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anime north 2011
May. 30th, 2011 12:37 pmBack again from the Anime North, complete once again for another year. Went really well overall, for me it went pretty smoothly with a few exceptions. The con was really crowded and it's my belief they will be instituting a membership cap for next year. In spite of iffy weather, the fans came out in droves and everybody seemed to be having fun. Lots of Sailor Moon and Pokemon cosplay. Giant Hetalia photoshoot. Tons of guys in those black Bleach overcoats, which for once probably came in handy, considering the weather (but if there's a new breakout anime hit, it's nowhere in evidence...)
For Shain and I the con started on Thursday when I zipped out to the airport to pick up Neil. He got hauled back to our palatial Toy Factory suite and we discovered that KARATE ROBO ZABOGA was playing at the Underground, so after lunch Neil and I caught that while Shain caught up on some work. (Box office transaction - me: "One for DENJIN ZABOGA, please." Box office: "You mean 'Karate Robot Zar-Bor-Gar'?" me: "Sure." I don't know how the rest of the crowd felt about the film- it's a comedy remake of a overly serious yet silly children's show from the 70s about a karate champion who has a motorcycle that turns into a karate-fighting robot - and the film's sponsor, the splatter-film magazine RUE MORGUE might have wished this movie was a little more exploitative and a little less goofy. But Neil and I enjoyed it immensely. Neil got taken back to the Doubletree and I went home and started packing.
Friday we got out to the con grounds just in time to stand in an hour-long line to check in at the Holiday Inn. I think they were having all minors fill out some kind of form, and there were a lot of minors checking into that hotel. We completed that ordeal just in time to zip over to the Doubletree and get our badges, put up some Hell flyers, and then I had to do my first panel, ANIME'S GUILTY PLEASURES, with Neil. We ditched out of that to zip over to the TCC and put up more flyers and figure out where the Nominoichi was going to be.
In spite of the gray skies the giant crowd of pre-regs, walk-ins, and waiting-for-the-dealers-to-open spread throughout the parking lot. Over in the next building the Ontario Progressive Conservatives were having an important meeting, but that didn't stop the march of Hell.
Nominoichi opened on time and we got our table set up fairly quickly. Didn't have a whole bunch of junk to unload this time - our junk purchases have gone way down in the past couple of years - but we made enough to cover our expenses, and a few meals, and some of some other people's Nominoichi junk. Here's our table and a guy in a shirt two sizes too large.
The Hanna Barbara tablecloth is not for sale.
The Nominoichi was in a larger space and wasn't AS crowded as last year's, though it did get awfully busy in there.
We did see some interesting classic anime cosplay, including a Nausicaa, a Captain Avatar, and a Yamato crewman. Or crew-woman, if you prefer.
Whoever she is, I wonder if she's the living embodiment of the dream girlfriend for most of anime fandom circa 1985? We wrapped up our Nomi table around 9:30 and headed over to the Doubletree to get ready for Anime Hell. But first we had dinner, which was some tacos and a burrito from a new burrito place that opened next to the Harveys and pretty much saved our lives. Great zippy Mexican food, I highly recommend it and I hope they did a lot of business over the weekend.
There was a whole thing at the beginning of Anime Hell where the tech guys needed to get back from a break to figure out how to get the DVD hooked back into the projector feed. But that didn't take long at all and soon we were off.
The crowd was at capacity for the entire show, something that doesn't always happen, and they seemed to enjoy most of it, even the slower, more conceptual bits.
Fake Tim & Eric ads, Mazinkaizer SKL and some bogus PSAs entertained the crowd and soon enough it was midnight and time for everybody to leave before the parody dub Gamera film. I feel sorry for those guys, Anime Hell is not your ideal lead-in.
After Hell we went back to the Perkins at the Holiday Inn for some decent pie, some slowwwww service, and a hollering match between two young drunk guys, their embarrassed girlfriends, and a table full of Muslim women.
Saturday morning we took one look at the crowded Perkins and opted instead for all-day breakfast at Zets, which is really super good and totally worth it. We did a Shojo panel at 3 and a Yamato panel at 4 that lasted until 6, had an aggressively mediocre lunch in the hotel restaurant, and helped Neil get set up for Totally Lame Anime.
