Planet Comicon, here we come!
This year, both of the kids wanted to cosplay. What is a cosplayer, you ask? It is a person who dresses up and takes on the personality of a particular character from a tv, movie, comic book, or video game.
Nik decided that he wanted to wear his Power Ranger costume. One of the Power Ranger actors was scheduled to make an appearance, so this came as no surprise. Noah wanted to wear a Superman costume. He no longer fits into the kids costume, so I had to order an adult version on line. Thank you, Amazon Prime! The costume arrived a couple days before the convention, and with a little roll of the sleeves and pants, it fit!
Noah as Superman!
Now that we knew what to expect from the convention, we made sure to arrive an hour early. Apparently, Trekkies like to arrive early, because there was already a very long line waiting to get in. We took our place in line, and patiently waited. Did I say patiently waited with two kids living with autism? Why yes, I did. The beauty of waiting around in a Comicon line, is that there is always something interesting to see.
My boys rockin' the Comicon costumes.
It's the 501st Legion!
Every Comicon convention must have an appearance by the local 501st Legion. 501st Legion is a world wide organization of Star Wars fans. These are more than just hard core Star Wars fans. In order to join, your costume must meet very strict guidelines, right down to the dings in the bounty hunters helmets. But the real beauty in this organization, is that it has participated in events that have raised over $14 million for charity worldwide.
As we waited in line, the 501st started to get into formation to prepare to enter the convention. So before I go on, let me tell you about a school assignment that Noah had. His teacher and her band of paras really think outside the box when they are teaching the kids in their class. They are an awesome group of ladies, because they do such a nice balance between educating, and making it fun and interesting. The assignment was to explore hobbies. He was asked to go out during spring break, and try out photography. So when the 501st started to line up, we handed over the camera to Noah and he went nuts. Here are his first shots.
The baddest bad guys are in the house.
More Star Wars awesomeness.
Once the line started moving, we were inside the convention in about 10 minutes. The line was long, but it moved quickly. First things, first. We headed straight to celebrity row to meet Blue Ranger, David Yost, aka Billy. The line wasn't too long, but we did have a short wait. While waiting, we noticed the line for Sylvester McCoy. He played Doctor Who (thank you, Marika!), and also played Radagast the Brown in The Hobbit. Sylvester's line was really long. Doctor Who and Hobbit fans are pretty loyal. Noah spotted a Radagast cosplayer in line.
Noah picked up his camera and snapped a picture of the Radagast cosplayer in line. He is the dude in long hair and long brown coat. His costume was amazing, but you had to see it from the front. When the guy got to meet Sylvester McCoy, you could hear how impressed he was with the costume. It was cool.
Radagast, as photographed by Noah.
It was finally our turn to meet David Yost. Nik is a big Power Ranger fan, so he was excited about this. And the guy was pretty nice. He asked the kids what their names were, and autographed a picture. Nik told him he was his biggest fan, and Noah said so was he. Then David Yost let them take a picture with him. He even let Nik and Noah hold props from the show! Now, I say let, but we paid for this luxury. $20 for autograph and $20 for the picture. And I saw no problem with that. This is how these guys make money, and it give the fans a great opportunity to meet them. So I happily paid the $40.
Autographed picture of Billy, the Blue Ranger.
Check out Nik, flexing those muscles.
I wanted to hit the Sylvester McCoy line, but it was pretty long and the kids didn't express a huge desire to see him, so we moved on. John Ratzenberger was another actor they wanted to meet. John was the voice of Ham in Toy Story, the Yeti in Monster's Inc, Mack in Cars, he has been in every Pixar movie. You may know him as Cliff in Cheers. He wasn't at his booth yet, so we headed over to the exhibit alley to check out the merchandise.
This is my favorite part of Comicon. No, not the shopping. It is the people watching. Some people really go all out on their cosplay.
Chewbacca, as photographed by Noah.
Noah and a Gremlin.
There was a Lego table. It had a big crowd in front of it, but my little Superman was able to snap this picture.
Photo by Noah. Hey, is that a hidden Mickey?
There was a dj playing music, so a couple of cosplayers decided to have a dance off.
Cosplay awesomeness!
There was so much merchandise for sale. We could have spent a fortune, but showed some restraint. And by we, I mean me. I could have spent allot of money there. The kids were given free reign on what to buy. They picked an assortment of action figures, comic books. plush characters, shirts, etc. I think we ended up spending less than $300.
Along the way, Noah spotted his hero, Spider-Man. He still had his camera, so he snapped a picture as Spider-Man posed for him.
With great power, comes great cosplay, or something like that.
Noah spotted a couple of cosplayers dressed as characters from Predator. He snapped a picture as they walked around. Note that these costumes are mostly made by hand by the cosplayers. BY. HAND! You really have to see these costumes in person to appreciate the talent. Ok, so I cheated by buying store made costumes. I don't have a sewing machine, people.
Predator, as photographed by Noah.
Noah was thoroughly his role as photographer. He would pick out what he wanted to photograph and snap away, with a big smile on his face. He just loved it. Allot of his shots came out blurry due to hand shake, but that is something we can teach him to avoid. Even his old mom has that problem.
