Story and Photos by Brent E. Beltrán
For the second full day of the greatest popular arts convention in the universe my wife Olympia and I had grand plans. We were going to spend the entirety of it in the Convention Center’s infamous Hall H.
Hall H is the largest programming room at Comic-Con. It seats 6000 or so people (not sure how many Wookies it might hold) and has the some of the best and most attended panels. And this Friday’s lineup was spectacular.
By the Power of Greyskull!
The two of us thought that if we got to the convention by 10am we might at some point get inside.
We were wrong.
Early that morning we discovered through social media that masses of people had camped outside Hall H. The line of sleeping Conners snaked around to the back of the Convention Center. My wife was bummed. We weren’t going to get in.
Giant Orc from #LOTR
Realizing this we switched gears. I was exhausted. I roamed all around the place the day before and I had walked to the Convention Center from my community of Barrio Logan.
That night we went back to The Con for an 8:30pm panel called Black Mask: Bringing a Punk Rock Sensibility, Activism, and Wu-Tang to Comics. We walked to and from our minivan that was parked on the outskirts of a Petco Park parking lot. Comic-Con is a lot of walking for a normally lazy, exercise deficient, overweight forty two year old fanboy.
Comrade Superman
When I got home, even though I was exhausted, I needed to put together a piece on my observations of the first day which was to be published the next morning here at the Free Press.
After banging my headache filled head against the keyboard for a couple hours I finally finished around 1am. Afterwards I Instagramed a dozen or so photos to the Free Press account and then proceeded to crash out.
Instead of rushing back the next day to get in line for Hall H we took our time. My wife’s daughter Seli was volunteering at Comic-Con at 11amso we dropped her off as close as we could.
Storm Troopers
We filled our bellies and then I dropped Oly and my boy Dino off at the Imperial Trolley Station and they walked from there.
Once again I parked our family transporter machine back at our barrio headquarters and proceeded to walk to the Convention Center and meet up with my family.
I finally got there after stumbling north on Harbor Dr. for about 20 minutes. And, once again like on the first day, passing the Christian zealots protesting the sinning Comic-Con attendees.
Black Sails Set
As I made my way I looked to my left and saw the idle wave of humanity waiting in line for Hall H. It curved around the massive concrete building and went beyond the scope of my vision.
I may have liked the programming that was taking place inside the frigid, over climate controlled, Hall H but there was no way I was willing to sacrifice my tired, achy corpse, beyond what I already have, by standing outside for hours on end. I’m too old for that shit. Instead, I proceeded onward to rendezvous with my equally exhausted, yet happy, wife and son.
Lego Iron Man
Some of Friday’s Hall H panels that we missed:
The World’s End: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost Reunited
Kick-Ass 2 and Riddick
AMC’s The Walking Dead
Game of Thrones Panel and Q&A Session
Sony & Screen Gems
At the Drive-In with the band Metallica
Follow San Diego Free Press on Instagram and Twitter for a variety of Comic-Con related photos and tweets.
Brent E. Beltrán
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