348 – Convention Attention – ECCC 2025 Recap!!

Hi, this is Christy Marks, creator of Gem in

the Holograms. You're listening to the Geekcast

Radio Network. This is Geekcast Radio, episode

348. Once again, we are bringing you our series

inside GCR called Convention Attention. It's

been a while since we've done one of these, folks.

It's been about a year. So actually, it's been

a little bit less than a year, considering the

last one was in August of 2024. But I am, of

course, TFGO to Mike, joining me once again for

the... Something we didn't do last year because

it was the mustard that was left off the hot

dog. But the ECCCCCCC recap is the moose himself,

the moose man himself, Mr. Christopher A. Morton.

Hello, sir. How are you? Greetings and salutations

all the way from the West Coast. That's right.

That's right. And crowding the crowd work there

is his good old buddy, Matt Crowder. He's working

the comic angle and everything else. How are

you doing? Not too bad. That's good, that's good.

We are recapping Emerald City Comic Con 2025,

which was held from March 6th through March 9th

at the Summit, a .k .a. Seattle Convention Center,

out there in the great state of Washington. Yay!

Yay! Huzzah! Yay! Oh, man. It's been a while.

I mean, I know we did the con catch -up last

year, and I think the last ECCC we did was in

2023, but man, I've lived here in Indiana for

three years now. It's hard to believe that I

have not lived out there in Washington since

2022. Oh, God. At the height of the great plague.

No, at the tail end of it. It was the comet tail

end of it, thank you. I don't know. It feels

like we're still in it sometimes. I mean, seriously.

Keep catching it. Yeah. Well, we caught some

sort of hopefully final time of Agent Yellow

and Red for the next... Anyway. Emerald City

Comic Con 2025, like I said. I was trying to

scroll. The problem with, and we mention this

in every episode of these folks for the convention

attention, the problem with going to any of the

convention, the Comic -Con websites after the

fact of the convention, it's like, hey, guess

what? Here's 2026's information. And it's like,

but I want to see 2025's. And it's like, I'm

trying to scroll down the guest list of seeing

all of the interesting guests that were probably

there i my because they thankfully ec were they

were they there okay were they there because

there was a lot of changes like the day before

tvs before the con they completely upset the

con which we'll talk about yeah um well i didn't

even get down half of the page i i stopped at

alan tudyk and i'm like okay as long as alan

tudyk showed up i don't care who else was there

did he Really? Did he show up? That's what you're

here to answer, but you guys didn't even show

up, did you? No, we kind of showed up. We originally

were scheduled to be part of the festivities.

They just cancelled all the festivities. All

of them. We should just claim if you're going

to a comic con, please make sure you good night's

rest before you go. Uh, you want to prep your

time for walking and wear comfortable shoes,

drink your vitamin C, um, really beef up on your

vitamins. Yeah. Just so much vitamin C. So that's

our, our disclaimer before you go to a comic

con. Always. So this one we went. Of course,

it's a Thursday through Sunday show. It's a four

-day show. Now, what's a little bit different

about this one, this is the third year that it's

premiering in its new convention center. But

a caveat to that is a good chunk of the show

is now back at the old convention center, which

is about three blocks away. Mostly covered walking,

but it's still three blocks away. What killed

this con a little bit. And, of course, a good

artist friend of ours, Vegas James, had another

booth there this year. And the main stage, or

three of the main stages, plus a lot of the photographs

and some autographs were in the old building.

Now, the autographs and all that, I understand.

It's the main stage that was the big caveat.

to this con. So a lot of people go off three

blocks to the main stage, watch a show. They

may have not returned back to the main show,

which is the feeling a lot of the people in the

con had. Because once they've taken that three

-walk block, and understand it's raining. Seattle,

in its greatness of March weather, it was raining

during the con. Granted, about, I'd say, a little

over half the walk is covered. because you go

through a nice covered kind of a tunnel area

to get between the two on the streets. But it's

still enough rain where you get wet trying to

get across the way to the courtyard into the

next building. So the breakup of this con was

more of the new invention that it's gotten bigger.

Now, our observation, well, especially James'

observation was, it was a Road City Comic Con

slipped into five stories. And they could have

fit everything into that building. Now that I'm

looking at it, I would probably argue a little

bit because there was times when that building

was still pretty crowded. There was areas that

was a little crushed to get through at times.

It ebbed and waved through, you know, how busy

and crowded it was to how thin it got. So overall,

I mean, that's the aspects of a constant development

as it starts to grow. And it's amazing this building

wasn't built with more capacity. where they're

feeling that they have to use the old convention

center because part of that was supposed to relieve

the cost of the old convention center, which

is practically three buildings, all condensed

to one. And now it's technically still three

buildings, but separated by three. I have a theory

that they have to do both buildings because the

celebrities want their high -end hotels. which

are right next to the Arch building, which is

the old convention center. Those have connectors

and can go from the hotel directly to the convention

center. Instead of having to walk three blocks

as a celebrity to the new convention center,

they don't want to do that. So they want to keep

the Arch building for the celebrities so that

they can stay comfortable next to their hotels.

Pretty good theory. I mean, actually, that fits

in line with our expertise in this con convention

world of a lot of them having that expectation.

The other big thing about this con that was different

than others was the price of the con. We've never

seen a Sunday ticket go for the same price as

a Saturday ticket at $80 a shot. That was a shocker

for us. And those that don't know, Sundays usually

end at five. And Saturdays usually end at like

7. Well, actually 11 because 7 the con ends and

then there's all the after con events. Yeah.

