Part 2 of the last con report of 2018, from not-very-sunny Jacksonville, Florida. But hey, it was alot warmer than where I flew from, so I’m not complaining!
I wanted to end this year on a high note, remembering the good moments and reminding myself of all the reasons I love this show and this cast and this fandom. I hope the pretty pictures and the amusing memories will brighten the last day of 2018 for you too!
Part 1 left off with Saturday night, so that’s where we’ll pick up here. Then it’s Sunday, which means Jared and Jensen, along with panels from Ruth Connell and Richard Speight Jr.
Saturday Night is always special at a Supernatural con, because it’s the concert that caps off the day. I love the Saturday Night Special because I can just enjoy it in between taking pictures and don’t have to do any live tweeting – maybe that’s why it’s usually one of my favorite parts of any con.
Louden Swain kicked things off, then Mark Pellegrino introduced Matt Cohen, who can rockstar out with the best of them. Remember when he was hesitant to sing at the SNS? You’d never know it now!
It’s the end of 2018, so it seems fitting to share some pictures and memories from the last Supernatural con of 2018, which happened to be in Jacksonville. I wanted to end the year with everything that’s positive about fandom and a reminder to myself as much as anyone of how much I love and enjoy this incredible cast and all the fans I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and hanging out with over the past decade plus. So here’s Part I of Jacksonville 2018, with some pretty pictures to brighten your last day of the year!
The hotel was under construction, which meant the beautiful view of the water was obstructed when you were at ground level, but luckily the vendor room was elevated with floor to ceiling windows, so the view from my table was breathtaking (if you just look past the various cranes and things). And from our hotel room and its teeny tiny balcony? Even better.
My good friend Alana was also at Jaxcon, so we took advantage of both being in town early to go have some lunch. We managed to find a restaurant that was 100% empty, and since we were the only ones there, of course that meant blogging and putting Africa By Toto on the jukebox. And then more blogging. And corn nuggets. Don’t knock ‘em if you haven’t tried ‘em!
Lots of my favorite SPNFamily friends were also at Jax, so it was a fun four days with lots of catching up and goofing off and not getting enough sleep – but hey, that’s what cons are all about!
(You can find the Day 1 blog including our corn nugget adventures on Alana’s channel if you’re curious. About corn nuggets.)
I’m just going to include some highlights in this blog, since the panels were broadcast on Stage It and I’m assuming most of you have had the pleasure of watching them by now. This is Part I, with Misha Collins, Rachel Miner, Kim Rhodes, Briana Buckmaster, Ruth Connell, Adam Fergus, David Haydn-Jones, Emily Swallow, Rob Benedict, Richard Speight Jr, Matt Cohen, Mark Pellegrino and a special appearance by Hayden Lee too. Phew, that was a jam packed Friday and Saturday!
Rachel Miner had a great answer when someone asked how she manages to keep her great attitude and beautiful soul?
Sunday was, as always, J2 day. The Jared and Jensen morning panel started out with a sad story of how Jensen hurt his knee training for the Bad Idea marathon with Jason Manns. Good friend that he is, Jared took a picture.
Jared: I took a picture of Jensen from the waist down with ice on both his knees and sent it to our guy friends and they were like, why’d you send this?
Jensen: No, they were like, why didn’t you show more?
Jared got a spam call and made a face, which prompted Jensen to give a talk about how to deal with unwanted sales calls.
Which was just proof that these two can make any topic hilarious.
And nice to look at.
Then someone made the mistake of giving Jared an entire tray of cupcakes. Jared went from gloating and gleeful while Jensen made faces and looked worried…
To dropping the entire tray on the floor. There was red icing everywhere, including all over Jared’s face!
While handlers swooped in to try to clean up, Jensen made Jared crack up even more by muttering that “you look like you just fellated Ronald McDonald”.
This was the last Supernatural con in Minneapolis (at least for now) so it seemed like everyone in attendance was determined to make it the very best one. The cast and the band love the giant theater with its for-real stage, complete with floor to ceiling (like 100 feet up ceiling) thick velvet curtains. There are layers of them, so finding your way onstage from backstage is a bit of a challenge – but it also makes everything seem like real theater and adds a feeling of professionalism to everything that happens.
