Dear Watchers: an omniversal comic book podcast

Rob: Welcome to Dear Watchers, a comic book omnivore podcast.
Guido: Uh, we're here with our New York Comic Con halftime report.
Rob: That's the only time I think we'll ever say the word half time.
Guido: That's funny you say that because I was going to say that's also the only sports analogy. And by the way, that audience is fake. So I just stopped it. We are not live at the con. You would not be able to hear us. But that's the only sports analogy that we'll be using today. But we're really excited to share about New York Comic Con with everyone in case you are not able to be there. So welcome to our halftime report. And New York Comic Con is so special to me. Even though I still aspire to go to San Diego ComicCon one day, it's really special because I have been every single year since they started it.
Rob: When was that? How many years?
Guido: I want to say 15 years.
Rob: Okay.
Guido: It was so small and it's grown so much every year. The other really cool thing about it is every year is a very different experience. And some of what we're sharing today and in our next update on the con will reveal why it was so unique to us this year. But every year is a really different experience. And we've been to the special edition spinoff that New York ComicCon did just on comics. I mean, I've rip if they should bring it back. Yeah, but anyway, that's why this con is really special and why we want to share with people who can't be here but want to see what it's like. We've been sharing online our photos and some videos and we're going to keep doing that. But we thought, hey, let's get together and talk a little bit about what our experience has been.
Rob: And I always think too, it's a good start of Spooky season because for me, it always is such a good kick off. I love that it's in early October because I connected so much with Halloween because people are dressing up and there's horror stuff there.
Guido: Yeah, uh, that's true.
Rob: It really makes me feel like, oh, it's Halloween time. It's fall time.
Guido: It's true. So if you want to feel what it feels like to be there a little bit through walking a mile in our shoes, then keep listening.
Rob: Yes. Which is probably a third of what we've walked in these last two days. I closed several rings on, uh, my.
Guido: Apple Watch and we have two days left. I mean, this is really it's wild to think we are only halfway through, but let's get to it. So number one, we have bought a lot of stuff and we won't bore you with everything we've bought. We like to consume a lot of things.
Rob: Right now is sitting on a bed of comics. I would say a blanket of comics it is.
Guido: So we've been posting pictures on our Twitter and some of what we've been posting to we've been posting to our coffee for our coffee patrons.
Rob: Yes. So while we're on that subject, we have two tiers to support us at $3 a month spectators and a six dollar a month watchers. And both tiers have monthly giveaways. So we have some great autographs for watcher giveaways coming up at the end of this month.
Guido: That's some of what we got this weekend. So it's been fun. Now that we have these Patron exclusives and we knew that we were doing this, and thank you to the people who've already joined who are entered in the giveaway. We knew we had to get some stuff with that in mind. So we have some really cool stuff coming.
Rob: Yeah. And I thought, speaking of picking up stuff, I saw you doing something guitar that I thought I'd never see you do, which was flipping through Slabbed comics.
Guido: It's true. It's true. I know Jake and Jesus would be very proud of the influence that I think they've probably had over me from Spectacles, but I did get my second ever Slabbed comic. And I guess I'll just reveal what it is because it's a weird one. And I got it because it's a weird one and I'm not a big Slab collector, but it is a 1995 New York comic book convention program guide signed on the COVID by easily two dozen artists and creators that were there. I can't even make out the autographs, but the autograph I saw at the top that I knew I had to have was Alan Morris. So I've got this 90 graded comic book program signed by all these people, and I can't wait to go through and decode all these autographs. So it's fun because my first Lab comic was also a New York Comic Con related grab. It was a David Lloyd's sketch cover benefiting the Hero initiative. So I like that. Uh, the slabs I own are weird, personalized, unique things that don't exist anywhere else.
Rob: And I've seen more and more just long boxes of Slab color than ever before. I mean, this is by far the most I've ever seen. It used to be up on the wall, and now they're there for you to just go through.
Guido: And it's helped. I mean, obviously, CTC knows what they're doing because then the top, of course, has the name, number, and grade, so it's very easy. You don't even really have to flip through. You can actually just scan the top of the boxes. So it has been fun to wade a little bit into those waters, and we just got a lot of other unique, neat stuff. You supported some of the movie things you like.
