I have made a bold statement there in the title considering this particular convention has yet to take place, but bear with me. Rogue Events bring you Asylum 12 – an unofficial convention for fans of the TV show Supernatural. Taking place from the 16th – 18th May at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel, Birmingham, this event is one that I insist every UK fan must attend.
The reason I am so sure that it is going to be awesome is because I attended Asylum 10 last year and it was a weekend to remember. The difference with these conventions is everyone attending is there for one reason – they are fans of Supernatural. Every attendee shares a common love for those the Winchesters, Castiel, Crowley and the rest. And for that reason there will be an atmosphere of mutual appreciation otherwise known as fangirling (and fanboying of course). If you are a fan then I guarantee there will be no instance of you not understanding the references made in talks or not laughing at that inside joke, it’s a refreshing experience. For the entire weekend you walk around with a secure sense of belonging.
Why are Rogue Events conventions so good? Well let’s start with the guest list for this particular event. First of, and one I am particulary excited about, is Jared Paldelecki otherwise known as Sam Winchester, one of the two leads in the show. It is not very often that the UK are blessed with the attendance of a lead from a current hit TV show. Next up is the king of Twitter, Misha Collins, I was present at his talks at A10 and the were amazing, he is so funny and genuinely happy to have been there (plus he told me my hair was awesome, he will be mine one day) Also attending is the the most prolific actor in geekdom, Mark Sheppard, a little grumpy in real life, I’m just saying don’t mess with this guy, he will take you down with a witty remark that will also be entertaining for everyone else present. I am very much looking forward to meeting Amanda Tapping, Stargate alumni and all round geek girl hero. Other guests include Sebastian Roche, Jim Beaver, Ty Olsson, Osric Chau, Gabriel Tigerman, and A.J. Buckley.
Jared Paldalecki
Misha Collins
Amanda Tapping
Mark Sheppard
Jim Beaver
Osric Chau
Sebastian Roche
Ty Olsson
A.J. Buckley
Adam J Harrington
All guests take part in the Q&As, photo shoots and signings, some even do artists lounges where a few attendees get to spend some quality time with the guest of their choosing.
On the Friday and Saturday these are themed parties (included in the ticket price) where people are encouraged to dress up, this events themes are Friday Tube Party and Saturday Zombies vs Humans. Click on the pictures for more information.
Friday night
Saturday night
The ticket price is a little steep at £108 for the basic package, but when you consider that what is included, it feels you get a lot for your money.
Guest Interviews & Panels
1 Free In Person Autograph from all regular attending guests
Access to the Vendors Room if available at the event
Fancy Dress Themed Discos on Friday and Saturday nights
A Souvenir Booklet, lanyard and Convention Badge!
At A10 at no point did I feel I didn’t get my moneys worth, it’s a lovely package that ensures you get to meet most of the guests attending, though there are some that require extra payment which can be purchased on the day.
You can save money if you are willing to share your picture with a friend.
The biggest plus about this event is the venue. Unlike most convention halls or arenas, there are no secret tunnels for the guests to travel to the various rooms, no, they walk right along side everyone else. You can be standing there minding your own business and Misha Collins strolls by – at one point during A10 he was playing Twister with a bunch of fans in the lounge area. This was an amazing experience and some what surreal. However, being a girl gives you one massive disadvantage, my husband met several of the attending guest in the toilet and broke all bathroom etiquette by engaging them in conversation – he also had a bit of a bromance going on with Ty Olsson. It was awesome.
I highly recommend the Asylum events for Supernatural fans but here is the bad news – Asylum 12 is sold out. I know, you’re disappointed but don’t lose hope my friends, Rogue Events already have tickets on sale for Asylum 13 taking place from the 17th to the 19th of October in Birmingham. You can purchase your tickets HERE.
To all those lucky enough to have there tickets for A12, I shall be covering the event for Geek Pride so please come and say hello, I’ll be live tweeting during the event from @geekpride1 and would love to talk to fellow attendees. I’ll look like this:
No, Skynet hasn’t taken over yet (though if Captain America: The Winter Soldier taught us anything it’s that villainous organizations are insidious bastards, so we might never know if it had happened already), but Matt Smith has joined the franchise that made the famous bad guys…well…famous.
