This past April Fool's Day, I pulled off the ultimate prank of tricking people into thinking I was a nerd by attending my first-ever WonderCon during a weekend in San Francisco. WonderCon is sorta like a Comic-Con lite, but this year's convention went big with some appearances by stars like Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively
(Green Lantern) and Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan
(Hanna).
Anyway, the joke was on the WonderConventioneers when they realized I pulled the April Fool's wool over their eyes and turned out to be a totally supercool dude merely
pretending to be geek. Suckers! It was cosplay, whatever that means! You should've seen the looks on their Batfaces!!! It was like Issue 104 of the DC Comics classic Silver Age... I mean, wait, what?
Um, just check out my show coverage after the
jump»
WonderCon 2011 was held at San Francisco's Moscone Center, or "Mom's Basement West," as the nerds called it.
The
Green Lantern movie opens in theaters on June 17, which is before Comic-Con, so WonderCon became the big staging area for all things having to do with the superhero, including the upcoming series of Green Lantern Minis from Mattel.
Green Lantern stars Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds endured
Gossip Girl and
Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place comments to discuss their new summer movie.
Ryan Reynolds admitted he almost made an April Fool's joke that the old rumors were true and that he would be playing the lead in
The Flash movie, but then he thought better than to roll the 20-sided dice with nerds.
Blake Lively, who plays Carol Ferris in
Green Lantern, said the
Gossip Girl bodyguard insisted she dye her hair brown for the role or she'd be risking her life with comic book fans. But then Blake went on to enrage the fans anyway by saying that she looked forward to being able to play
Star Sapphire in a sequel, but wished the costume covered up more.
Gossip Girl's Taylor Momsen would never complain about that.
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| Green Lantern's ring and lantern. |
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| Bobbles of Chuck Greene and Frank West from Capcom's Dead Rising 2 video game. |
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| Ghostbusters action figures by Mattel. |
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| Wrestling superstar, Honky Tonk Man! |
You haven't lived until you've seen a remote-controlled R2-D2 cruising down the seedy Tenderloin district in San Francisco. I'm pretty sure some
Star Wars geeks propositioned the droid for a good time.
"You're not an Imperial Guard, are you?"
"So... how much for a trip around Tatooine, if you know what I mean? Maybe just a trench run?"
"I have to pay how much?!? You're not the droid I'm looking for!"
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| Jane Wiedlin, guitarist for The Go-Go's and co-creator of the comic book, Lady Robotika. |
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| TNT's new sci-fi series, Falling Skies, is sorta like The Walking Dead but with aliens. Writer Melinda Hsu Taylor (LOST), star Drew Roy and writer/co-executive producer Mark Verheiden presented clips from the show, which is executive-produced by Steven Spielberg. |
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| Customized Mighty Mugg: Sanrio's Kuromi |
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| Customized Mighty Mugg: Skeletor |
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| DC statues for Super Friends b-stringers, Black Vulcan and Samurai. |
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| Another Super Friends junior varsity member -- El Dorado |
Atonement director Joe Wright promoted his first action film,
Hanna, along with star Saoirse Ronan
(Atonement, The Lovely Bones). Saoirse wore a Wonder Woman shirt in honor of the convention goers. She mentioned that she now finds herself asking, "What would Hanna do" to make sure she's making the best decisions.
Joe described
Hanna as a very European action film. He also described how it's about female empowerment unlike
Sucker Punch, which he criticized for objectifying women with skimpy outfits. About every other woman in the audience happened to be dressed up as Baby Doll from
Sucker Punch, and you could hear the collective pig-tailed group rallying behind him followed by the epiphany of, "Oh, wait."
Whatever you think of Sucker Punch, the majority of female cosplayers chose the film's characters as their costumes du jour. Here's a quick roundup of some of the better ones:
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| Baby Doll with The Green Hornet's Kato. |
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| Baby Doll and Superman! |
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| That same Baby Doll with Amber. |
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| More of the Sucker Punch crew including Sweet Pea (middle), Blondie (right) and my personal favorite version of Baby Doll at the show. |
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| DC Universe Action League mini figures |
Cinemax premiered clips from its new anthology series,
Femme Fatales, premiering Friday May 13 at 11pm (Cinemax After Dark!). The series is a mix of
Twilight Zone, grindhouse and film noir with chicks getting nekkid.
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| Dean Haglund (The X-Files, The Lone Gunmen) appears in the Femme Fatales episode, "Girls Gone Dead." |
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| Newcomer Christine Donlon plays the lead femme fatale nurse in the premiere episode, "Bad Medicine." |
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| Robert LaSardo (Death Race) plays the villain in "Bad Medicine." |
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| Ana Alexandra plays a femme fatale inmate in the female prison episode. |
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| Acura was showing off the official S.H.I.E.L.D. car from Thor (in theaters May 6). |
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| The Soup Nazi from Seinfeld had a booth to sign autographs and deny fans their soup. |
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| Capcom's Street Fighter cologne. Doesn't smell as bad as that Legend of Chun-Li movie. |
The masquerade is always the highlight of any geeky convention, and Sam Huntington
(Superman Returns, Being Human) and Brandon Routh
(Superman Returns, Chuck) helped kick off the party on Saturday. Their new film,
Dylan Dog: Dead of Night, about a paranormal investigator opens April 29.
Cosplay roundup:
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| Supergirl |
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| Resident Evil |
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| If only the Avatar and Holly Hobby kids knew there was an alien behind them... |
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| The carousel outside of the Moscone Center was a great place for bringing together the Rebels and The Empire. |
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| Phoenix and Captain America |
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| Axe Cop!!! (His weapon of choice is a hatchet and not the body spray.) |
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| Jabba the Hutt and the now-deceased baby Hutt (as Jenni calls him, "Deadba") |
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| Green Lantern |
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| DC Universe White Lantern dudes |
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| "Scoundrel Mites" featuring Li'l Riddler, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn, Catwoman and Joker. |
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| Darth Simi |
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| "Gotham by Gaslight" - steampunk Batman |
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| "Frying pans? Who knew?" - Tangled cosplayers |
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| The Dark Crystal |
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| Medusa |
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| Mystery Science Theater 3000's Joel Hodgson and Tom Servo |
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| Giant-sized Wicket and Princess Leia |
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| Dollar Bill from Watchmen |
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| Tron versions of Disney characters |
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| Resident Evil's Jill Valentine |
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| Jedi, Jedi, Jedi |
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| Darkwing Duck |
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| Vampire killers and vampires |
1 comment:
Nice pictures. BTW the character name from MST3K is Joel Robinson. The actor's name is Joel Hodgson.
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