Two Last Cents About C2E2 2012

 

I've been writing about last weekend's C2E2 comic convention and I realize that many of you have no idea what I'm talking about; I have no doubt that many of you are convinced I'm delusional

and are relieved that the wall of cyberspace is safely distancing you from a raving hayfamlunatic. I admit to being fond of the moon, but I'm no lunatic. Let's back up a bit.

In just its third year, C2E2 is a well respected regional convention. It has not yet attained the destination status of, let's say, a San Diego Comicon, but it's growing and getting stronger every year. Attendance records have not yet been released for last weekend, but there were 27000 attendees two years ago and 34000 last year. An estimate of 40000 for this year has been uttered. Those are hefty crowds!

The dates for C2E2  2013 have been announced and, if you'll be making it a destination, I have some advice for you. Arrive early and park in Lot A before it fills up. On two days of this year's convention I arrived a little later in the day than I might have liked and was relegated to parking in Lot B. I guess it's better than being waterboarded, but parking in B is far from a day at the beach. It's also far from the site of the convention. I had to walk about 1 mile to get to convention central, most of it through the wheezing underbelly of the massive McCormick Place convention center. As I trudged that desolate mile I couldn't help but think of Jack Kirby's Armagetto on Apokolips; I took a picture so I could show you the frightening trail. (And I have two words of advice for the C2E2 organizers: Shuttle Bus.)

One things you can't help but see at C2E2 are all the fans that attend wearing costumes; I'll direct you over here if you'd like to examine those. (The dress-up has never seemed so prevalent to me at WizardWorld, Chicago's other big annual convention.) I did snap a photo of a very young Batman flexing and patrolling the convention grounds and you saw it up at the top of this page (don't worry! The boy's dad gave me permission to publish the picture).

By the way, I asked a question of the panelists during one of this year's convention panels. I've written previously about the excellent DC Nation cartoon block on Saturday mornings, and one of the "shorts" that aired on that  Cartoon Network show the weekend of the convention was entitled Green Care Bear. It featured Hal Jordan becoming a Green Care Bear instead of a Green Lantern and the writers totally rewrote his oath and it was funny and excellent in every way. At Sunday's DC Kids Panel I asked: if something clever like Green Care Bears is created for a DC cartoon episode, could that concept then be included by the writers in a DC comic book? The answer from editor  Ian Sattler was: it depends. (You can enjoy Green Care Bear for yourself over here; I am startled to learn that it was not a new production for DC Nation but had appeared previously on Mad TV!)