Roger Ash & Emma Caulfield

by Roger Ash

I got back yesterday from the Chicago Comic-Con, and boy are my feet sore! I had a great time, but boy, standing on that concrete floor for three and a half days is tough. As some of you know, the Westfield crew – myself, Customer Service Goddess Mary Carter, and VP Brook Anthony – spent the weekend meeting people and giving away cool prizes. It’s always a treat to meet customers in person and to see old friends we’ve made over the years. I thought I’d share some of my adventures over the weekend for your amusement.

Thursday

Brook, Mary, and myself pack up the Westfield van and head to Chicago about 11am for the Chicago Comic-Con (previously Wizard World Chicago, previously Chicago Comic-Con). I was wondering how the convention would be this year as many publishers, including Marvel and DC, decided not to have booths there this year. This area was used for the media guests including some big names (Edward James Olmos, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Ray Park, cast members from Twilight) to ones that left you scratching your head.

Mary and I headed to check into the hotel prior to helping Brook set up the booth for preview night. When we got to the Aloft hotel, we discovered I blundered making the reservations. Luckily, we were aided by an amazing desk clerk who worked some magic and made things OK, gaining my gratitude and my highest possible recommendation for the Aloft hotel. With that taken care of, it was time to get ready for the evening.

Brook Anthony at the Westfield booth

Our booth, oddly enough, was next to a Gillette Fusion booth where people could actually try out the razor. Throughout the weekend, a number of people (including Brook and myself) gave it a try with a few people even shaving their heads. If you’re wondering, it was a darn good shave. Kitty-corner from us was Jon Jordan and the crew from crimespree, a magazine that features interviews with authors of crime fiction (the current issue features 100 Bullets‘ Brian Azzarello),  short stories, and reviews of crime movies and books. We’re thinking of listing this at Westfield. Would this be something you’d be interested in? Let us know! Anyhow, between those two booths we had some good neighbors for the weekend. If you’ve ever worked at a convention before, you know how good it is to have people around you that you like.

Another friendly neighbor who stopped by as we were setting up was George Perez who spent most of the weekend signing and sketching at the nearby Hero Initiative booth. He “killed” Mary in issue 2 of Crimson Plague and I was going to be in the book, but never quite made it. It was nice to see his smiling face again and you could always tell when he was at the Hero booth because the line would get really long really fast. I don’t know how much money he raised for Hero over the weekend, but I’m sure it was a lot.

The evening itself was rather slow. There were not that many fans, although the ones that were there were having a good time. I also heard a lot of grumbling about Marvel and DC not being there with many fans feeling slighted by them. It also seemed empty because a number of the celebrities weren’t scheduled to arrive till Friday and only about a quarter of the people in Artist’s Alley were there. I was hoping things would pick up Friday.

Friday

Friday started slow, but things did pick up pretty quickly. Friday is usually my favorite day at the Chicago-Con as there’s a lot going on, but the crowds aren’t as big as Saturday since Friday’s a work day. This year proved no different. Friday was also when people in costumes started appearing and there were some great ones this year with one of my favorites being the tallest Guardian (y’know, the guy from Oa) that I’ve ever seen. The most popular costume for women this year was Supergirl. I saw little girls maybe 3 years old dressed as her, adults, and everything in-between. The most popular costume for guys is hard to say, but the Joker and Indiana Jones were right up there.

On my walk through the hall, the dealer area was hopping. The dealer area was pretty big this year and I heard reports of people getting some great bargains over the weekend. When I got to Artist’s Alley, it was a huge difference from the night before. It was packed! Creators like Howard Chaykin, J. Scott Campbell, Frank Cho, and J.G. Jones had long lines all weekend long. I took some time to visit with Craig Rousseau (Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Perhapanauts), who had some wonderful new sketchbooks and was hard at work sketching. I also got the newest Joe and Monkey collection from Zach Miller. It’s always good for a laugh. I’ve heard mostly good things from the people who were in Artist’s Alley.

