Supernatural Convention 2015 Part 1
Family doesn’t end with blood.
The CW’s hit show “Supernatural” has been on the air for almost 10 years and just been renewed for its 11th season. What started as that other show about sexy people hunting monsters on what was then still the WB network, has turned into a flagship for its parent company and a rallying cry for a huge fandom that explores themes of what it means to be human, what it means to be a family and what it means to fight evil, within as well as literal things that go bump in the night.
During its first season, the tag line for Supernatural’s promos was “Scary just got sexy”, and it was described (not unjustly) as “The X-Files meets the Hardy Boys.” (X-Files image from one of our many novelty t shirts) But now, the line is changed firmly to “Join the Hunt.” Still, perhaps it might be better encapsulated with a line from one of the show’s own characters: Jim Beaver’s beloved portrayal of Bobby Singer (a gruff father figure named as a joke by the crew after one of the show’s head writers and executive producers) told the two main characters, brothers Sam (Jared Padaleki) and Dean (Jenson Ackles), that “Family don’t end with blood, boy!” and that has made a world of difference for people on social media, for youths exiled due to being LGBTQ, for fans and strangers to the show alike.
Supernatural Convention Part 2
I personally have been a fan of the show for about 5 years now, and the line “Saving people, hunting things: The Winchester Family Business since 1983” seemed especially appropriate to me as I was born on January the 17th, 1983, and the middle day of the Supernatural Convention at the San Francisco Airport Hyatt took place on my birthday. Much less like other nerdy conventions or even fan get-togethers, Supernatural Con is more similar to a 3 day rock concert with special celebrity guests on tour. This is both astounding and an enriching experience for any seasoned fan of the show, but be warned that it is one of the more costly fan expos I’ll ever attend.
I told every vendor that it was my birthday, and once I had shown proof, they even gave me discounts, and I participated in or volunteered for anything available, which also garnered me free stuff. I participated in a trivia contest with two other fans chosen from the audience (we did not win, despite best efforts. It was really hard), and I was one of maybe 100 people dressed as some version of the character Castiel, the rebel angel and sometimes ally/ assumed love interest/ big bad friend of the two main men on the show. 
I didn’t place in the costume contest either, though I felt really handsome in my long coat and disheveled necktie. (the zombie image from the classic horror movie t shirt I pulled just because in any nerd costume contest you can count on at least one zombie) The competition was steep and diverse, and the guy who won had made full sized black angel wings with pneumatic strings that allowed him to invisibly puppeteer them up and down.
Supernatural Convention Part 3
“King of Hell or President of the United States?”
There were also plenty of funny and hectic moments with both Collins and Sheppard, separately and together, not to mention the numerous other panelists and guests that took the stage that Saturday. I enjoyed hearing long lines of fans during Q&A’s ask the same 4-5 questions (reworded very slightly) to each guest in turn: “What was your most awkward moment?” “What’s your favorite episode?” “What’s your acting process?” “Who’s your celebrity crush?” “Can I have a hug?” And so on. Every once in a great while a really good fan question would come up, like someone asking Mark Sheppard, “Which did you like more: Being on Supernatural or being on Doctor Who?”
“I’m not going to answer that,” Mark said, instantly turning into the lovable raspy-voiced jerk he’s most known for portraying in fiction. He’s quite British, you see, so his preferences need not be stated. (Doctor Who t shirt selected with love from our Funny t shirt category because it’s pretty damn funny.) Everyone did their own impersonation of Sheppard at some point, usually just by saying the word “No”, or, occasionally the word “Cardio” for some reason.
Supernatural Convention Part 4
“What was your most Awkward moment?”
Misha when imitating Mark talked about their dynamic both on the show and in real life.
“He’s usually the one who always says “No” so I kinda became the guy who always says “Yes” somehow. It was like, at fan meet and greets, people would be sneaky and grope my ass and I was just like, okay, whatever. Or in pictures with fans they’ll always come up with these props and ask me to be silly, which I love.”
“”Misha, eat this banana in the picture with me!” “Misha, wear this octopus on your head!” “Misha, can I lick your stomach?” “Yeah!””
