My Umpteenth Comic Con – A Boston Comic Con Report From A Jaded Convention Veteran

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Smells like Dunkin Donuts and nerd spirit. Try not to breathe.

This was taken at 9:45am, when the line to get in was only curling around one side of the building.

Rob and I attended this year’s Boston Comic Con last weekend. We were pleased to have Pixiestyx and Trebuchet accompany us and not just because Trebuchet offered to drive on Saturday. It’s exciting to see a convention through the eyes of someone who hasn’t been to one before. And while we didn’t get to every creator or panel we had originally intended, a good time was generally had by all.

Rob and I have been attending San Diego Comic-Con for the past several years. It would be very easy to turn this post into a comparative study of Boston versus San Diego, but it wouldn’t be particularly fair. San Diego is the mega prom of all geekdom. Really, it is several conventions for fans of all stripes all crammed under one roof. You like movies? Go pack some Depends and hang out in Hall H. Like TV? Please direct yourself to Ballroom 20. Cosplay enthusiast? Action figure collector? Gamer? We’ve got panels for you, too. Oh, and there’s still programming for those who come because they love comic books. But, San Diego has taken on such a life of its own that it’s almost more like SXSW now. Alternative programming, such as Wootstock, Geek And Sundry, and Trickster, has spilled out into venues around Gaslamp and the surrounding neighborhoods. The number of options is mind boggling and, at times, overwhelming.

Boston Comic Con was a refreshing return to what a comics convention is supposed to be about: comics.

We arrived at the Boston convention somewhat biased by memories of a previously attended Boston convention a few years back. That show was small; it took up about three rooms in the basement of a hotel. We arrived in the early afternoon and walked in without difficulty. A couple laps of the vendor floor, a trip to the two rooms that held the creators, and a couple brief chats with Geof Darrow and David Mack and we were done. I think it would be generous to say we were there for two hours. However, in 2013, the Boston Comic Con is a whole ‘nother ball game.

The line we waited in, as previously purchased ticket holders, should have been my tip off that this was not the Con of old. At about 9:30am, we joined a line that had already stretched about three quarters of the way along the pier side of the Seaport Convention Center. We would hear later that it would grow to a point at which it would wrap around the building. A young woman, accompanied by a girl who couldn’t have been more than 10 or 11 who was enthusiastically wearing a Wonder Girl t-shirt, was handing out wristbands to ticket holders. We managed to get onto the convention floor by about 10:15 (door opened at 10am). Very shortly later, others wouldn’t be as lucky.

 

Convention volunteers checked wristbands at the door. Upon entrance to the room, a couple tables with program t-shirts designed by Tim Sale and sheets with daily programming were off immediately to the right. That was our first major mistake at this convention: those t-shirts sold out of everything but size triple X in about two hours. The sheets with the daily program were helpful, if you didn’t want to pull the same information up from the convention’s Web site on a smart phone. However, they lacked a map of the vendors, publishers, and creators’ booths on the convention floor. A large map was available in the center aisle, all the way at the back of the room. As a veteran convention attendee, I’ve found having a copy of a floor map handy. While the floor of the Seaport Convention Center is not as big as the San Diego Convention Center’s, as the crowds increased it became harder to get a good look at which folks were at which booths. Still, having gotten then while the crowds were relatively light, we were able to take a solid lap and sort out the overall lay of the room and its offerings. This would be useful when we returned the next day, so we could target our time more efficiently when getting art and other goodies. However, it would be nice if the Boston Comic Convention would make the floor plan and vendor key available to download from its Web site next year, or offer it with the list of programming for attendees on site.

As big as the crowds got though, it remained relatively easy to approach creators at booths to chat, buy art, or get books signed. Rob was able to get to see Kent Archer, formerly of Dr. McNinja, as well as get artwork from Cully Hamner (Detective Comics, The Shade, Red). I also was able to score some sweet art from James O’Barr (The Crow). My Little Pony artist, Sara Richard‘s booth was busy from very early in the day on both Saturday and Sunday with fans looking to score individually sketched MLP covers, but she was still approachable and answered questions about her work while she sketched. A few artists and writers required tickets to see, such as George Perez, Scott Snyder, and Joe Hill. Perez’s line was pretty orderly and moved steadily. One of the regulars at our local comics store, who know us by name and ask Rob to stop asking the customers if they’d like to see his George, said that as he waited for his chance in line, Perez was constantly smiling as he worked and friendly to everyone who he met. Snyder was a popular enough draw that holders of his tickets were called in waves to his booth over the PA system. Joe Hill’s signing at the IDW booth was a crush of ticket holders on Saturday, so much so that on Sunday the staff had decided to forgo a ticket system in favor of a first come-first serve line. A guy stood at the end of the line with a sign marking its end, but, Boston folks being who they are, at least 5 or 6 people lined up in back of him anyway. I don’t know if they made it to see Joe Hill. End of the line is end of the line in San Diego.

