Post-Con Quickies-Geek Spasms

[Geek King]

I'm back, I'm tired, and its late, but I need to report two awesome things that happened on the last day of the con, because I can't keep them to myself.

1) I ended up at the post-con guest and department head dinner seated at the same table as director Nabeshin Watanabe, his wife, and their translator. Talked about Gundam for a good twenty minutes. He's apparently a big fan, and wanted to know how anime fans here in the U.S. view the series. Remarkably nice couple. Proud of myself for not completely geeking out and going fanboi. I was tempted.

2) Fans of Space Battle Cruiser Yamato/Starblazers? Seen this trailer for the Live action movie yet? I just got to see the whole thing in an unofficial first screening (~40 people) thanks to the military consultant for the movie! I can't say much about it due to NDA, but...

it.

is.

fucking.

INCREDIBLE!!!

A great sci-fi flick if you don't know the series, and if you do know Yamato/Starblazers, it is everything the Transformers movie should have been.

For a couple of hours tonight, I was ten years old again.

Need sleep now. more later today.

[Wenchie]

I'm back, I'm tired, and its late, but I need to report two awesome things that happened on the last day of the con, because I can't keep them to myself.

1) I ended up at the post-con guest and department head dinner seated at the same table as director Nabeshin Watanabe, his wife, and their translator. Talked about Gundam for a good twenty minutes. He's apparently a big fan, and wanted to know how anime fans here in the U.S. view the series. Remarkably nice couple. Proud of myself for not completely geeking out and going fanboi. I was tempted.

Isn't Nabeshin awesome?

I worked Guest Escorts (aka guest security... not THOSE type of escorts!) for a convention in 2009, and got to meet Shinichi Watanabe (aka Nabeshin) - he's awesome!

Me & Nabeshin (and his assistant Aoi Kidokoro and my friend Will) on the sunday night of that convention: http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._1908878_n.jpg

And Nabeshin at the same convention in 2010, wearing a utilikilt: http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._1680450_n.jpg

Can't remember who the other person was in the pic... one of our other guests, I think.

Nabeshin is one of the most awesome people I know, even though he doesn't speak hardly ANY english. He also had a habit of sneaking off and losing his escorts... though when that happens he can normally be found out smoking. I have a few funny Nabeshin stories from the past few years!

And his Afro has powers. Seriously. Just ask him.

EDIT: And I didn't know that Nabeshin was married... strange. Wonder if it's recent? Normally he brings a different person every year to the convention who acts as his assistant... likes to give them more exposure.

[teh_blumchenkinder]

I stared at this thread for several minutes.
Then I started spasming-- OMG
AHYOUARESOLUCKY!
*spasms some more*

[Geek King]

Ug, sleep harder to catch up on when work has been so needy this week.

Isn't Nabeshin awesome?

I worked Guest Escorts (aka guest security... not THOSE type of escorts!) for a convention in 2009, and got to meet Shinichi Watanabe (aka Nabeshin) - he's awesome!

He was pretty awesome. He reminded me of some of my friends in the gaming group. The one thing that kind of surprised me was how 'normal' he was just talking about anime. Our american voice actors get more into the technical stuff they deal with, but Nabeshin talked about it just like any other fan. It was very easy to forget he directs them for a living, just talking to him.

EDIT: And I didn't know that Nabeshin was married... strange. Wonder if it's recent? Normally he brings a different person every year to the convention who acts as his assistant... likes to give them more exposure.

Apparently, his wife is a voice actress, and this was the first con he's taken her to outside Japan. I don't remember her stage name, but I know she played Kumi-kumi in Excel Saga and Puni Puni Poemy, and has been in several other anime. She complained that that he calls her "My little Dom" and since she isn't as familier with Gundam, she's not sure if that's good or not.

Other cool stuff:
Bought some prints from Fred Gallagher (Megatokyo) of Largo and Ericka in their steampunk/clubbing outfits. Got to see him drop most of a shelf full of t-shirts on Sarah and little Jack.


Not-so-cool stuff:

One of the american guests got a little pissy that we weren't showing an anime dubbed that he had done voice work on. As it was also one of Nabeshin's projects, and Nabeshin had been doing surprise pop-ins when his shows were being shown, I suggested to the guest relations staff they politely tell him to stuff it, or I would. We had other anime being shown dubbed that said guest had also worked on, so it isn't like we were snubbing him.

I'm told they caught one of our long-time vendors selling bootleg merchandise. These people have been buying space in our vendor's room for years, and were almost the last vendor I would have suspected of pulling that kind of thing. Our vendor's hall staff likely only caught them because they were near another vendor one of the big anime companies had called to warn us about the same thing. I really hope this was a lapse of judgement somewhere, and will be fixed. I'd hate to see them get blacklisted after all these years.

All-in-all, a good convention, even if my legs did hurt like hell when I got up Monday morning. Between heading the video rooms, making sure my staff were where they should have been, running to the store for supplies, and getting pulled back to ConOps everytime I tried to sneak back to my room for a short break, I feel like I put in over fifty miles in hiking this past weekend.

To teh_blumchenkinder: Yes, yes I am lucky.

[AnaKhouri]

Ah, we were at the same convention. I very much enjoyed Yasuhiro Koshi's panel (I learned how to do the proper Yamato salute!). It would be great if he was invited to attend in the future.

I have no idea what all the cosplays were (no clue what the kids are watching these days, although I did learn Hetalia is an anime/webcomic and not a BL dating-sim game like I thought). Was there a Frank from Donnie Darko there? Because once I looked down a hall and thought I saw him but when I glanced back he was gone, and now I wonder if I'm losing it.

I cosplayed Nausicaa on Saturday, if you happened to see me.

[Wenchie]

Not-so-cool stuff:

One of the american guests got a little pissy that we weren't showing an anime dubbed that he had done voice work on. As it was also one of Nabeshin's projects, and Nabeshin had been doing surprise pop-ins when his shows were being shown, I suggested to the guest relations staff they politely tell him to stuff it, or I would. We had other anime being shown dubbed that said guest had also worked on, so it isn't like we were snubbing him.

Looking at the guests you had at the con, I can pretty much guess who this might have been, since I've met and/or worked with most of the guests you've had. *sigh* Most of the guests you had are great... but there are a few who need to get hit by a clue-by-four.

I'm told they caught one of our long-time vendors selling bootleg merchandise. These people have been buying space in our vendor's room for years, and were almost the last vendor I would have suspected of pulling that kind of thing. Our vendor's hall staff likely only caught them because they were near another vendor one of the big anime companies had called to warn us about the same thing. I really hope this was a lapse of judgement somewhere, and will be fixed. I'd hate to see them get blacklisted after all these years.

Ouch! That's never a good. I have a friend who is an anime-merch vendor at a lot of cons. But he wasn't at your con this year, so I at least know it wasn't him!

All-in-all, a good convention, even if my legs did hurt like hell when I got up Monday morning. Between heading the video rooms, making sure my staff were where they should have been, running to the store for supplies, and getting pulled back to ConOps everytime I tried to sneak back to my room for a short break, I feel like I put in over fifty miles in hiking this past weekend.

All signs of a great convention! If my legs don't feel like they should be falling off by the end of the weekend, I wonder what I did.