So big cost difference. And obviously you see

the rising. I mean, you expect it. I mean, I

remember the days when it was like 40 bucks to

go to a comic con. Yeah, but it was $80 to go

to three days at ECC when I started going. which

is yeah incredible back in the day the cost of

a saturday ticket oh that hurts my heart and

see that actually hurts a lot other because not

only that i mean everything in the con is a lot

more expensive uh of course just the vendors

alone now the other aspect of the con is for

the people that go to the con set up shop um

artist alley table how much they're saying the

table ran this year artist alley was around 500

depending on who you know Which is double of

what we used to back in the old days. The vendor,

which is on floor zero, they're pushing how much?

So an interior like normal table is about $2

,000. If you had an end cap or a large booth,

$3 ,000. oh okay i know most of these are like

you know for giant people that end up making

money yeah that may end up making money but like

how could anybody make money at having to pay

wow that's my yeah the margins are not there

much anymore i mean artists even rs alley james

walked away This is one of his better cons. There's

a lot of appreciation for the style of art he

does, which is more he's comic. And in past comic

shows we've talked about, Vegas James, he's done

some more work outside the medium of his own

stuff. He did work on the new He -Man comic that

came out. So he's established now. His style

of work is just amazing. It's beautiful, all

very Marvel superhero style. He's also runner

-up two years ago at Road City Comic Con for

the Quick Draw event. Congratulations. James

has to come back and win that again. But his

established style did really well. And there's

a couple other guys around there that did really

well. Randall. Across the way, one of the other

artists, I know he did really well. Gosh, he

had a line of people. This is the other thing

Matt noticed in the Comic -Con was the sketch

art, the private one -shot work, was much more

this year than we've seen in the past. For more,

just basically headshots. What were the headshots

you were seeing there, Matt? The prices for headshots

have definitely hit inflation. There was a person

that I got a head sketch from, a known... artist,

it was like $100 for a head sketch years ago.

At this con, he was $400 for a head sketch. There

were people that I'd never even heard of that

are just cover artists that are doing the Japanese

style DC books and Marvel books that everybody's

all the rage for right now. They were charging

$750 for a head sketch and they haven't even

done interiors. They're just doing cover art.

It was ridiculous how expensive. getting art

done by people at the show. And I think it's

because of how expensive the fucking con tables

are now. Except Randall. He was still pretty

cheap. They work for much more affordable prices.

And no, you're saying that wrong. That's Randy

Emberlin. Oh, Randy. Sorry, Randy Emberlin. I

was saying Randall, wasn't I? Wrong one. Yep.

Randy Emberlin has had the same price like his

entire career, pretty much. And he's a super

nice guy. The other artists in Artist Alley had

a big variety. The follower two was the Artist

Alley again. This one actually took up just over

half. I noticed a lot of the late rows, there

was a lot of room between the booths, but more

you ran to the other end. The L, the past L,

row L was open. But when you get toward row A,

it's like they ran out of room. And the rows

got much narrower. And boy, they got crowded

really quick. It was hard to get through some

of those. But a lot of variety. Returning comics,

returning artists that I've seen. One of the

ones I stopped at was Amy Chow. And then who

else did I see? Trying to think of all the people

I've came across. There was a lot of big name

artists there too. Darn it. Matt, help me out

here. What was some of the other ones we've come

across? Brian Cook. Brian Cook was there. That's

who I was thinking. Butts on things. He showed

back up there. He's one of the regulars from

the Northwest. Valentin. He was there. Oh, yeah.

Valentin was there. Randy Amberlin, of course.

Who was the guy that you bought the book for?

Tom. I'm drawing a blank on his last name. Tom

Zoller. No, Zoller was not there. I looked. I

can find him. He did not show up to this con.

I know he's busy right now. There's a couple

of big -name artists that didn't show up this

year that normally show up. Katie Cook was there.

Katie Cook did get there, and I actually stopped

by her booth to see, but she was really busy.

But the folks over at Beyond the Western Deep,

they weren't there. It was Alex and Rachel, which

are artists that I absolutely love, and they

do a great comic strip. But they didn't show

up because of the cost of the con. It's the cost

of the environment. A lot of Northwest people

were there, not a lot of travelers from the East

Coast were showing up this year. Certainly nobody

from Canada. Yeah. Canadians were not coming

across, which really hurt. Which you could tell,

you could feel it, that there was a lack of fandom

at the show. Yeah. Now, we always push for people

to purchase at Artist Alley. If you go anywhere,

it's the place if you're going to spend money,

that's who you spend it on. But I know people

have come here and want to hear about, what about

the big guests, the ones that have come across,

the big name people? Well, this one, guys, all

the five families, all of us went Saturday for

one reason. The majority of everyone from Firefly

were supposed to do multiple panels. They had

to get together. That's why we were going on

Saturday. That was our whole focus, to see the

cast of Firefly all together, ready to go. It

was like everyone but Alan Tudyk. And Alan Tudyk,

he was the last one to show eventually. Adam

Baldwin was never on the schedule. Oh, Adam,

that's right. He didn't show up. But still, it

was the majority of the cast. So once they get

it going, we're all excited. The week before,

it went to crap. Oh, no. They basically started

pushing people out. of saturday because apparently

a lot of the some of the cast members could not

make saturday they made sunday so they moved

all the panels now the one big change on this

comic -con i gotta mention was the assigning

of panel booths or seats so you bought your tickets

and you had three panels that you can get priority

seating for so you get your name on the list

you had to show up 30 minutes early and you're

guaranteed to get into that panel And if you

didn't show up, your seat would have been given

out by the time they let people in. It's a priority

seating thing to help try to ebb in the flow

of people coming into these panels, especially

the big ones, because the main stage wasn't quite

as big as it was before. So that was the big

change. So everyone who signed up for Saturday

stuff, nearly all the Saturday stuff for their

paneling got canceled because Alan Duke eventually

could not make Saturday. He only could do Sunday.

