COMIC-CON REFLECTIONS

The convention center in San Diego is a gigantic steel and concrete sea shell washed up on the shore, sprawling like a beached whale along the edge of the bay, bristling with the elbows of would-be flying buttresses, the ribs of a gigantic wrecked and rolled over sea-going behemoth like the sixteenth century Spanish galleon but much much larger. Climbing through the wreckage for four days in July (21-24th) were all the comic book fans and popular culture geeks that the law allows — 125,000 of them bump up against the fire marshal’s limit, but probably there were another 20,000 more if anyone would (or could) do an actual count.

Attendees became a glutenous mob as they milled around and eddied through the aisles of seven adjoining exhibit halls in which were monumental displays for LucasFilm, Lionsgate, Warner Bros, Hasbro, Mattel, Lego, Viz, Nickelodeon, Konami, Phineas and Ferb, Square Enix, Pokemon, Sideshow Collectibles — oh, and Marvel, DC Comics, Dark Horse, Image, and Diamond Distributors. Various special interest exhibit booths were clustered together — illustrators, urban vinyl toys, web comics, small press—and, oh, “gold and silver age” comic books.

It would be a mistake to say the Comic Con International San Diego (to use its official name) is a comic book convention, but it’s preferred designation as a “popular culture convention” isn’t quite right either: it’s too broad. The Sandy Eggo Con (as if it is affectionately known here at the Rants & Raves Intergalactic Wurlitzer) is perhaps more accurately described as a “comic book culture” convention: it embraces that part of popular culture that grew out of or is closely allied with comic books—movies and tv series based upon comic book characters (or that could be based upon comic book characters—like Indiana Jones, f’instance), electronic games embodying comic book titles, toys depicting comic book characters, artists who illustrate so luxuriously the covers of comic books, movie posters, and game boxes; and on and on into the night.

Or maybe, to resort to the argot of the day, it’s just a monster geekfest.