By this time, we were all getting a bit hungry, so we hit the good court. This years selection was better than last year. $30 for burgers and hot dogs. That wasn't too expensive, considering where we were. They served Pepsi, instead of Coke, but we forgive them.
After lunch, we let the kids go to the bathroom. This meant taking off the costumes. No way we wanted them to get those dirty in a public restroom. Alex helped them out, and we were able to keep the costumes nice and clean. But Nik did not want to put his costume back on. No problem. They had clothes on underneath.
We walked by to see if John Ratzenberger was at his booth. He was! So we paid the $40 fee to get a picture taken with him. We had to stand in the line and wait. While in line, Noah noticed that a Bane cosplayer was standing in front of us. Bane is the enemy of Batman, in case you didn't know. Maybe I should have drawn a nerd diagram for this blog post? Bane turned around and said something in character to Noah. To our surprise, Noah talked right back, also in character. OMG Noah was cosplaying! After a minute, Bane turned back to face forward and Noah shouted "Don't turn your back on me, Bane!" LOL It was hilarious. I should have taken a picture or video, but I was too busy enjoying this awesome exchange. I don't know what it is about Comicon's and costumes, but Noah totally comes alive at these events. He seems to love to perform. He was talking up a storm to random people we came across. It was great to see.
Finally, it was our turn to meet John Ratzenberger. I should say, it was Nik and Noah's turn. $40 was only for 2 people in the picture. They did let me walk into the area so I could help Noah. John Ratzenberger said hello to them. After the picture, Noah started to rattle off various lines from the movies that John has been in. I think this confused the actor for a second, because he had this puzzled look on his face. Anyway, it was a quick, but pleasant exchange. There was a line behind us, so I took Noah by the hand to get him to move along.
After that, we did more people watching. Apparently, Darth Vader was preparing lunch for the 501st Legion. I hate Jar Jar Binks too, Darth.
Check out Nik with Darth's lighsaber spatula.
We wanted to check out some of the panel discussions, but there was a very long line to get to the room. I figured out that this was for Sylvester McCoy's presentation. Sorry we missed it, because I read a revue from a comicon fan that said it was one of the best presentations ever. Well, we would have never made it into the presentation by the looks of that long line. Oh well.
We did get to see the kids costume contest. We did not sign our boys up. I wouldn't have the nerve to do that with a store bought costume. Some of the kids costumes were amazing, and some were nothing to write home about. But the audience gave a nice round of applause for each kid, so that was nice.
After the contest was over, we headed back into the convention hall. Did you know that there is an R2D2 building club? Well, there is. This R2 unit roamed around the convention floor and led us right to the 501st Legion's table.
R2 as photographed by Noah.
Alex and Nik checking out the merchandise.
The 501st area was Star Wars Heaven. Just look at all the characters! The next 3 pictures are all Noah. Go Noah!
Needless to say, we were loving this! There were characters everywhere. Darth Vader tried to force choke Noah at first, but Noah wasn't digging it.
Then this happened. Nik and Noah got to kick some 501st butt! Major kudos to these Legion members, who had Noah do a fake punch, and Nik pose with the light saber. Look at those smiles! This was definitely a highlight.
Check out Noah's glare at the Emperor's royal guard. Back off, dude!
After the excitement of taking on the Dark Side, we needed a cotton candy break.
Then it was more people watching. On our way back to Exhibit alley, we ran into My Little Pony. At least, I think that's who this is.
My bronies. It's a thing. Google it.
The adult costume contest registration had ended, so the more elaborate cosplayers were coming out onto the convention floor.
The makeup on this guy was amazing.
Noah and a dwarf from The Hobbit. Not sure why Nik didn't want to get in on some of the pictures.
Alien! This costume was awesome!
We saw a huge crowd forming, and quickly figured out why. Some of the super hero cosplayers were out on the floor with a Stan Lee look alike. I wonder how many hours they put into building their costumes?
We spotted one of Noah's favorite villains, Loki. Noah chased after him. Before he could catch him, he had a run in with a Jawa.
Boy meets Jawa.
Finally, he caught up to Loki. The cosplayer was very nice and patiently posed with Noah. Noah just loved it.
At that point, Noah started to ask where Tree Trunks was. He stopped random cosplayers and asked them if they had seen Tree Trunks. I had no idea what that meant, until another cosplayer told me that it was a green elephant character. So we went looking from booth to booth, until we finally found it. Of course, Noah wanted to buy it. We let both kids pick out their last item for the day. After the excitement chasing down Tree Trunks, we were all beginning to run out of steam. And with still 3 hours to kill before the adult costume contest, we decided that it was time to head home.
My tired, but happy cosplayers.
And some of our loot. There is Tree Trunks, in the middle of the picture.
My closing thoughts on a great day. It's just another reminder not to give up in the tough times. It was not so long ago, that we could not have enjoyed something like this as a family. The event would have totally overwhelmed the kids a few years ago. The crowd, the noise, the standing in line. It would have been melt down after melt down. I feel so blessed to be able to experience these things with my family, and to see how happy they are. Alex and I are doing a pretty good job with our boys, if I do say so myself!
