Wizard World Minneapolis’s big day was Saturday, May 7th, at the
Minneapolis Convention Center.
We’ve previously mentioned there was a lot going on that first week in May in
Comic May-hem. So with
Captain America: Civil War on Friday,
Free Comic Book Day on Saturday,
Mother’s Day on Sunday, and
AniMinneapolis all weekend, Wizard World Minneapolis just didn’t quite land on the best weekend.
Here is the recap on Saturday’s show:
Kirk vs Raiden
|
Street Fighter V: Double Elimination Tournament: Player “krock” won the cash prize, a fight stick, and the title of
Wizard World Gaming, Minneapolis SFV champion. The gaming area, as previously mentioned, was a lot larger this year... and fans spent a lot of time demoing and playing games at the console stations.
Victor Dandridge
|
Corel Painter 2016 with Guest Artist Victor Dandridge: The ‘studio stage’ was in the middle of the exhibition hall. Dandridge gave us some valuable tips on Corel Painter 2016. The software simple, but complex, to use and Dandridge created art from scratch. Dandridge’s comic company
Vantage:Inhouse Productions launched in 2011 and publishes
The Samaritan,
Origins Unknown,
The Trouble w/Love and
8 Mins.
Barry Bostwick
|
Adventures in Middle Earth with Billy Boyd:
Billy Boyd, who played the hobbit Pippin’ Took, in
Lord of the Rings trilogy was a lot of fun. He came on stage with bottles of water and told fans to remember to “stay hydrated.”
Immediately, the first question
Mo Lightning asked Boyd was why they misspelled ‘Beefcake’, referring to Boyd’s band
Beecake. Boyd quickly corrected the moderator by saying that it was intentionally called Beecake. Apparently LotR’s co-star Dominic Monaghan sent Boyd a picture of a cake covered in bees.
Boyd had a lot of fun stories about being on the set of LotR, but clearly his passion is in music. When a fan asked him to sing ‘Denethor’, Boyd was more than happy to sing for us.
Kristen Bauer
|
Blood on the Bayou with Kristen Bauer: Although HBO’s
True Blood series ended, fans still fondly remember
Kristen Bauer and her role as vampire Pam. Most of the questions and stories involves
True Blood, but occasionally Bauer would also mention her role in
Once Upon a Time. Cosplayer/model
Brit Bliss moderated the panel.
Beyond the SHIELD
|
Beyond the SHIELD: a Conversation About Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD and Greater Cinematic Universe:
Adam Wells and
Robert Young discussed Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD. Like
last year, the two are big fans of the show and I believe the full recording may be available on
beyondtheshieldpodcast.com (I couldn’t find it at the website as of this writing).
Trevor Mueller, Zak Sally, and Victor Dandridge
|
Inside the World of Independent Comics with Billy Dogma’s Dean Haspiel, Sammy the Mouse’s Zak Sally, and Origins Unknown’s Victor Dandridge: As you can see from the photograph, in fact,
Trevor Mueller stepped in and replaced Dean Haspiel. All the writers/artists on the panel had a lot say about the freedom and owning their characters vs working for a big corporate company, such as Marvel or DC. Although
Zak Sally is best known for being in bands like
Low and
Enemymine, he’s also an important figure in underground comics, as he demonstrated as moderator to
Daniel Clowes’ recent Minneapolis appearance.
Jewel Staite
|
Everything’s Shiny, Cap’n: Jewel Staite: Everybody’s loveable mechanic, Kaylee Frye (
Jewel Staite) talked a lot of
Firefly and various shows and films. Among some of her biggest complaints about playing different characters is that she often has to become an expert in something only weeks before shooting. For example, she once played a doctor and they had flown in an expert to teach her how to play a surgeon. Or horseback riding, and various other jobs and skills that she ‘lacked’.
When asked what her biggest fear was, her go-to answer was “I’ll never work again.” Her biggest love is her family, especially her children.
J. Jonah Jameson
|
Spider-Man: Menace or Super-Menace? Hosted by J. Jonah Jameson:
The turnout to this panel was surprisingly quite popular! Spider-Man’s hater J. Jonah Jameson (played by Karl Brevik, member of SAG/AFTRA and San Diego Comic Con International Professional) basically screamed and yelled about how Spider-Man was a menace to society.
Fans tried to defend Spider-Man by saying how he’s saving the city, but, of course, Jameson turned it all around by saying Spider-Man attracted these villains, etc.
Karl Brevik isa . This panel has been hosted in several states as a performance based panel of entertainment. Fans of Spider-Man get all the laughs and joy of seeing J. Jonah Jameson talk his way out of almost everything thrown his way. Full of audience participation, it's a mix of a stand-up act, a roast, a Q&A and a good old fashioned sharing of Spider-Man knowledge.
