Heroes Convention 2009

Prelude
Thursday night I went out with the lovely Elizabeth Queener.  We stopped off at the Penguin for a pitcher of cheap beer, then headed to Snug Harbor, where we promptly switched to liquor.  We held court on the patio with various friends, drinking slowly as we both were on a tight budget.  Towards the end of the night, KC showed up, and settled in with us.  At one point this big black guy leaned over and asked me for a cigarette.  I opened my pack and I only had six left.  Common Market was closed so I wasn’t getting any more, and the night was sure to last beyond our leaving the bar.

“Sorry, man,” I apologized, “these are all I have left for the rest of the night,” and I showed him my nearly empty pack.  “If I had more…”  “That’s okay man,” he said, “don’t worry about it.”  At this point a drunken little waif next to him leaned over.  “No, you’re a racist.”

“What?” I asked, because she wasn’t saying it in anything remotely like a joking tone.  “You have a full pack of cigarettes and you won’t give him one?  You’re a racist.”  “Uhm,” I countered, “I have six, that’s hardly a pack.  These things are expensive.”  Then I pointed out our friend Michelle, whom I had bummed a cigarette a bit earlier.  “And I’m not racist.  I gave her a cigarette, and she’s Asian.  But…I also know her.”

“No, you’re a racist, and you’re lucky he doesn’t kick your ass,” the drunken waif fires back.  At this point KC decides to chime in.  “Heh, nobody’s kickin’ his ass, honey.  If anybody touches him, I’LL kick their ass.”  The black dude, who was totally peaceable up to that point, turned.  “You ain’t kickin’ MY ass…” and he and KC proceeded to cycle through an escalating exchange of cliché macho braggadocio, which ended in the two of them going outside to fight it out.  As we all rushed outside to either defuse the situation or witness the fight, the drunken waif could be heard saying to those around her, “I didn’t have anything to do with this.  What’s happening?  He’s crazy.”  And so on.

Outside the black guy just stripped off his shirt and paraded about like a raging bull, and KC stood there laughing, trying to convince him everything was fine, to calm down.  Eventually the bouncers insisted the guy leave, and we all went back inside.  The drunken waif immediately hit on us with all this shit about not being responsible, how she doesn’t even really know the guy, etc., and she had to be taken out to him before he’d leave from in front of the bar.  It was a stupid spectacle, and I was much happier once we repaired to my front porch to drink, smoke, listen to music and talk.

Friday
I usually go to the convention with people.  Although a lot of folks said they were going, no one really did.  Also I’ve been spoiled these past few years by having the stellar company of Mr. Jason Green (jagreen79), who couldn’t make it this year due to buying a house with his fiancée.  So I wandered around the show on my own Friday, buying up cheap trades and getting the lay of the land.  I decided to catch a dual interview with Bone’s Jeff Smith, and up-and-coming indie wunderkid Alec Longstreth.  Bone is Longstreth’s favorite comic, and Jeff reads Alec’s book Phase 7, so the two of them were a natural fit for sharing a panel.  The resulting conversation was casual and informative, and Longstreth particularly impressed me with his unabashed enthusiasm for all things comic book.  I left following the panel, most of my money for the day spent and my backpack a heavy burden.

Being alone as I wandered the exhibitor area in search of cheap reads afforded me the opportunity to catch peripheral snatches of conversation.  The silliest was these two guys checking out the Amazing Spider-Man issue with the Barack Obama cover.  One of them says to the other, “They put Barack Obama in a comic book…?”  First of all, what rock have you been living under, and where is it?  Because that’s where I’m hiding when the Rapture comes.  “Man, comics are getting so political.  I don’t know what’s going on…”  Really?  Is that a political statement, putting a President on a comic?  It seems like such an idiotic statement to make.  I don’t know why, it just struck me.