It seems that he’ll join the cast as someone with a strong connection to John Connor. I don’t know about you, but that leaves me with more questions than answers and I can already feel the theories building up. Hopefully the information that his role will grow in the second and the third movie of the promised trilogy is true, and he won’t die in his first five minutes of screen time, because shock value aside, that will do nothing more than piss me off and I’m sure other whovians (who will undoubtedly watch his franchise hopping as I will) will share my sentiments.
We’ve already learned that Emilia Clarke and Jason Clarke (no relation) are going to play the iconic roles of Sarah and John Connor, but Matt’s role is still shrouded in mystery. It’s a good publicity stunt, because let’s face it, now the internet will be scoured by the fans of both the actor and the Terminator franchise, that are looking for clues left, right and centre, and the anticipation alone will guarantee people’s curiosity and presence in the movie theatres. Alas, we’ll all have to wait until July 1st of next year to learn more (assuming they will manage to keep his role a secret for a whole year, which let’s face it, it’s a tall order in this day and age).
Are you excited about this news? I am, since I am a big fan of Matt’s, but given Terminator’s track-record as of late, I’m not sure it’s something I should be happy about. I guess time will tell.
I could see the convention center right there. It was so close. I was almost there. I could see people in cosplay. I was stuck in traffic. How on Earth did I end up with this kind of luck during my first event I have the privilege of covering?
“Just jump out here. I’ll park the car.” My husband says as we get a little closer.
I tuck and roll, almost literally, but I was in the drivers seat so had to switch drivers and adjust seats…. in the middle of downtown Honolulu during rush hour traffic. I immediately bolted for the front doors of the convention center. I felt like Frogger weaving in and out of cars and nearly losing my life to crazy drivers. I’m sure they thought I was jut as crazy for jumping out of my car in the middle of the highway though. If I survived the trek to the building, it would be worth it. I was covering Kawaii Kon 2014.
I survived! Whew! Now were am I going? Oh yeah… I needed to pick up my badge so I could actually do stuff here. But there’s the dealers room. There’s artists alley! Oh my gawd… There’s the rebel camp. Squee! Storm Troopers! Focus Brittany, get your badge. Right. To the registration table. OK cool. Got it. Now what to do first…
If I hadn’t gone online and looked at the schedule, I might have been completely overwhelmed by the amount of stuff to do. Day one of any convention is usually rather slow, especially at 3:30 on a Friday afternoon. Not Kawaii Kon. They had something for everyone. My first stop was The Introduction to Doctor Who panel. I got distracted, a lot. I was only going two rooms down from the registration table, but leave it to me to get lost on my way. I ended up on the 4th floor where they had all sorts of other cool workshops going on. None of which I was familiar with. Here’s a secret, I’m not an avid anime person. I have seen a few decent ones but I have always been more interested in the cosplay and artwork rather than the actual anime.
I found the Doctor Who room. They had already started by the time I got there but I still found a seat in the back and sat down. There were fez’s and 3D glasses galore in the audience which told me I was surrounded by fellow Whovians. What I thought would be a boring panel of Doctor Who fat ramblings, turned out to be a series of pretty cool YouTube videos and informative lectures. It was definitely a “beginners” guide to the Who life, but still pretty cool. A must see for any Doctor Who fan, new or old.
I wandered for a while after the panel. I just wanted to look at the cosplay and absorb everything I was seeing and everything offered. One room was doing a panel on Parents who cosplay. That was a very awesome thing to witness. Ever wanted to cosplay but also give your children an experience of a lifetime? This was where you learn the first steps to doing so. One family even dressed their kid up as Nibler from Futurama.
Artists alley was quite the buzz every time I walked by, naturally I was drawn in. Now keep in mind that Oahu is very small. We aren’t a huge island and the population is only 953,000 people, 80% of them live in the city. Even though we don’t boast a huge population, artists were everywhere. I had no idea that there were over 30 anime themed artists in Waikiki alone. Only a fraction were represented but the talent was exceptional. There was everything from custom costume makers to “get yourself drawn as a character” artists. There was a very informative weapons booth where I spent a good 30 minutes just looking and handling the various weapons and getting little demos from the owners. Even if the artists alley was the only thing I saw this year, I would have been happy.
