Pictures from the 2016 New York Comic Con, part 1: Friday (The Tick, Rotten Tomatoes, and a whole lotta costumes)

As in years past, I was able to make it to a few days of the annual New York Comic Con. The show is getting bigger every year, and the displays are getting fuller, too. In previous years, many of the big booths would simply have holdover displays from Comic-Con in San Diego; that still exists, but more often you'll see brand new or new-ish displays from some of the biggest exhibitors, many of which are also offering NYCC exclusives when they hadn't in the past.

I was able to make it to Friday and Saturday this time around, and I was able to spend most of the time wandering around as a fan, unlike in San Diego. This show remains too crowded for its own good, but it's starting to take on its own identity and the enthusiasm surrounding it is high. Let's take a look at some of the pictures I was able to take, this time from the Friday of the show.

I waited in line to enter the building for a solid 20 minutes before realizing that I was able to skip it with a professional badge. Oh well. While in line, I saw an unlikely team-up of Rick Grimes, Son of Satan and Quailman (from "Doug").

Here's a pretty decent Trump Taco.

"Stranger Thing" costumes probably outnumbered the next most prolific outfit 2-to-1. Incredibly enough, this isn't the only "wall" costume I saw at the show.

This is a really nice classic Superman!

Psylocke here even remembered the sash.

The shield here was really impressive. It a nice Captain America Hydra outfit.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is Space Ghost's wrestling granddad, Grandpa Ghostal. Fantastic attention to detail.

These flyers were at a number of places around the convention hall. Poor Barb. I care, too!

Outside, near the DC lobby booth, there was a costume contest and what seemed like a foot race between similarly costumed characters going on. I didn't stick around too long.

For example, here are a group of Green Lantern-related characters.

This might be my choice for best costume at the show, at least among the ones I saw. Love the classic battle suit Luthor, complete with tattered Superman cape. Very nice job.

Here's a shot of the lobby, near the DC booth.

Is this a Bombshell version of Wonder Woman? I'm not sure.

I love this Martian Manhunter mask! It was really well done. Get outta the shot, Spider-Gwen!

Thundercats group shot! It's gotta be challenging getting enough friends who are willing to dress up in elaborate costumes. Good for this group.

Video game character, yes?

I'm not sure that I've ever seen a Spawn costume before. This one is pretty good.

It looks like the Black Panther is trying to hand out a business card or something. This guy put a lot of work into this outfit.

This is the main lobby.

A really nice Wasp! The wings looked great. I wonder how difficult it is to walk though the aisles with wings. They must get bent and ripped off pretty often.

This is artist alley, in what appears to be a repurposed airplane hangar.

I was very excited to see this episode specific version of The Tick! He made the shirt himself. There were more than a few Tick costumes on display this weekend, which was great to see. Amazon even held a panel for some of its upcoming shows, including The Tick, which will return in 2017!

I will never see enough Futurama costumes.

Dr. Strange, Luke Cage and Iron Fist.

I guess Rogue stole Gambit's staff for this picture.

This was an odd setup. Batman and Superman worked really hard on their costumes, and they looked great. But why is Superman holding a dead Robin? Did I miss something by not seeing Batman v Superman? In any case, people loved this.

I, in turn, loved this Tick/Big Lebowski mashup, with a clever use of spoons.

Adult Swim had a big Rick and Morty display near one of the inside entrances. Last season ended with Rick in extraterrestrial prison, and you were able to get your picture in an cell next to him. I'm pretty sure I sold it.

After the show ended, I made my way to my only panel for the day, the Rotten Tomatoes panel, which I pretty much have to do at this point.

It was good to see everyone again, and the panel continues to be lots of fun. If you get the chance to attend one at a convention, you should make the effort to go.

Scott Mantz from Access Hollywood is a panel regular and a fun guy to be around. Access Hollywood...where else has that been in the news lately? Interesting!

Matt Atchity and Grae Drake continue to acknowledge my existence at these things, which is pretty kind of them. They are both wonderful people who slum it every time they take a picture with me.

Grae recently hosted a program on the SyFy channel. This is a pretty good picture of me.

After the show, it was off to Twin's Irish Pub, which I highly recommend if you're ever near midtown Manhattan. This started off as a small dinner with Jeff McComsey and Dom Vivona, but after a little while, other friends started showing up, seemingly out of the blue. This is one of the best things about coming to NYCC. A lot of friends who I collaborate with on comics are from the east coast, and most of 'em don't make it out to SDCC, so this is the one weekend out of the year that I get to see many of these guys. If you look closely enough at the table, you can see this year's giveaway, some series 1 Garbage Pail Kids cards, which were a big hit.

This was a busy trip. I made my way back into the city on Saturday, and I'll post those pictures soon. See you then! I guess.

Pictures from the 2013 New York Comic-Con, part 1

The 2013 New York Comic-Con was, by all accounts, bigger than ever, and I was lucky enough to receive a professional pass for the show, which now takes up four days, including an extended "preview" Thursday.  My work schedule meant that I couldn't make it for the entire show, so I drove out to eastern Pennsylvania on Friday evening and made my way into New York City on Saturday, October 12th for one of the country's largest comic and pop culture conventions.  I took a number of pictures, some of which I'll share today and a few more times in the days to come.  Let's begin!

