When academics go to Hollywood!
As the last stop in the 2013 convention tour, the Creation Supernatural convention in Burbank last weekend was invested with a lot of emotion, for both fans and cast. It’s been a wild ride, and there’s something bittersweet about the year ending. That gave Burcon an extra emotional punch, and more than a few moments that had us tearing up a bit. Here are some of the highlights of the con for us, including some meet and greet tidbits and pre-con chats.
Our weekend at the Chicago Con brought a surreal feeling of coming full circle – in a wonderful way. Chicon was our very first Creation Supernatural con, way back in 2007 (SPN wasn’t even popular enough to warrant its own convention then, so we shared it with a few Buffy and Angel alums). We did the first interviews for our book here, and met one of our favorite people, Richard Speight, here. Back then, we didn’t know if our little book on Supernatural and its amazing fans would ever come to fruition, and we had no idea the circuitous route it would take to finally get published. It seems fitting that Fangasm: Supernatural Fangirls was published this month, and here we are back in Chicago once again. It seems even more fitting that Richard is here too, along with two of the photographers who contributed their beautiful photos to the book, Chris Schmelke and Lizz Sisson, and of course quite a few of the actors whose interviews are some of the best parts of Fangasm – Jared, Jensen, Misha, Matt, Richard and Samantha. What we could never have anticipated is that everyone connected with our favorite Show would be so supportive, let alone that they’d all actually read it!
The Supernatural convention in beautiful Toronto wrapped up yesterday — due to flight cancellations and all-around craziness, we didn’t arrive until mid-day Saturday, but damn, the con packed alot into the next 18 hours! (Though we’re still sobbing about missing what was by all accounts an epic karaoke. There’s nothing like watching the guy who so convincingly plays Death bounce around the stage like an exuberant teenager. Not to mention Matt Cohen in his cheerleading skirt, which no longer seems to want to cover his toned abs. Not that we’ve heard any complaints. Or lodged any.)
Our friend Deborah was lucky enough to attend Jared’s meet and greet at DallasCon, and shared a few of her recollections. We’ll be at Jared’s meet and greet at Toronto Con in a few weeks ourselves, and this just made us look forward to it even more.
We chatted with Jared a bit at Dallas too, and were touched that he wanted to introduce us to his mom, since we’re both in education. We could totally see Jared being an English professor if he hadn’t become an actor. Of course, it might be hard to pay attention if your prof looked like Jared….
The Supernatural convention in Dallas is always special – for one thing, this year it included a pig named Icarus who stole everyone’s hearts, including Jared, Jensen and Misha. Also, it’s in the state the boys call home, and that means Jared and Jensen are more laid back than usual. Just as the guest actors and crew have said many times, it’s the guys at the top who set the tone for the rest of the set, and it’s the same with a convention. If Jared and Jensen are relaxed and having fun being with family – both their actual families and their SPNFamily — it seems to make everyone else at the con relaxed too. And they were definitely having fun – look at those smiles!
One of our good friends was lucky enough to attend Jared’s meet & greet at VanCon, and shared with us a few of her recollections. Of course, she was the first to say that she didn’t remember much, because she was basically having too much fun. Which is entirely unsurprising considering she was in a room with Jared Padalecki!
Jensen Ackles’ Meet and Greet in Vancouver stuck with what was a theme of the day with questions about both the actor’s newbie fatherhood and the Show that brought us all to the con in the first place. He joked about being sleep deprived and getting some rest this weekend (unlike most of the fans in the room, who by Sunday afternoon are always uniformly sleep deprived . . . but uniformly in a pretty damn good mood too.)
We’ve been having fun here in beautiful Vancouver for a few days, but today VanCon officially kicked off with the Location Tour hosted by SPN’s locations manager, Russ Hamilton, and his lovely assistant Andrea. We thought we’d share a few photos from our day on the ‘RussBus’.
Four years ago, New Jersey was a small con. It was also Misha’s first con and the birthplace of SPN Karaoke (no assigned seats – hell no seats at all!!). The little con has come a long way! Though we think that poster of Jared hanging above Matt Cohen’s head has been to every single con since the first one. Not that we’re complaining about that…
We’ve had a blast at NJCon, and hope some of you enjoyed our mad tweeting! Above is an example of how much fun Jared and Jensen were onstage today – this is Jared pantomiming the snake in Yellow Fever while Jensen looks perplexed. He should be used to this by now!
We’ve got a lot to share here, with some picture posts coming up of all three days of the con. But for now, a few tidbits from the Jared and Jensen meet and greets. Tidbits only, since we didn’t take notes. But the boys are rather memorable.