He paused and made a face to indicate his sudden realization that he’d made a terrible mistake and then, “Eep!”
So, apparently, according to Misha Collins himself, all actors are just really expensive whores and if you ask him to do pretty much anything at one of these conventions, he feels obliged to say yes. You’re welcome! (“Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!” Firefly Tshirt because it was certainly sudden and inevitable.) And yes, that totally happened: a fan actually licked his stomach at some point during a photo op. That was his most awkward moment.
Some thoughts on the TV show Z Nation
So I’m done with Star Trek TOS and enjoyed every minute of it. I think I might do the same thing with DS9 but want to take a break and talk about other stuff that has caught my eye on Netflix. First up: walking Dead Knock off Z Nation.
Of course calling a show a knock off of the Walking Dead is unfair since the Walking Dead is actually a knock off of about 800 zombie movies. Still, this show is like the Walking Dead with a mission. 
Zombie apocalypse happens (thank God. Image courtesy of our huge collection of zombie t-shirts) and one guy proves immune to the disease. Of course he was a prisoner forced to take the anti virus and has what might be generously considered a bad attitude and the lab they need to get him to is across the country. So the journey begins.
My first take on this show is it is alternatively one of the best zombie shows out there or the stupidest. Very hard core with things the Walking Dead wouldn’t touch like zombie children, zombie babies, cannibalism, and other stuff more than a little past PG-13. However once you get into the hard core nature of the show they trot out some dumb Zombi3-esque cliche and make the show look really stupid. Sorry but a zombie baby should present about as much danger to a full grown man as a football if you know what I mean.
Anyway I’m crunched for time but will parse out more thoughts on this show and a couple others I have been watching. Check back soon.
the Infamous Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 1 the Man Trap
This episode is special to me because it not only was a great story it it’s the one I think I literally wet myself the first time I saw it. The Buffalo was the creepiest Star Trek humanoid alien ever (the Horta was the all time creepiest alien ever) and scared the heck out of me. I still get the creeps when I see it and even seeing the stuffed one in Trelane’s mansion in the Squire of Gothos give me the heebie jeebies. Kudos to whomever designed and built that costume.
That being said if you ever wanted to lose your ability to trust or like women this is the episode for you (well, this one and Where No Man Has Gone Before, Mudds Women, What are Little Girls Made Of, the Conscious of the King, Space Seed, This Side of Paradise, Amok Time, Who Mourns for Adonis, Catspaw, the Gamesters of Triskelion, a Private Little War, By Any Other Name, Spocks Brain, Wink of an Eye, the Empath, Elaan of Troyius, That Which Survives, the Lights of Zetar, the Cloud Minders, and Turnabout Intruder. To say that betrayal by, betrayal of, and distrust of women is a recurring theme in TOS Star Trek is a bit of an understatement). 
A beautiful woman who turns into a hideous monster and sucks the life out of men sounds like every guys nightmare of a relationship from the most stereotypical point of view. However as I have noted before the question “Do you think this episode might be a little too misogynistic?” is one that I don’t think came up often at the writing table. Let’s celebrate Star Trek for it’s racial equality agenda, not for the fact that every female in it wore high skirts.
(Game Over image from the funny t shirt collection)
the Infamous Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Charlie X
This is one of my favorite episodes. My childhood was rife with alienation and isolation from other human beings and I therefore truly identified with poor Charlie Evans. I know a lot of other reviewers of Star Trek didn’t really like this episode due to the whole “god child” cliche (which would later be revisited in the Squire of Gothos) as well as the fact that this is another episode that treats women like walking talking sex dolls but the fate of Charlie (and his dark sense of humor) always struck a chord with me. To this day I feel terrible and kind of tear up whenever I see the final scene of Charlie begging for help. The terror he shows is apparent and the massive abandonment pretty much feels like my 2nd grade all the way through high school graduation.
