First Time Perspective

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to walk into the San Diego Comic Con for the first time and face it's 45,000+ people? Personally I've been going to the Con for over a decade, and come to think of it I'm gone to the fewest cons of all the people working this site! So, when I encountered a first time attendee in the line for autographs Stargate SG-1's Michael Shanks I asked her if she would share with all of us her impressions.

Impressions of Comic Con San Diego, 2001, or...
Darth Vader's in the Crosswalk, and isn't that The Tick?

by Adele Shakal

I know a little bit about comics, because I read a bit of anime and graphic novels. I know a little bit about midsize gaming conventions, because I have friends with that addiction. I know a little bit about science fiction fandom, again, mostly from friends. None of these prepared me for the event which is the San Diego Comic Con.

It's *huge*. Any dealers room with aisle numbers into the four or five digits is startling for the uninitiated! I was thrilled that I had remembered to wear comfortable shoes.

A local friend of mine had convinced me (after two years of wheedling) to drive down from Los Angeles this year. She had previously introduced me to some wonderful woman comic artists, like Roberta Gregory, Colleen Doran, Diane DiMassa, and Donna Barr. Their work is pretty hard to find in small comic shops, so she thought we'd have better luck at the con.

A few days before, I had found out that Michael Shanks, a Stargate SG-1 actor, would be attending, who rarely if ever does public appearances. I don't collect autographs and have never felt the need to meet anyone affiliated with any shows I've enjoyed, but there's a first time for everything...

Why did meeting him feel different for me, you ask? Over the past month or so I have discovered and then devoured all the SG-1 I can find, thanks to the season one DVDs, and it's rekindled my desire to *learn*. I've always been interested in geology and ancient studies, though I've been sidetracked over the past decade. I'd thought that this fire inside me had spectacularly burned out into a smoking singed charcoal lump, way back during my bachelors studies!

But here I am, up to my ears in heiroglyphics and cuneiform, signing up for online and correspondence courses in ancient languages and archaeology, starting to plan next year's vacations to volunteer with collection cataloguing or a dig or both, and realizing that returning to grad school is no longer out of the question... and I can't point my finger to any recent single cause except SG-1. Very strange, I know!

SG-1 has been a very entertaining impetus, pushing me back onto a track I had wandered from. The show doesn't get all its physics, anthropology or mythology right all the time, but it is science *fiction*, after all, and they make a remarkable effort. So, in gratitude, I've been writing thank-you notes, working my way down a list of creators, producers, actors, writers... and here was an opportunity to deliver a thank-you in person. I'd already mailed most of the other actors' notes.

I promised myself I wouldn't go through with it unless I could manage not to babble at him, and if the line was already overflowing with over-enthusiastic fans swamping him, I would just back out and mail the note. His was the most difficult to write of all of them that I have done so far, not only because of his character's academic specialties, but also because the character tends to bounce back from increasingly daunting setbacks without giving up his optimism or his fascination with life. Sometimes that is hard-won, but it keeps stubbornly reappearing. Most geeky academics I know don't realize their own capability for recovery or re-energizing once something goes wrong or they burn out, and I had felt that way for years, for a variety of reasons. I don't feel that way any more, and I'm not sure if it was simply the passage of time or a combination of inspirations that really made this click for me.

I had driven down to San Diego on Saturday morning, and since finding parking was more challenging than my local friend had predicted, we arrived in the con registration area mid-afternoon, picking up our badges and then wandering around the vendor room.

I hadn't realized that the masquerade party was Saturday night, and kept being startled by people in costume walking past. A very tall Darth Vader was the first one I spotted, crossing the street to one of the parking areas, but inside the con I bumped into lots more, including storm troopers and Jedi, Harry Potter's classmates from Hogwarts (complete with messenger owls), the "Buddy Christ" from the movie Dogma, and various superheroes including a very tall, very blue Tick. People put a lot of effort into those costumes!

