Still being on east coast time, I woke up around 5am PST, and had the lovely opportunity to just have a loungey, relaxing morning. It's days like this, when I'm the opposite of jet-lagged, that I understand the appeal of being a morning person, because it was kinda awesome. Got some exercise, watched some Teen Wolf, and grabbed breakfast, all before 7:30am, at which time I headed over to the marina next to the hotel for my nautical adventures.
The first thing I saw on Thursday when I pulled into hotel was a sign saying "boat rentals". It was essentially a fait accompli that I was going to rent a boat. And that's exactly what I did. At 8am sharp, when the rental place opened, I was in line, ready to take a 17' outboard powerboat out to tool around Mission Bay. It was wild (and wonderful) that I needed no license, and only the briefest of primers on "seamanship" before getting underway, but since there was essentially no one on the water I didn't really have to worry about hitting anyone. I spent a wonderful hour alternating between tearing across the water at top speed and just drifting in a pretty spot and soaking in the view and the sunrise. At the very end of my rental, as I was idling back to the dock, a dolphin decided that he wanted to be my buddy and followed along with me! He would drift just below the surface but keep pace, and then would breach and do something silly before going back. Not sure if I'm a secret dolphin whisperer, or if he's used to putting on an act for tourists who throw scraps. It was cool anyway!
After the brief but merry adventures of the SS Spackle, I made my way down to the convention center. It's about a 15 minute drive, and I was expecting (as the valets assured me last night) to be able to valet park my car and not worry about it. Sadly that was a grossly unfulfilled expectation. After circling one lot at the convention center Marriott for AN HOUR, I finally paid to get out of the lot without parking (an injustice if ever there was one), and moved to a different lot nearby. I lucked out and caught someone leaving in a pretty prime spot. I then grabbed my badge and headed for the floor.
Let me just say that I'm not sure what I was expecting, but whatever it was it was completely blown out of the water by the sheer *enormity* of this event. San Diego has a truly massive convention center, and every single square foot was packed to the brim with stands hocking comic books, graphic novels, art, toys, replicas, t-shirts, video games, and every bit of fandom ephemera you can imagine. It was so overwhelming that all I could do was gape and allow the thronging crowd to sweep me along. I will say that there weren't as many costumed people as I had expected (which was disappointing, I'll admit). However, there were some real winners. Hard to grab shots of a lot of them given the crowds, and due to wanting to be at least relatively discreet, but I snagged a few pics here and there.
[note: this may be long, so bear with me. I just want to try to capture the day]
Then it was time to get to work. As I mentioned, I was essentially playing stage manager for The Chair's panel. That was a lot of fun, and kept me busy for a few hours before and during the panel itself. As for the panel, again, I'm not sure what I was expecting. It was, by our estimation, highly successful! The crowd, about 300 strong (which is tiny compared to the big Hall H panels, but we were happy) was really getting what we're trying to do and asked smart, relevant questions. I think the lot of us felt highly encouraged by it. We started with a tease into the show, did some intro remarks, and then had a table read of the original script followed by clips from each movie of the scene we read aloud. It's remarkable to see side-by-side the films and the different approaches each director took. After a lively Q&A, our ending clip of course ran into technical difficulties, so we had to end on a slightly anticlimactic note, but by and large it was great!
At this point in the day, I transitioned into entourage mode. Chris Moore was walking the floor, so I tagged along. He's a big dude, so he part the crowd well - I just had to keep up. His goddaughter was with us, and she's really into the comic scene, so she explained a lot of what we were seeing, which was actually really helpful. I thought I was a nerd, but I swiftly realized I don't play at Comic-Con's level - or at least I don't play in that arena entirely.
After a zany and lengthy stroll (that hall is MASSIVE - like I'm talking over a mile long), we headed over to a nearby hotel for an interview that Chris was doing with the directors for XBox Live. A bunch of us hung out in the green room while they did the interview, which is kind of an unusual feeling. I don't think I have it in me to be in an entourage like that. I know that some people make a living doing that, and don't get me wrong it was fun and they're good people, but I couldn't help but feel a little odd for the fact that the only reason I had access to any of it was because I was with someone else for whom the access was actually intended, and my presence was tolerated so as not to give offense. Didn't stop me from eating a cannoli though.
Finally, since The Chair is a STARZ show, Chris and the directors were invited to the premiere of another STARZ show, Outlander. In order to keep us occupied between the interview and the red carpet, our entire group of about a dozen (The Chair producers, directors, the writer, and an actor) was whisked to a swanky hotel presidential suite and plied with delicious food and booze in generous quantities. We wined, we dined, and we had a good time. I knew the whole time that I was very fortunate to be there, and that this was one of those surreal things that can happen in entertainment in which you're treated in a way you probably don't deserve, but I'm grateful for the experience (and that steak was killer).
All in all, a very awesome but very long day. Tomorrow I have a breakfast meeting with Chris before he heads back to LA, and then I'll have about 12 hours before my flight leaves, most of which I intend to spend roaming the floor and really digging in and getting a true Comic-Con experience (not one tied to relatively famous and important people). Check back tomorrow for that!
Cheers!
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