Now, a funny aside (well, funny to me at least, so stick with me…). I was ORIGINALLY going to WonderCon (WC from now on) this past weekend to simply have a good time and hang with my beloved friends of the Northern California Browncoats. When I mentioned to my amazing Editor-in-Chief that I’m going, she says, "I look forward to your coverage." Coverage? What coverage? I’m going to have a vacation, not WRITE anything. 😉 However, I simply cannot say no, ever, to this lovely woman, so I agreed. So, what was originally a weekend away has now turned into a lengthy blog post, and I hope you enjoy it. 😉

I’m picked up at 3:30 AM by one of my best friends, James and his girlfriend, Lynn, of the SoCal Browncoats and Dwight from San Diego, and we start the long trek up to San Fransisco. I took the first driving shift and drove for about two hours. It was a very fun car ride, as we laughed a lot, slept some, and smelled the fresh cow-dung infested air. 😉 On the way up, I watched the latest episode of Supernatural on my portable media player, which was amazing. We stopped a few times for food and bathroom breaks.

  

We arrived at SF around 9:30 AM and checked in, heading over to the Moscone Center South for the convention proper. After helping a bit with the Browncoat table, I headed out on my own for breakfast. During my walk to Denny’s, I felt like someone was way too close to me, so I slightly turn my head and notice a grizzled looking middle aged man about SIX INCHES behind me, looking ahead quite intently. I walked a little faster…and noticed he did too. When I turned to enter Denny’s, I turned around and looked at him. He had stopped right in front of the door, staring ahead, looking confused. He then looked at me, looked around, and turned the other way and walked back. Welcome to San Fransisco…

After eating a lovely breakfast and reading my new Supernatural novel (can you tell I’m a fan?), I headed back to the Moscone Center to walkaround the dealer room now that it had opened. In walking around, I saw a lot of neat stuff including comics and products I’d never heard of, but all looked fun. I came to one table with a familiar looking fellow and looked down at the name…Mike Mignola. THE Mike Mignola…creator of Hellboy, only one of my favorite comics EVER. I admit I was a little starstruck, but when I walked up to him I simply shook his hand and said "Thank you for all the entertainment you’ve given me." He was gracious and accepted my compliment, and then tried to give everyone else that was there attention. He seemed quite nice and pleasant, which I was happy to see. I also then purchased one of two items (as I’m ALWAYS low on money, I tried to purchase very little at WC, and thankfully succeeded) at the con, a Hellboy novel called "Emerald Hell," which is actually quite good, so far.

  

 

 

After walking around some more, I headed up to my first panel…

Richard Hatch Panel

Now, I’ve seen Richard Hatch here and there at other cons, but I’d never seen one of his panels nor had ever spoken to him, so I was excited to see him in person. First off, let me say you can just FEEL the man’s passion for science fiction. He LOVES it. I was also excited to see that he’s a big Browncoat, as he loves Firefly. In fact, he spent some time railing against network execs for killing good shows before their time, and used Firefly as a case in point. He’s also a big Dexter fan, which made me very happy to hear.

  

 

  

In getting back to the topic of Battlestar Galactica, Mr. Hatch said that filming of the final ten episodes will start in a few weeks, and then proceeded to gush about working on the project. In answering questions from the audience, he said that the "frak will hit the fan" in season 4 (and he said this was the first project he’s ever had to sign a non-disclosure agreement for), and that these last episodes will be the "most powerful." He also said that Tricia Helfer is the actor most unlike their character.

He then went on to discuss the long journey that Galactica has been for him, from being on the show to the many years he fought to bring it back to air, helping get Ronald Moore involved, and so on. He also said that he has more Galactica novels in the works, which was a great thing to hear for a fan like myself. Once he was done with Q&A, he showed a video about Bear McCreary and his work on the music on Galactica, which, of course, was awesome.

After the panel, I wandered the dealer room a little more and found a table with the other purchase I made over the weekend. This one gentleman was selling…ahem…"unofficial" DVD sets, like the entire series of M.A.S.K., Batman Beyond, The Bionic Man and a score of others. I thought this was cool until I saw one in particular…The Invisible Man. The Invisible Man was a show that ran for two seasons and has been a favorite of mine, however up until now one could only buy it on DVD in the UK for some reason. While DVD’s of the first season had been announced for later this year at around $60, this entire series was being sold right in front of me for $40, so I had to take it.

  

 

  

 

I then walked over to the California Browncoats table for my volunteer shift which lasted from 4 PM until the convention closed at 7 PM. I love volunteering with the Browncoats, as it’s always fun and fast-paced. I was put onto the charity side of the table, and asked passers-by to donate money for Equality Now (Joss Whedon’s favorite charity) to enter into our prize drawing. It was a lot of fun. 

 

 

  

The after-convention hours consisted of having a lovely dinner at Naan and Curry – a delightful Indian restaurant – and then going to the San Fransisco Comic Book Museum, which was having a party. About 10:30 PM, both Dwight and I started to crash, hard, so by the time we
got back to our hotel room, we fell asleep as soon as we were able.