So it’s like 36 days until this year’s Comic-Con International in San Diego…time for my way-overused joke about how if you’re going and you’ll need a parking space, leave now. To answer the two most-asked questions I’m getting right now about this stellar annual event: No, my best friend Sergio Aragonés will not be at the con and no, I can’t help you find a hotel room.
Well, let me elaborate: Sergio is in good health. He’s just choosing to not attend. As for hotel rooms, I’m not an expert on this stuff as it’s been a long time — thirty years at least — since I’ve booked my own room for one of these. I will suggest that if you can’t find lodging close to the San Diego Convention Center (or can’t afford what you can find), you may need to widen your search area and then figure out how to get to the con each day. A friend of mine reported that it was cheaper for to him to book far, far away and figure on paying for Lyft each day than to pay for the only room he could locate within walking distance of the festivities.
My schedule currently has me moderating or appearing on seventeen panels…and yes, I know that’s crazy. Fine. It’s crazy. I sometimes do crazy things. It comes from reading too many comic books. Stop trying to bring me to my senses. I abandoned them a long time ago and haven’t missed them a whole lot since then.
The convention prefers I not post my schedule until they post the whole schedule…which they’ll do two weeks before each day of the con. That is to say the schedule for Thursday of the convention will be online two weeks before Thursday of the convention, the schedule for Friday of the convention will be online two weeks before Friday of the convention and so on. If you are attending, I urge you to study it carefully and jot down what you want to attend…and what you’ll attend if you can’t get into your first choices.
I also suggest you just forget about attending anything in Hall H. Just get that kind of nonsense out of your head right this minute. If you’re even thinking of trying that, read this about what that involves. And yes, I know that a guy who’s doing seventeen panels has no friggin’ business telling anyone they’re doing something foolish.
It’s probably safe though to tell you that I’ll be doing all of my usual panels — in the same time slots they’re always in and in the same rooms they were in last year. This includes two Cartoon Voices panel and the famous/infamous Quick Draw! game.
Are you perhaps interested in some stats? This will be the fifty-fourth of these conventions I’ve attended. If you’d like the whole list, let me refer you to this list I compiled last year.
Counting both Comic-Con Internationals and WonderCons, this year will be our 29th Quick Draw! game. I recently made up this list of all of them and who was on each one.
And counting Comic-Con Internationals, WonderCons and the ones I did online during the worst of COVID, the two Cartoon Voices panels we do this year will be #61 and #62 for me. I also recently made up this list of all of them and who was on each one. (I am still doing research and making changes on this list. If you have anything to offer, please let me know…but I think it’s pretty complete and accurate now.)
Lastly, someone’s going to ask this if I don’t address it now. In 2018, I hosted sixteen panels and appeared on one other. That’s my record to date. This year, I’m hosting thirteen panels and appearing on four others. So you can decide for yourself if that’s tying my old record or not. Either way, it’s crazy. Like I said, I sometimes do crazy things. Later today, I may even read some news and try to understand what’s happening in this country.
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