Comikaze 2013!

This was the third year for Stan Lee’s Comikaze, LA’s (pretty much) only pop culture convention. I’ve attended all three years, and it’s expanded immensely and improved upon itself every year.The first year, it was pretty small and a little esoteric - one random thing I recall is that there was a tattooing area set up, and if you got a tattoo of the Comikaze logo, you’d get free tickets for life (I wonder if anyone did, and if Comikaze honored the deal!). Last year, it was much much bigger, and as such, ran into a few problems, like huge unwieldy lines for registration, which angered a lot of attendees. They’ve really hit their stride this year, having done a remarkable job branding themselves throughout the year via their awesome social media presence.

One thing that differentiates them, not necessarily positively or negatively, from San Diego Comic Con, the granddaddy of all Cons, is their panel line-ups. SDCC attracts major studios and celebrities, eager to show you their upcoming films and TV shows, and this has become the calling card for the show (to the media, at least; plenty of other things do go on at SDCC). The panels at Comikaze seemed to mainly consist of fans/bloggers/commentators talking about stuff, which, don’t get me wrong, can be cool and super interesting. But it's not quite as attention grabbing or compelling.

A really cool aspect of Comikaze's panels, however, is that every year, they have these reunion panels, featuring casts of shows that were popular when I was kid. In the past, they've had the casts of All That, Wild & Crazy Kids, and Salute Your Shorts. This year featured the guys who played Pete and Pete in the Adventures of Pete & Pete, as well as the voice talents from Powerpuff Girls.

Further to that, they also tend more to the nostalgia factor. For example, they had a video game museum, showcasing vintage video games like this awesome Atari, and this original Nintendo system.

The exhibit floor was, to me, where Comikaze really shined. There were TONS of really unique vendors this year. When you attend as many conventions as I do, you tend to see a lot of the same booths over and over again (which is totally great for them, if they’re doing so well at each one that they can afford to keep doing this). I would say that a significant portion of the booths I saw were ones I’d never seen before. One in particular was selling wooden swords that they had handmade, some of which were from various movies and video games. I hope they sold a ton because they were super cool!

Another favorite was the booth with jewelry and other fun things in the shapes of assorted foods. I really thought it was called Pretty Pretty Jewelry, but now I can’t find anything by that name, so I guess I was wrong. I bought a really cute purple M&M ring from the very lovely girl who made all the things, and I’m sad that I can’t remember what it was called because I bet she has a great Etsy store or something.

Another thing I picked up was a Unicorn horn!! I’ve seen Unicorntopia at the last few conventions I’ve been to, but this is the first time I actually got one, and I proudly wore it for the rest of the day.

One of my goals was to get some of those sweet Pacific Rim figures. My mistake was in trying to , by the time we got to the end of the exhibit floor and went back to the beginning, the toy vendors had raised all their prices! I ended up having to pay more than I thought I would, but I guess at least I got to support small business instead of just buying them from Amazon. Gipsy Danger is now hanging out with Katniss Everdeen and Catwoman on my bookshelf.

I also wanted to pick up some more Funko Pops, but ended up getting a little overwhelmed and then just forgetting the whole thing. I came in with a couple I knew I wanted to get (namely, Glinda the Good Witch, the Sunflower from Plants vs. Zombies), but then I saw some that I didn’t even realize they made (Wicket the Ewok, Leia - both slave girl and princess editions, Maleficent, Wicked Witch) and then I just didn’t know what to do with myself. Oh well.

Oh, and did I mention I met Grover? Well, I did: