Geek Girls Network Tweet-Up @ Comic-Con

By Gabriel Madrigal

I’ve been attending Comic-Con for many years now and each year brings new surprises. For me, the best part about Con is not the panels, celebrities or costumes. No sir, for me, it’s the nightlife. Making new friends and sharing a drink while discussing the day’s events are where memories are created. So when my wife told us about the Geek Girls Network Tweet-Up, it didn’t take much to convince my group - we knew this was the place to be.

Sponsored by the Science Channel, ThinkGeek & Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab, the Geek Girls Network Tweet-Up flashed an impressive list of notable geeky patrons. But just who is the GGN? Besides being one of the nicest group of people I met at Con, they are, according to their site:

Geek Girls Network™, founded by Kristin Rielly (Publisher), is a resource hub for women who possess a passion, knowledge, and interest for all things “geeky”. Our mission is to provide timely and accurate news, reviews and training, across a broad spectrum of interests in order to promote and encourage women of all ages to embrace their “geekiness”.

The party was great! The room brimmed with wonderful people, great music and fantastic visuals. A DJ played everything from “Weird Al” Yankovic to the Big Bang Theory theme song. The room’s television screens showed montages of geeky movies and TV shows, from Star Wars to Ultraviolet to Venture Brothers and everything in between.

The Tweet-Up sponsors were as welcoming as the hosts and provided bits of geeky goodness to the lucky guests. A trivial contest/giveaway was the perfect end to the evening. We look forward to more events with the Geek Girls Network in the future!

Check out more pics from this great event by going HERE.

Pat's Adventures At Comic Con 2010 - Part One

Getting to Comic Con was a little bit more of a trip for me than it ever has been before. Since the move up to San Francisco only happened about a month ago, and wasn’t really expected before then, I had made absolutely no plans in advance for things like flights down to San Diego, or hotel reservations so that I would have a place to stay once I was down there. Being from Southern California up until very recently, these weren’t things that I had to think about before.

Getting flight reservations were easy enough, but finding an available hotel room within about a 20 mile radius of the Convention Center was nigh impossible with only 4 weeks or left until the Con started. Hell, all of the hotels in San Diego have pretty much all been reserved since about a day after last year’s Comic Con. That left me to begging for couches from my friends who still lived in the area. Luckily, my friend Matt Schier was kind enough to put me up for a few nights.

Thank you Matt. The fact that you live a 2.5 mile walk from the closest trolley stop (and up a big ass hill), were prices I gladly paid in exchange for being able to attend the Con.

With travel and accommodations squared away, it was simply a matter of waiting for the day to come when I could fly down and attend the greatest geek event of the year. The weeks went by thankfully quickly, and before I knew it I was boarding a plane bound for SD. Having never had to fly down to SD for Con before, I was completely amused to find that one could fairly easily pick out who else on your plane was also going to SD for the Convention. At least half of the people on my flight were Con bound, if all of the comic book or sci-fi t-shirts, hats and bags were to be believed. The guy in the “Flynn Lives” t-shirt? Totally a Con Attendee. The girl in the Pikachu beanie? Totally a Con Attendee.

I got into SD late Wednesday night, so I missed preview night. Damned new jobs and not having accrued enough vacation time yet to take three days off instead of two is to blame. Therefore, I didn’t get to the Convention Center until Thursday morning. Things were already in full swing by the time I got there. One of the things I love about Comic Con having gotten so big is that it has spilled out of the Convention center and can be seen all throughout the streets of SD. The moment I got off of the trolley, before I even got my badge, I’m already being greeted by the sight of giant robots.

Suck it Michael Bay, this is how Optimus Prime is supposed to look (sort of). This was a giant promo piece for a new animated Transformers animated series called Transformers: Prime or something like that. I don’t know if the show will be any good or not, but the new Design for Optimus is pretty sweet, so I can’t complain so far.

Once my badge was obtained, I made a mad dash upstairs so that I wouldn’t miss what has quickly become a new Con tradition of mine . . . attending the Fans Guide to Comic Con. Yeah, admittedly I’m biased because my friends Matt, Wes and Jesse run the panel, but it seriously is a great time. If you’ve never gotten to see their panel, you should check it out. Aside from dishing out helpful advice to Con newbies, they also entertain with great jokes and visual aids. The jokes change every year too. One of the things I loved about this year’s panel (aside from the constant Rob Liefeld jokes) were the inclusion of fake quotes from past Con attendees. This was one of my personal favorites:

After laughing my ass off at the Fan’s Guide panel, I headed downstairs to check out what is for me, the end-all-be-all of Comic Con. The exhibit hall floor. Sure, a lot of people come to Con to spend hours waiting in line for Hall H or Ballroom 20 so that they can drool over Johnny Depp or Angelina Jolie or whatever. Those people are fools. The bread and butter of Comic Con has always been the exhibit hall. Nowhere else in the known universe will you ever find a more eclectic mix of awesomeness under a single roof.