I spent way too much time looking at art and comic books and had about 5 minutes to get to my next adventure. I was going to try speed dating. Yes I know I’m a married woman. My husband even reminded me to take off my wedding ring before I got in line. After everyone verified they were over 18, we went in the room. This was going to be fun. I met at least 40 guys in just under an hour. We were only given a minute with each of the people who came over. They were all very interesting in different and unique ways. This was an ingenious way to meet people that share similar interests and goals in life. There was the guy who “gloved,” I didn’t know what gloving was until I met him. The amount of military in cosplay was a surprising statistic on this demographic. I don’t think the rest of their units knew about this side of them. As I looked around the room during the little breaks we got, I could see romances blossoming all around me. It was pretty cool to see everyone in an environment where they could be themselves and feel absolutely no shame for it and to not be judged by it. It made me wish the whole world was as open and accepting of differences. I truly hope that at least a few people found love that night.
I left Kawaii Kon that night with a new appreciation for people and anime. As I left I could hear the ButiShake party going on in one of the ballrooms and knew that people were having fun. Karaoke was still going strong in another room and the gaming room never calmed down. Day one of my Kawaii Kon adventure was over. Now to prepare for Day 2.
It’s another cartoon animal this week, this space rabbit has been fighting against the evil Toad Empire since the early 80’s in comics, and in his own TV show through the 90’s, it’s the fearless captain of The Righteous Indignation, Bucky O’Hare!
First up, this image from Marcotte. Great pic, love the background and shading, but most of all love the steely expression on that battle-hardened bunny face!
Next up, this image from Brendan Corris, part of a brilliant series he did with Bucky characters. I love this style, it’s got a bit of a Ren & Stimpy feel to it – could have been a very different show if it all looked like this!
A great pose and semi-realistic Bucky here from Royce Southerland. I always liked the weird balance of cheery kids cartoon with colourful animals and desperate battle for freedom against the oppressive Toad Empire in Bucky, and this one serious hard-hitting, freedom fighting space rabbit. This is how I would like a Bucky reboot to look – imagine how badass Deadeye Duck would be!
Ok, next for a bit of variety, and cause I have much love for pixel art, here is Bucky making a cameo appearance in Minecraft courtesy of Woodyman. He’s got some great Minecraft art over on his site, but this cute little Bucky sprite is my favourite.
For my final piece, after much deliberating, I’ve chosen this pic from Michael Mayne. It’s a great blend of cartoon and realism, I love the dark shading and the level of detail is very impressive! Also, this is one of those images that makes me want to pick up a pencil again and gives me a bit of inspiration to draw – always a good thing!
Congrats and thanks to all my featured artists, keep up the good work – mutants and aliens and toads beware!
Turns out there is some really good fan art out there for Bucky, (and also some really questionable art for Jenny) and I could probably have made this into a Top 10 feature. Feel free to link to any you find in the comments – there’s some great stuff out there!
If you have any suggestions for characters you would like to see featured here please comment or send us a message!
“Phosphor’s DayZ killer.” That’s what Rock, Paper, Shotgun called Nether. It’s a bold claim. Ever since the DayZ mod came swaggering onto the Internet, boldly seizing the survival horror crown, a whole host of competitors have sprung up, from the truly abominable WarZ (now hiding under the name of Infestation: Survivor Stories) to more developed titles like Rust. The mod even garnered enough attention to merit its own standalone game, reviewed here. So when a claim like “DayZ killer” gets put out there, it’s quite a challenge. Because while the standalone is currently underdeveloped and the mod does have a whole host of problems, that mod still represents a possible pinnacle of the genre which it seems to have brought to fruition. So, does Nether have the balls to commit matricide? Not quite but it gives its progenitor a damn good drubbing.
