London Super Comic Con 2013

"In fearful day, in raging night,
With strong hearts full, our souls ignite.
When all seems lost in the War of Light,
Look to the stars, for hope burns bright!"


I went to London Super Comic Con yesterday and this is my write up.  I have changed the text colour to blue in honour of my costume, a Blue Lantern, pictures coming up later!

This post will be long!

I went with 3 friends - a husband, wife and daughter.  They went as Clark Kent, Echo (Maya Lopez) and Batgirl, respectively.  It was their first Con and I'm very happy to say they loved it. They all have an interest in comics but are more casual readers than I am.  The daughter is 12 and was, I think, blown away by everything there.  As were the other two.  I shall henceforth refer to my companions by their costume names because I don't think it's fair to give out real names on here.

We had a few people on our hit list, well, that is mostly my hit list, but when Clark realised that folk who had worked on the Buffy/Angel-verse comics were there so got stuff for his brother, and also that a fella who had written an X-Men comic he just happened to have on him was there, so that was cool.  All of us wanted to meet David Mack because he created Echo.  Clark is himself Deaf and both myself and Echo sign, hence our interest in Mack.

Immediately upon arriving Echo and Clark recognised a friend of theirs, dressed as the Joker, which was cool. Then we went to Simon Furman's table.  He is mostly known for the Transformers comics, from the original run onwards.  My interest in him lies in the Thundercats comics.  I've met him a few times before and he's always been lovely but this time I brought old Thundercats issues for him to sign and explained how important these stories are to me.  We had a chat about the weekly schedule, how he got pulled off Thundercats to write Transformers and how he has good memories of editing and writing Thundercats.  It was a pleasure to meet him.  Here are my comics:

Then we went to Ian Churchill's table.  I don't know what I was expecting but he wasn't it - he was great!  Really down to earth, chatty, pleasant and I really warmed to him.  I talked about my love for this particular issue of Supergirl and he asked my views on the new 52.  I was honest.  He also had a petition to stop shark catching, or baiting or something.  I'm afraid I didn't ask for details but I did sign it, then talked about my job in a conservation charity and he gave me a copy of MarineMan, his new creator owned title.

Then we went to Mahmud Asrar's table and I gushed. Again.  And spent 30 quid on this beauty and 2 sketchbooks.

Then we looked around the rest of the con and went shopping.

I bought a lot.  That's not all of them.  I'll do short reviews of them all over the next week or so.  At one point we found ourselves at Rodney Ramos table and I seriously considered buying a page of either his Transmetropolitan or Green Arrow/Black Canary work.  I didn't.  I'm too poor. Darnit.

What else did we do?  At 12 we went to the Marvel through the ages panel and then left after 15 minutes because it was pretty dull.  Then we went to David Mack's table and my famous lack of social skills came in where I didn't notice the queue and we kind of jumped to the front.  Everyone else - I am so sorry and I am dying of embarrassment.

We talked to him about the Echo and Daredevil characters, and our Echo posed for a photo with him.

We also got stuff signed and bought a copy of End of Days - the issue with Echo in.  David Mack is utterly charming.  He's friendly, gracious, polite, charismatic - he's a true gentleman and it was an honour to meet and chat with him.  I now have quite the crush on him.

Then we went to the Daredevil through the ages panel.  Because our Clark is Deaf, the security staff let us sit at the front so our Echo could interpret for him.  If you sit at the back it's just too damn difficult to hear and you just can't interpret properly.  During the discussion Mack then commented on this and talked about how he introduced Echo and did the Vision Quest mini series.  We are all kinda in love with him now.  Well I am anyway.  A pic of our Echo's interpreting was put on Twitter and facebook and prompted a few people to say it was really sweet.  This irks me - it's not sweet, it's necessary.  A couple of other people also questioned why LSCC didn't provide terps.  But anyway, hopefully this has raised the profile of BSL and Deaf awareness.

Now for the rest of the pictures!

I like the addition of wellies for green boots!

Our Batgirl and Echo, plus a gingerbread Wonder Woman.  I could have done without Ginger Wondy shouting can you see my vagina after the photo was taken though.  Incidentally, yes you can.  He was there with a Gingerbread Punisher.

I am informed by twitter that the lady on the right is Pixie, not the Wasp.  As for Black Cat, I always love Black Cat costumers.

 Cap'n A!

Our Clark, Echo and Batgirl just before the Daredevil session.  Batgirl proudly displaying the Gail Simone Batgirl she bought.

 Zatanna and Ame-Comi Joker, or possibly Duela.  I think Ame-Comi Joker.

 My first Green Lantern - Hal Jordan.

My second Green Lantern, Kyle Rayner, who lent me his light up Blue Lantern ring for the photo.  This one is of my trying to work out how to turn it on.  Fat fingers don't bode well for this sort of thing.  He had a brilliant mask.

 

 Rings ready!

This little Mera wins the convention.  She was adorable. So cute.

 Matrix Supergirl!!

Stephanie Brown and Tim Drake Robin.  I love this Steph. 

 Super best friends forever!  This is our Batgirl and pre new-52, post crisis Kara.

Oh my gosh, this Xena costume was great.  I love her.  I have come away with a crush on a lot of people at this con.  Steph!Robin, this Xena, David Mack.

Thor and Loki.

 This is a lovley picture of us.

 This is me being a massive dork. Again.

 Full shot of Echo.


EDIT - I've found a couple more photos on the interwebs.  G'nort was there!

This guy is the father of Mera and he sent me the picture after seeing my write up here.  Thank you!  I am rather gutted I didn't see him in costume on the day.

I also met Star Sapphire:

So of course got a photo.  That is Jennie Whitwood from Fancy Dresscapades, who I met last year, when she was dressed as Ms Marvel.  You can see more of her photos over on her blog, including her really very cool Gwen Stacey outfit.

 Now I am inspired to do a proper Aquaman costume.  This one:

Not entirely sure how to pull off the armour look though... Thoughts anyone?  When I mentioned this plan to a few other people they seemed a bit surprised...  I like dressing up as male characters.  It feels freer-er.  Like it has less pressure to be skinny and hot.  Having said that, I can't even begin to pull off this Aquaman costume unless I do flatten out my torso a bit.  My legs are fine.  But my middle is still rather wobbly.  Ah well, I have a year to do it.