Michael Golden
|
Storytelling with Michael Golden: One of the best artist around,
Michael Golden talked about how to tell story through artwork. Golden’s expressive artwork can be seen on
The ‘Nam,
Batman,
X-Men,
Micronauts and
G.I.Joe.
Unfortunately, it was hard to hear as you can hear J. Jonah Jameson’s loud voice over at the ‘Spider-Man: Menace or Super-Menace?’ panel (next door).
Non-Compliant Geek’s Guide to Self Care
|
The Non-Compliant Geek’s Guide to Self Care: This all-women was all about loving yourself, not some idealized, media-fueled of the perfect body type. Some of the panelists are also moderate the
Yoga Quest: Narrate Yogic Adventures, so they know a thing or two about keeping yourself healthy and flexible.
Jason David Frank
|
One-On-One with Power Ranger: Jason David Frank:
As usual, the ever-animated
Jason David Frank (the Green Ranger) engaged with his fans. Frank was also live-streaming his Q&A and seemed excited about his reality television show
My Morphin Life. Among some of the questions asked was about the upcoming 2017
Power Rangers, which Frank said he has nothing to do with the film.
Trevor Mueller
|
Making Webcomics: Harvey Award nominated creator
Trevor Mueller described his own over eleven-year experience with web comics, his process and general tips and tools, transitioning to print and benefits and drawbacks to both versions.
Jeremy Shada
|
What Time Is It? With Jeremy Shada:
The voice of Finn from Cartoon Network’s insanely popular
Adventure Time revealed stories from the studio, being in a band called Make Out Monday, and doing work outside of
Adventure Time, including the voice of Lance in the upcoming
Voltron: Legendary Defender, debuting on Nexflix in June.
Security Gaps In Hogwarts
|
Security Gaps In Hogwarts: Surprisingly
Harry Potters is still a big deal, as this popular panel (featuring Karl Brevik as Albus Dumbledore) touched on the imaginary security gaps in the imaginary Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The school is just not safe from troll in the girl’s bathrooms, giant three-headed dogs, corrupted professors, etc.
They also offered some suggestions in keeping Hogwarts safe.
Danny Fingeroth
|
The Marvel Legacy: The 77-Year History Of The House Of Ideas, From The Beginning To Deadpool To Captain America: Civil War With Spider-Man’s Danny Fingeroth: This panel was similar to last year’s Fingeroth panel about Marvel. Fingeroth studied the early years, from Timely Publications to Atlas Comics, to eventually Marvel Comics. Although it is mostly about Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, these two guys built the foundation of everything Marvel today.
Intro to Cosplay
|
Intro to Cosplay with Wizard World Cosplay Guest Hannah Eva: Over next door was cosplayer
Hannah Eva and
SuperKayce. The two bounded over their various DIY costume ideas and gave fans suggestions on where to start if they are thinking of creating that perfect costume.
Paige
|
Inside The Ring With WWE Superstar Paige:
The English WWE and NXT wrestler had some of the longest lines of the weekend and her panel/Q+A had a good turnout, with fans asking questions of various subjects.
She referenced her UK TV documentary The Wrestlers: Fighting with my Family, which chronicled her rise to fame, her desire to team up with fellow wrestler Sasha Banks, and finding musical inspiration with 80’s hard rock, modern metal, occasional Adele, and some country music as well.
David Ramsey
|
Protecting Star City and Oliver Queen with David Ramsey:
Arrow’s John Diggle provided perhaps the most enjoyable Q+A of the weekend, revealing how much of a “co-star” fight scenes are to the series, the logistics in scheduling a TV crossover, how
The Flash set has canned soda pop (something craft service on Arrow does not have) including Mountain Dew, and his relationship with the other actors, including Eugene Byrd, who plays his brother.
Ramsey also revealed he was originally written as John Stewart (Green Lantern - but DC Comics wouldn’t approve it, and also mentioned a new helmet (designed by Cisco from
The Flash) is coming (and is “less Magneto-looking”) and that he would like to assume the role of Moonknight or The Guardian, if he could pick another hero.
Storytime is Over: David Giuntoli, Bitsie Tulloch, and Sasha Roiz: Undeniably the biggest draw of the Wizard World Comic Convention was the cast of
Grimm.
Some of the questions asked were if there were some hijinks behind the stage, and Bitsie volunteered that she swapped out David’s car keys so he couldn’t figure out why his car wouldn’t start, etc. The vibe I got was that the Grimm cast had a lot of great chemistry, and it shows.
Another question was about make-up prosthetics, but Sasha quickly answered that all the special effects are digitally done and very little theater make-up is needed.
According to the cast, the season 5 finale is perhaps the best show they’ve ever done. They suggested that some characters won’t be returning and even hinted that the show has ended (which is untrue, since NBC just renewed the show for a sixth season).
)
Recent Comments