By Tony “Thunder” Klepack
DAY 1: My BotCon
account began Thursday July 19th at 5:00 AM when I got up to catch my flight
which left at 8:30 AM. I pre-cleared customs in Edmonton and noted three
things: 1) We couldn’t pre-clear customs in Edmonton last year because
our airport wasn’t yet set up for it. 2) There’s now a direct flight to
Los Angeles (a lot of good that does me now! Where was it last year for
BotCon??) 3) When searching for my flight information at the terminal,
I discovered a direct flight to Minneapolis/St. Paul! I wished I realized
that earlier--I could’ve taken a flight directly there instead of going
with the airline I did which had to go to Denver and switch planes. Ah
well...
My trouble
with airport security happened early this year--I set the metal detectors
off and was thoroughly searched. In the end, they found nothing (didn’t
check for that metal plate in my head, huh?) And we assumed it must’ve
been the metal buttons on my denim jacket.
Anyway,
the flight took us down to Denver (well, nothing interesting happened in-flight
this time around). I landed at Denver some two and half hours later--it’s
a truly bizarre and amazing airport (complete with moving floor “movator”
thingys in the middle of the terminal and trains from the main terminal
to the baggage claims. You are quite literally trapped where you are if
you are just switching planes). I never saw the city of Denver on the way
in (or out) and wondered where it was exactly.
I reached
Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport at 3:15 PM local time (an hour
ahead of my timezone) and called Matthew Swenson (I figured, hey--I’m his
neighborhood anyway...). After waiting/searching for him for about 75 minutes
(he had to get home from work first--so technically it was only 40 minutes),
I decided to just take a taxi. First, though, I called the Hotel to make
sure my reservation was still there--fortunately, they’d canceled it at
4 PM. The lady on duty was quite friendly and helpful and restored it for
me (whew! I’d hate to have slept out on the street!) Just as I was on the
phone, I sensed a disturbance in the force and turned to see Matthew! (Incidentally,
the airport was well marked out this year--I just left him bad instructions--I
told him to meet me by “door 1", failing to realize there were three different
levels with a “door 1").
We left
the airport in his, uh, porsche (yeah, that’s right) and went directly
to St. Paul and the Days Inn. We checked in, payed all the appropriate
items (including extortion money to some thugs in the lobby. Best $1,000
I ever spent for “protection”.) If you’re somebody who wasn’t there, the
Days Inn can best be described as... “quaint” (translation: you get what
you pay for--which, in this case, wasn’t much. Give me the Marriott from
last year any day!)
We then
went over to the Burger King (three blocks away) and had supper.
Afterward, we went to an amusement park in Minneapolis somewhere called
“Valleyfair”. $14 bucks got us in and access to pretty much all the rides
(good deal, actually). Having been a newbie to rollercoasters (oh, the
embarrassment!) I had to try all five of those out--including the “Wild
Thing”--one of America’s worst (er, best). It was totally awesome (naturally)
and, as an added bonus, I now no longer fear death. We also tried all the
water rides (all good except for that last one, which was boring. We’re
in the car/boat thingy with four teenaged girls and they barely even got
wet! Oh the depravity of it all!)
We saw
a really cool Star Wars arcade game (but lacked time to try it out)
since the park was closing in 5 minutes by that time...
(A lot
of the guys working at Valleyfair looked quite similar--perhaps
they’re cloning personnel to save costs?)
We returned
to the Hotel and I slept four hours on a stone tablet--I mean, bed (I’ve
come to expect crappy beds in hotels. Anaheim was some kind of freak of
space/time where the beds were actually comfortable).
DAY 2: I went
downstairs for some reason and on the way back up in the elevator, I met
this long-haired guy with several boxes who I asked if he was going to
Botcon. He nodded and explained that he was a dealer, and had been into
Transformers for a long time. He was just “in it for the money”
(brutal honesty) and had been to all the past BotCons in both America and
Japan (but he wasn’t going to Botcon Europe this year because it would
“probably suck”.) I got off on my floor and it later dawned on me that
I may have been talking to Tony Preto (guess what? I was right!)
We met
up with Tim Finn Friday morning (we actually saw him Thursday when we checked
in originally). We asked the hotel clerk where there was a good place to
eat and she directed us to the Downtowner cafe where we consumed
breakfast.
We went
to the Mall of America on Friday morning (with Tim Finn) and were bedazzled
by it’s resplendent beauty, yada, yada. We found a cool SW Lego display
and many cool shops and the like. Tim left us later (had to return to Botcon
and set up his table--he was looking forward to carrying all that paper
in the rain).
Matthew
and I stayed a while longer and even located the SW arcade game in the
Mall. I played it several times (awesome, but way too hard. It cost about
$1.40 a shot--four tokens, with three being a dollar. I played it about
five times). We then went five minutes across the street to the airport
and picked up Tony Buchanan (he was a little heavy, but we managed).
Our triumvirate
went back to the MOA for a while longer, discussed old times (we’ve all
met in person only once so that took all of five minutes) and ate lunch
(pizza!!) We eventually left there and went to a comic shop (on the way
to Toys “R” Us originally). We found many used TFs in the comic
shop as well as a SW collection that would take anyone’s breath away (I
never knew there was a full-sized imperial shuttle toy! Awesome!) We found
little of any real use and eventually, discovering we had only about 20
minutes to get to the RiverCenter before pre-registration finished, left
there and sped off for St. Paul (our TRU visit was, alas, lost forever).
We went
to RiverCenter and registered. We hung out a little while and left, returning
later for the pizza party. We could tell both times that Glen Hallitt was
pissed--normally he’s such a nice, quiet guy--but this time he was yelling
at the stupid fans who were disobeying the instructions. He had this look
in his
optic--an edgy, “you want
some of this” kinda look. Needless to say, we all did as he told, fearing
his vengeful wrath--not wanting to tempt a pre-mature “Omega Point”.
Er, yeah.
So, anyway, we came back at the pizza party and had our two slices each
(Tim Finn and I went back for seconds when everyone had been fed--hey,
they did say we could do that in the instructions). After pizza, we went
and watched as the guests were introduced and all the merchandise and exclusive
toys were shown off. (Next year how about doing it on a podium so we can
all see over the tall people?)
After
the formal show was over, I went and talked to Matt Kirkby and his people
(Barb Brewer, her man Tony Tuski, Rosemary Faulkerson, Heather Feldman,
Austin Welch, Sharon LaBorde, Darren (her guy, who’s last name I don’t
know)... I think that was it). He showed me the terrible tragedy that was
the Optimus Prime cake (the art was based
off Heather’s beautiful art and came out looking like a five year old’s
drawing!) I called Raksha over (I figured she needed a good laugh) and
fortunately, her and Sharon didn’t take each other’s heads off (although
it might’ve been fun to have watched...)
We (Matt
K and I) took a piece of cake to Jim Byrne (Inferno’s voice and Joe Dawson
from Highlander) whom promptly said he wasn’t going to eat it (he
must’ve figured we poisoned it--I mean, we did, but he was just too damn
sharp for us, I guess). I told him he was great in Highlander (Jim,
not Matt--although he was pretty good in it too) and that he made
the show (it’s true--without the Watchers the show would’ve really sucked
as ‘who get’s decapitated this week?’ Hmm...maybe that’s why Highlander:
The Raven isn’t very good, then?)
We went
back to Barbara Brewer/Tony Tuski/Matt Kirkby/Austin Welch/Rosemary Faulkerson’s
room and watched some of their video of the Friday night BC presentation
and there was also a Nerf war (one of several...)
We all
went to bed that night (in our separate rooms, I mean--at least, that’s
what I’m putting in this PG version).
DAY 3: The first
day of the convention. After a little more sleep (5½-6 hours), Matthew,
Tony Buchanan and I went to day one of the convention. It was a nirvana
of overpriced toys and chaos in the dealer room. After trying to figure
out where I got my convention exclusive toys, I found the right line-up
and got in it. I saw many things of interest there--Metal Force Convoy
for a $100. (Basically, a resin/something model of Optimus Prime from Japan.
Very popular); some idiot was trying to sell a loose Skyquake for $125!!
(I just sold mine for $25! And mine was in better shape too!) I saw Tony
Preto’s table, Digital Toys, Starbase Rugby, Raksha’s table, Tim Finn’s,
Marg Davis’ table (eventually), Spacebridge UK (or whatever he’s called)
and so much more stuff--toys I haven’t seen in years, toys I only dreamt
of, and so forth. My favourite though, was somebody’s toy in a display
case which transformed into a--get this--toilet! (I’m not kidding! I found
this guy’s webpage yesterday and the toy was his special little kitbash
project. It elicited quite a few comments apparently.) My second runner-up
was Marg Davis’ Arcee Action Master toy (apparently a very rare toy. She
was offered $5,000 from Hasbro in the past for it. Hold out for $10,000
Marg!)