This basically means rounding up stray chairs, pocketing lost change, and trying to keep people from blocking the halls. After Neil got cranking Shain and I ditched out and went back to the Holiday Inn and went swimming, which was a nice break. We got back to the hotel right as things were popping for Saturday night. There was a giant crowd outside the TCC:
There was a super long lineup for the 404's that were going to be starting in the Plaza Ballroom once the fully-packed costume contest was over:
And of course TLA was full. So let's recap: all the event rooms are full and all the hallways are full of people in line for the next events in those rooms, and there are people lining up outside in the rain for even more events. I'd say this convention is full.
Also there were Harlock and Emeraldus cosplayers.
Tochiro here also cosplayed as Harlock on Friday.
TLA wrapped and we did our best to facilitate 900 people trying to make it through a narrow hallway. This was not helped by four attention-whores in full body color spandex costumes, who felt it was a great idea to pose for photos in the very same narrow hallway that 900 people were trying to get through all at once. There's a time and a place, fellas, and that ain't it.
Actually all my gripes about the show come back to crowding. Every photo op blocked a hallway, every door-lurker blocked a door, the normal shambling gait of the congoer, annoying at the best of times, all was exacerbated one thousand percent by the severe crowding.
Sunday morning we got up, stood in another line to check out because nobody can be bothered to notice the rate they're paying until they check out, and then suddenly it's a problem, and then we made it back over to the Doubletree to catch Helen McCarthy's panel and to catch up with Helen. We all took a tour through the dealer's room; Shain got some DVDs and I got a children's book from PSYCHO-ARMOR GOVARION from our friends at the Beguiling. Then it was back to the Doubletree for me for my last panel, Classic Anime College, which took place in a room that finally had air conditioning. Too much AC, actually. Coffee service arrived two hours late and almost instantly the con was breaking the room down because the hotel had booked another event that needed to get started almost right away. Checked out, cleaned up, and packed, we ditched Anime North, had dinner at The Counter, a quick stop for ice cream at Tom's Dairy Freeze on the Queensway (since 1969!) and then through the thunderstorm back to the Doubletree where even now Neil is checking out and getting ready for his flight back to Boston and another successful Anime North is safely in the memory box. Get your badges early for '12, there WILL be a limited supply...
For Shain and I the con started on Thursday when I zipped out to the airport to pick up Neil. He got hauled back to our palatial Toy Factory suite and we discovered that KARATE ROBO ZABOGA was playing at the Underground, so after lunch Neil and I caught that while Shain caught up on some work. (Box office transaction - me: "One for DENJIN ZABOGA, please." Box office: "You mean 'Karate Robot Zar-Bor-Gar'?" me: "Sure." I don't know how the rest of the crowd felt about the film- it's a comedy remake of a overly serious yet silly children's show from the 70s about a karate champion who has a motorcycle that turns into a karate-fighting robot - and the film's sponsor, the splatter-film magazine RUE MORGUE might have wished this movie was a little more exploitative and a little less goofy. But Neil and I enjoyed it immensely. Neil got taken back to the Doubletree and I went home and started packing.
Friday we got out to the con grounds just in time to stand in an hour-long line to check in at the Holiday Inn. I think they were having all minors fill out some kind of form, and there were a lot of minors checking into that hotel. We completed that ordeal just in time to zip over to the Doubletree and get our badges, put up some Hell flyers, and then I had to do my first panel, ANIME'S GUILTY PLEASURES, with Neil. We ditched out of that to zip over to the TCC and put up more flyers and figure out where the Nominoichi was going to be.
In spite of the gray skies the giant crowd of pre-regs, walk-ins, and waiting-for-the-dealers-to-open spread throughout the parking lot. Over in the next building the Ontario Progressive Conservatives were having an important meeting, but that didn't stop the march of Hell.
Nominoichi opened on time and we got our table set up fairly quickly. Didn't have a whole bunch of junk to unload this time - our junk purchases have gone way down in the past couple of years - but we made enough to cover our expenses, and a few meals, and some of some other people's Nominoichi junk. Here's our table and a guy in a shirt two sizes too large.