I got stuck between two tents for 20 minutes
You see, the problem with the DayZ mod is that rather than focus on fixing all the issues with the original mod to present a whole entity, the legions of modders decided it would be better to just keep making more and more mods, endlessly expanding an already, sometimes painfully, broken game. This means that when a title like Nether steps up to the bat, they do so with one big advantage and one big disadvantage. To their credit, they enter the arena with a proper, fully developed game created by and for a professional studio as opposed to a for fun modding collective. On the other hand, this collective approach has meant that the DayZ mod is massively expanded and can offer a large range of approaches to the game within a wide variety of situations and environs, a feat that’s hard to replicate within the confines of a studio effort.
And, perhaps predictably, it’s a feat that Nether doesn’t pull off. Now, it must of course be borne in mind that I have been playing an advance copy, beta version of the game but, as an indicator, I just don’t think it can pull it off. Though full studio development does have its advantages, it just can’t replicate the scale of a modding community’s frenzied efforts to pull things off that a studio would never consider for a whole host of reasons. So I respect and like Nether. For what it is, it’s made a considerably strong effort and, in fact it’s not even the game’s problem that it’s been described as such. Obviously it is inevitable, as I’ve proven, that such a game will draw comparisons to its strongest competitor but I don”t believe that this is what Phosphor was necessarily setting out to do. Particularly as, while Nether may indeed fall into the same broad genre of survival horror, it is in actual fact, a fairly different game from DayZ. I mean, if nothing else, let’s take a look at the game’s titular monsters.
I immediately regret my decision to go outside.
Teleporting. Bile spewing. Musclebound. There are a couple of types of Nether. Did I mention the freaking teleporting? In fairness, the teleport patterns are fairly predictable and it’s not too hard to beat the more basic types. But when they start grouping up and spitting black goo in your eyes and there’s one of the freaking huge, tank like types on the horizon, you tend to start avoiding the creatures whenever possible.
The freaky bastards claw like a bitch when they hit you and, rather than just finding guns,there is more of an emphasis on crafting so it’s not uncommon to find yourself running around with whatever blade you’ve happened to come across or buy. The katana is pretty good. Even the basic butter knife you spawn with works in a tough spot. But I highly recommend getting a gun as soon as possible. Not because of the Nethers though. Because of quite possibly the single greatest threat in the game
Players.The game’s tagline is “Prey or Pray”. Clearly I didn’t pay enough attention in Sunday school because I was most definitely the other players’ bitch.
One player killed me after pursuing me for a weirdly long time given that all I had was the basic spawn gear. He must have felt truly triumphant as he swung his machete to cut down the dude with a butter knife. The other two player deaths I simply assume were player kills because I never saw or heard a freaking thing. So either it was some kind of game glitch or I was headshotted by players I never saw. Either way, it was readily apparent that trying to peacefully go about my way scavenging for gear was not going to work out as well as I hoped. My first clue should probably have been the tribes.
The immediate regret of wandering into this room
Nether employs a tribal system in which players can join tribes and then compete for control of buildings across the map. Dominance obviously provides perks as the greater control over the environment allows you to explore more safely, utilising team work for greater protection when scavenging, thus ever improving on your current gear. The important part is that competition bit though. While I haven’t yet managed to properly involve myself in tribal conflict, it is an interesting dynamic to throw in. The true enemy in any post-apocalyptic situation, more than somewhat tragically, is always your fellow survivors. You can learn to avoid monsters or predict their patterns. But you can never quite predict that bastard sniper in the towerblock.
I’m King Of The World!
Though, speaking of towerblocks… See that image there? On the left? That’s a player hand-gliding. Because that’s a thing in Nether. This isn’t even an essential function or core item by any means, I just think it’s cool as balls that I can hurl myself off of skyscrapers and gracefully glide through the air, soaring like a majestic peacock. Like, the amount of in-game money that this thing costs is so negligible compared to the awesome factor. It’s a goddamn hand-glider. Those pesky Nethers can teleport all they want, I’m just gonna flip them the finger as I glide above. You know, before quickly putting the hand back on the glider because you really shouldn’t try to steer one of these things single handed.