The artroom
had many cool pics in it (including a Super Galvatron pic this fellow did--can
you tell this was my fav?) Also, Marg’s Nightbird kitbash, several fan-made
toys, etc. This room also served as the display room for all the new Japanese
toys, Hasbro re-releases of the classic BW toys, the yet-to-be released
stuff (like TM2 Megatron, Stinkbomb, Prowl, etc.) And was also the room
for the raffle/registration to be part of the TF Trivial Pursuit trivia
game (more on that later).
The panels
(such as there were this year) were great. The Hasbro/Mainframe had a Hasbro
rep (Brian Chapman) and a Mainframe rep (Asaph Fipke, creative producer
on BW/BM). They showed us episode one of Beast Machines (The
Re-formatting). It was truly awesome (although I don’t know if I care
for this new creative direction yet or not). The Hasbro guy also showed
us two prototypes of BM toys--Cheetor and Tankorr. He told us there will
be regular, deluxe, mega, ultra, super and supreme sizes of many of the
toys (including duplicates of some--like the old Go-Bots series
with it’s small and big size toys of the same characters. The large ones
having more details and crap like sounds and such). No pictures or video
cameras were allowed during the episode and panel--the doors were locked
tight and all were warned what would happen if the rules were disobeyed--No,
not ritualistic castration--much worse! They’d stop showing us the show!
(Gasp!)
Other
events in the panel/video room included “Miscellaneous video showcase”--highlights
of Jim Byrne and Scott McNeil’s careers (such as they’ve been). Basically,
this meant (from what I could tell) playing an episode of Highlander
to kill time (after all, what’s Scott ever done??) Fan panel #1 was the
long-awaited fan media panel
organized by Tony Buchanan. He talked about Auto-Update and the
Transmasters fan club. Matthew Swenson plugged his new newsletter
Trans-Net and I think Tim Finn’s Trans-Spoof for him (I can’t
remember); Heather Feldman plugged Maelstrom; Marg Davis plugged
Cillacon/Bloodlines/Femmes Unite; Austin Welch plugged Somewhere
in Time (his Back to the Future crossover--somebody in the audience
gave him a strange look when he mentioned it); Sharon and Darren plugged
Tales of Cybertron (coming soon!) and, Matt Kirkby plugged the incredible
epic storyline (so good it was once touted by Time magazine
as the “storyzine of the century”)--Transformers:
Balance of Power! I’m not biased or anything, but this was definitely
the best fanzine offered to the audience, bar none (I could’ve been on
stage too but there wasn’t enough room and Matt did a good job plugging
it anyway). Sharon and Austin talked the longest about their respective
projects (I’m not judging or anything--I’m just saying is all). At the
end of the panel, Tim rushed in and sold everybody on his petition to get
Transformers: The Movie re-released on DVD (Yay!)
At 6
PM they did an encore performance of Beast Machines. But before
that, fan panel #2 was about MUSHing, ATTCM and Decepticon fandom (as organized
by Raksha). We watched as she proudly had her fellow Decepticon fans defend
their faction and beliefs from the irate audience (well, they wanted to
see BM again and the panel went over by 20 minutes). One Decepticon fan
proudly told the audience how he’d ‘been a Decepticon since...’ Not that
he’d been a Decepticon fan, but that he’d been a Decepticon!!
I admire the bad guys as much as anybody, but come on! When you start referring
to yourself as a giant robot, you should really get some professional psychological
help!
I almost
nodded off during BM second showing--no, it really was good--I was
just so tired is all. Afterward, I got a Coke® and returned
for the only season 3 show I missed--Master Blaster (after seeing
it, I wished I could’ve seen BM again to wash that crap out of my mind).
Back
before the second fan panel ended, Matthew Swenson and I got into the TF
Trivial Pursuit trivia game. Jon Hartman read off trivia from his laptop
and had three teams try to answer the questions at a small table in the
dealer room (very little fanfare for that). Jon explained how they designed
the really cool, professional-looking TF Trivial Pursuit gameboard to us
and we played. To be blunt, the questions were 90% hard and somehow Matthew
and I managed to score maybe only one or two easy ones. Team #1 and team
#2 (#2 was one guy--I guess his partner didn’t show up) beat the snot out
of us. They both had three pieces each while we stumbled onto only one
(lucky shot). (Matthew was so embarrassed he got Tim Finn for another round
on Sunday--fortunately I take solace in knowing they didn’t fare much better--HA!