I’m not joking here. You can find just about everything on the floor. Are you looking for bootleg episodes of some forgotten cult sci-fi show? The floor has those. Need some new Steampunk gear to add to your costume? Jesus, you had about 20 different booths to choose from this year. Looking for out of print trade paperbacks? Got those too.

The hall has become so massively large over the years, that it now takes me two full days to cover all of it. I’ve learned too that if you don’t approach the floor with a specific plan of attack, you’re bound to miss something. My plan? Start in the 100 isle, and then make a back and forth grid pattern moving slowly down every aisle, making sure to stop at every booth to see what cool stuff they have. You really don’t want to miss any of the cool stuff that you can find on the floor. Missing a single aisle could mean you miss something totally awesome, like this . . . .

That’s right, that’s Ecto 1, just chilling out on the exhibit hall floor. Would you seriously want to miss that just because you were too lazy to walk down all of the aisles? Have I made my point yet?

I’m not exaggerating when I say it takes me two days to fully cover the floor now either. By the end of Thursday, I had only managed to make it to about the 2300 aisle, and the aisle markers go above 5000 now. As I said earlier too, the floor isn’t even all there is to see. The Con has spilled out into the heart of Downtown SD. When I walked outside to lunch, these are a few of the sights that greeted me:

After Lunch, it was back to the exhibit hall for more walking around and finding cool stuff. Marvel had some big Thor thing going on over at their booth. They had even built a giant replica of Odin’s throne in Asgard, which situated in front of giant golden doors that were rumored to hold some big secret from the film. Annoyingly though, the doors wouldn’t be opened until Saturday, so all I could do for now was stare impatiently at them and wonder what wonders they contained.

The day was quickly coming to a close though. Nighttime programming was about to begin. I had a panel I had to get to. Geek-tastic and GeekRoundTable were working together to present the first episode of Matt & Wes vs. The Zombie Apocalypse to a live audience.

How did the panel go? Was the film well received? Sadly, that will have to wait for another post as this one has gotten far too long as it is.

Never fear though true believer. That next post will be up soon. Check back tomorrow.

The same Pat time . . .

The same Pat channel . . .

Flynn’s Arcade Returns To Comic Con

By Gabriel Madrigal

Last year’s big Comic-Con surprise was Flynn’s Arcade – a secret warehouse turned classic arcade which was located a few blocks north of the convention center. And in 2010, to every TRON fan’s delight, Flynn’s was back!

But this time the secret was more heavily guarded. Whereas last year offered tantalizing hints via handwritten photocopies, this year Twitter was the method used to disseminate information to the masses (@operationtron). Attendees in the know could follow the clues and find the secret location. (But between you and me, it was the exact same place as last year at 335 6th Street.)

Every hour, on the hour, 100 tickets where handed out until they were gone. Once inside, the scene was familiar to any fan of the movie. A roomful of coin-operated video game machines from yester-year lined the walls with such titles as Donkey Kong, TRON, and Galaga. Even Kevin Flynn’s infamous Space Paranoids was available for play.

After having your fill of Pac-Man fever, a trap door behind the TRON machine would lead guests down a hallway dotted with movie props. This was all new to Flynn’s Arcade. One special prop, the laser that transported Flynn to the world of TRON, was of special interest to the visiting geeks.

But that was just the beginning. We followed further along the rabbit hole…

Until we got to the TRON: Legacy Lounge.

Behold! A TRON-inspired room, complete with repeat showings of the newest movie trailer, listening stations featuring the new TRON soundtrack by Daft Punk and scattered movie props. All this, and all the Coke Zero you could drink.

For another year, Flynn’s Arcade was my favorite part of Comic-Con. Here’s to hoping the movie lives up to the hype.

Click HERE to view the whole set of photos from Flynn's Arcade

Matt & Wes vs. The Zombie Apocalypse: Episode One

A long while back, some of you may remember this little web comic that my friend Matt and I posted online. It was about two friends who started having an argument about what is and is not a zombie, in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. We thought it was a funny little idea, and we were happy when the people who read it told us they thought it was funny too. That was about all we had hoped for, but then something unexpected happened.

Two of our friends up in LA by the name of Candice and Daniel Landsberg read the comic too, and they came up with an idea. What if that comic was turned into a short film? It would be fairly easy to make. It only required one location, we could get Matt and Wes to play themselves in the film, and we could put it online.

The two of them pushed this idea to Matt and I, as well as to some of our other friends, and we decided to go for it. Another friend of mine by the name of Robert Magness hopped on as writer and director. He wrote a screenplay based on the comic that we all loved, and we started setting dates for filming.