Saturday
I woke up late after staying up the night before watching Curb Your Enthusiasm, which may be my favorite live action sitcom ever.  I never tire of it.  So I didn’t make the show until around 12:30 or 1, and by 1:30 I had once again depleted my daily funds, aside from food money.  So I decided to get some crap signed.  Normally I’m not big on meeting guys and getting sketches, because I get all timid and quiet and I don’t know what to say.  Unless I’m in a familiar place surrounded by people I know fairly well, I’m actually pretty shy.  So meeting the comic professionals can be a bit of a struggle for me.  I queued up to get Bill Sienkiewicz to sign my copy of Fantastic Comics #24 and Stray Toasters trade.  Bill promptly disappeared from his table as soon as the line formed, and I waited about 15 minutes before throwing in the towel.  Instead I went and pestered Andy Kuhn, getting him to sign Fantastic Comics #24 and congratulating him on his shout out from Mr. Keith Giffen in a recent column.  Well-deserved praise from an authoritative professional, Andy deserves it.  The guy’s work is tops.

I stumbled toward Jeff Smith’s table to see what was going on and ran across Alec Longsteth’s table.  Instead of wait in Jeff’s sizable line, I just talked to Alec, and the guy is incredibly nice and very earnest.  His love for the medium is absolutely infectious, and I was glad to be made aware of him.  I bought a collection of two issues of Phase 7, on Alec’s recommendation, and he threw in two other issues of Phase 7 free of charge.  Whatta guy!

Then I went on to catch an interview/podcast with Guy Davis of BPRD fame.  What an incredibly nice and humble guy.  He gave plenty of insight to his creative process, and was generous about taking questions from the audience.  Somehow I even mustered the courage to field a question, even though the interviewer had to reiterate it because Guy couldn’t understand me.  He had mentioned how he did a ZOT! short and sent it to Scott McCloud for a critique, and Scott sent him a box full of foreign comics, to give Guy a bit of perspective beyond the American school of sequential art.  I asked Guy what books out of the collection he thought were the most beneficial to the development of his style.  He said Akira, and explained in depth why.  Awesome.

I left, ate some pizza and read Superpatriot: Liberty & Justice (which I scored for half-off).  Dave Johnson, you rule.  I spent the rest of the night reading comics, including all of Transitions, the Phase 7 collection Alec sold me.  It was a two issue autobiographical tale about Alec’s life in relation to comics, how he came to read them, make them, love them.  It was by turns funny and poignant, and just a remarkable piece of work.  In appreciation, I assembled a selection of Low Key Comics to take him on Sunday.

Sunday
I hadn’t expected to spend Saturday alone, but it generally worked in my favor, as I got the chance to jaw on with some wonderful cartoonists.  I made that my primary goal for Sunday, since I had already spent too much money, and had a respectable pile of schwag already.  My first order of business was to head back to Longstreth’s table and thank him for the comics.  I blathered on about how much I enjoyed everything he gave me, and he accepted my clumsy praise with humility and grace.  I offered him a stack of Low Key books (Low Key Comics #1 and 2, Everyman #1 and 2, Downhill From Here #1, Snug Comics and Tales From the Wedge, basically anything I had more than one copy of).  In return he insisted I take two more issues of Phase 7, and a zine.  I attempted to decline but Alec wouldn’t hear of it.  We talked briefly about 24 hour comics (Longstreth does one a year, and they are all available at his website) and I tottered off before I became too much of an annoyance.

I scoured the small press tables and found Low Key cohort Chris McJunkin.  We talked art supplies and such, and I handed off a couple more copies of Everyman.  Once I was done there I got a call from Elizabeth Tolley, who was coming to the show to see a friend from out of town who was a guest on Indie Island.  Tolley surprised me when she said she collected Jim Balent issues of Catwoman, so I helped her scour longboxes for issues she needed.  Normally I go in for trades, but I found a ton of singles for super cheap, most of them complete sets or completing runs I had part of already.  I also picked up some Sandman singles for Ryan, who has become slightly obsessed with Neil Gaiman after seeing Coraline.

