Grave Considerations: Star Wars Celebration 2019

 Last week, my wife and I had the incredible experience and massive pleasure of attending the official Star Wars convention, Celebration, held in sweet home Chicago. The five day festival honors and . . . celebrates . . . all things Star Wars.

What a great time.

The last couple of years have been real rough to be part of a fandom, almost regardless of which fandom it is. Star Wars has had its share of bitching, as has Marvel; sports seem like they’ve been horribly toxic for many years already; the gaming world has always been full of jagoffs. Things really have felt bleak at times; but not Celebration. Star Wars Celebration was a joyful event that focused on all things positive and Star Wars, even though that is redundant. The atmosphere was amazing and universally positive and welcoming, proving that Star Wars really is for everyone. I personally have felt real nerves before both Celebration and last months’ C2E2 specifically because I’m not interested in the full diapered tantrums of haters and the ignorant, and am just hopeful that those people won’t attend conventions devoted to things that they clearly hate, but who can tell, really. The world is full of all kinds of people, even those who would attend an event just to be negative about it. For some reason.

Grave Considerations: C2E2 2019

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.

Grave Considerations: TFCon Chicago 2018

This past weekend was TFCon Chicago 2018, the American version of the wildly popular Canadian Transformers fan convention. Havingattended a few years ago, my wife and I went this year as well, and had a great couple of hours. Our first excursion to the convention was one made out of curiosity and marked my initial participation in the Third Party scene; this year, we both returned as grizzled veterans with vaster knowledge and more critical eyes. Let’s take a look back at the afternoon that was, shall we?

Grave Considerations: TFCon Toronto 2018 and SDCC 2018 Reveals

Hi everyone. I know that this month has been a less than active one around the Coffin, and I don’t really know the reason why. I have been busy with summer classes, and Life has been busy with conventions and new toy reveals and movies and stuff, I just have not been able to find the time or motivation to do much blog-related work. Sure, I have posted a pair of articles this month, and have begun three or four more, but for some unknown reason I’m having a real hard time mustering up the energy to dedicate myself to Coffin business. So I figured I’d take a little time and talk about some toy reveals we’ve gotten this past week, between TFCon Toronto and San Diego Comic Con.

Grave Considerations: C2E2 2018

Two weeks ago the 2018 edition of the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo, or C2E2, too place, and we made our annual pilgrimage to MacCormick Place, a building we drive past everyday on the way to work. This year my wife and I were approved for Professional passes, so we got two days of entry for basically the price of one. At least we went for two days: we had three day passes, but we have yet to go for all three. Something comes up for Saturday night/Sunday, or we’re just too worn out from Friday and Saturday to go on Sunday.

Star Wars: The Black Series HASCON Exclusive Captain Rex

  

The retail version of this figure is set to release soon, as etailers have begun soliciting preorders, and enough time has passed since the institution of the The Last Jedi Star Wars gag order, so let’s have a look at the HASCON exclusive Captain Rex.

Iron Factory: Tyrant’s Wings Clone

Here’s something that’s a little different. There has been a vein of the third party mine that has focused on making small, Legends scale figures as opposed to the larger variety. As an idea, this has been one that has been well received, and one that at times has piqued Coffin interests as well. One such company is Iron Factory, and when their TFCon USA 2017 exclusive Sunstorm repaint of their Starscream was announced, it seemed like as good a time as any to jump in to this area of third party merchandise.

So, Iron Factory’s Legend scaled Starscream is called Tyrant, and the other Seekers fall under the group moniker of Tyrant’s Wings. Sunstorm, as established by the Dreamwave G1 continuity, was a religious zealot who identified Starscream as his brother, so it kinda makes some sense that here, in the unofficial realm, that would translate to Clone.

Kinda.

Grave Considerations: TFCon Chicago 2016

On Saturday, October 26^th, my wife and I went to TFCon Chicago. Over the years, I’ve never gone to a Botcon, despite a few of them having been in the Chicago area, and I missed TFCon in 2014 when it was in Chicago as well. We’ve been going to C2E2 for the last few years, so the two of us are no newcomers to the convention scene, but this was our first trek to a property exclusive convention.