So he ended up moving to a Sunday shift, and

then Jules didn't make it either. He canceled

the day before. Yeah. So everybody was... So

what you're saying is the Firefly convention

stuff got canceled just like the show. Pretty

much. Pretty much. Did you read Pop Fox? Same

person. Never seen them in the same building

at the same time. Have you? Conspiracy. Yes,

conspiracy. So that was a big change. I had the

big draw. Some of the five family members went

for all the autographs they can get. They were

in line for quite some time to get all those.

And pretty much their whole con, we could even

hardly spend any time with them because their

whole Saturday, even Sunday, was spent in the

Arch building just standing in line to get autographs,

which was beyond. I couldn't do that. I mean,

I got a few autographs, ones that I value today.

But when I go to Comic -Cons, of course, Matt

knows my big thing is the panels. I want to go

see panels. I want to see information about beginning,

intermediate people in the fields that they enjoy

or about a fandom they enjoy. Well, you want

to hear from the people, and you really can't

hear from the people standing in line waiting

for an autograph when that's a personal one -on

-one thing. Would you like the personal one -on

-one thing? Absolutely, great. But the point

of the panel is so everyone can hear from the

people that worked on or took part in or had

a part in whatever it is, whether it's a TV show,

a movie, a comic, or whatever. That's the point

of the panel is to go to see the people that

worked on it and get the overall group interaction

more so than the individual interaction. I don't

know. Oh, yeah. Now, Firefly wasn't the only

draw. That was just one of their main attention

getters for Emerald City this year. Right. Other

people that have come or that arrived this year

was Adam Savage. He had a pretty good line for

his area. Bruce Campbell. who has an organ home,

and I love the actor to death. He arrived. He

was a great panel and great. Everyone loved getting

their autographs and pictures with him. Denise

Richards was here. Apparently, she grew a pretty

large line. A lot of people were pretty excited

about her. She was really nice. There was a Starship

Trooper -like reunion where they had Van Dyne

and that cast. And then Star Trek, Strange New

Worlds had a bunch of cast members. So they had

a big panel and Star Trek fandom. Really not

much in the way of Star Wars this year, except

for the black guy. He was the only Star Wars

person. I can't remember his name. Are you talking

about Billy Dee Williams? No, the Stormtrooper

from the new ones. Oh, John Boyega. Yeah. He

was there, but no other Star Wars person. So

it was kind of lacking in the Star Wars department

for once. Seth Green arrived, but he didn't do

a panel this year. It was just he's there for

Autograph and Pictures. So he didn't kick into

the, which is a little bit different than what

his style, but I'm heard he does a great panel

if you can catch it. But that was the big groupings

of them. They had a lot of other shows, voice

actors that arrived. Of course, several of the

Hell in the Boss, Hasbro Hotel, the actors like

Alec Brightman, he showed up for it. Some old

school voice actors from the X -Men days showed

up. They were there signing autographs for voicing.

They had the Dragon Ball Z voice actors of Vegeta,

Piccolo, and Goku. That was a big... big time

thing for people that are into anime. Nice. Nice.

So that, that rounds up some of your big celebrities

that came to this comic con. And now we can,

if you want to, we can get into the grits of

what the panels and the inner workings of the

comic con were. Matt, what panels did you go

see? I didn't go to a single one. That's right.

You don't do the panels. No, I was, I wanted

to go do Firefly. That's why I got a Saturday

ticket. You're right. And they canceled on you.

Yeah. What panel did you go to, Chris? What did

they talk about? I went to several panels. This

is the first year they did a thing called The

Tavern up on Floor 5. And it looks like this

big tavern with these lights. And they had live

shows of pirate shanties, one guy called Earl

the Bard. They just ran music. So you can go

there, sit down for a little bit, and just listen

to If they had a tavern like this in Portland

that ran all day long, I would go to it a lot.

It was really nice. I actually enjoyed it immensely.

There was like beanbag chairs by the stage and

all the tables were set up. Those were really

enjoyable. I caught two of the smaller panels,

one on, or I caught four panels total. One was

more, I stopped in and looked at some. Intro

art, some intro into the world of writing. The

big one I was really excited when I'm looking

through the panels and I noticed someone who

didn't have a table booth, but was on a panel.

And this is Travis Baldry. Now, if you don't

know, he writes a cozy little novel called Legends

and Lattes. It is a fantastic D &D novel about

a barbarian who retires to open a coffee shop.

And it is the epitome of comfort or cozy novel

writing, which kind of emerged during the start

of the pandemic. No huge action scenes, no super

suspense. It's just everyday fantasy people dealing

with, you know, real world issues. I was super

excited about this panel. It had a lot to do

with the writing styles of what he did. I absolutely

loved it. So I get into this panel with a friend

of mine, and we sit down there. There's him.

There's two other writers. I can't remember their

names. One wrote the book, I remember, called

Automated Noodles. It's kind of a futuristic,

robotic future. California separates from the

United States in this automated society, but

they lose the war. It's about robots in San Francisco

that just want to run a noodle shop. That's all

they want to do. Okay. Apparently, it's a non

-binary couple of robots, which I don't get.

Whatever. From the moment I sat down, the panel

started, has zero to do with comfort writing

and cozy novel creation. It ended up being all

hate speech about the current government. Oh,

no. How personal, non -binary. Rights are being

offended or fronted by the government. I went

through 45 minutes of this just while I write.

It's like, I don't care about your sexual preference.

I just want to hear about your book. Now, Travis

didn't really jump on that bandwagon, but his

two people that were with him up there, and they

had a moderator who didn't moderate squat. Here's

another great example for Comic -Con, which I've

complained to him. Get moderators that moderate

the panel. Stop getting a moderator that cows

down to a moderator. Now, I understand there

are some moderators. Your best job is to get

the hell out of the way. Let the people do their

own thing. Because experienced panel people or

professional actors will run the gambit. Like

Will Wheaton. You don't need to moderate Will

Wheaton. That's fine. William Shatner won't even

let you moderate. He'll throw you off the stage.

There's only room for my ego. You must sit down

with the common folk. Yes, exactly. But as we

mentioned with SummerCon, we had the hell of

a boss, husband, hotel moderator who just did

a horrible job. And the same came with this panel.

It was just all about all their sexual preferences

are being affronted, how they went to only two

sexes in the government. Now, the room, it read

the room, the room was all cheering it on because

that's just, we're in Seattle. I really don't

care. I wanted to learn more about Legends of

Lattes, what next book they're, because he wrote

Bookshelves and Bone Dust, and there's supposed

to be a third book coming out. That's what I

wanted to hear about. What's your third book?

Because it's a great series. Yeah. And I will

do a whole podcast on cozy writing because that

medium out there is really well and has never

been represented in the writing community for

many years. Yeah, we can do one. I just have

to read the stuff first. That's all. There's

a great audio book, too. The fact is, Travis

Baldry reads his own works. Because he started

narrating books for people. That's how he got

into writing. He narrated these books, and so

he wrote his own and then narrated his own, and

he does a really good job. Cool. It's, again,

not super big action or nothing. It's just a

person writing a good old coffee shop. So that

was the down point of this Comic -Con, was coming

to a panel. It had nothing to do with the panel,

and I really wish they would get moderators in

play. Not the only panel. And there's other panels

there that are specific to that genre. You know,

there's inclusive rights for everybody. There's

a quiet room for LGBT community if you need some

space to talk or to relax. They actually set

aside multiple rooms for that community. I mean,

the con's very open to that inclusiveness to

everything. That's great. Let them have their

space. But I came to a room to learn about books

and it just didn't happen. It didn't happen because

they had an agenda for something completely different.

And it wasn't that you weren't against hearing

that. It wasn't what you wanted to hear. You

didn't want an agenda in your ear. You wanted

to know about the person's work. That's what

you wanted to know about. That's the information

you wanted. That was the downside of the Comic

-Con for that Saturday. I heard from my other

friends that were actually at the Friday show

and Sunday show that the con was pretty busy.

The flow of traffic was all right. Now, Matt

does read a lot of the comments that came across

the Facebook site. You want to highlight a couple

of those great little events that happened on

there? At least this time there wasn't a lap

dance circle of minors. So they improved upon

that aspect of it from a couple of years ago.

So, so good job, but there was a lot of complaining

about just little things that if you go to, I

think there was a lot of new con goers and this

is not the con that you want to go to as your

first con. No, it's way too big. And you don't

understand it. Like people that were special

needs of like with a cane or something like that,

complaining about how long they were standing

in line to get autographs. And even in their

comments, they were like, yes, the line monitor,

they moved us over into the VIP signatures, but

without having purchased the VIP pass to be part

of that line. But they were still not. happy

enough with that because they still had to stand

there in line that there should have been chairs

or something in the line so that they could sit

down because the line took them 45 minutes yeah

ungrateful little small things I've noticed because

we've gone there so many times throughout the

years I thought the con actually did better this

year they had more chairs available throughout

the con so people could sit down and not have

to sit along the wall there's still there's never

going to be enough chairs that you're not going

to see people sitting on the floor and up against

the wall but they did a better job of having

those rest areas available for people to sit

down and tried to make the alleyways wider like

chris said an artist alley until they you know

miscalculated It was just a lot of nitpicking

stuff that people I don't think quite understood

how cons actually operate. So overall, I think

they did a better job, but it's still not the

Emerald City that I used to love to go to. And

I would get a four day pass and I would stay

all weekend. uh going to all the events and hanging

out with all my friends and and doing stuff now

it's like uh do i even want to go up for one

day right you for this con unfortunately this

was the reason that we went up we went up for

firefly and unfortunately got very disappointed

because they all canceled you need to find something

that you actually want to go do and see there

otherwise it's going to be a very disappointing

con yeah So I know you guys went up specifically

for the one day kind of thing, but did they even

offer multiple day passes? Yes. Okay. Okay. I

just wanted to make sure because the only pass

that they sell out of is the four day pass. Right.

And Saturday, that's the only ones that they

ever sell out of. Okay. If you want to go one

Thursday, you want to go one Friday, you want

to go one Sunday, those passes are usually always

available. Saturday and the weekend passes are

the only ones that ever sell out. And you're

paying through the nose for individual days.

Yes. Well, yeah, of course. You're going to pay

through the nose for individual days. But, yeah,

no, I was just kind of curious because you guys

only did go the one day. I was like, but do they

still sell the multi -day passes? I don't know.