Rob: Yes. I'm a big fan of the film, Mandy. So Legion M, who was the, I guess, kind of crowdsourcing production company that helped make that movie, they've, uh, been there the last few years, and they have always some great mandy stuff. The new thing was this book called Mandy the Ultimate Poster Collection. And it's a collection of official posters and fan posters for the movie star, uh, Nicholas Cage. So I'm really excited to kind of flip.
Guido: There's also a little Nicholas Cage doll I'd rather not on the table.
Rob: Nicolas Cage doll holding an axe and a, uh, Nicholas Cage pin. Lots of Nicholas Cage, mandy memorabilia.
Guido: Too much, I'm going to say. But that does relate to some horror stuff we've been up to.
Rob: Yes. I said I like that. ComicCon kind of is a kick off of Halloween season. So we went to a few multimedia things. The biggest, really, I think being this panel for the show, chucky, uh, and Scifi.
Guido: Yes.
Rob: And you and I are not big panel people, but we're big fans of.
Guido: Not the multimedia panel. I like the smaller comic book panels, which we're going to share about one in a moment. But this was really fun.
Rob: Yeah.
Guido: Because what's cool about Chucky, we both love it. And you can talk about why you love it. But what was really neat about the panel and actually one of the audience questions brought this up, was that this is a almost 40 year story being told. And especially for us as we spend time on this podcast, deconstructing world, building stories and narratives. This is primarily one person who, with a team around him, has created child's play and Chucky and this whole universe. And the series now on TV keeps breaking it open wider and wider and wider and telling these amazing stories. But they're all one narrative. It's wild. And I love that.
Rob: Yeah. Don Mancini has written every film from the first child's play movie in 88, uh, through the modern TV show. He directed the later movies, and we're.
Guido: Not talking the reboot that doesn't count. Separate and not even owned by the same people. So ignore that.
Rob: And Domintini is, uh, a queer creator. And he puts a lot of that sensibility into the show cast. And they've talked a lot a bit on the panel and also in other things to really make it a family. So Brad Doris is the immortal voice of Chucky, but his daughter Fiona is on the TV show. There's this group of kids and everyone you could just get the sense on the, uh, panel that everyone really does enjoy working with one another. And the real highlight of the panel for me, and I'm sure for you, too, was, uh, Jennifer Tilly, the icon. She was in a tiara legend glittery dress. They were kind of making fun and saying, like, she won Miss Hackensack, which is where the show takes place in New Jersey. And she's just so great. And you can tell that her and Don are best friends. And that comes across so much on the show, too.
Guido: Yeah, it was really fun to see the chemistry that they all have and the way that he's telling the story and having fun with it and they're all having fun with it. So uh, everyone should watch Chucky, the TV series. It is helped when you watch the movies because it's just so cool that they are telling this one story, but you could dive into the series and just have fun with a very campy, very horror based. Lots of kills, but really fun, funny, queer, kooky, twisty soapy show.
Rob: It's really the perfect blend I think, of horror and comedy and like the satire in there so much meta humor, lots of meta stuff. There's a little bit of romance there's really kind of is like a for everyone kind of show, as long as you can stomach some great kills and great tactical effects too. Which is uh, a cool thing because Chucky is still an actual puppet and they even showed that in some of the behindthescenes stuff. So it's not just like a little CGI guy running around, he is puppeted and that really comes across on the show.
Guido: Yeah. So we also went to and posted some clips from Private. One of the highlights that will stay a highlight I think for me, the Marvel Bullpen panel, that was a tribute to Mark Gruenwald, who, as our regular listeners know, is an inspiration for me and for this show. He coined the term omniverse as a fan and then started working for Marvel, creating of course, the official handbook and getting into the canon and continuity of the Marvel world and breaking it open himself with his humor and his personality. So it was a great panel with special guests that were totally unexpected. It was, I'd say led in part by his widow Catherine Grew Inwald who we've actually got to spend time with and hopefully there will be more to share on that, which has been really amazing. But also Jim Sallikrup and Janice Chang and Elliot Brown and people Bilson Kevitch and Bilson Covich showed up. Uh, who we got to talk to you a bit after Bill Peter Sanderson.
Rob: Who'S another uh, god of this book.
