Tag Archives: Review

Balticon – A Review In Parts

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I’m trying something new this year. Normally I review my convention experience all in one big lump. I’ve taken a day or two now and I think there’s too much to cover and do justice with one lump. I know I prefer shorter posts when I’m checking my news feeds a lot of the time. That being the case I’m going to set these lumps of review to pop up at different times. Hopefully this new review strategy will be a good one – you’ll have to let me know!

Here we go with part one – the general stuff.

I truly enjoy going to Balticon. I’ve been going for a long time. Not as long as many folks, but long enough. I look forward each year to seeing old friends, making new ones and generally having fun. This year was no exception.

I was invited as a guest / panelist again this year. I love that I have the chance to do this. I hope it is something that continues. I also signed up to be part of the art show this year. While I wasn’t ready to try to sell any of my art, I wanted to be part of the show and see what it was all about.

Making sure I was actually on the guest list was difficult. I work on staff for other conventions, so I know things can be difficult. I tried, really tried to be patient. It seemed to pay off, even if the paperwork I got was later than the deadline it gave inside.

So – guest stuff arranged, art stuff sent in and confirmed I was ready.

The registration / sign in stuff at the con itself was not. I’m certain that social media exploded with anger and frustration over this. I’m also certain that the convention staff is aware of everyone’s opinion so I’m just going to describe it as bad. That is perhaps the negligent misuse of understatement, but 4 lines and 2+ hours later I had a badge with no staple or ribbons, my original schedule, the remake and a suggestion that I look for the app for the schedule as that was likely more up to date than anything printed that I’d been given we’ll just stick with bad.

I figured in the midst of all this I’d go and get set up for the art show. Except they weren’t ready. Again, I’ve been on staff – I know things can get behind. I could always come back later. You know, later when the crash that hurt registration so much had the chance to affect art show sign in. The art show folks were diligent and helpful to me as a newbie and I really had very little to worry about. I took it all in stride and got stuff hung up.

By the time I got past all that I really wasn’t feeling the con groove. The wife and I skipped out and headed for dinner. There were panels we’d thought of heading to, but the changes were such a mess we skipped them altogether.

Friday was a struggle, but no worries – there would be more to the weekend!

And there was. I had some excellent panels. I’ll break them down more in another post, but they were right on target for me.

Seeing old friends and making new friends (even by way of shared misery in line) was just as fantastic as always. I can think of at least a half a dozen folks I normally see at the convention that didn’t make it this year. I don’t know numbers but I got the feeling that attendance was down quite a lot. The mood seemed to be less festive than I’d seen in the past. I didn’t see the array of hall costumes I’d seen before. Maybe I was just missing something or not in the right place at the right time – but a busy con shouldn’t need the right place at the right time to make it work. The right place and right time should be just about anywhere at a con.

Maybe I’m jaded? Maybe it was me?

I’ll post more through the week – I think that’s enough for now.

Regen!

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This was previously published in Watch The Skies:

Regeneration Who – or – Where you should have been

This convention review is different than any of the others I’ve presented here before. It is different both because I got a different perspective and because from many reactions this convention was different than others before.

I don’t work on staff for many conventions. The creators of Regeneration Who are the same folks that put on Intervention Con where I normally lend a hand with the Children’s programming track. Regen didn’t have a dedicated children’s track this year so I became something of a free agent. I phrased it just that way when I was chatting with some of the other staff. I joked that I could now negotiate for double the going rate for staff pay. He came right back with, “I’ll offer you triple to get on my team…”

I should have negotiated better.

I ended up bouncing from place to place, from team to team through this entire convention. I essentially worked from the time I got up and dressed to the time I fell over at the end of the night. I must have walked ten miles each day. I was utterly exhausted by the end of the whole thing. Spent.

What all my travels afforded me was a chance to see much, much more of the convention than I might have otherwise. There were huge things going on here – Tom Baker Skyped in and answered questions from the attendees. The line for that was immense. There were funny things going on. The sort of things that stop conversations cold – like Sylvester McCoy and Sophie (Aldred) Henderson (the 7th Doctor and companion) riding a bell-hop cart down the hall. There were crazy moments like guiding the life size special weapons Dalek into the middle of the vendor room and opening it up so that actors could sign the inside of it. There were little moments that didn’t matter to anyone other than the very few people involved, like being able to pull a pink back pack full of “My Little Ponies” out of the lost and found bin to help fix up a weekend for a sobbing little girl.

The hope for the weekend was to be able to draw a few hundred folks and cover the expenses so the show would go on again next year. By all accounts the attendance was more than triple the expectation. There were flaws. There were issues. They were handled. I can’t say that’s been the case with every con I’ve gone to. Yes, being on the staff and spending more than a little of my time running for operations to try to help solve some of these issues I got to see and hear more than the attendees. Yes, I’m biased because I was helping. You know who wasn’t? The standing ovation from the attendees that came to the last panel of the convention called, “how’d we do?”.

Even seeing the issues behind the scenes, or perhaps because of seeing the issues behind the scenes, I’m going to recommend that if you’re a fan of Doctor Who you make it a point to get to this convention next year. I’m already on board.

The Hobbit III or Are We There Yet?

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Three films. Really? Yes, really.

