ComicCon-ing: Space City Comic Con Preview

Our anniversary is May 28^th.  We will be spending it at the Space City Comic Con.  Why?  Because the nerd couple that cons together, stays together.

Space City Comic Con will be held at the NRG Center in Houston, Texas.  Houston is a fun six-hour ride from New Orleans…if you don’t get stuck in Baton Rouge traffic.  The best shrimp poboy in the world is at Old Tyme Grocery in Lafayette.  Every gas station between Lafayette and Lake Charles has some of the best boudin and cracklin you can find.  (I will write a blog one day about Louisiana’s gas station food culture…some of the meals found in gas stations can rival the best restaurants in any city.)  The rest area on the Texas side of the border is one of the nicest rest stops on I-10 and it has a raised walking trail through the swamp area behind it.

While the journey is fun, the destination is Space City Comic Con.  Space City bills itself as “the Gulf Coast’s fan-culture convention and family entertainment, pop-culture expo for all ages.”  Memorial Day weekend poses many options for us, especially since it is our anniversary.  However, because of this convention being in Houston, it is a perfect fit for us.  The con is not super expensive, and we found a very nice hotel three miles away from the NRG Center for a very moderate price.  We were originally going to go to MegaCon in Orlando, but flights for Memorial Day weekend were too expensive.  The people in charge of tourism for Houston should be thankful that the Con will attract plenty of people like us to the city.  We can’t wait to try some good Mexican food, visit some local record stores, and shop at IKEA and do it for cheaper than a trip anywhere else. My NOLA nerd friends should look into it if they don’t have any plans.

The main attraction for this year’s Space City Comic Con is that they were able to get around twenty guests from Sons of Anarchy.  I caught the show one evening in the middle of its run.  Without giving away much, this episode revolved around a shooting at funeral.    Those ten minutes I watched hooked me completely.  It was so well acted and directed, I knew had to watch every episode. Hamlet meets the Godfather on Harleys. Not every episode was great, but no episode was bad.  And when it was great, it was one of the best shows on television.   I’ve met Ron Perlman and Tommy Flanagan before in New Orleans and I met Mark Boone at Mega Con in Orlando. In other words, I’ve already started collecting SoA autographs. Space City Con pulled a major score by getting the show’s lead, Charlie Hunnam to appear.  We have already purchased our autograph tickets for him, but also other favorites of the show: Ryan Hurst, Kim Coates, and Drea de Matteo.  Cristina surpised me with those when I got home from work. Because they will be there on May 28, it’s an anniversary gift. Budget is the only thing stopping me from getting everyone from the show’s autographs.  Did I mention that have nearly twenty people from SoA there?!

If Sons of Anarchy is not for you, there are plenty of other television and movie guests. Doctor Who will be represented by Alex Kingston, Billie Piper and Colin Baker.  Star Trek will have Marina Sirtis, Michael Dorn, Rene Auberjonois, and Brent Spiner.  Game of Thrones will have Julian Glover, Esme Bianco, and Eugene Simon.  I might get a Hellboy poster and have Ron Perlman and Doug Jones sign it.

But most importantly…Sam Jones will be there.  The freaking savior of the universe!  I should thank him for saving every one of us.

Of course, if you are going to a comic con, you need to talk to and buy from the artists.  DMC…yes as in Run DMC…will be there.  I haven’t read any of his titles but I am making a trip to BSI Comics this week and will pick one up for him to sign.  I might bring my King of Rock cover as well. Sam de La Rosa has done some Star Wars cover art for their original run with Marvel as well as working on numerous other titles for numerous publishers.  Doug Hazlewood is an inker who worked on Grant Morrison’s run on Animal Man in the late eighties and worked on the Adventures of Superman including the Death of Superman.

The one thing I hope the con does before the event is list the times of panels on their website.  I like to plan when I go to cons and having a list of panels and their times ahead of the event makes it easier to schedule.

If we are wearing our NolaNerdCouple.com shirts, come say hi.  If we aren’t wearing them, we still should be recognizable.  We will be cosplaying as the happy couple celebrating five years of marriage bliss.

Which means we will be dressed like we dress every day.