Parking in New York City is obviously outrageous (in 2010 it was $50 per day), so I drove to Newark and took a train into Penn Station.  I wasn't the only one who decided on this route, as I was accompanied on the train by the Blues Brothers.  They looked like they knew what they were doing, so I followed them through the maze from Penn Station to street level to the convention center.

Upon arriving from underground, there was a famous landmark or two to take in.

The way to the convention center, along 34th street, was easy enough to follow because the way was lined with folks in costumes.  Even so, there were convention workers in bright orange shirts along several street corners, directing the human traffic toward their destination.

As a perk of having the professional pass, I was allowed to enter through a side entrance.  There were a handful of others entering at the same time I was, but there were no lines to speak of, and I basically walked right in.  My badge was scanned and I successfully managed to make it to NYCC without getting killed!  Very exciting.

There was lots to see upon entering, and for a while I just wandered around, looking to see what I could see.  Eventually I made my way to the artist alley section, which was a little out of the way, so I could get to the FUBAR booth.  I wanted to say hello to the guys working there, and I selfishly wanted to drop off some of the things I was carrying.  Along the way I saw this person dressed up at Ragdoll from the Secret Six.

I talked to the FUBAR guys for a while, and got a peek at Dom Vivona's personal sketchbook.  He showed me this great illustration of the Tick, reminiscent of the early Edlund work.  Very cool!

I eventually made it back to the convention floor, where I saw the First Second display.  I walked up and bought the recently released Battling Boy, which I was looking forward to, when someone asked if I was in line for the Paul Pope signing.  I had no idea what he was talking about, but I soon found out that Pope was making an appearance soon and, from where I was standing at the booth, I was accidentally around seventh in line.  I kept my impromptu spot and soon I was able to get the copy of my book signed by Pope himself.  I also landed a number of promotional items, all of which I'll show off a little bit later.  It was a lucky score for me.

I was pretty excited to see Nick Fury's flying convertible in the new SHIELD program; so far it's been a highlight from an otherwise mediocre production (pick it up, Whedon!).  Having a car at the convention was a nice touch as well.

Since I've taken in some episodes on Netflix, I've come to appreciate Bob's Burgers for what it is.  Here's some younger costumers at the show.

And here's a slightly more modest Molotov Cocktease from the Venture Bros.!

The accessories obviously make this costume.

Some '90s, cartoon-era X-Men.  What's that guy in the bottom right got going on on his iPad screen?

A few "Age of Apocalypse" X-Men!  And...Lady Deathstryke, I think?

Teams were a big focus of a lot of costumes on Saturday.  I wonder if these were groups who came together, or individuals who found each other at the con and decided to take advantage of a good thing.  This '80s era Justice League did a nice job.

And here's a group of Fantomex characters...and Vision...and...Waldo.  Okay.

Lots of cool things to see at NYCC.  I'll post more pictures soon!

FUBAR has enough going on that it requires its own section of RANDOM NOTES!

To me, I think that FUBAR represents the best of what independent comics (and comics in general) can accomplish: a lot of different, talented people from all over coming together to tell fun stories on a regular basis.  The formula is difficult to sustain; having a regular creative team on a book comes with its own challenges, but an anthology, with all of its moving parts, can easily get bogged down in a "too many cooks" situation.  For whatever reason, FUBAR has bucked that trend and is moving along at a faster pace than ever before, and there are some new developments that should propel the book and concept into 2014 and, hopefully, beyond.

The latest news has to start with the final tally for Jeff McComsey's outrageously successful Kickstarter campain, which will bring us all the anticipated "Mother Russia" original graphic novel and a few other projects.  As you can see from the image above, there were almost 1900 backers, nearly all of whom ordered at least the book itself.  In terms of independent comics, selling this many books right off the bat is a huge success, one that we're all looking to build on.

One of the projects springing from this campaign is FUBAR: Better Red than Dead, a short anthology that'll be written by McComsey and me.  It, of course, takes place during the Cold War period and features a knock-down cover by the great Pietro.  This book will ship out to all Kickstarter backers who pledged at least $25 to the campaign, and I believe it will be offered to comic shops and at conventions at a later date.

The book soon to be on shelves is our new Guts and Glory feature, with stories taking place in earlier times, as the Steve Becker cover suggests.  This book will also ship to Kickstarter backers, though it'll show up in comic shops first.  As a matter of fact, it's available to order right now, with a Diamond order code of OCT130801.  Similar in format to the two By the Sword issues, I've got a story in this issue title "I Am".

The FUBAR crew, including the pictured Becker, Dom Vivona and McComsey, made a scene at the recently concluded New York Comic-Con.  I had a chance to sit in on the booth on the Saturday of the show and it was a busy, fun time.  The comic news website Bleeding Cool ran an interview about FUBAR, and McComsey and I took the time to answer some questions about the book and the concept in general.  The interview can be read in its entirety here: http://live.bleedingcool.org/2013/10/12/848/

Lastly, Swedish artist Daniel Thollin posted this picture recently of a magazine interview he gave.  Thollin has worked on a number of FUBAR projects, including the "Old Ghosts" story story that I wrote for volume two of the series.  You can see the book in the extreme foreground of the publicity shot, which is fun to take note of.  I don't speak Swedish, but I'm assuming that the article headline outs Thollin as the Batman of Sweden, which, let's face it, I kind of already figuerd.