Conventions

The "under new management" Wizard World Chicago Comic-Con was held this past weekend, and even without the Situation on hand, we heard from all that it was very well attended. Industry analyst Milton Griepp also attended, and had some observations on the show make-up:

Pop culture business news site ICv2 has announced the ICv2 Conference on Comics and Digital II to be held in conjunction with this year's New York Comic-Con. It will be held on WEDNESDAY, October 10th,1:00 to 5:00 p.m. -- in previous years it was held on the Thursday prior to the Con but NYCC is essentially a 4 day show now. As in previous years, The Beat is a sponsor of this event. Here's the line-up of panels, with speakers to be announce. All of them sound extremely interesting.

A few months ago there was a bit of fanfare—and tanning oil—when it was announced that Jersey Shore cast member Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino and his family would be writing a comic for Wizard World, and appearing at various shows on the tour.

It's a sign of the length of the Comic-Con Recovery Process that even though I thought I could wrap this all up on Tuesday, it's taken me another four days and many many packets of Vietnamese Instant Coffee (Cà Phê Hòa Tan) to have the energy to write my thoughts. If you don't want to read them you can listen to much the same thing in the PW Comics World More to Come podcast. While I'm pretty sure everyone has purged the week of July 11-15th from their mind entirely —and I just about have forgotten it all myself—for the sake of completeness, here's what I thought and observed and smelled and saw and heard:

By Alexander Añé The Making a Living in Manga panel featured Adam Warren, Becky Cloonan, Fred Gallagher, Audra Furuichi, Christopher Butcher, JuYoun Lee, Erik Ko,...

This is the part where we fellow journos log roll, right? CBR News Editor Kiel Phegley has the most delightful Comic-Con recap, from yachts to Joe Keatinge to Elijah Wood to Whit Spurgeon. And so many potential quotes of the day. Is it THIS:

by Mike Scigliano

-- A guest list and the expenses associated with it, like everything else involved in producing a comicon, come out of your overall budget.  You've got to balance the books to make the show work.  Hotel rooms and airfare add up quickly and spending all your cash on guests but next to nothing on marketing or programming needs, for instance, could lead to a train wreck pretty quickly.

by AK Benjamin

-- [AK Benjamin is the husband of previous Beat contributor Meridith Jensen-Benjamin. Here's his view of the con, with some great advice.]

Seriously. I feel like it is New Year's Day again now that you-know-what is over. I can clean the closets, file things away, start NEW projects and just get on with life. BONUS: Comic-Con was so early this year that I actually have five weeks of summer left!

Fun photos from San Diego Comic-Con! I'm no 'virgin' to cons but this was my first time at the BIG SHOW and working at a publisher (Fantagraphics) instead being a freelance cartoonist. Still, I managed to sneak in some photos during my bathroom breaks. More fun below:

Courtesy of Jamie Coville, here are 16 of the top panels from Comic-Con 2012. It's almost as good as being there and if you don't like crowds, it's better. Many thanks to Jamie for providing this service. Jamie's photos can be seen here.

by Merideth Jenson-Benjamin

In what has become an annual pilgrimage for the Benjamin family, last week we packed our Febreeze and granola bars, and headed out to San Diego Comic-Con. Once we got home, I had a post-mortem with my ten year old daughter about the experience. Our conversation follows: