Hey folks, Harry here with a devilish FishBulb... who has not only broken the BNAT barrier, he's manifesting contribution compulsion... Behold it all!!!
Good evening my large Red-Woolen Friend,
We once met on or near your birthday as I proudly embodied the only San Diego resident to be invited to BNAT 5. It is as this moment, the high point of being a Geek living near downtown SD in 2004, dawns upon us that I decide to send in my very first report to my often beloved (when i don't have to click Refresh nineteen times before the damn page actually loads, that is) AICN. A brief report on some of the goings on of Comic-Con International 2004.
This morning (Saturday) dawned hung over and groggy. The weather cloudy and muggy, hot early. My wife and I awoke, ate, dressed, etc. and started off on the twenty minute walk from our apartment to the Convention Center. My first priority was simple, get into Hall H right away and don't leave for six and a half hours.
By now everybody knows that Revenge of the Sith is The Title. Did I like it? Yes. Did I scream like a little girl when I first heard it? Sure, but that doesn't make me gay. The other surprise of the presentation was that Hayden showed and chatted with us for a bit. During this exchange, Rick MCallum allowed us to view a video of behind the scene ROTS footage featuring our first look of Hayden as Darth Vader, the mask being slowly lowered onto his greasy mop. Good shit. Although I must add that the ROTS video game looks to be a mathafookin blast and that we will, one day, be able to take aim and kill and Ewok. You heard it here first folks. Revenge of the Sith? Nah...Revenge of the Fanboys!
My wife, happily representing BNAT (Return of the Tracking Shot), and I stuck around for the Sin City panel. I am not familiar with the books but have been curious as hell about what this film could look like after hearing reports of some sort of revolutionary process Robert Rodriguez is implementing. Well, this bloke doesn't fuck around. Within five minutes of showing up he asks us if we want to see the opening scene that he used to convince Frank Miller, Bruce Willis, the Studio, etc. that this was a movie worth being involved with. Three seconds (literally) into the clip I turned to my lady and said, "I am fucking dying to see this movie now." This flick pops off the screen. Stark blacks and whites, exciting use of color, kick ass music, disturbing looking characters, and NOTHING like Kill Bill. I can't really say more about this one, it looks to be a knockout.
After much seat wrangling to get closer and a slight time delay, the Paramount Panel began. Trey and Matt came on first and showed the Trailer and two film clips for Team America: World Police! YES!!!!! I mean, AAAAGGGHH!!! Now!!! Right....Fucking!!! NAAAA!!!! Ok ok, chillin' agin'. We saw the Paris scene that we've heard about from Moriarty, as well as a scene featuring Kim Jong Il (who sounds occasionally like Cartman, "You're bustin' my balls!"), Hans Blix and some Hammerheads. These guys were clearly tired of dealing with puppets but were great sports about answering questions and providing this great look at what is suddenly my most anticipated film of the year.
Finally, my stay in the 6,700 seat, cavernous Hall H came to a close as the Sky Captain panel began. I'm not going to go into this one at all. No really new news, cool people, cool clips, but I'm sure someone else will get into this one much more deeply than I am capable of. Sufficed to say, this looks totally sweet and I'm looking forward to seeing it.
My last stop so far this evening came at the panel for Michael Chabon, presenting The Amazing Adventures of the Escapist based after his TAA of Kavalier and Clay (my favorite book). I managed to ask about the status of the film adaptation of Kavalier and Clay. His answer was, "Its a Dead Shark. It aint movin'." If it does take place, he mentioned that the idea was to have the Antarctica section presented visually as a comic book, but without animation (he didn't seem quire sure how this would be done). This guy is damn cool though and a great writer, if you haven't checked out Kavalier and Clay you owe it to yourself to seek it out.
After that panel we ran home to get drunk and baked before heading back down to catch the Masquerade and stumbling into the midnight double feature of Pink Floyd The Wall and Wizards. Seeing as how I'm not quite drunk or stoned enough right now and have to leave in about half an hour, I gotta get to work.
Later red Monkey,
FishBulb