For the zombie special effects, Matt knew these two guys who call themselves the Bloodshed Brothers. Their real names are Zach and Jeromy Ball. They’re haunted house and horror effects lovers who have been building their own amazing haunted houses for years. They have an attic full of fake body parts and they know how to make bloody gore look good. Matt talked to them, and they were more than happy to hop on board and help us bring our zombies to life (or is it undeath?).

At this point, all the lights were green. Two days of filming, and a few months of post production later, and here it is:

Matt & Wes vs. The Zombie Apocalypse: Episode 1 – A Zombie By Any Other Name

That’s right, episode one. We had so much fun making this thing, we just had to make some more. A whole season in fact. We have plans for at least a 10 episode run with this, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled for future episodes. We are going to be shooting the second episode soon.

We really hope you like this, and we want others to like it too. Please forward this to as many people as you can. Spread this thing as if it was a real zombie infection.

If you want, you can also follow the series on facebook, or at the official website for the series, www.mattandwes.com

The Vader Project

By Johann Joseph

I managed to catch the tail end of this awesome art tour. Unfortunately, it was the very end of the tour. All 100 of these Vader masks head for the auction block in July.

The story of the project is a semi-classic tale. Dov Kelemer and Sara Jo Marks of DKE toys got together with their friend Ronnie Goldfinger, from Master Replicas. In 2006 they headed to the NY Toy Fair to meet the rest of the Master Replicas company to discuss their idea. But how do you discuss a plan to ask for 100 1:1 scale Darth Vader masks when all future plans at this point are purely concept?

Well, however they did it, the present day shows that their discussion was fruitful.

Lucky for them there were 100 of these masks that were stored in China that Master Replioca could part with. A production flaw opened the gates a bit. What came next was their "wish list" of artists that they were hoping would participate in the project. And almost all from the original 100 said yes.

Now, here they were in California with 100 helmets in their living room. They sent them out to the artists, and almost as quickly they were starting to get them back. Fast forward to 2007, right before Star Wars Celebration IV. They were asked to show this collection, but due to business decisions not their own, they were without a sponsor. So, creative control, producing and bills all landed on them.

At the time of the Celebration, they had 66 Helmets, all standing in rows. Not sure if the show was going to sink or swim. It was truly a make or break moment for these two. They had 20,000 people walk through the doors over the course of the next 5 days to see this gallery open for the first time. The show then followed the celebration to Europe and Japan, and was even showcased at Comic Con.

Some of the designs became iconic, like the Statue of Liberty designed Vader mask. The tour even went on to a record breaking showing in 2009 at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pennsylvania. That was the history of the show, and now here in the present I managed to snag a copy of the Vader Project auction book. Some of these pieces go from $3,000 to $20,000.

As I walked through the rows of these masks, I was in awe of the artists interpretation of cultural pop (some had George W. Bush and Dick Cheney with a quote "Disturbance in the Force") to just Star Wars themed masks. Amanda Visell had painted hers as the bridge of the Death Star. And Vanbeater designed his mask with a giant hercules beetle-like horn sticking out of the front. Everyone's creativity seemed to be going all out on these masks. Even Jo Hahn of Linkin Park fashioned reindeer antlers on his.

Unfortunately, the gallery didn't have the best lighting, and the masks weren't positioned to get the most optimal shots. I really hope you go out of your way to view the other designs, I wasn't able to take photos of because some were being touched up for the auction and I had a dying battery. But it was definitely something worth seeing for myself.

To see all of the helmets, visit the tour's website at www.thevaderproject.com

Torchwood Is Back, In More Ways Than One

For those of us who are big fans of the Doctor Who spinoff show Torchwood, it's been a tough year. After the critically acclaimed and fan loved third season/mini-series event "Children Of Earth" aired on BBC last summer, we've been left hanging with no definite word as to what was going to happen to the show going forward. The show ended with the Torchwood team seemingly broken up for good. All but two members of the team were dead, one was pregnant, and the leader ran away to space to deal with the guilt of what had to do to save the world. It wasn't exactly a happy ending.

Fans waited eagerly to hear that a fourth season of the show had been picked up by the BBC, but no word came. Then there were rumors of budget cutbacks at the network and that Torchwood may have been one of the many shows that were forced to end their run due to lack of money. It was a dark time indeed, but things were about to get darker.

New rumors of an American version of Torchwood started swirling all around the internet. The sci-fi serial killer Fox was looking at adapting the show for American Audiences. Actor John Barrowman was said to still be in-line to reprise his role as Captain Jack Harkness, but there was word that the character may be changed so that he wasn't as omnisexual (read as "not gay") as he was on the British version of the series. Fans (myself included) recoiled in horror at the prospect that Fox might sexually neuter the show and destroy a franchise that was so loved, like they have so many times before.

The only bright spot for the last year for Torchwood fans was when word came down that Fox decided to pass on the project. Yes, it still meant no new Torchwood was going to be made, but at least Fox wouldn't ruin it either. Nothing is preferrable to Fox tinkering with things.