I may have become sidetracked. But here’s my closing comment. Put hand-gliders in DayZ. Seriously. On another note, Nether is pretty damn good. I think Rock, Paper, Shotgun somewhat overstated the impact it’s going to have as it suffers from certain limitations it’s competitor doesn’t (the delivery missions especially seem like they will become more than a little repetitively boring) but, taken aside from that, Nether delivers a promising experience that is sure to get even better as it comes out of beta and into the fully formed version of a game that delivers on interesting new enemies, a wonderfully rendered world and flight. Welcome to your new apocalypse.
On the PC, it was the game with one the best titles in years. Controversially known as Stealth Bastard among the master race and Stealth Inc. to everyone else, the 2012 indie platformer managed to accumulate over 1 million downloads across the PC, PS3 and Vita and was the winner of the 2013 TIGA award for best action-adventure. In a similar way to Hotline Miami and Super Meat Boy, it struck a chord with a Metroidvania fanbase who still feel nostalgic about a time when most games were as tough as fuck as there was no such thing as a memory card.
It’s perhaps slightly surprising then that Curve Studios have today confirmed that Stealth Inc. 2, will be released later this year and exclusively on the Wii U. In an official announcement, the London-based developer have promised that the game will heavily expand on the world of the original and offer a new co-op mode that takes full advantage of the Wii U’s unique GamePad controller.
There is absolutely no doubt that the Wii U in serious need of some more exclusives but what with Nintendo’s dodgy DRM systems on the eShop and a much smaller install-base compared with rival platforms, I’m slightly sceptical of this decision. The GamePad could add an extra dimension to how the game plays though and based on Curve’s reputation for quality, we’ll look forward to trying it when it releases later this year.
Disney Interactive today announced the first major upgrade to it’s behemoth title Disney Infinity… and it’s time for the geeks to rejoice! Marvel Heroes and villains will be making their way to the title, as well as the PS4 and Xbox One.
The trailer itself is rather awesome – starting the same way the teaser does with Captain America‘s shield bouncing around the Disney Infinity world… only this time Cap catches his trusty Vibranium disk, and the carnage unfolds.
Now to me this is excellent news – I’m a huge Marvel fan, and I’m a gamer… plus I quite enjoy Disney Infinity. However what really got me excited were the little things I recognised and the other characters I noticed within the trailer itself. Have a watch here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEsH3CDXvKU
Character-wise I’m loving the inclusion of Loki, Groot and Rocket Raccoon… the gameplay looks great with Hulk using cars and smashing… well… everything. M.O.D.O.K too… it all looks rather awesome. I’m hoping the characters come thick and fast too as there’s such a plethora of choice – I really hope that Disney don’t just stick to characters from the recent movies, and we see some of the more unusual characters (Deadpool please!!!).
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Loki & M.O.D.O.K make an entrance
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Rocket & Groot tearing it up
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What do you think? Do you like the look of it? What do you think to the style of the characters? Comment below!
It has been confirmed that the British actor Bob Hoskins sadly passed away in hospital on Tuesday after suffering with pneumonia.
The Oscar-nominated screen legend is probably best known for his role as the sleuth Eddie Valiant in Who Frames Roger Rabbit but over 20 years ago, Hoskins was also responsible for bringing gaming’s biggest icon to the big screen in a film that has since become a notorious example of why movies based on video games are usually a bad idea.
Released in 1993, Super Mario Brothers featured Hoskins as the immortal Italian-American plumber and pitted him against rival King Kooper, played by Dennis Hopper, in an alternate universe where the dinosaurs were never made extinct. The film was a massive commercial failure and Nintendo have denied any requests by Hollywood to dramatise their IP’s ever since. In 2011, Hoskins told the The Guardian that he considered Super Mario Bros to be the extreme low point of his career and that if he could change the past then he wouldn’t have done it at all.
Hoskins retired from acting in 2011 after being diagnosed with Parkinsons disease. His family have asked for their privacy to be respected and we offer them our condolences at this difficult time.
For the second year running, Geek Pride were given the opportunity to attend Wales Comic Con at Glyndwr University in Wrexham, North Wales. Whilst it may not be quite as widely known as the likes of the London and Manchester events, it’s fast becoming one of my favourite UK conventions in the calendar. Now in it’s seventh year, Wales Comic Con has grown from a small event seeing a few hundred like minded folk at the venue to a hugely popular convention that welcomed thousands through it’s doors. This year, being my third at the event, really upped the game in my mind and was a great experience to be a part of.
