London Film and Comic Con

[moonlettuce]

So, my feet hurt, my arse hurts (I've been walking or sitting on the ground for two days except for the trains, so stop thinking that, ya pervs...), but gods, it's been fun.

I flew down after work on Friday to stay with temaris for the weekend. Flight was fine, although Tem had to come and pick me up from the airport because the timing meant I'd just missed the train to hers.

We were up pretty early on Saturday and headed over to Earl's Court. The first thing that's there when you got in was Bumblebee in Camaro form. Dude, I should not get this excited over a yellow car with a go-faster stripe.

We wandered around and met up with the4ts (after much mobile phone tag *grin*). The first actor I saw was Michael Gross (Burt Gummer from Tremors), so I got my Tremors!geek on and went to join the queue. (As Tem said, "Dude! All the UK Tremors fans in one place. All seven of them..." My response was pretty much :-p)

Michael Gross was so amazingly lovely. He was speaking to everyone, asking how they were, getting stuff personalised. When people were asking for photos, he wasn't just sitting there and leaning over the table, he was getting up and coming around to stand next to people and getting his PA to take the photo. And then, if it was a digital camera, he was telling people to check they were happy with the photo and if they weren't they could do another one. Seriously, such a nice guy. Admittedly, I saw him early on the Saturday, so he may have been a grumpy bastard by Sunday afternoon, but I doubt it *grin*

We managed to pick up a seiyaharris, and got her a Gareth David-Lloyd auto before grabbing Tom Baker autograph tickets and wandering for a little while before we bailed to the nearby Tescos and Costa for a two hour lunch.

Back at Earl's Court, we wandered over to Tom Baker, who didn't look like he was in that good a mood when people were getting photos taken with him. (He was just sitting there when the photos were taken.) The lass in front pf us was wearing an '18' badge and TB asked her if it was her birthday.When she said yes, he made the comment about wishing he was the right side of seventy, still. Tem said, yes, but you're still looking good, and that seemed to perk him right up. The four of us got photos with him and when I went up he said, "Claire, get closer to me, and then we'll have the photo..." It was said with a waggle of his eyebrows that just made me crack up. I haven't looked, but I just hope the photo turned out okay and isn't of me creasing myself laughing.

There was more wandering and buying of Buffy and Supernatural comics (seiyaharris), beautiful notebooks with designs done in copper (temaris) and a photo of Zac Efron (ahem, can't quite remember who bought that...).

We then had The Talk (tm) about Sunday.

Sunday. Ah, Sunday. The one day out of the two that Patrick Stewart and the Heroes cast are signing. It's going to be hectic. We know this. Which is why we decide to get to Earl's Court for about 8am, for the 10am opening. Which means getting up at 6:00am.

*whimper*

However, it's Patrick Stewart, and I will do it.

Flick to Sunday and Tem and I actually getting out of the flat in time to catch the first train to Earl's Court. We found saffronra and solittleshame, who had got there about ten minutes before we had. So, off we went to queue.

Oh, am I glad we went as soon as we did. There were still quite a few people ahead of us, but we were a respectable way up the queue. seiyaharris joined us about 20 minutes after we got there, and the4ts got there about 9:45am due to travel issues, and shamelessly queue jumped to join us *grin*

The queueing was actually quite fun. At one point, seiyaharris, solittleshame and I did a Starbuck's run, and on the whole it went pretty quickly.

The next bit, however? Total fucking nightmare.

You had to queue to get the virtual queue tickets, and everyone aimed to Patrick Stewart first, which meant his queue was huge. We got tickets in the 200s, but they'd gone to over 1,000 by the end of it.

After that, there was queueing for the Heroes people. Milo Ventimiglia and Adrian Pasdar were in the 300s, Jack Coleman was in the 200s, and Hayden Panettiere was the upper end of 600 (689 to be precise).

We wandered around for a bit, including diving out to Tescos to buy lunch and then went to get Patrick Stewart.

So, let me start this by saying that I've been an X-Men geek for 23 years. I read my first X-Men comic at 8 years old and fell head-first into a world of beautiful women who control the weather, gawky teenagers who fall through floors, gruff Canadians who can open a tin with one swipe and a man who led them all in his dream. I gleefully admit that I would love to meet Chris Claremont (and then possibly slap him for making me spend this much money over the years) and my dream job is still, to this day, to write for Marvel.

I also saw my first episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1987. ('The Naked Now' as opposed to 'Encounter At Farpoint', because the video store didn't have EaF in.) I was 11. For the next seven years, I followed the crew of the Enterprise. I cried at the end of 'All Good Things', when the camera spirals up and out of the ship, and I still cannot make it through the final scene of 'Skin of Evil' without at least a few tears. The NCC 1701-D was my ship, and Jean-Luc Picard was my captain.

When it was announced that Patrick Stewart was playing Xavier, I couldn't have been happier. For the issues I've had with the X-Men movies (and they have been plenty), the portrayal of Charles has never been one of them.

