Updated on December 10, 2021
After weeks of anticipation, I’m finally in Chicago for this year’s C2E2 comic convention.
Today’s experience at the comic convention found a few changes from last year’s show: the convention’s been moved to a different part of McCormick Place, with the main difference being there’s now a dedicated food court inside the convention hall. Food court food, of course, was a bit pricey. There’s also a dedicated shuttle bus running between the convention and various spots downtown, though I still took the regular CTA bus (route #3, which runs between the Loop and McCormick Place).
The convention floor itself was similar to last year’s show, with many of the same vendors… from the Chicago area and midwest, that is. While I couldn’t tell from some of the signs, I’m not sure if the vendors from farther away places such as Quebec came back this year.
I bought some cheap trade paperbacks, as well as a cheap archive (the Golden Age Superboy Archive DC came out with recently). My list of desired books isn’t as long as last year’s, plus some items I want don’t seem to be available from most of the vendors (good luck finding much from Archie; there’s also still more Marvel than DC trade paperbacks present, at least to me).
I was pleased there was a bigger variety of costumes this time around, whereas last year it felt like everyone went as the Joker (probably due to the influence of “The Dark Knight” movie). One of the best costumes I saw this year was someone dressed as the new African-American (well, Black, since he’s from Atlantis) version of Aqualad.
I went to one panel, the “DC Nation” one, which featured DC head honcho Dan DiDio and some other DC bigshots answering questions about what to expect from DC in upcoming months. Basically, a lot of “Flashpoint” hype and vaguely-defined “aftermath of ‘Flashpoint’” remarks. A few members of the audience seemed a bit more savvy (or longer-memoried) than DiDio, etc. figured; one person in the audience (after DiDio gave the “Flashpoint will change the past, get fixed, but with unknown differences remaining” bit) compared the story to “Zero Hour” (the lame mid-90s storyline that was a big continuity reboot that, like Flashpoint, also used time-travel to accomplish such). One annoying part: an audience member said they’d been reading kid-friendly 90s title “Batman Adventures” when they were in their 30s; DiDio made a joke about “we need to get you some more age-appropriate comics.” Never mind that was probably the best Batman title at the time (with a Batman that wasn’t an obnoxious jerk). Meh…
Tomorrow, I’ll give the artists’ alley a go, plus attend a few more panels. Hopefully, I’ll also get to see local Chicago TV icon Svengoolie (who’ll be appearing at the show for autographs), as well as take a few more photographs. And yes, my phone will be more fully charged, so I can keep giving Twitter updates… I hope. See you tomorrow!
