Starfest Redeux!
posted on Sun, 04/19/2009 - 16:00 by
theshadow
Alright because it was late, I was already kinda tipsy from my drinks and I was typing it up on my iPhone I left out quite a lot of details from my last Starfest post. So I figured I would fill in the gaps from the first day and fill in Day.
Day 1 - Friday
So aside from everything already in my post I fill in that the dealers room wasn't a complete loss. Its not like it was utter crap or anything, there were a couple of things I did consider purchasing but when I did the cost to value math I realized that it just wasn't worth it. What did I spend my beloved pocket money on you ask? Well I was really excited about this year because there was quite the guest line up. The top of my must-see list being Brent Spiner (Wikipedia | IMDB). I was lucky enough that the line was short for his autograph so I got his.
I spent a lot of time hanging around NDK/Starfest Staff because there wasn't really anything I wanted to see or do on this day. After I posted my last blog I was probably up for another two hours or so before attempting to go to sleep. Which... was difficult. Taking in all the sugar I had, the strange bed, cold weather (it was horrible! seriously from the 10th floor we couldn't even see the parking lot!), and people running around screaming in the parking lot at 2am (I was crashing in a friends room on the 2nd floor) I didn't get much sleep. But oh well.
Day 2 - Saturday
So after a rather rocky sleepless night I got up with my friend about 8:20ish and headed down to the con space. I lugged my bags to my car and set off to find something to do. I checked in with my friends in the anime room and then went to the hotel restaurant for some breakfast. After getting some food in me I felt better and then headed off to wander around. Seriously not having anything I really wanted to do till about 1pm I just chatted with friends and took up space. Normally I would have made way to the board game room and killed some time socializing over that. But unfortunately for what ever reason they only had boardgames available on Saturday at 9pm-12am. (LAME).
Finally, after almost completely running out of time killers I made way to Main Events to catch the latter half of Trailer Park Theatre which is basically a run down of upcoming movies. This was followed by a trailer/30 min Q&A spot for a movie called Orphan which looks OK if you're a horror/thriller kind of person.
This was followed by the Q&A session with Katee Sackhoff (Wikipedia | IMDB) . I can tell you now that I enjoyed her acting in BSG and enjoyed her Q&A even more. She is a truly hilarious and down to earth person. She really didn't try to hide anything and was incredibly silly. I look forward to catching up on some of her work some time in the future.
After Katee's Q&A we had two different movie Pre-view/Q&A sessions with two movies that I thought looked really cool. The first was Battle for Terra which was a low budget 3D animation film that looks like it has incredible potential I really do recommend that you check out the trailer. Next was a movie that was 9 the movie which is based on the incredible and very awesome short 9 it has been extended and redone into an entire movie with the help of Tim Burton. I remember watching the original trailer but it had completely fallen off my radar but seeing this presentation really rekindled my interest. I really think that this movie is going to do well.
By this point you can tell that I was pretty much parked in Main Events for a while. Which is true. But to be honest Main Events is why you go to Starfest. Truth be told you don't get much for the money you pay and so its best that you milk it for all its worth. By the end of the 9 presentation it was about 5:30pm which started Brent Spiner's Q&A. For a while now people had been telling me what a funny man he was in real life and even pointed me to his twitter account which I must say is quite a riot. But seeing him during this session was truly something else. He dealt with his adoring fan base (and more obsessive ones) with great poise and respect. I'm really glad I got to see him.
So after all this sitting came the final event I attended at Starfest. By this point the lack of overall sleep and energy was catching up to me. I had started to develop quite a headache. "House Call" is a two man one act play done by Robert Picardo (Wikipedia | IMDB) and Ethan Phillips ( Wikipedia | IMDB). It was based in the Star Trek universe with the characters they themselves played. It was quite entertaining with several moments of hilarity. Though it was sad this this was a ticketed event which meant it costed additional I can safely say that it was worth it.
When the play ended I felt it was time to head home. I didn't really have anything on Sunday that I wanted to do and I wasn't feeling to well and really wanted to get a good nights sleep. So I hopped in my car and headed home. Overall I had fun but I'd admit I'm a bit weary of coming back next year. Standing around chatting with friends is cool and all but it really was bad that I spent more time doing that then enjoying events offered by the convention which really makes the cost of the the weekend look bad. I may spread a hint of whisper that returning the game room would be a good idea I wasn't the only one that felt that w/out that diversion between events that we'd actually like to attend that attending felt a bit like a waste.
Finally I do have some pictures from the convention but I have to sift through them some of them are personal and others are kind of blurry so I figure that I'd create a completely different post about them.
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