SDCC 12: New, shorter Eisner Awards are a delight

Whether it was the dropped categories or just fairy magic, the Eisner Awards came in at a trim 2 1/4 hours last night, an awards show running time that would fit comfortably on Nickelodeon or Spike. While such Eisner classics as sting music straight from Soma’s Secret Agent channel and tiki-themed table centerpieces were still in evidence, the replacement of the emcee with an announcer, and a majority of shorter acceptance speeches definitely helped, but the arrival of a couple of stage manager/show runners probably slimmed things down as well. Also there was a dearth of schtick from the presenters—except mostly the last one, Jonathan Ross, who is allowed to be as schticky as he likes. Speeches were shorter too, except R.C. Harvey but his was still pretty interesting. (We have out live tweet on a different device and once we get better coverage we’ll post.)

Since the awards had begun earlier than before (8 pm as opposed to 8:30) this meant that you could actually do something AFTER the awards, which many did, but the traditional cocktail party was well attended with probably the biggest gathering of the comics talent at the show, from Lynn Johnston to Brecht Evens. The lowkey party setting outside the Indigo Ballroom is still perhaps a little TOO lowkey—it would be nice for people to be motivated to move right out of the ballroom to the mingling area more quickly since the ballroom is so big—but it was great hanging with so many cool comicos, from Los Bros and families, to the D&Q and Fantagraphics contingents to Larry Marder to Maggie Thompson to James Kochalka to…well, you get the idea.

Shown above, btw, the evening’s big winner, Ramon Perez and his takeaway sack of Eisner Awards. Sweet.