As we arrived at the venue, we were greeted by the familiar gigantic queues at the doors, waiting for them to open. Like many events, Wales Comic Con offers an early bird ticket, allowing entry from 10am rather than the 11am general entry, which really is a must for any fans that don’t want to be waiting outside for a long period of time. Since Geek Pride are super awesome and we were on the press list, we were able to walk straight through to the press area and were even allowed access before the doors opened, which was a really interesting experience. As expected with any convention, the main hall is always absolutely jam-packed, although I do applaud the organisers this year on spacing things out more and moving the entrance away from the hall to avoid a rush as people get inside.
Walking into the main hall, which was empty apart from the arriving guests and their event assistants, was a weird, but very cool, experience. As soon as we got inside we bumped into an almost bemused Jesse McClure, star of Amercian TV show, Storage Hunters. Jesse was an absolutely lovely guy and was more than happy for a quick interview, which will be up on the website over the next few days. We then turned around to spot friendly convention favourite Mark Addy, who you’ll hear more about in my Game of Thrones interview later this week. That’s right, I’ve got an awful lot of transcribing to get on with.
Over the past few years, the event has had some fantastic guests on offer. Being a massive Buffy dork when I as younger, some of my favourites in the past have been Anthony Stewart Head in 2012 and Nicholas Brendon last year, along with many of the Game of Thrones and comic artists at the event. This year did certainly not disappoint, with a huge variety of guests on offer from TV, film, wrestling and the comic universe. I felt that the organisers excelled this year in particular with the comic artists that appeared at the event, which is always one of the highlights for me. Some of my favourites at the weekend include the lovely Neil Edwards, Andrew Wildman, Stephen Baskerville, Liam Shalloo, Lee Townsend, Henry Davies and John-Paul Bove. I’m aware that’s quite a list, but all of these guys really were great and very kindly took the time for a chat and even to sketch for us – more on that later. However, my biggest highlight at the event was getting to meet and interview the fantastic Charlie Adlard, artist for The Walking Dead comic series created by Robert Kirkman.
Neil Edwards sketching for us.
Adlard’s appearance at the event was the one I was most looking forward to and I was filled to the brim with fangirl excitement after I got in touch with him an arranged an interview for over the weekend. I’m a huge fan of The Walking Dead and Adlard’s artwork in particular and there’s no doubt that he was the most popular guest at the event. Offering autographs for free and original sketches for only £10, which would be donated to charity, Adlard’s queue was most definitely the biggest I’ve seen at Wales Comic Con over the past three years. Eventually, the organisers had to actually start giving out tickets for folk to join the queue once their number was called out. I’ll refrain from babbling on about him for now, make sure to check out my full interview with him on the website over the next few days.
An unusual request – Howard the Duck in Rick’s hat.
Along with the excellent artists on offer, Wales Comic Con hosted quite a variety of stars from film and TV. From Game of Thrones, Red Dwarf, Battlestar Galactica and Atlantis regulars to stars of The Hobbit, Lost Girl, Harry Potter and much more. Some of the bigger names there included Kenny Baker (R2D2!), Warwick Davis, Alison Mack of Smallville and TV favourite, Jonathan Ross. Make sure to check back later in the week with my Game of Thrones cast interview and coverage of the An Audience with Jonathan Ross Q&A. Many of the guests were involved in photo shoots as well as Q&As, which as always, were incredibly popular. There were also wrestling legends on offer, including the hilarious Rikishi, who’s cheeky grin and shouting ‘hey girls, I see you smiling at me’ left us in a fit of nervous giggles. Marc Silk, who refers to himself as the ‘voice guy’ is always a familiar guest and another that was absolutely charming to talk to. Silk is most known for his work on Johnny Bravo, Scooby Doo and with Disney, but the list really is endless. In fact, the only guest that it wasn’t a pleasure to meet was wrestling ‘legend’ Vader, the only person to shun our calendar because he apparently doesn’t agree with donating to charity.
It’s not all about the guests though and there were plenty of other things going on to keep folk occupied. An Owl Santuary, Gaming Bus, car displays and wrestling ring were all found outside which offered a chance to get away from the ever busy main hall. A great selection of stalls were on offer this year with all sorts for sale such as comic books, memorabilia, clothing, jewellery and table top games. We caught up with Wrexham store 4th Planet Games before the event kicked off who had set up a table-top gaming area to offer attendees the opportunity to purchase games and then play them straight away. The shop is relatively new and this was their first convention, but they seemed busy enough later in the day!
As as expected, cosplay was extremely popular at the event and I was rather disappointed that I had opted out this year. However, after spending all day in a Totoro Kigurumi last year in the rather warm main hall, I was rather glad that I had decided against it. This year, people had finally started moving away from the typical Harley and Joker costumes to something rather different. A popular theme at the event was Frozen, with several Anna and Elsa pairs wandering around. The Alien Loves Predator duo returned and some of my other favourites included a very cute little Link, Jon Snow & Ygritte and the puppet from the Saw franchise. That guy was so dedicated that at one point in the afternoon we spotted him in a queue for the burger van, still sitting on his tricycle. Make sure to check out our full gallery on Facebook!
Overall, Wales Comic Con 2014 really was excellently organised and I felt that everyone was very accommodating with us. One thing that I would like to see in the future is more guests donating their autograph and photograph fees to charity, which a couple of people were doing this year. Charlie Adlard’s £10 donation for an original sketch, which covered everything from zombie wedding photos to Superman and Howard the Duck, was such an amazing bargain and I’m hoping that he’s set a trend. Adlard, along with Jonathan Ross, were signing for free and had both commented that they did not feel guests should charge for autographs. However, I certainly wouldn’t mind parting with the cash if I knew it was going to a good cause, so it would be great to see that take off over the next couple of years.
Now, you might remember that towards the end of 2013 the Geek Pride team got together to shoot a Charity Cosplay Calendar to raise money for Cancer Research UK. The calendar was shot at a studio in Manchester by Geek Pride overlord, Matt Geary and sold online to the lovely people that donated money. Well, I wanted to take something with me to Wales Comic Con that I could try and get signed in order to auction off to raise more money for the charity and what better than a copy of our fabulous calendar. Now, I wasn’t too hopeful with this but I thought that we could get at least a few people on board to autograph the cover for me.
I was completely overwhelmed with what happened when I took the calendar with me on Sunday. I began by explaining my plan and asking comic artist, Neil Edwards (Marvel & DC), if he would sign the front for me. Instead, Neil opened the calendar and began sketching Superman on the first page whilst I stared open-mouthed in awe. This really set a trend which saw Charlie Adlard, Stephen Baskerville, Lee Townsend, Andrew Wildman, Liam Shalloo and Henry Davies also sketching for us. Not only that, but we got plenty more autographs on the front from other artists, Game of Thrones cast members, Kenny Baker, Marc Silk, Rikishi, Jesse McClure and Norman Lovett.
I’d like to thank everyone that took part in signing or sketching for the calendar, as well as helping to share it on Facebook and Twitter. So far I’ve had Charlie Adlard, John-Paul Bove and Liam Shalloo help spread the word, along with friends and supporters of Geek Pride. The calendar is now being auctioned on eBay with 100% of the sale going to charity; 75% will go to our original charity Cancer Research UK, with the remaining 25% going to The Sophie Lancaster Foundation as a thank you to my cameraman for helping to achieve this, with him being a supporter of the charity.
Please help by spreading the word or even putting a cheeky bid on the calendar! It has 20 autographs/sketches and images of each sketch can be found on the listing.
So, that’s my rather lengthy Wales Comic Con 2014 round-up and now it’s time for me to get transcribing the eighteen recordings I have from the event. Look out for upcoming interviews with Charlie Adlard, Jesse McClure, Game of Thrones cast (Mark Addy, Ellie Kendrick, Kerry Ingram, Aimee Richardson and Ian McElhinney) and plenty of comic artists. Also, check out our Facebook page for more photos from throughout the day!
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