And yeah, you're right. It sounds like where

ECCC is in their convention history here, it

doesn't sound like they are in any way, shape,

or form looking to welcome in easily new people.

No. They want the convention... who can run the

gambit of the way that they set that show up.

Yes. And basically you're going to be trampled

like Billy Crystal in City Slickers if you don't

know what the hell you're doing. Which, you know,

hey, more promotion for Rose City Comic Con,

folks. It's much easier and much more friendly.

Yep. And it gives you a lot more options, too.

It's funny. Everything in Seattle is very black

and white. Like, these are the restaurants that

are there. There are no other options. You will

pay those prices or you won't eat. That's right.

And like Portland, Rose City, they have food

trucks. Yep. And it's going to be different every

year that you go there. Like, oh. I want to eat

at that taco place. Well, that taco truck was

there last year. It doesn't mean they're going

to be there this year. So it's kind of cool that

they rotate in food options and have close food

options that are affordable too. Yeah, absolutely.

Seattle, you're downtown Seattle. You better

go when it's happy hour, which means you're leaving

the show to go do happy hour. Cause yeah. Yeah,

three to six, you're leaving the heart of the

show to go get cheap food or not even cheap food.

So also another rule of con going for those that

have not done it. Pack snacks. Yes. Oh, yeah.

Pack snacks. Energy bars. Jerky. Things that'll

stay with you and give you energy, not just straight

sugar. Yeah. Exactly. Now, we did get a staple

of the Emerald City Comic Con for most people

to have meals is just outside the restaurant

of, why am I drawing a blank on it? Matt, help

me. Which restaurant? Which restaurant? The one

that's closing right outside. Oh, Cheesecake

Factory. Cheesecake Factory, that's right. Cheesecake

Factory is closing, in fact, here within the

month. That's a staple of Emerald City. How do

you draw a blank on the Cheesecake Factory? I

was looking at something else on my screen and

my mind went elsewhere. I'm looking at attendance

values. Because we didn't eat there this time.

We did not because we weren't there multiple

days, too. Yeah. One thing we didn't mention

when we started the show was the attendance.

Now, pre -pandemic attendance for Emerald City

Comic Con reached a peak about 98 ,000. And then

they believe this year the numbers haven't been

announced, but they either achieved it or just

finally broke in the 100 ,000 level this year

alone. So it was a very packed con and they have

the space for it, especially if they're doing

two big buildings to offset a lot of the. They

have the space to do up to there. Cause I remember

in 2019 that that was a shoulder to shoulder.

We were working on the sixth floor on that one.

And that was incredibly busy con. That was right

before all. Everything went haywire. Yeah, it's

crazy. That's the overview of ECC, CCCCC. I guess

we should go to the next section if we want to

touch in a minute here. We will go over the upcoming

cons for 2025, which for the Northwest will be

SummerCon and, of course, our very home city,

Rose City Comic Con. So those are the next two

you guys are going to? Yes. So I just did a comic

book swap meet this weekend at Lloyd Center and

there was a guy walking around handing out flyers

for something called Geek Week, which is like

10 days in September at the same time that Rose

City is going on, except Rose City is only a

three day con where this is like a full week.

So we might go check a day of that out and see

what that's about. I'm kind of hoping it's kind

of given that. old rose city when it was done

at the double tree ballroom that it was that

small and you had like massage therapists setting

up tables and you had like etsy people selling

buttons that they make out of their garage and

that kind of small town actual artists and not

some corporation ripping off an artist and throwing

it on a t -shirt kind of thing that a lot of

those cons have turned into. Why do I feel like

watching a social network after this podcast

right now? Yeah. The merch at Emerald City was

a little disappointing. It was more like a showroom

floor of things that you can't afford, but oh,

it'd be really cool if you could have that. wormwood

gaming table meant for dnd that's like ten thousand

dollars or whatever but you know actual things

that you can afford it was a little a little

lacking or you know if you've gone to one con

you've seen them at every single con so you already

have the one thing that you wanted from them

and they don't come out with new product oh you're

talking about t -turtle One of many T -shirt

companies that was there that had the exact same

run of T -shirts that they've had for like the

last five years. Yep. Nothing special about T

-Turtle. You disappoint me. I usually try to

buy a T -Turtle shirt on every con, but this

year, nothing new. It was all the same. I was

really disappointed. There has only been, even

though I can't. buy them anymore because they

don't fit me anymore. There has only been one

t -shirt company ever that I have ever bought

stuff from that has new stuff every day and that

is Ripped Apparel because they have new designs

every day. There we go. New stuff. One thing

Matt didn't mention, he did pick up a nice little

golden gem at Emerald City Comic Con. For you

comic book nerds out there. Are you talking about

the slab that I bought? Yes, the beautiful little

slab that you got a great deal on. Yeah, I did

get a really good deal on a Jim Lee signed. It

was unfortunately a 9 .4, but it was super cheap.

It was like 85 bucks for a Jim Lee signed first

appearance of Omega Red. Oh, nice. Very cool.

That was kind of a nice little gem that I found.

Because Jim Lee is like at least 50 bucks for

an autograph. Sometimes more, depending on what

show he's at. And also a first appearance. So

it was nice. Cool. Very cool. Well, if we want

to highlight the two cons we're going to be at

this year. First of all, I want to mention about

SummerCon. June 20th through the 22nd. The one

that's in Central Washington and Puyallup, Washington.