Happily though, word has come down last week that Torchwood is officially back. And not just in one media format, but in two.

First up, The BBC has officialy announced that an all new season of Torchwood (10 new episodes) has been ordered, but there's a bit of a twist. The new shows will be co-produced with the American cable network Starz.

The 10-episode instalment will be written by a team led by Torchwood creator, Russell T Davies, and produced by BBC Worldwide Productions. Davies and BBC Worldwide Productions’ SVP Scripted, Julie Gardner, return as executive producers with BBC Worldwide Productions EVP Jane Tranter. The series has been commissioned by Controller BBC ONE, Jay Hunt, Controller BBC Drama, Ben Stephenson, and Starz President and CEO, Chris Albrecht.

While previous series were based on location in Cardiff, Wales, this new instalment will see storylines widen to include locations in the U.S. and around the world. John Barrowman and Eve Myles will return in their roles as Captain Jack and Gwen respectively, along with new faces.

Announcing the commission, Ben Stephenson, Controller, BBC Drama Commissioning said: "We have a long history of working with many U.S. networks but it is incredibly exciting to be working with Starz for the first time, as well as to be reunited with the best of British in Russell, Jane and Julie. Torchwood will burst back onto the screen with a shocking and moving story with global stakes and locations that will make it feel bigger and bolder than ever"

To be honest, I don't see a lot to worry about in that statement. Torchwood's original creator (and all around awesome guy) Russel T. Davies is on board. Not only is John Barrowman coming back to play Captain Jack, but Eve Myles is returning to play Gwen Cooper as well. We've got the show's creator, and the actors for both of the team's surviving members coming back. It's not a reboot, it's a continuation of the series . . . . and to top things off, it's going to be on cable, not network TV. That means that Captain Jack's sexual antics are no longer limited by what he can do on Network TV

Oh God. Just imagine what Captain Jack Harkness will be like now that he can do whatever he wants.

Adding an international scope to the show isn't a bad thing either. I would totally love to see how Gwen and Captain Jack deal with having to work with agencies from around the world. It could add whole new layers to the show. Plus, Starz has made some pretty decent shows themselves. I'm still dying for a second season to Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Having them airing a new Torchwood season is fine by me. At the very least, it'll be a million times better than what Fox would have probably done with the show.

It's not just TV where one can continue to follow the adventures of Torchwood though. There's a new comic book series coming out too. It comes out this August from Titan Comics, and it features two stories. One of those stories has been written by none other than Captain Jack himself, John Barrowman.

Barrowman's tale, "Captain Jack and the Selkie," finds Jack Harkness dealing with a remote Scottish island where people are disappearing one by one. The book's second story, "Broken," was written by Torchwood script editor Gary Russell; in this five-part adventure, Jack, Gwen, and Ian get trapped in a cosmic hotel.

It certainly seems that after a long drought for Torchwood fans, the rain has finally come. We're about to get more John Barrowman than we know what to do with, which I'm sure is exactly how he likes it.

Space Prom

By Johann Joseph

As costume themed parties go, everything starts in the parking lot. You can begin to see who went all out with their costumes, who barely put up the ante, and who came to just view it all. But for a space theme, it didn't seem to stop many people from attempting to enjoy this once a year event.

The Back To The Grind of Riverside throws a Prom themed event every Spring, this year was just the best time for any Sci-Fi fan

As soon as I walked in my eyes were greeted with aluminum foil, sparkly sequenced outfits and odd shaped "armor". My costume of Ronald Ray Gun", I will admit, shamed the well thought out costumes of the crowd.

Live bands played inside and sometimes they even came outside to play. Some bandmates dressed as aliens, or were in full suits of gray. There was a display of laser guns on the wall and a "Space Lounge" for techno music down stairs.

I walked up to a few people just to ask them what the theme of their costume was.I got a quote of "A Sci-Fi movie from the 1940's" and a part of my mind got blown. Some people actually had this idea stored in the back of their heads and this Prom gave the opportunity to let their creativity out.

Of course, what didn't need explaining were the Star Wars and Star Trek themed outfits. Some of my personal favorites were a Robotech themed group and Bret from Flight Of The Conchords in his Daft Punk costume.

That was all before 11pm. Then, in walked Sinestro. That's right! The Fear monger showed up!

I have to admit that the written word really cannot compare to seeing these things, which is why it was a great thing that the Space Prom even provided a photographer! We took our Prom photos, as did everyone in attendance. For your visual pleasure, here are some of the photos I took, and some from the Prom group archive.

To see a my set of photos from the event, you can find them at the Geek-tastic Flickr page HERE.

These are only some of the 400+ photos that were taken from the Prom book. To see them all, check them out on their Facebook page

I can't wait to see what next year will hold.