Anyway this episode made number 8 on my personal top 10 best TOS Episode list. I suppose it’s true that I am more drawn towards the darker stories. Shore Leave and the Trouble with Tribbles I can take or leave but given the opportunity to see City on the Edge of Forever or the Conscious of the King and I will always take it. Take what you will of that if you care to try to understand my own dark personality. (Dark Side (that’s the literal translation) image comes from my collection of Star Wars t-shirts)
the Infamous Dave Inman
Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 3 Where No Man Has Gone Before
This is an interesting episode in that it is the second pilot for the series. The first one, the Cage, was rejected of hand by NBC. Thankfully Lucille Ball convinced them to run a second pilot and this one came out great. I guess all Trek fans owe a great debt to the late Lucille Ball. I think I will add some I Love Lucy shirts to our site next in thanks.
You can tell this is a pilot as the women were still wearing slacks. I guess the mandatory short skirts and 70s black disco boots came down as notes from the studio executives. You don’t hear me complaining. I just Googled some Uhura pics and she makes that uniform look amazing. I admit I have a weakness for women in Star Trek uniforms from any series. When we set up our booth a Star Trek convention it is always extremely distracting.
Anyway, this episode is also the only time in TOS that we see the Phaser Rifle. Of course from TNG onward the rifle was so prevalent you’d think they were insulating the ship bulkhead with them but Roddenberry really didn’t want to make this show into a shoot em up. 
That being said I’ve always felt one great weakness of Star Trek is all the guns look like TV remote controls. Not like this Aliens beauty I pulled from the horror movie t shirt category.
the Infamous Dave Inman
Into the Woods Review Part 1
Don’t go in there.
I think I have a love/hate relationship with studio marketing departments. I love them in that they always seem to be way smarter than the actual movie director, writers, or producers. They can sniff out a stinker and pick out the few gems like a smuggler who moves diamonds inside his digestive tract in order to compose a trailer that puts asses in theater seats. They are really, really good at that.
But I hate them because they suck me in every time. I have seen a lot of really craptacular movies in my time but I honestly can’t think of a single really bad trailer. Sure you can pick out subtle clues that the film is the movie equivalent of getting your manhood slammed in a car door several times (most of those clues usually rhyme with Bichael May, Cicholas Nage, or Orberto Rorci) but most times trailers are the Judas goat leading you up the ramp.
The point is I have seen the trailer for this film dozens of times and never once got the impression that it was a freaking awful musical. A lot of you might think that I have a thing against musicals but the truth is there are several I like a great deal. 
Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog, the Rocky Horror Picture Show, the Little Mermaid, and Beauty and the Beast are all excellent examples of what a musical should be: a fun story with good dialog greatly enhanced by clever inspired original music destined to become iconic (I dare you to tell me you don’t know the words to the Time Warp. Image from the movie t shirt category).
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Into the Woods Review Part 2
What I object to is bad musicals like this one: tertiary stories with immemorable music in place of dialog sung by people who were hired for their star appeal rather than their singing ability. The music is non stop and takes up the space normally held by dialog (thus making every dialog another glass chewing grind fest). It is punctuated by a few moments of speaking and I was grasping on those like a man trapped under the ice trying to breath little air pockets. The songs are really just two songs as sung by either a man or woman. The female songs are all rising inflection ear bleeders and the male songs angsty suicide dirges. Also I thought it was established in Sweeney Todd that Johnny Depp can’t sing (Sorry dude. I do like you a lot but this film in not your rocket car).
Then there is the story. Honestly I have always thought a new take on a classic fairy tale cold be really cool and every time I see a new one coming down the Hollywood outflow pipe I get my hopes up. 
I keep hoping to see Snow White rewritten by Chuck Palahniuk and directed by James Cameran as an Alien sequel (image courtesy of the horror movie t-shirts). Instead I keep getting brain softening rehash of better Disney movies like this one. As I have said on other cruddy multi story films (cough cough New Years Eve cough cough) when you have more than one story thread you lose connection with the audience and the problem compounds itself as you add more. This film had Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, and maybe Thumbelina and honestly by switching back and forth between the stories you never connect with any of the characters enough to care. If I were someone who had never seen or read a fairy tale I would have been both completely lost and apathetic.
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