Guido: The archivist of Marvel in the past. So it was so amazing to hear this history and just see that even though people have tried to sort of call into question the myth of the Marvel Bullpen and the way Stan might have been spinning a yarn talking about the bullpen. There was at least during uh. The groomwald years. From the late seventy s to the early 90s. There was a feeling of it being a bull pan. Of it being this bootstrap New York organization with these people all with their eccentricities and personalities coming together. I mean even to learn about some of the queer history of the Bulletin from Justin Kevitch and some of the other folks, about some of the trans people who were in the office and the diverse identities around race and gender and sexuality and age, it was so cool and none of it was very romanticized. It was really just sharing about their lives. And it's been such a pleasure and an honor to be able to connect with some of these people. And again, this is not the last you're going to hear from the people that we got to connect with.
Rob: I don't know if you remember this on this episode of the simpsons, but there's the simpsons where they go to new york, and, uh, abart wants to go find the mad magazine offices, and he goes up to the skyscraper and just looked like a normal office. And the secret he's like, mad magazine. The secretary is like, little boy, there's nothing funny to see here. This is just a corporate office. And then alfred newman, like, opens the door, and there's all these hijinks behind him. It's like, oh, give me the blue, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that's, like, how it felt because there was lots of roller skating downstairs.
Guido: Oh, my gosh, the photos of the sleepovers in the office and the ranks they would pull and pool parties the team would have. And really, really cool to hear that and to get to then afterwards connect with some of those folks like catherine, like janice, people who've been so deeply connected to the history of everything we and our listeners love.
Rob: And I think the good and bad thing about panels like this is because comic con has moved away from comics in some ways. These panels almost feel underground a little bit because you have your brain there. These panelists, like you were saying, are just kind of coming in. A lot of them were not officially.
Guido: Going to weren't announced.
Rob: There are people in the audience who were also working for marvel as well, so you have this whole kind of experience. Ah. So it's kind of sad that not more people are taking you. It feels special that you're there. Then, in fact, we were taking a photo with, um, mark's widow, and then bill sync just, like, photo bombed our photo, which is like, how amazing. How often can you say that?
Guido: I know, uh, jim sank took a picture with my phone, and then we used janice's phone to take a picture.
Rob: Of her and catherine.
Guido: So, yeah, it really is so amazing to be able to be connected with people in that. So what a great panel. And I think there's a lot that we're going to see come out of it, both for our show and also just for marvel and the legacy of this team.
Rob: And speaking of being connected to people, I think often at comic con, it's just you and me, or maybe there's one other person that we know from new york city, but this year has been, like, our biggest year for friends and people who are meeting for the first time in actual real life.
Guido: Yeah. Although what I was thinking a little bit of the last few days is like, stop saying you always say in real life, stop saying that's true. It was amazing to me. So, for example, we saw Brad and Lisa from Comic Book Couples Counseling, who we have spent a good amount of time with online. We saw Joey Vasquez from Midtown Comics, who we spent a good amount of time with interviewing on the show and getting to know we had not met them in person, but, uh, as soon as we saw each other, it was like we'd know each other in person for so long. It was really fun to have that experience and it just made me think about the fact that the digital community we are connected to, it's not fake, it's not artificial, it's digital. Yes, but these are real connections and they translate into, quote, unquote, real relationships. So, yeah, we saw Brad and Lisa we're going to see again later today. We saw Joey. We made some new friends, some of whom you'll hear from on some future episodes. But we know that the ODPH, the Ocho duro Parlay Hour podcast, we saw them from afar. We know Baitov and Oblivion Bar are both there and we've been waiting to find each other. We've been crossing in the Twitter verse, but in New York Comic Con together, xmen 90s covers who are connected to on Twitter has been around and all people have just been spotting from afar. But it's been really fun to connect with at the Con. There are a lot more people I wish could make it to New York Comic Con, but yeah, alas.
Rob: HM. So I think that's it for our half time report.
Guido: We might come back with a final report because we have a lot more panels that we're heading to creators that we're checking in with. We did get to meet some and connect with some already touched on artist Ali.
Rob: So I think that's going to be a lot.
Guido: Today is our focus because while we're seeing friends, uh, our day ahead is with best friend Elliot Comic Art. So he is going to arrive any moment so that we can spend the day doing that. We'll keep adding photos to our Twitter. We'll keep putting out some videos on our YouTube which we really don't use, but now we are trying to we'll put stuff on our coffee. Remember, you can join to be a part of the giveaways we've got going. So we wish you were all here.
Rob: Yes. And go to Deer Watchers.com. Click there to support and follow us. And we will be back soon with another update. Mhm.