When the New Orleans Comic Con rolled into town, there was a palatable excitement in the air. The Convention Center was cool to mask the sunny day, with its blue carpet beckoning many exciting sights inside. Considered one of the premier pop culture and sci-fi conventions in the country (which is a fancy way of saying a geek festival), it attracted many different types of people, while featuring very diverse celebrities as well. A guy in front of me in the line said, “I’d, hate to see the line for people without tickets,” which in fact snaked for blocks outside, to give you any indication of the popularity of this event. There were costumes galore, from the popular stormtroopers to Superman. I even saw Darth Vader brush himself up in the bathroom, which was as surreal a sight I’ll likely ever see in life.
One of those was MIA, though replaced by an equally relevant figure. WWE superstar Zack Ryder was pulled from the event, possibly due to Kane breaking his back. But all was not lost, for the Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase graced us with his presence. He’s familiar with Louisiana, seeing as he performed here at the start of his wrestling career. He was a big and burly fellow, though congenial to my request for an autograph, even laughing as I flashed a ten dollar bill at my girlfriend who snapped a picture. Alas, we can’t all be as rich as him, though we may try.
Lou Ferrigno and Kevin Sorbo also manned booths, remembered respectively for their roles as the Hulk and Hercules, two pillars of strength. Later in the day I was able to chat with James Marsters, who played Spike on Buffy and is now the voice of Lex Luthor for the DC online series. He wore a black shirt and had his wavy hair slicked back. If it was bleach blond, it would have been like the bloodsucker was back, which meant I would have run for the hills, if only stopping to chuckle at a snide line. When talking about how he approaches the role of Superman’s bald nemesis, he explained while he clasped his hands in a rolling motion, “As an artist, it’s important to find that balance between love and hate,” which stemmed from the observation that in the Superman/Doomsday cartoon, Luthor does seem to exhibit some sort of affection for the Man of Steel. Regarding Luthor’s current web-based incarnation, which features a robotic exoskeleton and is more gloatingly evil, Marsters says the producers tell him, “Be a dick.”
Actors weren’t the only notable sight. Many comic book merchants set up shop, hawking Silver Age singles and graphic novels. Enrica Jang, the author of Azteca, stressed the maturity of graphic novels….as some people may not realize, comic books ain’t for kiddies anymore. Arthur Suydam, the distinctive artist behind the Marvel Zombies line, also stood by, with several of his prints, including a gorgeous one of an undead Batman that I picked up. Speaking of flesh-hungry rotting corpses, that was the subject of one of the movies screening for the New Orleans Horror Film Festival, “Play Dead”, which chose a fresh protagonist in several canines. They were on site and showed off the efforts of local gorehound directors all weekend upstairs.
There were several rare finds with DVDs and action figures…I was able to scoop up some 90s wrestling PPVS from one stand. The last day noted television actor Adam Baldwin, of “Chuck” and “Firefly”, had a Q&A panel to the open public. The room was full with appreciative fans who had numerous questions for him. When asked what propelled him to play Colonel John Casey, Baldwin gleams that he got to rough up the main character a bit, and then quips, “I like guns.” He also revealed that he considers Jane his “inner child” and that he has been involved in theatre since the 5th grade. He gave away signed Blu-Rays and DVDs to fans he felt asked good questions. And on a final random note, what’s his favorite Subway sandwich? Plain turkey with mayo on it, and a bit of bacon (as Baldwin surveys, “Bacon goes with everything”).
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