HA!).
I bought
another set of convention toy exclusives on Saturday and that was about
it. Last year I was sparing with my money but this year’s conservativeness
made last year look like a shopping spree by comparison.
That
night, we all got together in Barbara Brewer/Tony Tuski/Matt Kirkby/etc.’s
room again and had pizza from Domino’s (nobody knows like
Domino’s!™)--after having priorly searched several streets
of St. Paul for a restaurant... I also met Katherine Brown back at the
room (I don’t know her but I recall seeing the name in AU before, so...)
I think I also met Max Prohaska there (or somewhere anyway).
There
we watched a bit of some of Tony B.’s Japanese episode of Headmasters
(I lead the ‘making fun of it’ section in the room--the Singapore version’s
bad dubbing makes it all too easy). I also spoke to and got a picture of
some woman there who I later realized was Marg Davis (well, I’d never met
her in person before! How was I supposed to know who she was?) I also met
Ozzy Mendez and Michelle Quivedo there, Matt “the cartoon expert” Karpowich
(again, from last year), Jay Bernal (I think), some lady who’s name I didn’t
get and Patricia Pajunen (save the best for last;). We also watched some
of Headmasters: The Rebirth (I haven’t seen that since 1987 when
it first aired!) And some of Inhumanoids: The Movie.
DAY #4: We all
woke up tired on Sunday morning. I was both surprised and delighted to
wake up with a certain female fan in my arms (a spoil of last night’s Nerf
war! I won’t say her name to protect her honor. ...man, was I drunk on
Saturday night!)
We had
breakfast at the same restaurant all three convention days and ended up
getting to the BotCon late on Sunday morning--I missed my one chance at
seeing The Key to Vector Sigma (arrghh!! Well, I suppose it probably
wasn’t that good anyway....after all, the cartoon was, in general, awful.)
I watched
a little of the fan MSTK3000 panel---but was quickly reminded of how badly
it sucked last year so I skipped out and went to the dealer room. There,
I decided to go find a drug store and get more film. I went back to the
Hotel and got instructions--three blocks and to your left. I went as instructed
and got lost--it was three blocks and right. I eventually found
Walgreen’s and got another roll. After loading it, I snapped
some shots of St. Paul’s cool downtown architecture (most of these pics
never turned out anyway).
I got
back in time for the Jim Byrne/Scott McNeil panel. Jim arrived first--it
appears Scott was letting Marg Davis (his groupie) sit on his lap in the
dealer room (I’ll let you make up the rest of that story yourselves...;)
Anyhow, Jim was quite honest--admitting he did Inferno and his Mainframe
stuff for the money (what all the voice actors think but don’t generally
say in front of the fans). During the panel, Jim Byrne spoke of his 2 CDs
out from “Stony Plain Records”--as he said that, I thought; “Wait a
minute! Stony Plain? That’s like the place back home...”--and before
I finished uttering the thought he said, “which is based out of Edmonton,
Alberta, Canada.” (For those of you reading this, Stony Plain is a small
town west of Edmonton).
I missed
the TF: The Movie showing for a trip to Subway with Tony Buchanan.
There, we had meatball subs (I ordered one the previous day but they were
so busy with the onflux of BotCon fans they screwed up my order. Being
the kind, courteous Canuck [jerk] I am, I said nothing and just ate it).
We returned
to the BC in time for the BotCon organizer panel--Jon, Glen and shifty-eyed
Karl answered all our questions (be they good or stupid). They also announced
next year’s convention in Ft. Wayne, Indiana (July 28 - 30). It
will be as big as ‘97 and they’re going to be “going nuts”. Interestingly,
they apologized for the Hotel (I guess they didn’t care for it either).
Over 700 pre-registrants, over 1,000 attendees (finally, we’ve broken the
four digit barrier!)
Also
during Sunday sometime (I think before I left for the drugstore??) I talked
to Marg and Patricia at their table and bought Bloodlines #6. Then
went and got Trans Spoof #7, Con-Quest #25 (and I already
had the BOP BotCon special and Matthew’s Trans-Net #1). In
my rush, I neglected to buy Maelstrom! Oops!)