The Hanna Barbara tablecloth is not for sale.
The Nominoichi was in a larger space and wasn't AS crowded as last year's, though it did get awfully busy in there.
We did see some interesting classic anime cosplay, including a Nausicaa, a Captain Avatar, and a Yamato crewman. Or crew-woman, if you prefer.
Whoever she is, I wonder if she's the living embodiment of the dream girlfriend for most of anime fandom circa 1985? We wrapped up our Nomi table around 9:30 and headed over to the Doubletree to get ready for Anime Hell. But first we had dinner, which was some tacos and a burrito from a new burrito place that opened next to the Harveys and pretty much saved our lives. Great zippy Mexican food, I highly recommend it and I hope they did a lot of business over the weekend.
There was a whole thing at the beginning of Anime Hell where the tech guys needed to get back from a break to figure out how to get the DVD hooked back into the projector feed. But that didn't take long at all and soon we were off.
The crowd was at capacity for the entire show, something that doesn't always happen, and they seemed to enjoy most of it, even the slower, more conceptual bits.
Fake Tim & Eric ads, Mazinkaizer SKL and some bogus PSAs entertained the crowd and soon enough it was midnight and time for everybody to leave before the parody dub Gamera film. I feel sorry for those guys, Anime Hell is not your ideal lead-in.
After Hell we went back to the Perkins at the Holiday Inn for some decent pie, some slowwwww service, and a hollering match between two young drunk guys, their embarrassed girlfriends, and a table full of Muslim women.
Saturday morning we took one look at the crowded Perkins and opted instead for all-day breakfast at Zets, which is really super good and totally worth it. We did a Shojo panel at 3 and a Yamato panel at 4 that lasted until 6, had an aggressively mediocre lunch in the hotel restaurant, and helped Neil get set up for Totally Lame Anime.
This basically means rounding up stray chairs, pocketing lost change, and trying to keep people from blocking the halls. After Neil got cranking Shain and I ditched out and went back to the Holiday Inn and went swimming, which was a nice break. We got back to the hotel right as things were popping for Saturday night. There was a giant crowd outside the TCC:
There was a super long lineup for the 404's that were going to be starting in the Plaza Ballroom once the fully-packed costume contest was over:
And of course TLA was full. So let's recap: all the event rooms are full and all the hallways are full of people in line for the next events in those rooms, and there are people lining up outside in the rain for even more events. I'd say this convention is full.
Also there were Harlock and Emeraldus cosplayers.
Tochiro here also cosplayed as Harlock on Friday.
TLA wrapped and we did our best to facilitate 900 people trying to make it through a narrow hallway. This was not helped by four attention-whores in full body color spandex costumes, who felt it was a great idea to pose for photos in the very same narrow hallway that 900 people were trying to get through all at once. There's a time and a place, fellas, and that ain't it.
Actually all my gripes about the show come back to crowding. Every photo op blocked a hallway, every door-lurker blocked a door, the normal shambling gait of the congoer, annoying at the best of times, all was exacerbated one thousand percent by the severe crowding.
Sunday morning we got up, stood in another line to check out because nobody can be bothered to notice the rate they're paying until they check out, and then suddenly it's a problem, and then we made it back over to the Doubletree to catch Helen McCarthy's panel and to catch up with Helen. We all took a tour through the dealer's room; Shain got some DVDs and I got a children's book from PSYCHO-ARMOR GOVARION from our friends at the Beguiling. Then it was back to the Doubletree for me for my last panel, Classic Anime College, which took place in a room that finally had air conditioning. Too much AC, actually. Coffee service arrived two hours late and almost instantly the con was breaking the room down because the hotel had booked another event that needed to get started almost right away. Checked out, cleaned up, and packed, we ditched Anime North, had dinner at The Counter, a quick stop for ice cream at Tom's Dairy Freeze on the Queensway (since 1969!) and then through the thunderstorm back to the Doubletree where even now Neil is checking out and getting ready for his flight back to Boston and another successful Anime North is safely in the memory box. Get your badges early for '12, there WILL be a limited supply...