It's at the fairgrounds. This one is going to

be, we're going to be there multiple days. Only

because of who's going to be there. For Matt,

Kevin Eastman is making his return back to the

con here. And in previous summer cons, we have

noticed that they do not maintain line integrity

very well or line flow very well. That is really

one of the only issues that I've ever had with

SummerCon is that their people, their volunteers,

or whoever organizes their security team or volunteer

team, they do not understand line management

at all. And I spent an entire day waiting to

get Kevin Eastman's signature because of how

poorly run. their line management is. And I was

in line a couple hours before the signing was

even supposed to be, and it still took me eight

hours of standing in line to get it. Oh, no.

Yeah. Kevin Eastman also is an awesome person,

and he knew that the line management was very

terrible, so he was doing some free stuff for

some people, because he is a very nice, generous

person. Yes, he is awesome. Yeah, hopefully they

can remedy that from a few years ago and actually

have a smooth line. I'm not going to hold my

breath, but I certainly have some more stuff

for him that I would love to get him to sign.

Yeah. Now, in typical fashion for the Northwest,

our big three cons are always ECC, SummerCon,

and Rose City. So as soon as one completes...

The guest list of the next one starts filling

out. And the day after ECC ended, SummerCon started

really posting on who they're getting. Now, Eastman

was always a guarantee. That was one of the first

people they announced as soon as the show came

up live. Now, Charlie Cock is going to show up

at this one. In fact, it's all Daredevil for

the series. Most of the cast is going to be there.

Nice. Don Bluth is, of course, since he's in

the Northwest, he's showing up to the... Keith

David, who I would like personally to see, is

showing back up at this Comic -Con. And, of course,

the big headliner is William Shatner is showing

up to this con. I think this is the first time

he's come to this one. The what? SummerCon? The

SummerCon. No. No, he got in a fight with Ray

Park last year. That's right. Forget about that.

Talk about Star Wars versus Star Trek. Yeah,

he got his panties in a twist because Ray Park

had a longer line than him and threw a huge fucking

fit about it where they had to go get a different

pavilion so that he could have his own signing

building because he could not stand Ray Park

having a longer line than him. You say, Keith,

David, all I can think of is the fate of the

world is entrusted to a bunch of retards I wouldn't

trust with a potato gun. I'm excited because

I always loved the work he did, like in Princess

and the Frog. I absolutely love his character

in that one, Goliath. Of course, he's in Hasbun

Hotel. I like his style of voice acting and I'm

really excited about going up there. And he's

one that, cause I do have a blink variant copy

of gargoyles. I really need to get a picture

done on it, but I could easily get Keith David

to sign on that one. Cause that'd be kind of

cool since he's the voice of Goliath. Yeah, that

would be so cool. Yeah. I just remember him as,

I mean, I remember him as all the stuff you're

talking about, but man, general Kinsey from Armageddon.

Of course, they have a couple of Disney princesses

coming to this one, voice actors from there.

But that's just the start. I mean, it's very

early on. Yeah, it's very early on. They're going

to get it pretty quickly. So we're going to be

at Summercom. We're definitely going to be hitting

two days up there. So Matt can get his stuff,

and I can do the work. Not sure if Vegas James

is going to get a booth up there. He's trying.

He's trying. Will Paul will be hanging around

his booth. That's usually what we do. Definitely

an artist we want you to go. purchase from for

those in the Pacific Northwest. The next Comic

-Con, of course, that we need to chat about is

our home city Comic -Con, Rose City. The one

that we have gone to since its starting days

and the one that I missed last year because I

was in the hospital and I wasn't going anywhere.

Luckily, you kicked that virus's ass. Oh, I did.

I beat that. My kidneys are better. I'm in better

health. There you go. And I had to do it before

Matt was going to murder me. Yeah, true. Road

City Comic Con is here at the Convention Center

in Portland, Oregon, September 5th through September

7th. The overall experience for here is beautiful

about Portland is you can get a hotel a little

bit of ways away from the Road City Comic Con,

and you can jump on a train system to the Convention

Center. So you don't have to pay bigger prices

being right outside the Convention Center. You

go anywhere along the multiple Rutt -Max lines,

get a hotel off that that's walking distance

and just catch a train in and out for each day.

That's the beauty of Rose City Comic Con, I will

admit. Again, this is very early for attendance,

but their theme this year is all leading up to

the Goonies. It's the 40th anniversary of the

Goonies. So that is going to be the... focus

of everything and of course that's they have

all the goonies up there who are coming um well

not all of them several of the goonies have set

up cory feldman is already sean austin is already

going to be there uh several of the adults the

only one outside of for celebrities is of course

our our favorite con person is will wheaton he's

agreed to be there for friday saturday so we

are excited if you go to a comic -con with will

wheaton Do not miss his panels. He is one of

the best panel goers, presenters out there that

I've ever seen. His stories will memorize you.

And he is absolutely, he loves it for the fans.

And it's absolutely wonderful to go see him.

Voice actors are several anime and X -Men voice

actors have already agreed to be going there.

And there's a slew of some comic artists. I don't,

I know a couple of them, but nothing super huge.

But we'll see more of that as SummerCon comes

and goes. Those ranks will definitely fill out.

Very cool. Very cool. All right, folks. Go ahead.

I do want to point out one sad note. One thing

about Emerald City Comic Con as it went out,

one author that I've actually met a couple of

times, Terry Brooks, the author of the Shannara

series, is taking the back step role. He is now

done writing books. After this Comic -Con, he's

old. He's near 90, and he mentioned dementia,

and it started hitting him. He's forgetting things.

