Southcoast Toy and Comic Show

I am working with doctors to try and diagnose something. So for the time being, beer reviews are suspended as alcohol would really screw with things. Instead, I will discuss the Southcoast Toy and Comic Show in Fairhaven, MA.
The apparent idea behind behind this event was to gather vendors and artists from the Southcoast region of Massachusetts in one centralized area and let collectors throw money at them. Organizers added a few semi-celebrities with 8x10s and photo-ops. They also set something up with a local shadowcast to perform some of their special convention pieces. Perhaps that is why it cost eight freaking dollars per person to enter what was essentially a specialized flea market. The advantage to paying twice what I thought was fair to get in was I felt pretty okay about nickel and diming dealers. Downside was even though I had a Darth Vader costume hoodie in the car, I couldn't justify splurging on a photo-op with Guy Who Was Force Choked In Star Wars or Oh Yeah She WAS In Back to the Future or Raven. Of course, given the fact last time I met a pro-wrestler I made him so uncomfortable it's amazing I didn't get a prototype of the Tensai bomb, maybe I should thank the promoters.
Outside of some truly exceptional artwork and adorable handsewn stuffed animals, the selection of goods were fairly typical. Several comic book shops brought out a plethora of fully stuffed boxes and a wall's worth of sexy golden or silver age goodies. Someone got a low grade laser printer and grabbed some mediocre resolution copyrighted images off the Internet then stuffed them in rigid plastic sleeves alongside decent quality goods and exploited bad lighting a bit. Another dealer let us have four incomplete Muppet stuffed animals for the asking price of one then stuffed them into a bag from the local secondhand shop where the lot would've gone us 1/3 the cost at most. Then there was the guy seemingly singlehandedly responsible for my missing all recent limited Masters of the Universe collectibles selling at a pretty formidable mark-up. Most dealers I talked to were decent people who noted my broad range of geekery and forgo the ridiculous salespitch regarding insanely inflated worth.
The one real surprise was the Dr. Horrible shadowcast performance by the RKO Army. For some time, I've been telling people to drive the extra half hour and take in their performances as they take themselves just seriously enough to put on an enjoyable, well done show sans pomposity every time. This go round, however, the synch on almost everything was so far off it was distracting. I think that spacial concerns created by performing in a tiny lounge vs a large theater
account for early entrances. However, gestures 30+ seconds prior to corresponding cues just look bad. Maybe their busy Rocky and Repo schedules meant the Army didn't have time to prepare properly. Perhaps performing to a room seemingly consisting of two casual audience members and friends, family, cast, and crew didn't encourage a Grade-A effort. However, the fact is I felt a little bit better about not adding one of their Repo! performances to the agenda for the wife's birthday spectacular. It was still fun but if I'd driven 90 minutes put of my way expressly for that, I might have issued several crotch punches. Oh and whomever decided on that "hur hur NPH is totally gay" theme to some of the call outs they sound like frat boy bullshit and add nothing to the show.

Event:90/100 for exceeding cheese expectations
Shadowcast:60/100

- Posted using The Hammer