The lines to get into the convention and those ticketed artists lines were the only attempts we saw at any kind of line management (such as they were) or crowd control in the convention. This played out in a particularly unfortunate manner when it came to the panels on offer by the convention this year. The space immediately in front of the Waterfront Ballroom was an impenetrable mass of humanity just prior to the DC Comics panel with a line that snaked out haphazardly out of that morass into the adjoining lobby space. No convention workers seemed to be on hand to guide things and provide some order. While we did make it into the room, seating was down to a few individual seats scattered mostly in areas with poor sight lines to the front of the room. There are two very large columns on either side of the Waterfront Ballroom, which seats over 400 people. If you are stuck near one of the columns it becomes almost impossible to see anything worthwhile, especially if you’re five foot two like me. We thought we’d solve this on Sunday by attending the Mike Mignola Spotlight that was scheduled in the room prior to the Marvel panel and then moving up toward the front before Marvel started, but no such luck. The panel room was very abrasively cleared by a con volunteer who refused to open the room to the Marvel panel before the previous occupants left. So, we sulked our way out thinking that maybe we’d just get back in line. However, the glut of people on the other side of the door made that fairly impossible. Even worse was discovering, when we came back to wait for the Joe Hill panel, that the room was only maybe half to two thirds full in that room during the Marvel panel (as determined by glances inside the room as doors opened and closed when attendees wandered in and out of the panel). The solitary 12 year old looking volunteer (seriously, they had one lone little kid manning the doors) had given up on doing anything other than letting whoever wanted in the room, even if early for the next panel. Clearly not all the volunteers were working together on message.

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These Hobbit/LOTR cosplayers don’t know that they are standing exactly in the same spot where a mother had been changing her infant’s diaper on the floor in front of God and everyone just 15 minutes previously while we waited for the Joe Hill panel.

Even with 20,000 people in attendance at this convention, there was absolutely no reason to put that kind of policy in place. All it does is alienate panel attendees who don’t want to have to choose between back to back panel and risk getting kicked out of a room. The more attendees feel comfortable that they can sit in panels and interact with creators and other fans in that manner, because, for some of us (ok, me) the panel experience is what we’re there for, the longer we’re going to stay at the convention and spend some more time on the floor, possibly buying more stuff. A panel room clearing policy, frankly, feels like some convention organizer couldn’t get into a panel at some other convention and got all nerd rage-y and butt hurt. Either get bigger rooms or, if you insist on the room clearing nonsense, put a ticketing system in place for the panels with line monitoring and control so that attendees who want to see back to back panels can do so with out risk of seat loss. Hopefully the panel issues are symptomatic of growing pains from this convention’s expansion and not indicative of how they will approach panels in the future, because that was a big mood dampener.

All in all though, the growth of the Boston Comic Convention was a delight to see. The opportunity to have such unfettered access to artists, coupled with the sheer enthusiasm of the attendees – I saw a couple of little kids sprinting down an aisle to get a picture with some cosplayers which is something that just Does. Not. Happen. in San Diego (the running, I mean. No one can move, let alone run on the floor) – was rewarding and a pleasure to be a part of. And, you want to see your home town convention grow, because that boosts the kind of participation it’ll get from creators who come to attend. Scott Snyder, for example, held a previously unannounced panel on Sunday because of the number of fans who wanted to see him. How awesome is that?

Next year’s convention has already been announced. It will be held again at the Seaport Convention Center. Originally, it was going to be scheduled for April, but listening to feed back from attendees, they’ve decided to hold it in August again and add a third day:


That’s one bit of feedback they’ve already taken into account. Here’s hoping that next year’s convention will also take into consideration the feedback it’s been hearing about ticketing, panels, and staffing to continue to improve the convention experience for attendees.

Categories: Geek Culture Tags:
August 9, 2013 by Amanda
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