May 29, 2006

Attending my very first anime convention this past weekend was… educational to say the least. Anime North 2006 was an exceptionally well-run show, and the sheer number of people in attendance was really surprising to me. The wonderful people at The Beguiling offered me a little space at their table this year which was incredibly generous of them, so I just couldn’t say no!

I met up with fellow tablemates Bryan Lee O’Malley and Ryan North, who also had a release party planned on Saturday for their two excellent new books, Scott Pilgrim and the Infinite Sadness and Dinosaur Comics: Your Whole Family is Made out of Meat. Set-up on the Friday afternoon was pretty chaotic, but it was definitely controlled chaos.

Mal had written up a clever sign to help sell his books…

…which was accompanied by a very classy Scott Pilgrim cutout.

However, the first order of business for the day was to purchase our long-awaited copies of the new Scott Pilgrim book. Ryan received a pretty awesome drawing in his book.

The doors opened up to the public not long after, and the crowds poured in. While Saturday had the most traffic of all the days, there was a steady flow of people all weekend long.

As the show progressed, I learned an important lesson: my art style does not cross over well with the hardcore manga fans. It was discouraging not selling very much all weekend long, but it was certainly nice to see Mal and Ryan’s books selling incredibly well (Ryan has fans everywhere it seems). Saturday was definitely the busiest of all the days, so I didn’t get much of a chance to snap photos of all the cosplayers that were at the show, but I did manage to grab a couple of photos:

Ryan drinks out of handpuppet T-Rex’s, um, bottom.

As the afternoon wound down, we were off to help set up for Mal and Ryan’s release party. Held at Rocco’s, right across from Honest Ed’s (which features prominently in the latest volume of Scott Pilgrim), there was quite a turnout for the party, the demographic ranging from teenagers to Ryan North’s parents (who were absolutely lovely people)!

Ryan and Mal signing books and chatting with their fans.

Mal’s steady lineup of fans.

Talk to the hand.

There were giant ants mounted to the ceiling of the room! I actually thought they were pretty neat.

After signing many books, Ryan had a reading of a few of his comics, which he then followed up by writing a live comic with the help of the audience. It was entertaining to say the least. The strip he wrote that evening at the show can be read here, which was later cleaned up into Monday’s comic!

Ryan then got up and told embarrassing stories about his life! The audience was enthralled. Or disgusted. Or possibly both.

One of Ryan’s fans gave him a weird potato. Mal was also given a super-tasty loaf of bread by someone, but I forgot to take a photo of that.

The night wrapped up a little early as people migrated to the bar for drinks, but all in all, the evening was a resounding success. Here is the man that helped put it all together, Chris Butcher.

Errr… I had nothing to do with this. I just found them like this as we were cleaning up, I swear.

Back at the bar, many drinks were being had. Jim Zubkavich contemplates the terror that is a shot of Smurf Jizz.

Ryan: “we are manly men for drinking these shots of tequila!”

Kean: “well, it certainly seemed like a good idea at the time…”

And then it was on to - you guessed it! - karaoke. The Eurythmics, Van Halen, GnR, Quiet Riot… you know, the usual.

I finally crawl into bed at almost 5 in the morning, and I’m awake again several hours later for the final day of the con.

Coolest discovery of the con: Heather Chan and her crocheted Prince from Katamari Damacy! She also had some really great fabric buttons that were quite the hit at the show.

And that was about it for the show. After helping to pack the Beguiling’s truck and then unloading it back at the store, we went out for one last dinner, where…

…after dinner was finished, I was feeling bored and idly said to Parrish, “I’ll give you twenty bucks if you chug this entire bottle of olive oil.” Ben offered to put another twenty into the pot, and at that point, Parrish was off and chugging. It is quite a terrifying sight watching a grown man chug an entire half-bottle of olive oil. After he had finished and claimed his forty dollars, he received a round of applause not only from our table, but the entire bar staff as well.

I’m not sure if that’s the most fitting story to end this post with, but that’s how it all happened.