So, yeah, Patrick Stewart.

The flying down, the getting up at stupid o'clock, the queueing, the sore feet. All of it pales into insignificance next to the fact that I stood in front of Patrick Stewart.

(And I totally kept the squee inside until I'd got the photos signed and moved away. And then I may have bounced. A lot. *grin*)

After PS, we went outside to eat lunch. We claimed a spot on the steps outside and started eating. And we were still there when Patrick Stewart came out. He was only signing until 2:00pm and was standing less than 5 feet away from us when he was talking to the LFCC people and getting into his car. And can I just say, that I am amazingly glad that I was facing the way I was because he had to bend over when he got into the car (side opening door and an eight seater car) and, dude! the man looks good in those jeans he was wearing when he bends over *grin*

Of course, I think they stopped at somewhere between 500 and 600, meaning a lot of people will have been disappointed. Especially the guy who was just coming in at 1:45pm with a full TNG cast shot signed by everyone *apart* from PS.

After lunch, we bounced over for the heroes people.

Both Milo and Adrian were total sweeties. (And there may have been an 'awwww' moment when we saw them walking through the place (surrounded by security!) and Adrian had his hand first in the small of Milo's back, and then on his shoulder, guiding him through the people.)

We weren't sure if we were going to get Hayden. She was only up to 300 by 2:00pm. Gods alone know what she'd been doing, but I'm guessing she was chatting a bit with everyone. However, by the time we got through (about 4:15pm), she was barely looking at anyone and scrawling 'Hayden' on whatever was put in front of her. I'm guessing it was her first con, and I don't know if she was prepared to be that popular.

We then left at about 4:45pm in order to avoid the scrum when it closed at 5:00pm.

So, two days down the line and I'm kinda sore, and definitely poorer, but damn, I've thoroughly enjoyed this weekend. And if I ever need to remember why, I just need to think of three words:

Patrick. Fucking. Stewart.

Because, dudes, that alone was worth everything.

Now, before I go, z_rayne and ravurian, can you both please send me your addresses (z_rayne, I don't think I've got your new one), because there were a couple of occasions where I saw something and totally thought of you *grin*

Comments

[lonelybrit]

*grin*

If I had gotten there early I would totally have gone for a Stewart autograph. Princess_s actually did get one, and we were all just going 'Dude... Patrick Stewart... dude...' in awe at irregular intervals over the rest of the day.

And had I not run out of funds, I would totally have gotten a Mr Gross autograph as I LOVED Tremours :) When I did look over, he was still being an absolutely smiling gent to everyone who came to him, hats off, he's the man *nods*

Glad you had a good time, sometimes fandom is exhausting but yes, it's worth it!

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

So, so worth it. For the amount of time queueing and money spent, I still love conventions far too much *g*

[xandutch.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the lovely report. I had a wonderful relaxing weekend with my family... interspersed with the occasional jealous flashes of 'Dude! Why don't I live in London? WHY?' I have to live vicariously. *g*

[the4ts.livejournal.com]

Well, bugger! I got Jack Coleman (oh such a charming man!)'s auto and Hayden was up to 430 by then and I had 685. Kept an eye out for you, went back to Andee Frizzell and had another chat with her (she is so nice!) and got another photo (but worse than my one yesterday as totally out of focus but I may be able to salvage it). Got a Gareth photo on the sly and was about to ask for another one with me as the one I got at GMEX was not that good but then a group of paying bods arrived so I didn't bother. I then grabbed two of Nana Visitor, a very bad one of Adrian (but have sort of salvaged it), looked for (but couldn't see) you or the SFX stan so decided to head home at 3.45. Am semi-kicking myself for not checking the queue numbers now before I left but what the hey, I had resigned myself much earlier on to not getting one and got others I hadn't expected so am still totally thrilled!

Thanks for helping make everything such a fun weekend as the company was just as important as the guests, well at least near enough ;)

[zoerayne]

Sounds like you had a lovely time. *g*

My contact info is here and you're on the filter.

[seiyaharris.livejournal.com]

I will say, we headed over as almost an after thought at 4 to see where she was up to and she was on something like 500, if that. Claire asked her steward what the chances of gettign to 700 were by close and he said 'very good' so we sat down to wait it out and I headed over to check at about 4:20 and he'd just called 690! She was going like the clappers! lol

[alinak.livejournal.com]

*wibbles*

You saw Adrian and Milo?

*wibbles some more*

...together?

*falls down*

(Yeah... kinda fond of those two! *g*)

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

Michael Gross was just so absolutely wonderful :)

And, yes, it's exhausting and expensive, but I wouldn't change it for the world *grin*

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

I could point out that I don't live in London, either *g*

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

Oh, it was so much fun :D The problem with these sorts of things is that, as soon as they're over, I want them to happen again.

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

Yep.

And we saw Adrian guiding Milo through people. With touching and all *g*

[xandutch.livejournal.com]

Shhh. :)

[moonlettuce.livejournal.com]

*grin*