Experiencing Wondercon for the First Time

Anaheim Wondercon 2013 was a super fan-friendly convention, where comic book and sci-fi fans could dress in costume, purchase merchandise, attend panel sessions, and watch movie previews, short films, and even try out new video games. Unlike other bigger conventions, this con was geared towards fans coming together rather than being focused on swag and marketing.

The real comic book nerd in the family was my brother but I read comics too. I can still remember how my mom, in an effort to organize things, bound together my brother’s comic book collection into a leather bound book. It seemed cool at the time, but we realized that binding them together made the comics lose their (resale) value. My brother would later lovingly collect each comic book in those plastic cover protectors, and keep them in specially designed comic book storage boxes. We started out reading the funny comics – The Archies, Huey, Dewey and Louie etc before graduating into the Marvel and DC worlds of comic book heroes. But the real comic book turning point for me was Neil Gaiman’s Sandman Series.

I can go on and tell you about my love for comics and graphic novels, but what I really want to tell you about right now is Wondercon. On the last weekend of March, I attended Wondercon at the Anaheim Convention Center, the annual comic book, science fiction and movie convention. I like to describe it as a mini Comic-Con (San Diego). Considering the last comic convention I attended was a decade ago in Philadelphia (Wizard East), I was a bit overwhelmed by Wondercon. There were so many cosplayers from Dr. Whos to Super Mario and various anime characters, I felt really under dressed in my jeans and t-shirt.

Take a look at some scenes from WonderCon 2013.

The Highlights of Wondercon for Me were:

• COSPLAY in full force. People of all ages dressed in costume and it wasn’t even Halloween! Also, at the entrance there was a table where cosplayers were asked to have their “weapons” inspected. It was really interesting because among the weapons were Ghostbusters Proton Packs, light sabers, swords and all sorts of sci-fi firearms.

Homestuck Cosplay at Wondercon. Bumped into these ladies in the restroom. Homestuck is a popular web comic.

• Seeing my old friend Whilce Portacio, Filipino-American comic book writer and artist, at Artist’s Alley.   Last time I saw Whilce was at Wizard East, a decade ago!  He is known for Noted for his work on such titles as The Punisher, X-factor, Uncanny X-Men, Iron Man, Wetworks and Spawn.

Whilce and I at Wondercon 2013.

• And last but not least, a highlight of Wondercon 2013 for me was the session with Director Guillermo del Toro, who debuted an exclusive trailer for the robots vs. monsters movie, Pacific Rim. I’ve been a fan of his since “Pan’s Labyrinth,” and let me just say the dude is a comic book nerd superhero himself. He reminded me of Kevin Smith with a Latino accent.
  The first Pacific Rim trailer was revealed at last year’s San Diego Comic Con, and so it was only fitting that this special trailer was shown at Wondercon.  The trailer was interesting, but even more interesting was the conversation with Del Toro, who answered questions from the audience too.

Guillermo Del Toro shared an exclusive trailer for the upcoming Pacific Rim Movie.