The
first New York Comic Con was an overcrowded mess that was all but shut
by a fire marshal. The second convention used more room at the Javits
convention center, and did not have too many people because the
organizers limited pass sales for Saturday, the busiest day.
The
show covered nearly all of recorded comics history. King Features
Syndicate, nearly a century old, had a booth to celebrate their
long-running comic strips, some which date from the birth of newspaper
comics. Had you stopped by this booth during the convention weekend,
you could have met the artists responsible for the 21st-century
versions of classic comics such as Prince Valiant, Beetle Bailey, Hi
and Lois, Mary Worth, Apartment 3-G - and even the Spider-Man daily
strip.
Spider-Man
is one of the great New Yorkers of all time, fictional or not.
Co-creator Stan Lee made the city of New York as much a character in
Spider-Man and other Marvel comics as the universe of heroes and
villains he helped to start in the 1960's. Lee is still extremely
active in the industry and was a big presence at the New York show. He
had a traffic-stopping Saturday autograph session on the show floor,
then was the star of a panel where his latest animated series was
previewed. Lee was popular in New York, as always, but there was one
artist who was more popular...
...and
that was Jhonen Vasquez, the young, quirky artist who appeals to a
generation of fans who had not yet been born when Spider-Man was
created. Vasquez' popularity does not lead him to make many convention
appearances - he did slip into Anime Central once - so his Manhattan
panel was extremely popular. It looked as if more fans attended
Vasquez' panel than went to Lee's panel that was held in the same room.
Fans weren't disappointed with Vasquez' unconventional attitude; when a
fan asked why he liked bunnies and mentioned a list of his characters,
Vasquez first corrected the fan and said one of the characters was a
bear, not a bunny. In finishing the answer, Vasquez said "The cuter it
is, the funnier it is when you see something awful happen to it."
For
the last couple of years, we've followed actor Dan Woren, Tommy Yune of
Harmony Gold and composer Scott Glasgow as they've struggled to
complete Robotech, the Shadow Chronicles. Finally, the film is
completed and you can buy the feature through Funimation. That opens a
world of possibilities for Harmony Gold and Robotech; Yune said there's
a chance that more Robotech feature films may be produced with
Funimation, and maybe even a TV series. Fans at the Harmony Gold panel
were extremely interested in Robotech's future and wanted to know if
all of the characters from the original Macross series would return in
future Robotech films. The answer; the more Robotech that will be
produced, the more time the writers can devote to those characters (and
many of those characters don't appear in Chronicles because there's not
enough time).
There
was a big Japanese presence at the New York show. On the gaming side of
the show floor, the big inflatable Pikachu hovered over a Pokemon
display that sold a variety of plush stuff and bags. On the comics side
of the floor, the first booth fans saw was the hometown DC Comics
booth, but TokyoPop was right behind and Viz was next door, followed by
Funimation, ADV Films, Bandai and Manga Entertainment. The Dark Horse
booth was in that high-rent neighborhood, but that company also is a
manga translator. You could see that pattern all over the show floor,
with manga publishers right next door to comics companies. Take out the
anime and manga exhibitors, and the comic con might have been at least
a third smaller than it was.
But
you never knew who would be at the convention. Off in a corner of the
floor was animator Bill Plympton, a legend in the world of independent
films who is known for making cartoons in which he draws every line of
every frame, regardless of the length of the film. You could have
walked up to Plympton, shaked the non-callused had that drew all of
those frames, and then purchased one of those frames from its creator.
Upstairs at the convention center was an all-star artists alley that
included Colleen Doran, creator of "A Distant Soil." While artists'
alleys at anime conventions usually are made of hopeful amateurs, the
New York alley had a bevy of experienced, accomplished industry
professionals. Look closely at the rear background of the Plympton
picture: that's the booth of Archie comics, a publisher that's been
around since 1939 and whose lead Archie series started in 1941. They're
one of the oldest companies in the business, yet they had a small booth
near the back of the floor.
The
first New York Comic Con was an overcrowded mess that was all but shut
by a fire marshal. The second convention used more room at the Javits
convention center, and did not have too many people because the
organizers limited pass sales for Saturday, the busiest day. 
The
show covered nearly all of recorded comics history. King Features
Syndicate, nearly a century old, had a booth to celebrate their
long-running comic strips, some which date from the birth of newspaper
comics. Had you stopped by this booth during the convention weekend,
you could have met the artists responsible for the 21st-century
versions of classic comics such as Prince Valiant, Beetle Bailey, Hi
and Lois, Mary Worth, Apartment 3-G - and even the Spider-Man daily
strip. 
Spider-Man
is one of the great New Yorkers of all time, fictional or not.
Co-creator Stan Lee made the city of New York as much a character in
Spider-Man and other Marvel comics as the universe of heroes and
villains he helped to start in the 1960's. Lee is still extremely
active in the industry and was a big presence at the New York show. He
had a traffic-stopping Saturday autograph session on the show floor,
then was the star of a panel where his latest animated series was
previewed. Lee was popular in New York, as always, but there was one
artist who was more popular...
...and
that was Jhonen Vasquez, the young, quirky artist who appeals to a
generation of fans who had not yet been born when Spider-Man was
created. Vasquez' popularity does not lead him to make many convention
appearances - he did slip into Anime Central once - so his Manhattan
panel was extremely popular. It looked as if more fans attended
Vasquez' panel than went to Lee's panel that was held in the same room.
Fans weren't disappointed with Vasquez' unconventional attitude; when a
fan asked why he liked bunnies and mentioned a list of his characters,
Vasquez first corrected the fan and said one of the characters was a
bear, not a bunny. In finishing the answer, Vasquez said "The cuter it
is, the funnier it is when you see something awful happen to it."
For
the last couple of years, we've followed actor Dan Woren, Tommy Yune of
Harmony Gold and composer Scott Glasgow as they've struggled to
complete Robotech, the Shadow Chronicles. Finally, the film is
completed and you can buy the feature through Funimation. That opens a
world of possibilities for Harmony Gold and Robotech; Yune said there's
a chance that more Robotech feature films may be produced with
Funimation, and maybe even a TV series. Fans at the Harmony Gold panel
were extremely interested in Robotech's future and wanted to know if
all of the characters from the original Macross series would return in
future Robotech films. The answer; the more Robotech that will be
produced, the more time the writers can devote to those characters (and
many of those characters don't appear in Chronicles because there's not
enough time).
There
was a big Japanese presence at the New York show. On the gaming side of
the show floor, the big inflatable Pikachu hovered over a Pokemon
display that sold a variety of plush stuff and bags. On the comics side
of the floor, the first booth fans saw was the hometown DC Comics
booth, but TokyoPop was right behind and Viz was next door, followed by
Funimation, ADV Films, Bandai and Manga Entertainment. The Dark Horse
booth was in that high-rent neighborhood, but that company also is a
manga translator. You could see that pattern all over the show floor,
with manga publishers right next door to comics companies. Take out the
anime and manga exhibitors, and the comic con might have been at least
a third smaller than it was.
But
you never knew who would be at the convention. Off in a corner of the
floor was animator Bill Plympton, a legend in the world of independent
films who is known for making cartoons in which he draws every line of
every frame, regardless of the length of the film. You could have
walked up to Plympton, shaked the non-callused had that drew all of
those frames, and then purchased one of those frames from its creator.
Upstairs at the convention center was an all-star artists alley that
included Colleen Doran, creator of "A Distant Soil." While artists'
alleys at anime conventions usually are made of hopeful amateurs, the
New York alley had a bevy of experienced, accomplished industry
professionals. Look closely at the rear background of the Plympton
picture: that's the booth of Archie comics, a publisher that's been
around since 1939 and whose lead Archie series started in 1941. They're
one of the oldest companies in the business, yet they had a small booth
near the back of the floor.
