Mark Evanier's Blog, page 252

Today's Video Link

Donald Trump once told his supporters that they'd get tired of so much winning. These days, they're probably desperate for any. Having lost the biggest prize (i.e., The Presidency), Trump is now losing court battle after court battle…and a lot of them are battles to keep his lawyers and aides from having to testify.

Like you probably, I once thought the attorney-client privilege covered a lot more than it apparently does. Devin Stone, the "Legal Eagle" of YouTube, explains to us about the crime-fraud exception in that privilege and he's amazed how often Trump is losing on this, too…

Unlike some of my friends, I can wait for the indictment/arrest of D.J.T. in the Stormy Daniels matter. I sure wouldn't mind if an indictment for election-tampering or possession of classified documents came first. Would you?

Today's Video Link

Hey, let's watch the sizzle reel for a production of the musical Little Shop of Horrors — in Japanese…

Doctor Octopi

Or maybe this should be "Doctors [plural] Octopi." You figure it out. But this is about cosplayers. There were a lot of them at WonderCon and each time I left the main hall and headed for my hotel room, I tried to spend a little time watching them. Most were in an area outside the convention hall, posing for photos and videos. Some were putting on little performances. There were some concrete benches in that area and I'd park myself on one and just watch the passing show for a little while.

Science-fiction fan conventions predate comic book conventions and there were always cosplayers at the first s-f cons even if the word "cosplayer" had not yet been coined. A masquerade show with all the costumed folks parading before judges was (usually) the most-attended event and it was held (usually) on Saturday night. The costumes ranged from the elaborate to the effortless, the latter exemplified by the inevitable clown who'd enter in his street clothes and call his presentation something like "Man from Planet Zord-7 disguised as an Earthling."

Also simple was the occasional lady who'd parade around nude and call her "outfit" something like "Visions of Love." You could see the folks who spent months and fortunes crafting their costumes resenting the hell out of the attention the naked ladies got.

And I suspect that the best costumes from those days at s-f cons — and the best ones from the first few decades of Comic-Con — would be ranked as the lower end of cosplaying I viewed this past weekend at WonderCon. The A+ ones from then would notch about a C- today. Some of the work is stunning. A lot of it does not look like the work of amateurs, though I'm sure most of it is.

(And before someone asks about this: We don't have naked women "cosplaying" at comic book conventions but if we did, I doubt they'd attract all that much attention.)

A lot of the best costumes are original designs. A lot of the ones based on pre-existing characters are especially astonishing when you consider that someone is replicating a design done by a comic book or animation artist who never dreamed for a nano-second that anyone would ever actually make that costume…but someone did.

Case in point: A lot of costumes designed for comics probably seemed impossible to bring to life and none more than Doctor Octopus, the popular villain who debuted in the third issue of Amazing Spider-Man. Once upon a time if you'd told me someone would build a reasonable facsimile of that gear and wear it to a convention, I'd have bet you a vast sum you were wrong. Not only has it been done by one person but at WonderCon, I counted four Doctor Octopuses or Doctor Octopi or whatever the proper plural is.

(And again, before someone asks: The original look of the Bad Doctor was probably designed by Steve Ditko, who drew the first Spider-Man comics. I say "probably" because Jack Kirby told me that he'd designed some of the early Spider-Man villains and Mr. Ditko agreed, though neither man could tell me for sure which ones Jack did. Both men were more than imaginative enough to come up with something like that.)

Seeing four Doc Ocks made me think of the old cliché about the woman who buys an expensive designer gown for a swanky public affair, gets there and is mortified to see that someone else is wearing the same dress. Imagine spending months building a Dr. Octopus suit, crafting those impossible tentacles that they did via CGI in the movie but you had to really build them and not with the budget and tech crew of a major motion picture. Even if someone is now selling parts you can use to fabricate your costume, it's a helluva lot of work.

And then you get into the get-up, which is probably not the most comfy thing to wear but you figure it'll be worth the time, effort, money and pain because of all the attention you'll get. And then you walk out into the area where cosplayers play and pose…

…and there's another Doctor Octopus. And another. And another…

I managed to grab photos of what I think were the two best. I suspect one other fellow whose simulation wasn't as good disappeared because of how badly he was losing The Arms Race. But I definitely spotted four and since I only passed through Cosplayer Central now and then, there might have been even more. There were others (like someone dressed as another Spider-Man foe, The Scorpion) that were equally as elaborate but I only saw one of each of those.

And of course, there were simpler costumes in mass quantity: Quite a few Disney-style (or specific Disney) princesses. A whole bunch of Supermans, Supergirls, Batmen, Robins, Wonder Women…even a Groo. I was asked to pose with a group re-creating the regular characters on the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon series. And speaking of "drag," as everyone is these days, there were a lot of ladies as Captain America, Spider-Man, The Flash, et al. Since comic book companies have discovered the merchandising potential of female versions of male characters, I'm not sure if a female Thor counts as cross-dressing.

It was a wonderful assemblage of creativity and artistry out there. I still have the occasional problem with cosplayers who pose and/or swing swords blindly where others are trying to walk but most of 'em are wonderful.

And there's one other thing I noticed which may be helpful if you find that comic book conventions are too crowded and you can't get through the throngs of people. If so, try dressing up as Doctor Octopus. Most people seem to get the hell out of their way. Maybe that's why there were so many of them.