We found the MGM/SG-1 booth, and it had a big sign (up above a fellow in a Jaffa costume passing out postcards) saying that Shanks' appearance would be *in* the booth. That couldn't possibly have worked, and they hadn't put additional information up; an updated poster would have been useful. I saw lots of SG-1 merchandise for sale in the booth, most of which I believe is available through MGM's SG-1 website superstore at http://www.stargate-sg1.com/.

In any case, I figured that all of the autograph sessions were probably in the single large autograph area upstairs, so I left my friend wandering in the vendor area with a promise to meet up later.

In the autograph area, there were a bunch of lines and overflow lines. The information booth staff in the center looked really tired, but were helpful in pointing me in the right direction. I found the right overflow line, and started to overhear people talking about the little blue ticket situation.

As I understand it, there was a big misunderstanding about who could and could not get autographs: over the course of the week, apparently the MGM/SG-1 booth in the vendor room was handing out little blue tickets. They only passed out 500 of the tickets, since they didn't think Shanks could sign more than 500 autographs during the time of his appearance, without his hand falling off or running out of time or whatever. I don't know what their criteria was for handing out the tickets, perhaps you had to buy something at the booth?

Apparently, at the start of his appearance, the security and support staff told everyone that did not have a little blue ticket that they could not get an autograph, and couldn't even wait in the line. This was kinda rough on people, because the 500 tickets had already been passed out by that point.

I decided to hang around, and by a little after 4pm, the overflow line was accepting people without little blue tickets, but if anyone who had a ticket showed up, they moved ahead of us. I chatted with some cool folks in the overflow line, and met some people passing out enlistment applications for new official SG-1 fan club. More information about that is now online at http://www.lightspeedfineart.com/stargate.html.

We were warned that Shanks might not do autographs past the 500 number total, and that if the end-of-appearance time rolled around, he might be tired out and simply call it a day... everyone around me was either really quiet, or really patiently vocal about understanding that. A group of us kept stating how mellow we were, and that we appreciated the chance to wait around, even if things didn't work out as well as we could have hoped for, and that seemed to reassure the support staff. I thought they seemed rather sympathetic since we had been patient and hadn't made a big deal out of it, just letting people with blue tickets move ahead of us with smiles and a little envy.

Eventually, even though more people with blue tickets showed up and bumped us back a couple of times, the overflow line had few enough people in it that the support staff let us start moving into the regular line even if we didn't have blue tickets.

By the time we got nearer the front of the actual line, some rather daunting security folks started asking if we had tickets. We answered that the overflow line people had told us about the situation, and that we didn't mind waiting no matter what happened. Some of the sales staff told us that to stay in the line, we'd have to buy something if we didn't have tickets, and no one objected at all.

The line wound up and down between dividers for a while, and the way that it was set up, you got fairly close to the signing table and then farther away again and then back again a few times. That may have been done on purpose, to help everybody keep from getting completely tongue-tied when we actually got up to the table!

I spotted Shanks trying surreptitiously trying to rub writers cramp out of his hand a few times. By that point he had to have signed at least 400 autographs if not more, and he wasn't just writing his name, he was paying attention to special requests from what I could see. He was seated at the table, and would move his hands under or behind the table to try to work the kinks out without attracting too much attention. He was smiling and laughing with the fans and the support staff most of the time.

The autograph table was selling three different 8x10 photos (one black & white, two in color), bigger posters, and ballcaps. They may have had other stuff, but that's what I noticed. Lots of people were having their photos taken with him, and I saw at least one woman go around the table to stand next to him for her photo rather than having the table in between them.

I think I was in line for about two hours... but I got to chatting so much that I kind of lost track of time. I'd never been to a big con of any kind before and I'm sure it showed. We watched the line for the masquerade party start to form across the room from us, and it grew really really big really really fast! Someone said that there were between 40,000 and 45,000 people at the con on Saturday, and the masquerade room max capacity was only 4,500, so I'm not sure how that was all supposed to work. There seemed to be multiple lines and some color of tickets involved. It struck me that the con info packet should include more orientation information about ticket and line protocols for clueless newbies like me!

