This past weekend marked the tenth anniversary of C2E2,
which bills itself as “the funnest weekend of the year.” That claim is never
too far off, as the yearly sign of Spring’s arrival is met in our household
with great anticipation and excitement. We only attended Friday this year,
because Star Wars Celebration will grace our fair city in the next three weeks,
and in the interest of finances for that far rarer and far more personally important
convention, we made the unhappy but totally correct decision to limit our C2E2
temptations to a single day.
Being that we were only going for one day, we didn’t try to
plan anything out in terms of getting things signed or anything, but instead
just went to walk around and have a good time. We did. My wife and I both
picked up some things from the Artist Alley, most notably a signed print of the
cover art from Cannibal Corpses’ Butchered
At Birth album, directly from artist Vince Locke himself. Oh, that was
cool. Having spent the last 20-something years staring at the covers of Corpse
albums, meeting the man and buying a limited print was a super great
experience. I didn’t even know he was going to be there. We didn’t do much in
the way of preparation before the show, knowing only a few of the larger names
in attendance and then being surprised when, for instance, we stumbled across a
table for Chris Claremont. We never saw him, but knowing we were in the same
location with the person who is responsible for essentially everything we know
about the X-Men is a pretty amazing feeling. The last few conventions we have
been able to meet artists and get some things signed, but that usually is a
time consuming thing, and with our not having a lot of time this time, we
quietly decided to skip the signature hunting.
Our buying was also pretty restrained, again a byproduct of
Celebration being mere weeks away, but we always do buy something. The big
ticket purchases this time around were a pair of custom lightsabers from
Ultrasabers. They were my wife’s idea: we’re going in costume for Celebration, and
she wanted to make sure our outfits were complete with lightsabers, and while I
may have been content with buying some off the shelf versions from Target or
something, my wife wanted quality. The sabers are really excellent, with actual
metal handles and durable light-up blades. My wife got a purple one, and it
should not be a surprise to learn that I bought a red one. We may eventually
feature these lightsabers on the Coffin, I don’t really know just yet, but they
are gorgeous. And a lot more affordable than I would ever have thought. We bought
relatively basic models for about $70 each, which is a lot less than I had
always thought such an accessory would end up costing.
We picked up a few other figures, but nothing real major. We
saw some cool things, but nothing really major. I think that because we were
trying to resist temptations, we didn’t look at booths and sellers as closely
as we normally do, treating things instead as display pieces instead of samples
of things we could buy. I was on the lookout for some older Black Series figures, as I’ve started
thinking that Celebration may see inflated prices because they are things being
sold at Celebration, so I thought I could maybe find a few things for cheaper
at C2E2. But I was wrong, not about the prices, but about the availability,
which has been a thing of concern to me both prior to and now after my shopping
excursion. Maybe I need to just put all of my hopes into the Archive line at this point.
I may be short on words for this years’ installment, but
C2E2 once again proved to be an outstandingly fun time, and a really, really
needed break from work and stress, granting a few hours of just plain fun. While
we never really do spend enough time there, and always feel a little sad
putting it behind us, it’s always something that we anticipate with great
enthusiasm, and one day of attendance is so much vastly better than none. The 2020
installment was just announced to be even earlier than this years, taking place
at the end of February, which means the wait time is already shorter than last
year. So now, we set our sights on Celebration. . . .
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