It was also a great place for taking pictures, even for a non-photographer like me, so this post will be broken into two. First up, Thursday through Saturday, including Misha Collins and the Saturday Night Special!
Minneapolis is a funny city, interconnected by indoor walkways that tie all the hotels to the convention center like a network of human hamster habitrails. I was outside the first day I was there and then never ventured out again as the weather took a turn for the cold and rainy.
Thursday, after setting up in the vendor room, I got to watch the new Supernatural episode with some fellow fangirls at the honors floor guest suite in one of the hotels. There was wine and cheese and crackers and even sandwiches custom made by the lovely gentleman in charge of the suite. I’m not sure what he made of the four women shrieking with screams and then doubling over with laughter, but he seemed to be amused enough to want to make us sandwiches, so that’s a win. And we were grateful!
Most of the “vendor squad” was there, so I spent a little time catching up with friends, and then met lots of new people who hadn’t yet read Family Don’t End With Blood or any of our other books. And some familiar people who I haven’t seen in a while too, one of the best part of cons.
Predictably, I stayed up way too late chatting, then grabbed a bagel and latte and headed back to the convention center for the start of the con on Friday. SPNMinn kicked off with our hosts Richard Speight Jr. and Rob Benedict.
And then with Rachel Miner, who is always a ray of sunshine every time she takes the stage.
Happy 100th Con Supernatural! Part Two of my NJ/NYC adventures (you can also read about EW’s sneak peek Season 14 premiere party and Jensen and Jared on Live with Kelly and Ryan in Part One here)
The Supernatural New Jersey con is the closest I get to a “home” con – a less than two hour drive from Philly. The key word there being “drive” – as in, no airfare! Woohoo!! I packed up my car with many boxes of books and headed out on Thursday up the NJ Turnpike to scenic Secaucus, happy not to have to deal with airport and parking and TSA. Apparently I got a bit too cocky though, because no sooner had I arrived at the vendor section of the gigantic Meadowlands convention center than I realized that I hadn’t brought my usual backpack for flights to cons – so I had only part of what I needed for my vendor table!
NOOOOO! Luckily the convention center is adjacent to a giant Walmart, so I trekked over and had my promo pics reprinted, then trekked back to finish setting up. (My friends and I returned to Walmart later that night to stock up on supplies for the con weekend, which included an alarming amount of Beefaroni and ramen noodles, bags of chips and possibly some Lunchables but hey, con weekend!) We love Embassy Suites with their mini kitchens in the room and free breakfast buffet every morning – between that and the Walmart, we were set. And it’s a good thing, since I was on my own in the vendor room – luckily fandom is always wonderful and generous, with fellow fans offering to grab me drinks and pretzels or time for a bathroom break.
This con was special because it was the 100th Creation Supernatural convention – also christened Schmelke Con for the one person who has been at all 100 and taken over 250,000 photo ops to prove it — the one and only Chris Schmelke! There’s no overestimating the difference Chris has made to these conventions – photo ops are a special thing and nobody knows how to make them more special than Chris. We interviewed Chris for one of our first books, Fangasm Supernatural Fangirls, and it was immediately obvious that he truly cares about fans’ experience – he gets it. And so he does everything necessary to make sure those few moments allow a genuine connection. Chris will be the first one to say that Supernatural conventions are unlike any other, and in part that’s because these actors also go out of their way to make the photo ops special.
There were all sorts of special decorations celebrating the 100th con and Creation even handed out bracelets to commemorate the occasion, so it was very cool to be there!
Nothing says happy 100th like this!
Richard introduced Friday’s first guest panelist, Rachel Miner, by giving her well deserved props for her work with Random Acts. She was asked about her initial reaction to her character Meg, and said that she got to read her audition scene with Jared and Jensen. Eric Kripke was there too, and they both ended up laughing; she knew right away that she loved the character.