I'm not sure, but I think that by then that Shanks had already done more than had been agreed to, either by the autograph numbers or by time... or was close to it. But he was still going strong.

I was one of the first batch of non-blue-ticket people to reach the table. I bought one each of the three photos and tucked them into my bag, confusing both the blue-ticket-taker and the sales staff, who had gotten into the habit of just passing the photos directly down the table to him for signing... I explained that I was only there to hand him a thank-you note and to say thank you in person, and that I hoped that wasn't too much trouble. They seemed a little confused, but let me go ahead in the line. I figured that buying the photos ($40 total, in cash) probably smoothed the way considerably, but I don't know for sure since I'm not sure how this sort of thing is supposed to work, never having done it before...

The staff folks asked me a few times, "are you sure?" and "really?" and I'm pretty sure that some of the people in line with me thought I was nuts, too, since I didn't even have a camera with me... many of the folks in line seemed to be fairly hard-core autograph collectors, with binders of sleeve-protected photos and cards.

When I got to to him, he seemed very personable and a little tired, but seemed to have been enjoying himself. There was a pile of dead markers and a pile of new markers sitting on the table beside him, which made me even more glad I wasn't asking him for anything at that point.

As it was, I nearly backed out of the whole thing. Part of me still thinks it was crazy to have waited in line to hand a card to an actor who doesn't know me at all, but SG-1 has really affected me in a very positive way, and it did feel right doing it...

I managed to very briefly say what I wanted to say without tripping over my words too much, which felt pretty good. I closed the quick conversation by shaking his hand and wishing him safe journeying home, and walked away. I don't know how much longer he stayed or if everyone else in the line behind me got to talk to him or not.

My lasting impressions: His smile is even more warm in person than on screen, and he has a nice handshake, even after signing hundreds of autographs.

All in all, it was a good experience for me, and from what I saw, the rest of the crowd, too. I *sincerely* hope Shanks can say the same.

I'm still mailing out the last of my thank-you notes but it felt really right handing him his in person. I plan on continuing to write my letters, and I encourage everyone else to do the same while waiting for the other SG-1 DVDs as well as possible future seasons and films!

I met up with my friend, and we ogled the masquerade line a bit, because by that time, there were a lot of people in impressive costumes standing there. We wandered back to the vendor room for a little while, taking notes of booths we wanted to return to on Sunday, and then left the con to hit the Gaslamp Quarter for awesome Creole food.

On Sunday, we arrived early in the day but still had an adventure finding parking. I can only advise that writing down where you are parked will come in handy at the end of the day!!

We spent the rest of the day browsing the art gallery and the vendor room. We were able to meet Brian, Wendy, and Toby Froud at their booth. I've always been a big fan of Jim Henson's work, and the Frouds were instrumental in creating Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal, two of my favorite movies. Seeing their work up close was truly amazing.

I managed to keep to my budget in the vendor area, which was even more amazing... we didn't find many of the comics we were searching for, but I did pick up information packets from the Friends of Lulu who run http://www.friends-lulu.org/, and I bought a copy of Dignifying Science, a graphic novel about women scientists, for my cousins who are just entering middle school.

I enjoyed seeing the stuffed-animal dolls of gods and goddesses in the Stuffe & Nonsense booth, and they had some nice Egyptian-themed jewelry that snagged my friend's attention! Sheri Rohrbacher's crystalline prints at the art show called to my inner mineralogist. And I had a fit of giggles when I saw T-shirts for sale saying "Stop laughing, computers are cool now!"

It would have been nice to see more gender-neutral booths in the vendor area; I like some adult art, but what was available was mostly very targeted toward male audiences... where are the luscious drawings of the male form for us? All we get is muscle-bound he-men ready to hunt monsters, with the one notable exception of the LA Williams' LAW Studio booth, who had a few beautiful prints.

All in all, I had a great weekend. Next year, I think I'll brave more of the panels and special movie and anime viewings, since I was a little too overwhelmed this year to plan ahead to attend the ones I would've wanted to see. This big con is about far more than just comics!