autographed copies of The Last Unicorn DVD.

(As an aside, as many of you know, Beagle is raising money to begin court proceedings to recover rights and money owed him. New Line Cinema has very generously sold him many Last Unicorn Anniversary Edition DVDs at cost. He then sells them for $25, signed in three places and personalized. It's a great deal, makes an awesome present, and helps a good cause.)

Sunday's Panels

CBLDF Art Jam.

Artists were: Matt Wagner, Terry Moore, Judd Winick, and J.H. Williams.

While the artists were drawing away (and hot damn! is Terry Moore fast; he was the first done) there was a presentation and Q & A session about the fund and its current cases, including the Gordon Lee case.

The CBLDF raised enough money to cover about two hours of legal costs in the Gordon Lee case.

Girls Kick Ass

Due to the length of the CBLDF panel, I arrived at this one about 10 minutes in.

I enjoyed this panel because it had some good, lively, discussion of what makes a female character strong, and touched on the fact that it's not just physical prowess or "ass kickery" in combat that makes a female character strong, that strength is not always equal to masculine aggression.

On the topic of the roles of female characters, author Ellen Klages talked about how she has always enjoyed the villainesses in Disney movies, because they were powerful, independent women, unlike the princesses, who "were there to get rescued."

Quote of the panel: "I don't want my characters to pull mega combat skills out of a handbag." — Vicki Patterson

The Art of the Cover

This panel was hosted by Mark Evanier, who chose five covers from each of the panelists at random. Panelists were Nick Cardy, Gene Colan, Phil Jimenez, Al Felstein, Michael Turner, and Tony Harris.

Any panel where you see Phil Jimenez gush at Gene Colan about how good he is is pure gold. This was my favorite panel of the con, largely because it was fun to watch these artists ooh and ahh over each other's work, ask questions, and tell stories of what went into the creation of these covers.

For example, Gene Colan was talking about how much he hated word balloons on a cover, that they distracted from the art, and that, "If there's a word balloon on it, it's a bad cover". One of his featured covers had word balloons on it and Colan talked about all the ways that he should have changed the cover to make it more dynamic, at which point Tony Harris interjected and said, "Mr. Colan, there is absolutely nothing boring about that cover."

Al Feldstein had several audience members (and panelists) giggling away as he talked about the process of getting his covers approved without changes to them ... he happened to be the Art Director and the EIC.

Quote of the panel: "UPC codes should be abolished from the front of comics because they absolutely destroy the composition." — Tony Harris

Over? So soon?

San Diego is the con for which one must train like its a major fitness event, and by the time Sunday evening rolls around, you need a vacation from your vacation.

I didn't feel that way at all about WonderCon. I wanted another day of it.

I love the new facility. It's spacious. There were several places on site to buy food, decent places to eat it, and some of the food choices were actually healthy.

This year's programming track rocked. I'm normally not much for going to panels at comic cons, but if I had gone to everything I put a mark down next to because it looked interesting, I would not have made it the convention floor.

But don't take it from me or this "scratch the surface" con report; I highly encourage you to experience the awesomeness for yourself at WonderCon 2008.

WonderCon — Official Site