Today's Video Link

Devin Stone, the "Legal Eagle" of YouTube, tells us all about The Incredible Florida Man. This one is more interesting than you might think…

Attend the Tale Soon

The reviews are in for the just-opened Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd with Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford. For the most part, they're raves…so now I really have to get back there to see it.

P.S.

I just awoke from an 8.5 hour sleep which is around three hours longer than my norm. That's an indicator of how exhausted I was after WonderCon but it's not the best indicator. The best indicator is that last night, when I wrote up the story of having to get by without my wallet and the necessary items within, I forgot to include the punch line. Here's the rest of the tale…

So I decide it's time to get back home and because I'm not driving these days (knee problems), I call an Uber on my cell phone. Lacking a wallet and credit cards, the cell phone saved my life. I get into the Uber, the driver heads for the 5 freeway and a few minutes into the ride, the screen on the cell phone begins to go off and on, off and on, off and on. I know I'm low on power but not that low.

Fortunately, my computer case is in the Uber with me and in it, I have one of those portable iPhone battery chargers I touted here. It brings the screen back up long enough for me to take this screen shot —

— and then the whole thing goes dead for the rest of the ride home. It was like my phone said, "Okay, you don't need me anymore on this trip!" I think I need to go have a new battery installed.

Today's Video Link

Here's the musical Grease in Japanese. I don't think it loses much in the translation…

The Word From WonderCon – Sunday

And now I'm home, having enjoyed myself thoroughly at the convention. I'll write more about it in the coming days but now I feel I should tell you about the stupid thing I did. When I travel, I am fierce about packing everything I might need wherever I might roam. Still, even with my lists and checking and double-checking, I always manage to forget something. Sometimes, it's trivial…

But sometimes, it's pretty serious. This time, it was pretty serious. This time, it was my wallet. You know…that thing that contains money, credit cards and my picture I.D. I thought I had it but when I got to the hotel check-in, it turned out I didn't. And as the lady at the desk informed me, this hotel requires that picture I.D. to check in.

I tried pointing out that there was a picture of me in the convention program book. I was even wearing the same hat in that photo that I had on at check-in. She said no, that wouldn't do. The convention staffer who deals with the hotel ran over and assured the desk clerk that I was indeed Mark Evanier and she made me sound very important. That also would not do.

I thought for a moment I was going to have to make the 90 minute round-trip back to my home. Then the desk clerk talked to the manager and someone looked it up and saw that I'd stayed at that hotel several times before. They decided to make an exception.

Fortunately, I had my cell phone and my cell phone has Apple Pay on it so I could use it to leave the credit card deposit and later to pay for some meals. And it has Zelle and PayPal on it so some friends who were selling stuff at the con were willing to give me cash…and it wasn't a loan. They agreed that if I sent a certain amount of money to their bank accounts, they'd hand me the same amount in currency. That covered dinner at a restaurant that doesn't take Apple Pay and I also had cash for tipping purposes.

So it turned out okay but it was still a pretty stupid thing to do.

From the Floor at WonderCon

I needed a place to sit down for a while and Marv Wolfman was away from his table so I've been sitting here for a while signing his name on things. So far, I've signed it on 23 copies of Tomb of Dracula, 17 copies of Teen Titans, one Adventures of Superman, four promissory notes and a confession to kidnapping the Lindbergh Baby. When they haul him away for the last of these, his table will be mine.

The Word From WonderCon – Saturday

Yesterday at WonderCon was way more crowded than Friday but, at least in the parts of it that I traversed, it wasn't unpleasantly crowded. There were a lot more happy people there and that made for a happier room but not one that I had trouble getting around in. I didn't see all of it and probably won't…but what I did note was much less emphasis on current comics from DC and Marvel and a lot more exhibitors exhibiting products of which someone probably said, "You know, this might sell well to the kind of people who buy comic books." There also seemed to be a lot of Mystery Boxes for sale. I may write something here in the next few days about the mystique of Mystery Boxes.

Another observation: The longer you're at a convention these days, the more everyone starts looking like a Funko Pop figurine of themselves. Everyone's head just gets wider and wider.

Lots of great cosplayers to see. If someone makes one of those videos of most of the cosplayers modeling their "cos," I'll try to link to it. I saw costumes that their makers must have been working on since the last WonderCon or maybe the one before it. (And the one before it was 2019.)

I did my customary Jack Kirby Tribute Panel to a packed room and later in the day, was back in the same room (only now even more packed) for the also-customary Cartoon Voices Panel. I was almost late for the latter due to one of those security folks who thinks his assignment is to stop you from going through the most convenient door and instead take the least convenient route. I couldn't even understand the way he wanted me to go…some path that I think would have taken me through the Haunted Mansion ride — and not even the one at Disneyland, a mile away. It was either the one at Disney World in Florida or Disneyland Tokyo. It took every verbal skill I learned watching all those Sgt. Bilko episodes to get him to let me pass.

I'm heading out now for a breakfast meeting. I'll be back later to write more about yesterday and today. That is, unless that same security guard won't let me back into this hotel without re-routing me through Knotts Berry Farm. I'd prefer Disneyland because by then, I might be in the mood for a Dole Whip.