Supanova is over for 2010 so I thought I would take a moment to reflect on the weekend and be thankful that we get such a fantastic convention in Perth. Eager as always I attended preview night on Friday night. During the evening I watched the opening ceremony where we received a sneak peak at some of the guests who would be appearing over the weekend.
Following that I attended the Joe Kubert panel and was able to meet him for a quick personal chat. To have such a huge contributor to the comic industry appear to discuss his school and comics in general is just fantastic. Arriving early on Saturday I explored the convention room floor, the cosplayers were out in force putting on a colourful and varied display of brilliant costumes.
Keen to secure the autographs I was hoping to get over the weekend I lined up for tickets early and managed to get through the queues with minimum fuss. I can’t recommend being early enough! The lines for certain autographs just get longer and longer over the weekend so be organised, arrived early and you can avoid spending a lot of time waiting around.
With autographs of various personal items including dvds, and comics taken care of I headed in for the Charisma Carpenter panel where the charismatic actress was happy to chat about her various projects over her career as well as talk about her upcoming work including the Sylvester Stallone directed ‘The Expendables’ coming later this year.
After seeing Charisma I went over to the comic supastars booth where I spoke to Shane McCarthy, Tom Taylor and Colin Wilson all about their various projects and works in the comics industry. Colin Wilson drew me a fantastic sketch of ‘Jenson’ from the Losers which will join my growing collection of sketches at home. They were a great bunch of people in the comics supastars booth, approachable and keen to chat with the fans.
The Saturday afternoon for me was filled with panels including Lou Ferrigno, Summer Glau, and Michael Winslow. Lou Ferrigno was brilliant to listen to, both entertaining and inspirational. Summer was interesting and fun as she interacted with the crowd in her own shy way and Michael Winslow an extremely talented man was hugely entertaining and just hilarious.
On the second day being a big Star Wars fan I went straight in to the Daniel Logan panel where he shared many funny stories from his experience working on Attack of the Clones. He also spoke about the work he has been doing on the Star Wars: Clone Wars animated series as the young Boba Fett.
Around lunch time I spoke to Stuart Immonen who gave me a Hal Jordan sketch for which I am very grateful and then I lined up for the Eliza Dusku panel which proved to be a wise decision to do so early given how many people ended up lining up for a seat. With a very packed panel Eliza was confident and entertaining taking on all sorts of questions covering Buffy/Angel, True Lies, Tru Calling and of course Dollhouse.
After spending the last few hours soaking in the atmosphere my weekend ended with Shane McCarthy’s panel which mostly centred on his work on Transformers. Shane gave a very entertaining panel and did his best to answer every question from the audience including a list of printed out questions that had been assembled by a very prepared and forward thinking fan. The panel ended with a bunch of supanova guests all making a surprise appearance and bidding everyone a thankyou and a farewell as the convention wound down.
Thus ends Supanova 2010 for Perth, it really is a fantastic event for anyone with an interest in popular culture. If you missed out it will be back next year, before then it will appear in Brisbane and Melbourne in April 2011.
Hopefully the crowds will continue to grow each year and maybe we can look forward to a better venue for the convention. The showgrounds is functional and has some great aspects, however I can’t help but think of the Perth Convention Centre right in the middle of Perth. The convention centre is sadly currently pricing itself out of reach of Supanova. It really is a shame given the high calibre international guests who travel here and we aren’t able to provide them with the best facilities available.
In closing I’d say I’ve been to Comic-con more than once which is an awesome experience and I plan to go again, however it can’t beat the intimate nature and accessibility that Supanova provides. Access to some of the guests at Supanova would simply be a nightmare at something as huge as Comic-con however here in Perth we can line up, meet the guests for a quick chat and a sketch or autograph and then head off to the next thing we want to see.
Supanova frakking rocks!!!!