I’ve talked about my thoughts on Peter Jackson’s Hobbit trilogy before. Since then my view has deflated like a balloon left long after the party has moved on, just hovering through the middle of the room never reaching the height it once attained and knowing it will end up on the floor, or worse in the end.

I had the opportunity to go and see the final installment, but was forced by schedule to go to see it in the dread 3D. I went, but I didn’t have high hopes. The middle film had moments but I just wasn’t certain the folks on Jackson’s team could pull off the mind numbing spectacular ending they would need to blow past the critics and wow the viewing audience. I hated the very idea of seeing this in 3D. In the end 3D didn’t detract from the film particularly but it didn’t add anything either. Save the money and see it flat if you see it in the theater. IF you see it in the theater. I was not moved by this film at all. The above mentioned mind numbing? It was administered in drawn out, wannabe heartfelt moments that lacked impact because they were so far removed from the rest of the movie. All the positive character development and relationship emphasis faded over the course of the year. What was left felt like… leftovers.

Smaug, the five minute preface to some other film? That’s what we got here. Yes, the special effects were magnificent but the impact was lost. The gap killed the dragon with certainty. Not the gap in his scales, the gap between his start as this amazing horror and his ignoble end. Time killed his power more than any black arrow.

Love and death can be heart wrenching, gut twisting and draw tears from the most stoic. Time and distance don’t kill love in the real world, but it flat out kills the impact of it in the movies. It was strained and made up and it didn’t work for me. I don’t begrudge Kili a love life, I just don’t want it in the movie. It took up space and watered down other relationships that could have had more impact. Think back on Two Towers when Gimli tells Eowyn that Aragorn has fallen in battle. The emotion there is a punch to the heart. If you’re going off the books, do it well or don’t do it at all!

Cross dressing jokes? Not in the film – save them for the gag reels. I’m not going to discuss these any more. This… this I blame Hollywood for.

I suspect that when all the film parts are watched together they will have a greater impact and the gaps that killed the theater going experience will be minimized. There will still need to be gaps – most humans will need a break somewhere in the eight hours or whatever it will be to see all the films at once.

IF you saw the other two parts in the theater, see the third one there too, but don’t rush. I’ll be interested to see how many box sets of this are created when all of the movie bits are finally released to DVD. If you’ve skipped the theater experience so far, definitely wait for all the parts to hit DVD and check them out in the comfort of your own home (with your own ability to pause for pee breaks!).

i09 says this: http://io9.com/everything-they-said-about-making-three-hobbit-movies-w-1671978013 and I agree.

I forgot my socks – or – Philcon 2014

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This was the first time I was an invited guest of Philcon. I was very excited to attend. I have attended other conventions, even working on staff, for a number of years but had very little experience with this convention. Being asked to be there as a guest was just fantastic.

It’s good to be lucky in friends – and I am. I was able to hitch a ride with my friend Mary and split a room 4 ways with some other friends. It was nostalgic to get back to that kind of feeling, get to the con on a tight budget. My friends made my convention much more fun than it might have otherwise been. I had a great weekend – even if I did forget my socks. I remembered to do the laundry before I departed, just missed that one little detail on the way out the door.

The folks working the convention were nothing but nice to me. Long before everything got underway I threw myself on the mercy of the program committee. I was rewarded greatly! I was able to be on a technology panel, two art panels, a literary panel, a gaming panel and a fan panel! It was a remarkably diverse set of folks I got to hang out with and I was thrilled to meet some new friends and fellow fans.

There was great conversation and interesting viewpoints. I’m not going to give a panel for panel breakdown here. The best way to get in on these conversations is to attend. Get out there and go to a convention! You might discover an artist or author you like. You could hear how language is being preserved, how long is too long for a book series or where a really good fan fiction site is. You could watch an anime you’ve never had the chance to see or play a game you’ve wanted to try ever since you heard about it from a friend.

IF you’re really lucky you’ll be part of an epic story like the Bridesmaid Brawl… Defend the Pizza!

This great weekend was not without its issues. I was fortunate not to have issues of my own, but many of the folks I know did have problems. I heard complaints about the failings of other guest schedules. There were tracks or topics that had been on program for many years that failed to appear this year. The schedules were delivered late and the web site was terribly slow to update. The actual schedule for things like the opening of the dealer room were in question. Certain events failed to get advertising and died before ever getting off the ground. The con suite seemed to be thin on the snack front. It could have been the times I was there, but for the most part the gaming suite was far better stocked (the bonus being you could jump in on a game while you snacked as well). These sort of things can happen to a convention being run by fans and volunteers. There was one thing I noticed that can’t happen to a convention – at least not often or the convention will fail.

Attendees were few and far between. It might have been timing – world fantasy convention was just a week or two before and it was in Washington DC so many folks that might have gone to Philcon could have blown the budget there and skipped this year. It might have been the proximity to Thanksgiving travel. I could be completely wrong about the number of folks that were there – but it certainly didn’t feel that way. I saw a lot of empty seats at the panels. There certainly weren’t crowds in the hallways. I was on one panel where the panelists outnumbered the audience two to one. It made for a conversational atmosphere while we were sitting there but it worries me for the future. I hope more folks sign up and show up. This con gave me the feeling it was old, possibly dying and that would be a shame.

I hope next year to be invited again. I hope you will sign up and get there too. I also hope I remember my socks next year.