Just thought I’d wrap the post-con week up with a final piece to showcase the remaining miscellaneous photos I took during the show. Despite selling out ever single day, this year’s SDCC was actually much smoother run and better thought out than the last few, or at least that’s how it seemed on the floor. Yes, it was crowded as hell, but we didn’t have to deal with the waves of people flooding the pathways at regular intervals whenever all the panels let out at the same time, picking up our passes was easier than ever, and the “security” people were all pleasant and not as dickish as they’ve had a tendency to be in the past.

The city of San Diego, on the other hand, really needs to do something about getting a few pedestrian walkways built so that people can walk over the street in front of the convention center rather than back up and get stuck on the train tracks. Here’s a shot of what that clusterfunk looked like.

Keep in mind, that photo was taken on Saturday morning, before the crowd was insanely massive. I didn’t get a shot off of the outside area as the show let out in the evening, but that was an even worse scene.

Click the “more” link for some more SDCC tidbits.

Ah yes – this was a nice idea that didn’t quite work. Marvel decided to have Jon Favreau show up in their booth for the big Iron Man armor unveiling, and had him say a few words to the crowd. Unfortunately, the scene was so mobbed, I couldn’t make out half of what he was saying, and the booth was semi-enclosed, so people were stacked like cattle. Still, very cool of Marvel to try to bring a taste of the panels to the con floor – hopefully next year the logistics will be revamped so similar events will work even better.

Having the armor sitting on the main floor, on the other hand, worked rather nicely. This thing was really impressive!

Two photos of good ol’ Iorek Byrnison from the Golden Compass booth, just to try to give you a sense of scale. This guy was massive, and the ladies seemed to be particularly enamored with him.

There’s an entire line of Dark Crystal sculptures coming out, but this UrRu is the only one whose photo turned out clear. They also had a Windwalker on display behind camera-confounding glass that also looked incredible. There’s something about creepy puppets that is just awesome.

Now we come to the Sideshow Collectibles part of the post. I didn’t take pics of the typically sweet statues and maquettes that we all know they produce. I focussed instead on the more interesting and odd. Like this hybrid Punisher/Venom figure. I assume this comes from an issue of What If? or something, but I’ll be damned if I can figure out what made someone think “Hey, now that’s the perfect idea for a high-priced action figure!” It is kinda cool, though…

The wife was all over these guys. The Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow was about 10 inches tall, and the others were 2-3 inches tall. Don’t recall the price on the big guy, but the little ones are going to be $6.50 a pop. Not the worst thing to get your pirate-obsessed significant other for a no-reason gift.

This one beats everything else at the show, hands down. A ridiculously expensive Spider-Man figure that looks less like an officially licensed product and more like a 14 inch tall kinky cos-play person. Seriosuly, this photo doesn’t do the creepiness of this thing justice. It looks like one of those fetish costumes you can buy off of ebay and gives you an oogy feeling by simply looking at it.

That’ll just about do it for this year! All in all, it was a great show and I’m already looking forward to next year. If you’ve never had the opportunity to attend, or if you haven’t been in the last, say, 3-4 years, I highly recommend you make the effort to get out there. It’s no exaggeration to say that there’s no other comic/sci-fi/movie/tv convention that can even hope to compare to the spectacle the SDCC has grown into.

Spread the word!