L is for Love?

L is for Love.

Do you know what I love? 

I love being geeky.

I love that in the trunk of my car I have a bag stuffed with mixed polyhedral dice, a few pencils and several types of character sheets "just in case".

I love discussing whether Batman is Bruce Wayne's alter ego or is it the other way around?

And I love Comic-con.

I feel like a literary genius the way I keep tying these posts in to Comic-con.

And by "genius" I mean "hack".

This marks only my second year visiting Comic-con. While there is some doom of the horizon, I'm still glad I went.

Mainly it was the crowd this year that got to me. Not in the particulars of who went - anyone who can go, should - but in the number of people that went. I'm not in an experienced place where I feel comfortable waxing nostalgic about the "good ole days" this being my second year and all. But I can't help but notice how many more people seemed to come this year and the impact that it had on my overall enjoyment.

For example, last year I was able to attend virtually every panel I wanted, I hit up at least 7 of them. Which I assume is a bit of luck, granted; I don’t think that happens every time. But I really had no trouble going from room to room so long as there was a 15-20 minute break from when the last panel ended and the next began. Seats weren't always great but if you’re not in the front row, every other seat was pretty much the same. All of the rooms are decked out with multiple massive TV screens for you to watch from.

This year, I got in to three panels. 2 of which were spur of the moment “I’m tired, let’s slip in here and sit down for a bit” situations. The other one being the only one of interest to me, which was Joss Whedon’s panel. And I only got in to see that because I was snuck in after it started – don’t ask.

On multiple occasions I waited in line 45 minutes before the panel started and missed them because they were at capacity before half the crowd in line was let in. Eventually I found myself often times showing up early to get in lines only to be told that the room was at capacity, AND the queue to get in to the next panel was so full the organizers weren't letting anyone else wait in line.

You couldn't even wait in line anymore.

Let me tell you, waiting in line early and the not being able to get in is frustrating but understandable; there's no reserving a spot, and they don't clear the room after every panel. But when it gets to the point that you get there early only to find that you’re not even allowed to wait to see IF you can get in; that out and out blows.

It's not like panels are ever repeated. Where you interested in hearing Neil Gaiman talk about his craft? Maybe have the opportunity to ask him a question about it? Too bad; 150,000 people have shown up to see him also and he’s only on one panel for the weekend in a room that seats 4,000.

Don’t even get me started on getting something to eat there. Do you know what 5 cafeteria style places on the exhibition hall floor, times seating for 50 outside of each, plus Noon, divided by 150,000 people equals? I believe the correct Mathematical term for that is ‘bull shit’.

Now had this been a unique experience to me then I would have chalked it up to bad luck. But it was an experience I heard echoed by my family and friends who also went. We were all continually denied access to panels because of overcrowding.

What ends up happening is that, in order to catch the panel you want, you need to get into that room a few hours early and sit there, sleep through a couple of panels you don’t want to see, until who you actually came to see, talks. This forces you to miss out on any other talks going on in other rooms at the time and this theoretically prevents someone who wants to see the panels that you are suffering through, from seeing them.

Because of the way the system is set up, doing this is the only way to guarantee a spot in the room.

Maybe they sold more tickets this year, or maybe it was the same as last year, and it just ended up being everyone was trying to get into the same panels. I don't know why it happened but I do know that it's something that needs to be addressed.

As much as I love the Exhibition Hall, the panels are why you go to Comic-con.

Give people the option to sign up online for the panels they want to see, move the venue to someplace bigger, or even offer the same panels more that once throughout the day. Anything to show that they are trying to avoid what happened this year.

GAH!

The whole thing just left me frustrated.

It may be hard to believe but, all of that being said, I still loved my trip to comic-con this year. There's just something about being knee deep in your own people. People who share your passion for things not quite mainstream. People for whom your obscure references are not so obscure. People who probably have a "just in case" bag of dice sitting in the trunk of their cars too.