Well, here is what I am sure will be just another in a long line of posts about Botcon 1997. If anyone cares, here is my take on the convention. If not, then don't read any further. It's not arranged in any particular order.
First, the quick review. Incredible, fantastic, awesome, etc., etc., you get the point.
Jon, Karl, and Glen did a fantastic job. After this, whoever is going to hold Botcon next year is going to have a tough time beating this years con.
This year, I went as a dealer. I wanted to get rid of some stuff I didn't need. (And get in early to find some stuff I wanted.)
The Dinner was great. It was great to meet some fellow ATTers. I hope the Dinner becomes a tradition. I certainly was not expecting a hand painted decoy as the exclusive. They are incredible. Beautiful work Dave. I got Wheeljack. He's very cool. Incidently, if anyone got Optimus Prime, and would like to have Wheeljack, I might be persuaded to trade.
The guests Q & A sessions were very interesting. Of course my favorite was Peter Cullen. He was not quite what I was expecting. I don't know what I was expecting, but the thought of Optimus Prime in a Cowboy hat somehow wasn't quite right. He had some very interesting things to say about Optimus Prime being a hero. He did seem really disappointed about Frank Welker not coming, and was obviously upset by talking about Chris Latta. I missed almost the entire Q & A sessions with everyone else. I did make it for all the autographs though.
The concert was wonderful. Ground Zero is awesome. I've already listened to it about 150 times.
Now, as I'm sure most everyone has heard by now Saturday night was very interesting if you were staying at the Sheraton. I'm not going to go through it, as it has been talked about a lot, I'm sure. From what I have heard, everyone either heard the alarm once at 4:00 or once at 2:00 and once at 4:00. Well, on the second floor, it rang SEVEN TIMES. I don't know why. My father and I had a handicapped room (he's a bi-lateral amputee), and there was an alarm and a lovely strobe light in the room. Funny thing is, the rest of the floor NEVER rang. Oh well, it was defiantly interesting.
I only had a few minutes to look through the art room. There were a lot of great things, but the Unicron statue was AWESOME. I was not there to hear who won. Wish I had been.
I missed the Hasbro presentation. I had to stay in the dealer room at my table. Oh well, I'll have to read about it, though from what I hear, there were a lot of no comments.
Although I missed the Bob Forward panel, I'm told he would not say what was going to happen to Optimus Primal. That was the ONE thing I had wanted to find out.
Let's see, what's left. Oh yeah, surprise of my life, my character Lone Wolf made the cover of the Botcon magazine!! My thanks to Raksha and Magic. I have no artistic ability, and this is probably the only way I would ever have a physical representation of Lone Wolf. Now perhaps I should finish the story I started for him. I've only glanced through the book, but it looks excellent. I just loved page 10.
I loved the Comic that came with the exclusive toy. That little note inside the front cover from Simon Furman and Andrew Wildman was wonderful.
Well, I guess that was about it. Well, one final question then. What did everyone get? I picked up a whole bunch of stuff. It's a good thing I don't make a living selling toys. Every cent I made at my table ended up going to another dealer. Let's see, I got:
So, where will it be next year?
Well, I hope everyone else enjoyed Botcon 97 as much as I did. Thanks Jon, Karl, and Glen for putting on a great show. Thanks to all the guests who seemed genuinely happy to be there.