I heard from a friend at the show that the line to get books signed by Guest of Honor Mark Millar was impressively long and his evening panel was a lot of fun.

Roger Ash & Rowdy Roddy Piper

Allow me a somewhat geeky aside: I have a weakness for professional wrestling, especially the guys who were around in the 80s as that was my Golden Age of watching wrestling on TV. So I was excited to see that many wrestling legends from that era were going to be at the show. (I do think there’s a connection between comics and professional wrestling, but that’s a subject for another column.) I got to meet guys like Honky Tonk Man, Ted DiBiase and Virgil, and Bushwacker Luke who was half of my favorite tag team. And meeting the legendary Rowdy Roddy Piper was the icing on the cake. All these guys were incredibly nice and I got the same sort of feeling I get when I meet one of my childhood comic heroes for the first time. My main thought is always,  “Thank you for all the fun you’ve given me over the years.”

Friday was also when the panels began. There didn’t seem to be as many panel as usual, but it seemed like a better mix than in recent years with panels featuring comic creators and publishers (DC and Marvel were represented there even if there were no booths) as well as celebrity guests and things that were just fun such as costume shows. There seemed to be fewer “Here’s how to get into comics” panels than recent years. The only panel I went to, Sunday’s WWE Legends panel, was very well run and very interesting. If you’ve ever seen the movie, The Wrestler, some of what they talked about was eerily similar to what was shown in the film.

The lucky winners of the Hellboy print

I would have liked to have seen more panels, but I was there for work and Friday was a busy day. My voice was shot by the time the hall closed after talking to people at the booth and giving away some great prizes such as a signed Hellboy print. That was my favorite giveaway all weekend because there was a lady in the crowd who was dressed in an amazing Delirium costume who really, really wanted to win it. She didn’t, but a friend of hers did. When he handed it to her as a gift, she actually started crying she was so overwhelmed. It’s such a good feeling to help make someone that happy.

Saturday

As expected, Saturday was busy, busy, busy! The convention hall was packed. It was the hottest day of the weekend with the outside temps in the 90s and humid. And the air conditioning wasn’t up to the challenge. You coulda wrung a gallon of water out of my shirt by the end of the day.

With that many people there, I didn’t leave the Westfield booth too often as I didn’t feel like fighting the crowds. But that was OK as we were hopping. We had what I think was our most popular giveaway Saturday with the giant Bone plush. Man, people love that!

Brook’s family – wife Meg, daughter Lauryn, and son Dylan – came down on Saturday and they had a wonderful time. Everything was fun and exciting to Lauryn and Dylan and if they stopped smiling all day long, I never saw it.

On one of my ventures out of the booth, I had the chance to meet the lovely and talented Emma Caulfield, who played Anya on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. One thing I learned from her is that she is doing a new web comic, along with Camilla Rantsen, Christian Meesey, and Thomas Mauer, that just started called Contropussy. It’s racy. You have been warned.

A long day was capped off by a great dinner with friends.

Sunday

Things slowed down on Sunday which was a nice break from the past two days. There was time for a final lap around the hall to say goodbye to friends. It’s tough saying goodbye, but there’s always a convention right around the corner, so you know you’ll be seeing everyone again sooner than you realize.

The Chicago Comic-Con really had a different feel than it has in the past without a number of the publishers there. Not bad, just different. I heard some complaints about errors in the program such as incorrect or nonexistent exclusive items. However, everyone I talked to had a good time and, at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about. Or is that the Hokey Pokey?

One final note

Roger Ash and Joker Lady

If you’re the person in this picture who’s not me, you forgot to pick up the umbrella you left at our booth. We still have it and will happily send it to you if you get us your address. Simply contact us at help@westfieldcomics.com and put “Umbrella” in the subject line.

Here’s a video wrap-up at we did at the convention. Take a look!