Surprise!! A Week of June-ness isn't quite over yet! I'm pulling an encore on all of y'all!
Today is the story of Aylesbury Comic- Con. Was it an experience of comical proportions, or was it just a con?
Well, the tickets were £8 and if you followed the Facebook page in the lead up to the event, you could literally watch your £8 wither away into insignificance as more and more Z list TV stars dropped off the guest list.
'Due to work commitments, blah blah couldn't come to Comic-Con.'
"Surely coming and making an appearance at Aylesbury Comic-Con is a work commitment?" Matthew asked, puzzled when he scrolled through the Facebook page to see the line up (or lack of). He also predicted ahead of time that it was going to be rubbish. I may have felt a tinge of this too, but I thought it might be better to reserve judgement until I was actually there.
Aylesbury's version of the world renowned convention was the second held by Fanzone and this year, the event was being held at the Stoke Mandeville Stadium for most of the day on Saturday 30th June. As we queued up, we were already getting a taster of things to come. A couple of teens (I guess they were teens, neither me or Matthew could tell) were dressed up as policemen and had Matthew fooled for a minute. He insisted he was joking, but I knew this was another of his brain farts. His haste to say "Oh, they're even doing bag checks here!" made me draw that conclusion. First of the cosplay's receiving a 10/10 in the convincing stakes from Matthew. Even without their high-vis vests. Our attention was also drawn to a couple of teenage girls who pretty much had their arses out while cosplaying as the (female) Joker and Harley Quinn.
As we were let in and given an illegible stamp on our hands we set about checking out what our £8 had bought us. In truth, it seemed that our money had bought us entry into a shop. A POP figure swamped, comic book boasting, comic branded canvas clad, Harry Potter fan-girling shop. I reckon such a shop would provide free entry elsewhere, but not here and not today.
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| Aylesbury Comic-Con |
Once we'd taken a look round the comic store and Predator had bumped into me and uncharacteristically apologised, we thought we would check out what and if anything else was happening throughout the day. This is probably the time to mention what special guests Fanzone Events (presenters of this Comic- Con) could persuade out of the dark depths of the co-starring and background acting world. The most well known from these stars was Norman Lovett from the TV comedy show Red Dwarf. Other stars from Harry Potter and Doctor Who included Chem So, Iain McNiece and Simon Fisher-Becker. These stars were scheduled to do a Q&A session later in the afternoon and would be posing for selfies and signing autographs for between £10 and £15 a pop in the meantime. They have to earn money in between jobs somehow I guess.
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| Stitch was having a great time |
We decided that we would leave and come back later in the afternoon to see the talks, the cosplay fashion show and the finale of the cosplay competition and of course to see more of the self proclaimed 'Youtube sensation' Michael the Lunatic (nope, me neither) and Banana Man!
At 2pm we were back in the stuffy stadium and sitting waiting for the first of the talks to begin. Up first was Norman Lovett. This was the most anticipated talk for Matthew as he watched Red Dwarf and thought this talk would be the funnier of the few on offer. However, as he got up on the stage and struggled with the microphone trying to make himself heard above the crowds of people shopping and playing retro games and squealing over Chewbakka and Groot, I found myself cringing rather than laughing or even listening. I thought that maybe this was just me, but as I looked around at the sparse crowd that had sat down for the talk including Matthew, I realised that this wasn't going to plan. The real sad part was when the guy (trying to) interview him opened up the floor to questions. One question came after a painful 30 seconds of nothing. With that one question answered, it was time for Norman to say his strained thank-you's to the crowd that had obviously dropped off long beforehand and walk back to his designated autograph and selfie table. While I sound like I'm mocking, I'm only half mocking. The other half felt genuinely bad for him.
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| I am Groot....am I? |
You thought I was being a dick there, well be prepared for more when I tell you about the second and last talk of the afternoon before the cosplay competition. Chem So came onto the stage and waited patiently to be joined by his other Q&A stars Iain McNiece and Simon Fisher-Becker. This was where the afternoon got more interesting. Iain and Simon were....are well of a certain size. We'd seen this ourselves when we'd seen them earlier in the day, but what we could not have prepared ourselves for what we were about to witness as they made their way up to the stage.
Iain was up first. An electric scooter came wheeling past us and stopped stage adjacent. Next was the scooter dismount which in itself proved strangely captivating as he almost came a cropper, but the process of coming onto the stage was even more nail biting as several men- even Banana Man had to come to his aid. You couldn't write this stuff. Of course I felt bad for being so entertained by this, but honestly after having seen what else was on offer so far at this convention, I could quite easily say that this was by far the most entertaining thing I'd seen all day. They say it's not over until the fat lady sings, but this time the line up of stars was concluded by the arrival of Simon Fisher-Becker. Fisher-Becker was considerably bigger than McNiece and judging by the way in which McNiece had arrived, this was promising to be another comically bad entrance on stage left. Once again along came an electric scooter and once again the dismount from said scooter was awkward to say the least. But with the scooter dismount a few feet behind him, his next mission was to make it onto the stage. Several attempts to make it onto the stage proved fruitless and also proved hilariously awkward to watch. Again Banana Man, several other people and the interviewer all pitched in to help him up. A few more attempts to get him up failed. This was turning into an epic drama in my head. Will he make it on stage in time for the Q&A?! There was no other choice but to stay tuned to this oddly fascinating, cringe-worthy scenario unfolding before my eyes. I could sense that Matthew was staring on just like me, in pure fascination. Finally, Simon was up and sat down and the Q&A commenced. Like with Norman, it was hard to hear them all and the questions from both the interviewer and the crowd were lacking. Motivation to carry on the Q&A then dried up and the trio said their thank-you's and goodbyes before leaving for their respective selfie and autograph tables. The dismount from the stage was a lot more uneventful than the entrance. It was seeing them both wheel off slowly in their scooters summed this all up for me. I again felt bad for them. They came here probably under the pretense of a massive crowd from a relatively small town coming to see them. Instead, they had to come to a stuffy sports hall, sit at a desk for hours to then struggle to come on stage to feel a bit ignored by people there.
Soon, the stage was cleared in favour of the cosplay competition. Everyone in costume had signed themselves up to take part and this proved to be a reasonably interesting part of the afternoon, second to the comical stage entrances. Everyone from the female Joker to Chewbakka, Edward Kenway from Assassins Creed and a boy dressed up as Yoda joined in with the competition seperated into the kids and adults sections. The kids all won a little something in case war broke out, and the adults won prizes from 4th place to 1st. With the winner being announced from the last competition, it was time for the Aylesbury Comic-Con to end.
Looking back on it now, I still laugh at how silly it all was. It paled in comparison to what it could've been. There was very little there to actually do other than play on one of the 4 retro consoles in the corner. There could've been more there even if just for the kids but maybe the budget was tighter this year than last year. Who knows, but based on this year if I was asked whether I would go to Aylesbury Comic-Con 2019 I would respectfully pass. £8 could've gone towards a ticket to see the actual Avengers movie. This was something to get the small kids out of the house, but it was barely enough to keep everyone there all day.
So, that brings us to the (actual) end of A Week of June-ness 2018. I hope you have enjoyed this little encore. I will hopefully be back with more June Mulie madness next year. I will obviously be back blogging normally before then so stay tuned. For now though, bye!!
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