Last weekend I spent my time out at the Supanova Pop Culture Expo as it swung through Brisbane this year. This was the second Supanova to be held in Brisbane during November after the change in schedule to add the Gold Coast convention in April during which the Brisbane and Melbourne legs usually took place. Luckily the nearing Summer temperatures were not too bad; but instead it decided to rain on us Friday and Saturday.
This year what really attracted me to begin with was a real insane line up which included Eve Myles who played Gwen in Torchwood and voiced Merril in Dragon Age 2. Along with Eve we had Kai Owen (Rhys In Torchwood) however unfortunately both had to pull out very early. None the less the line up included at least one person I had to see.
The first panel I went into was the end of Laurene Landon’s. This was not part of my plan however, as I was second in the line up for James Marsters (whom I have seen before) and they decided to put us in behind everyone in Laurene’s panel after moving everyone up into the special ticket holder’s seats.
During this panel a few interesting stories were shared including one about how the idea for Cellular came about on napkins and one about how shocked and angered Larry Cohen was when he saw what his film Captivity was turned into. Laurene also mentioned how she found out recently during the convention that Cassandra Peterson (Elvira) had fought to have a billboard for Captivity removed from near her daughter’s school as the inappropriate scene depicted on it couldn’t help but be seen from the school-grounds.
After Laurene’s time was over it was not long at all before James Marsters was on stage and ready to wow his huge captive audience. For those few of you who don’t know James Marsters is most famous for playing Spike in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel,. He also has had various roles in many other series popular in geek culter such as Brainiac in Smallville, Barnabas Greeley in Caprica, Captain John Hart in Torchwood. Further to this he also has lent his voice to a number of projects too such as Lex Luthor in Superman: Doomsday and DC Universe Online. To read more about James Marster’s panel go to my post on it here.
After Jame’s Marster’s panel the next person I was keen on seeing was Felicia Day. Felicia is best known for her great web series “The Guild”. Felicia also had a small role in Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a Potential Slayer in the final season, something I am going to have to go back and have a look at. She also played Penny in Doctor Horrible’s Sing Along Blog and played Tallis in Dragon Age: Redemption as well as providing her voice in Dragon Age 2. This was her first time in Australia and of course my first chance to see her at a convention. To read more about Felecia Day’s panel read my post on it here.
After Felicia’s panel was done I had some time to kill so I grabbed a bite to eat, a couple dagwood dogs were my con/carnie food of choice. At almost ten bucks for the both of them if I wasn’t too lazy to walk back to the train station I could have gotten a decent sub from Subway for that price but heck it’s all part of the experience. After eats it was time to head over for the cosplay competition. Somehow I ended up catching the end of seiyū Morita Masakazu’s panel in which he discussed his various roles such as Tidus from Final Fantasy X and Ichigo from Bleach in their original Japanese release.
There were several skits and plenty of laughs (aka lols) to be had during the Cosplay competition for the day. I was able to capture a good few shots from my less than perfect position and even recorded a few pieces. If you want to see these photos or watch the recordings you will be able to see them in my post coming soon. The saturday was rounded out with James Marster’s concert which was as entertaining as ever with his interesting blend of acoustic music and little background stories for a number of his songs. For more of my thoughts on concert you can read my post about it coming soon.
Sunday didn’t turn out to be as big for me; after the long day before and getting rained on plenty Friday and Saturday. I went to see one panel on that day, the very first panel in the Film Ink area. This one was with one of the top Tolkien studiers in Australia and most specifically the Hobbit. He shared his opinions on the movies, where they were going and how he viewed them. After this panel I looked through the stalls for a final time before leaving rather early. I originally had intentions to see Gareth David-Lloyd for a second time but the line up was already huge when we exited the Hobbit panel. Faced with a wait of a few hours before anyone else that interested me and being somewhat tired from the previous days’ efforts and raining on it was best to leave.
Next Supanova I’ll be going to isn’t really all too far away, Supanova Gold Coast 2013 in April next year. With promises to replace his missed showing this year by Michael Rosenbaum I can almost guarantee I will be there; I just hope he will be.