It's hard for him to converse in the public.

There is a writer who's worked underneath him

for years in the scenario world. She'll be taking

over all the duties as main author. He's let

out some guidelines for her to follow, but he

is officially done after the book they just released.

For an author that I grew up on, It's sad. His

books are amazing. Do not watch the TV show.

That's garbage. But the books are fantastic.

And for any new person who's getting into reading,

the Shannara series is a really good series to

immerse yourself with. Are you saying that MTV

did not do a good job of producing the Shannara

Chronicles? Terrible job. The poster. The poster.

Okay, you know what? You're getting me on a tangent.

Music, television, programming did not do a good

job with a fantasy story. Damn you, Matthew.

All right. Another tangent for another time.

Sorry about that, sir. Oh, boy. But yes, Terry

Brooks, amazing, amazing person, amazing writer.

Yeah. I mean, you gotta, Hey, as long as you

can go out at the top of your game, right. I

guess. I mean, you know, if you decide that you

need to take a step back with, especially if,

if health is, is a concern, obviously, you know,

it's very sad, but Hey, the man had a wonderful

career. Yep, he's not doing the Robert Jordan

thing. It's like I'm a book or two away from

finishing the series. I just certainly hope that

they don't Tim Curry him with his family, that

they just let him retire and be retired and not

quite literally wheeled out for the public masses.

Yep, that's another tangent for another podcast.

Yeah, let's hope that doesn't happen, or let's

hope the other thing. doesn't happen that we

will talk about off air that apparently is happening

and i'm sorry but kickstarter get your shit together

and stop that campaign ah yes stupid anyway anything

else on the conventions before i send it to a

quick podcast ad break gentlemen One of the nice

things that's been happening recently with Emerald

City is that they quite literally have CGC from

Florida come out and do their show. They're not

doing third party where you get. grading where

you give it to one guy you pay him extra and

then they hand deliver your books to florida

but it's just like a whole bunch of extra steps

and a whole bunch of extra money cgc has finally

started coming to seattle to do the show so you

can give them your books directly and pay cgc

prices and not get taken to the cleaner So that's

really nice. And it's very convenient to do.

It's really easy. They have a huge booth, lots

of employees there to help you go through their

application of filling out for what books you're

sending off. And there's so many people there

that you don't have to worry about your books

being protected like you do with other third

party. groups that are sending like two people

and they have to go off and go watch signings

and they leave your books unprotected at their

booth with nobody there for cg for cgc grading

like people that like to get their books sent

off That's what I did on Saturday. That was my

highlight, was being able to actually interact

with CGC, send off books that I've been holding

on to because they are high value and I do not

trust the post office to not throw them into

a sewer grate or jab it with a box knife. So

I was able to hand deliver that to them and I

will hopefully get them back in a month or two.

Because it's going directly to them and not through

this person, then this person, then back to this

person, and then back to me. That is nice if

you're into the whole grading book thing. Yeah,

I've noticed that with CGC is that they're going

to a lot more shows in general, not just for

the comic grading, but for other just grading

stuff in general. Oh, yeah, they're grading video

games, cards. They just partnered up with PSA.

So they're doing authentications. So you no longer,

it will state on the book, there is witnessed

yellow labels and then there are authenticated

yellow labels where they'll just say, yep, that's

so -and -so's signature. And then there's other

times that they are witnessing it and saying,

yes, this is that person's signature because

I saw them write it. I haven't seen any dip in

price on authentication to witnessed. So apparently.

the authentication process everybody is saying

no that's just as good yeah very cool very cool

all right folks you're gonna hear some podcast

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Alright, folks, we are back here on GeekCast

Radio. This is episode 348. We are two away from

350. And any final thoughts from you, Mr. Christopher,

sir? The progression of where Comic -Con, again,

the stigma of the word comic book convention

is really not the overall view of what these

events are anymore. It is pulp culture. That's

what's the overview design. Now, Emerald City

was the first. I hadn't seen a lot of WWE wrestling

involved. There was like one wrestler there.

That was it. It's funny because that usually

tags along with these conventions. You'll see

a big group of WWE wrestlers tag along with it.

But it is still a great place to express yourself,

to express the culture that you love or the fandom

you love, because there are other people who

love what you love, and this is a good place

to meet them. Some of them are a little, you

know, sketchy, and this is not furry conventions.

Stop it, Matt, because I knew you were going

to mention that. But it's a great place for people

to go to, to enjoy the medium out there of different

venues, either be books, either be videos. audio,

or just big film. You gambit everything there.

So definitely I encourage you to go. And don't

even have to go alone. Try to bring your friend.

And you don't have to hit every day. I don't

encourage going every day because it's way too

much. You will get sick. You will get sick. Confunk

is a thing, folks. And we've survived it. So

here's the thing, folks. Really quickly, before

I let Matt have the floor and have his final

say, here's the thing, folks. Confunk is a thing.

Not only is it a thing for people that actually

go to conventions, but it's also a thing for

people who sit at home in front of their computer

screens looking at convention websites trying

to keep up with the news. And I'm already sick.

One of us. One of us. Thank you, Joe. Matt, go

ahead. What are your final thoughts? Hygiene.

Hygiene, hygiene, hygiene. Please, when going

to cons, shower, change your clothes. If you

have, I don't know, a furry costume, please clean

it. Please put some air freshener in it. Something

like that, because we don't need this turning

into what anime cons used to be of just the giant...

smell pool of grossness there's a lot of people

you get really crammed in some of those alleys

and we all want to be able to breathe oxygen

that'd be great okay okay okay yeah people get

crammed in a lot of those back alleys kind of

like the back of a volkswagen oh boy kind of

yes folks do your best and like like Matt and

Chris have said, I agree. Okay, so if you go

to any, it's not just specific to ECCCCCCCC,

but if you go to any convention's website, whether

it's your local convention, whether it's a national

convention, whatever, and you see it has three

different things that you want to go to, what

I would suggest is, especially if these things

are on different days, get those multiple day

passes get that friday saturday sunday pass for

that specific thing on that specific day kind

of thing or like they've said in this whole episode

if there's only one day that they wanted to go

because there's only one specific thing go for

that one day and have that fun you don't have

to you know go bankrupt over a convention that

might end up mentally discharging yourself out

of somewhere and just, no, just have fun folks

be responsible. And I've got one other thing

though, to mention to new con goers. If there

is a celebrity that you are really wanting to

see, make sure you check on all of their social

media to make sure that one, they were invited

through the guest. Then also check the website

of the con. This show, I noticed on Facebook

and Instagram, they were pushing celebrities

that had already canceled, but they had only

mentioned on the website of Emerald City Comic

Con that that celebrity had actually canceled.

But on Facebook and Instagram, they were still

pushing the picture of that celebrity saying,

come get autographs, come see the panels, come

see this. But the website, the home website for

Emerald City said this artist had canceled. But

for weeks after that, I knew that that artist

had canceled. They were still pushing them on

other social medias. So check everything. that

you can check this with that artist or that celebrity

to see if they've mentioned going to that con,

uh, to see if dates have changed or anything

like that. So if, Oh, sorry guys, I can't make

Saturday. I'm only making Sunday and then check

the, the show to make sure that they're being

honest on all of their social medias. Yeah, absolutely.

Any, uh, any other promotions or anything else

you guys want to do before I run through the

closing? No, not really. Well, of course, you

can always find me around there at dpodcast .com.

Again, we're not really doing much new shows,

but we're more capable of doing things that we

really want to do because we're just lazy, and

who knows? With the most interest, we might actually

get stuff done. So you can poke us around out

there. Otherwise, you can always catch me floating

around here at the Geekcast Radio Network because

I like to poke around when I can. Stop it. I

mean, never mind. Poke the bear. Thank you for

listening to us here on Geekast Radio. If you'd

like to get in contact with us to leave feedback

for the show, there are several ways to do so.

Visit the website geekastradio .com where you

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You can also visit shop .geekastradio .com where

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mats. We have other things. I have no idea. Just

check that out. You can check us out in any of

the podcatching clients you choose to use, Apple,

Android, all that good stuff. You can follow

us on all the social medias at geekcastradio

for the network. I am at tfg1mike. Chris, social

media, yay, nay? Social media, I mainly look

for dpodcast .com. Of course, you can catch me

if you do DeviantArt. Look for Tabaxian, and

you will find all my artist goodies there. There

you go. What about you, Matt? Not really. I don't

post on anything. He's very anti -social, folks.

Bah humbugs. At least on the internet. Yes. You

can become a fan on Facebook. Go to facebook

.com slash geekcastradionetwork. We hope you

enjoyed this episode of Geekcast Radio. I wish

you'll join us next time. We'll be talking about

something. I have no idea what it is yet. We

have no plans. I wasn't even sure. Until they

brought this up, I was like, oh, okay, cool.

I haven't made a plan for geek cast radio in

a couple of months, folks. I'm over on studio

2009 doing the Columbo files and we're doing

movies and things and whatever the pull bag is

doing comic book stuff. And I don't even know

what else we're doing. Uh, I think we're about

to finish the boy meets world podcast, podcast

meets podcaster meets world. So we're, we're

doing that. What kind of books are you hitting

over there at the pull bag? right now oh let's

see we just we're in the middle of mutant march

so we are going through we're continuing our

run through idw publishing tmnt uh we just released

episode 575 of the pullback which is idw tmnt

reborn volume 5 which collects issues 124 to

130 of the comic book series from idw So there's

that. I literally just, as of this recording,

I just finished editing episode 577, which is...

I'm surprised I got it under this. It's 2 hours,

48 minutes, and 16 seconds. It was about to be

3 hours, 14 minutes, and 56, 28, 37, 84, whatever

pi number you can think of. But we did volume

7. of the reborn series so we're making our end

run through the idw tm and t series up to issue

150 and then this september in inside the pull

bag we are going to do sewer surfing september

which we haven't done since uh 2017 i think which

is just wow well it's just a theme thing but

we're doing that so we we're giving ourselves

enough time So that way we have at least the

first trade of the new series written by Jason

Aaron. So at least by September, that new series

will be in trade paperback by that time. So we'll

have at least, I think the first two arcs in

trade by then. I know that at least the first

arc, the first six issues will be traded by then.

And then after that, I don't know. I had a lot

of health issues lately myself with the brain

and everything else. Yeah, yeah. Technically,

I've been sick since last Halloween in 2024,

so if I'm not recording or editing, I'm asleep.

I can relate. Yeah. So, yeah, there's that. Yeah,

Mike, at least you have all ten toes. You don't

have to take your pants off to count to 20s.

Oh, no, that's what the calculator's for on my

phone. Oh, boy. All right. For now, I am TF2

and Mike with Chris and Matt. Thank you for listening.

Until next time. Oh, yeah. And unleash the geek

in you. You've just heard a podcast from the

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