Sunday
night I lost track of Tony and Matthew (for like 1½ - two hours)
so I hung out with Matt Kirkby et al. During my wait for the others to
return, I went with Marg, Patricia and Rosemary to this odd collectibles
store nearby the Hotel. They were already closed but waiting for the girls
return so I had a quick glance around too. Rosemary bought a katana replica
and somebody bought a set of numchuks (I forget who). Patricia said how
she wanted a whip really badly (possibly to use on her new boyfriend? This
must be the way vicious rumours get started...;) We left and returned to
the Hotel.
Eventually,
Matthew and Tony returned--they apparently went with Tim Finn to help David
Kolodny-Nagy move his BC stuff back to his hotel, which was six blocks
away from RiverCentre, in Matthew’s car). They returned with Matthew Griffin
(Matt no.#4 in case you’ve lost count). He’s the Australian dude behind
Austrans. We (Tony Buchanan, Matthew Swenson, Rosemary, Patricia,
Marg, DKN, Matthew Griffin, Tim Finn and myself) all went to some restaurant
and had dinner there. Afterward, the girls and I went out in Rosemary’s
car--we told the guys we were going to go check out a local K-Mart
and see if it was still open--but what we actually did was... (well, no,
actually that was what we did--I just wanted that last part to sound
dirty). And they were closed! Blast it!
We went
back to the Hotel, went to Tony/Barb/etc.’s room, went to our room (Tony,
Matthew, me) and finally Marg and Patricia’s room. We all had a running
Nerf gun war, Patricia and I fought over possession of a Nerf ball (she
won. But, that was because I let her...yeah! Sure... What? You don’t believe
me now?) Also, Marg and I engaged (Woo!) in a pillow fight. She’s very
good--trained in the lost art of Jedi style pillow technique (the question
is: which of them is the Apprentice and which the Master?)
We went
to bed that night (um, in our respect rooms) and prepared for our inevitable
goodbyes the next day.
DAY 5: We got
up early and left the Hotel. Matthew, Tony and I had breakfast at Burger
King and then it was off to the airport. I said goodbye to Matthew
and Tony and left for my plane. I bought some souvenirs ($58 for 2 t-shirts
and 4 keychains! Ouch!), and left on my plane. I got to Denver and I bought
some more souvenirs and hopped my next plane to Edmonton. I actually saw
Denver on the way in/out this time around (I guess we just hit the airport
the wrong way last time).
(I could
swear I had the same flight attendant on two or three of my flights--this
sandy-haired woman in her late-thirties or so.) My plane crashed over Calgary
and I had to walk the remaining two hundred miles on foot (ah well. C’est
la vie).
(End transmission).
General miscellaneous
comments: Tony and I spoke to the same fan from last year and I actually
caught his name this time--I’ve since forgotten it but I know he’s a guy
who’s name I’ve heard before and should remember (ah well, there’s always
next year...) Otherwise, we also saw Raymundo Aleman (again), Max Prohaska,
Phil Zeman, Jay Bernal, Steve-o Stonebreaker (gads! What were his parents
thinking?) and others. I also saw several internet geeks there (but didn’t
recognize them at the time--Scylla was that large lady with the glasses
and purple hair. One of the MSTK3000 guys is also a well-known internet
guy. I saw, but didn’t talk to this time, the Lukis Bros. (Check out their
cool site at http://www.unicron.com.
It’s full of neat kitbash-type stuff like Ravage and Trans-Mutate from
last year.) I also saw the infamous Blue-Jackal--she did those music videos
at the end of the con--and many other internet types were present).
Just
for the record: Although the
Mall of America is America’s biggest mall, and quite impressive
in it’s own right, Edmonton’s West
Edmonton Mall is the world’s biggest (you readers must come
here and see it sometime!) The same company
owns both malls (coincidence? I think not!) and ours was the first. We
are the Alpha and they are the Omega Point (gee, have I used that enough
yet in this report??)
Apparently
Matt Kirkby and Marg Davis are married and have been for years (this was
news to both of them though). Also, Matt was getting chicks left and right
at the convention (strange, but “true”). I also (finally) managed to annoy
a couple of women with calling them “chicks”. Marg and Patricia were quite
irritated by that word--geez, why do they think I ever use it but
to annoy women??
I also
learned Tony Buchanan is obsessed with some kind of pop called Surge®--he
stocked up on a couple of crates of the stuff before he left Minneapolis/St.
Paul (in case anybody wants to send him a bribe, this is the stuff to use).
I think
that’s all this time around (hope my account didn’t put too many of you
to sleep). Until next time, make mine Marvel, and Hear the Thunder...
Tony “Thunder” Klepack