I ran into an old acquaintance Justin Gammon, whom I met through Maine years ago.  We played catch-up and he gave me the lowdown on what he’s been up to, namely a blog concerning obscure toys.  I offered him some issues of Everyman and Snug Comics, and he gave me a minicomic coloring book and a little promo from his toy blog.  We had a great conversation about toys, and I can’t wait to dig in to his website.  It looks fab.

Biggest surprise of the weekend: Tom Scioli.  I like his art a lot but oddly I’ve never bought anything he’s done.  But I wanted to solicit him for a signature in my Fantastic Comics #24.  He was working on a sweet looking Mr. Miracle sketch when I approached him.  The guy was so incredibly nice and talkative.  Somehow we got on the subject of Steve Gerber, and that was it for me.  I couldn’t shut up.  I didn’t want to stop gabbing but it was time for lunch, so I dragged myself away.

Queener scooped up Tolley and I and we had a pricey lunch at trendy Epicenter eatery Mez.  I am so unimpressed with uptown Charlotte.  Nothing has any character or singularity.  Everything is the same hard lines, high ceilings and faux sophistication.  I thought it was really ironic that a place that bars cigarettes had huge panels of art that were just swirls of smoke.  Our lunch took longer than expected (I guess it was more like dinner, but we all had late nights so it felt more like lunch).  I got back to the convention with less than an hour to spare.  I’d had my eye on a lot of Miracleman comics all weekend (5 bucks a pop, but out of print and in decent shape) and I also noticed a bitchin’ Godzilla shirt I wanted to get, too.  Both of these purchases had to be unpacked by the vendors, who had both already started breaking down.  Luckily I got both, and left the Convention Center with an empty wallet and again, a heavy, heavy backpack.

Overall I had a pretty good time.  It was strange being on my own for the most part, and despite an impressive roster of guests, attendance seemed lighter than last year.  Also, the Small Press, Indie Island and Artist Alley sections of the show comprised more space than the Exhibitors, taking up just over half of the hall.  I can’t decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing, or just a thing.  Regardless, it was a fine way to blow a weekend and a wad of cash, and waste some time.  Hopefully, come next year, I’ll have some copies of Art the Amoeba and Oh, Heavens! to trade.  We’ll see…

Here’s the list of loot:

Trades (all either $5, ½ off, or BOGO)
Appleseed: Book One – Masamune Shirow
Cerebus – Dave Sim
Easy Way – Christopher E. Long/Andy Kuhn
Fanboy – Mark Evanier/Sergio Aragones/various
Flaming Carrot Comics – Bob Burden
The Groo Jamboree – Sergio Aragones
Jack Staff: Soldiers – Paul Grist
Mister Blank: Exhaustive Collection – Christopher J. Hicks
Nevada – Steve Gerber/Phil Winslade
Stray Bullets vol. 1 – David Lapham
Stray Bullets vol. 2 – David Lapham
Stray Toasters – Bill Sienkiewicz
Superpatriot: Liberty & Justice – Tom & Mary Bierbaum/Keith Giffen/Dave Johnson
Marvel Essentials: Tales of the Zombie – various
Trasition: Phase 7 #010 & #011 – Alec Longstreth

Singles (all from $0.10 – 1.00)
1963 Book Two: The Fury
1963 Book Five: Horus, Lord of Light
Teen Titans Spotlight on Aqualad (early Erik Larsen art!  Sienkiewicz cover!)
Iceman #1-4
The Thing #2
Miracleman #2-6, 9 (ok, ok, these were $5 a pop, but that’s a steal)
Nightcrawler #1-4
Power & Glory #1 and 3 (I already had 2 and 4)
The Awesome Slapstick #1-3 (no 4, DAMN IT, but I’ve wanted this book for a while)
Sludge #2-9 (more Gerber!  I was on the hunt for plenty o’ Gerber)
Wildstar: Sky Zero #1-4, Born to Be Wild #1

Minicomics, Zines, etc.
Cosmic Adventures: A Mini-comic for Coloring! #1 – Justin Gammon
The Dvorak Zine – Alec Longstreth
Phase 7 #005, 006, 012-014 – Alec Longstreth
Weirdotoys – Justin Gammon