Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Star Wars 3-D coming 2012

star-wars-trilogy-1-0 Ever since the Star Wars first released, there has been something about the Star Wars franchise that just set it apart from all the others. Perhaps it was because at the time of its release, Star Wars was very cutting edge. Sure over the years, Star Wars as a series has fallen into disarray with the arrival of the prequels, but it still as a series managed to stay at the cutting edge of film making technology.

George Lucas, it appears, not wanting to be out done has decided to convert all of the Star Wars films into 3-D. This is not the first time George Lucas has made the decision to update the Star Wars franchise. Many of you may remember the Star Wars, digital remastering of the original series of Star Wars films back in the 90s, which added in modern special effects as well as some scenes that had been cut from the original films. (Well, and the controversial editing out of David Prowse at the end of Return of the Jedi in favour of Hayden Christensen.) George Lucas has shown that he is a man that is never happy with the final product and will continually move to update the Star Wars experience into the future. Well that is assuming this release will make money, which it is guaranteed to do.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, George Lucas was persuaded to go 3-D by the Avatar experience. Avatar which is now the highest grossing film in history, partly due to its 3-D ticket sales and IMAX versions, had ground breaking 3-D technology, which would make for an amazing Star Wars experience.

Assuming that when Star Wars is converted to 3-D it comes out as well as Avatar, I think George Lucas can go running to the bank. Personally, I’m a bit worried that Star Wars may not make the jump to 3-D as gracefully as Avatar did. Avatar was shot for 3-D; while Star Wars was shot for 2-D and we have all seen what 2-D films converted to 3-D look like. For the most part, 2-D films up conversions to 3-D haven’t done so well. But what gives me hope is that George Lucas is involved.

I know that many out there have probably given up on George Lucas as a director, given his recent Star Wars directing stint, but one thing that can’t be taken away from George Lucas is his vision and understanding of film making technology. This is why George Lucas owns the best special effects house in the business in ILM. The other reason for hope is that George Lucas is allowing for time to get the 3-D conversion right. According to The Hollywood Reporter post, the conversion to 3-D will take a year to be completed. This was far longer than films like Clash of the Titans and The Last Airbender allowed for their conversion to 3-D. So I’m on the up and up on the Star Wars 3-D experience.

What about you? What do you think of the Star Wars 3-D re-release?

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Rim Introduces the PlayBook

It sounds better than iPad.

In case you missed it, yesterday RIM unveiled their tablet device called “PlayBook” at their developer conference. The PlayBook is being touted as the world’s first professional tablet. And it does look somewhat impressive. The PlayBook comes loaded with multitasking, BES support, etc and is ultra thin at 9.7 mm. I just wonder who is going to buy it.

Let’s face it, Apple takes up all of the oxygen in the tablet space. I’d be surprised if most people know that PlayBook exists. Apple has created this Willy Wonka appeal for their products and I’m not sure that even business professionals will be swayed to buy RIM’s new device. If they need exchange support a few may pick up a PlayBook, which I believe the iPad lacks, but for the everyday consumer, I can’t really see them picking the PlayBook over an iPad, just because of Apples appeal to the regular consumer.

As for which device would perform better and do what you want to do, we’ll have to wait till there are some reviews out in order to make a good decision on this device. My fears are that it won’t have the battery life the iPad has, since it has a dual core processor. But it appears to be slightly smaller, so I’ll have to wait and see if my suspicions are true.

So what do you think of the PlayBook? Are you going to buy one?

VIA

Monday, September 27, 2010

Chuck Norris fixes iPhone 4 Antenna issue

You probably know him as the most feared man in the world.  Chuck Norris doesn’t use a cellphone since everyone knows they better listen when Chuck Norris talks.  But what you probably didn’t know is Chuck Norris can also solve your iPhone 4 antenna issues. Just check out the video above.

So it appears that that fear of Chuck Norris doesn’t end with people.  A little fact that is always good to know. 

I wonder if Chuck will work on a receiver?  I’ll let you know.

 VIA

Friday, September 24, 2010

Videotron Offers the Fastest Internet in the Country

internetvideotron I wish I lived in Quebec.

Today Quebec can add one more notch under their belt. Not only is Quebec the home of the Poutine, it now hosts Canada’s fastest Internet service. Videotron today launched their new 120 Mbps network for the tidy sum of $160 a month (Canadian), $150 if you bundle it with a TV subscription or Telephone service. The service does however come with an unfortunate cap of 170 GBs down and 30 GBs up, which begs the question of who this service is targeted at?

All of us geeks would die to have fast internet, but I have to believe that $160 is a bit much for most of us. If this service was priced under a hundred I could see some people going for it, but with a low cap of 170 GBs down, I can’t see anyone wanting to really pay $160 for it. Then again, maybe that’s just me.

By now some maybe questioning why I would call 170 GBs a low bandwidth cap? Well its simple, anyone that wants speeds of 120 Mbps is going to want to use it for just that, its amazing speed. And what would you need those speeds for? Online streaming and file downloads. For simple browsing, e-mail, you don’t really need a lot of speed, but where it becomes important is when you’re doing online gaming, online video streaming and downloading files. Another place where it would matter is if you wanted to run a server.

But we also need to look at the other possibilities, true HD streaming can happen at these speeds. Right now, services like YouTube and Netflix are really compressed and they don’t do 1080p, but with a 120Mbps you can do 1080p without all of the heavy compression. So when I see a price of $160 I have to think that part of the pricing is to try and protect Videotron’s other business of cable TV. If someone could pair a fast internet service with a Netflix, Boxee service I think a lot of people would begin to consider dropping their cable subscriptions, as many already have. But companies like Videotron wouldn’t want you to do that, so they need to keep the price high to protect their cable subscriptions.

In places like Stockholm, according to a Tipster at Engadget, you can get a 1 Gbps connection for about 900 SEK ($134.93 CAD, 130 USD). So in Stockholm you can get about 10 times the speed of Videotron’s offering for less. I just wished North America would start to catch up with the rest of the world and offer a real internet service instead of protecting their cable business. Then again, I can’t blame cable providers from not wanting to kill their cable businesses, as online revenues aren’t so grand.

So until cable companies can start to make money online, I guess we’ll all just have to dream about faster internet speeds.

VIA

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Netflix launches in Canada

Netflix Finally

Yesterday, I and many other people got our wish as Netflix made their journey into Canada for the first time. Netflix’s arrival was greeted with much excitement, especially with the help of some local actors in the audience at Netflix’s press conference.

What gets me is why Netflix went so far as to hire actors to pretend to be excited about their new service in Canada and then to even give interviews to the press about how they “felt” about Netflix. I think Steve Swasey, Netflix VP of corporate communications, said it best when he said,

“that a script was handed out to the extras, and that "some people got carried away and it's embarrassing to Netflix.”

And embarrassing it must be.

As for Netflix’s Canadian service, it’s not bad but it’s not good either. Yesterday as I got home from work I quickly signed up for the Netflix service, as it was a no brainer with the first month free offer. After signing up, I decided to try streaming on my Playstation 3, which did work pretty well. The Picture wasn’t bad. Some films looked better than some, and as you played a film would clear up, just like the American service.

But what I didn’t expect was the selection. I’ve been listening to a lot of Podcasts from Twit to Diggnation, were these guys have raved about the selection of videos available on the service. When I took a look through the catalogue for films that I might want to watch, I found that a lot of films are not available. The film names are in the list, but beside them is the message “Not Available”. This was really disappointing. I guess Netflix decided to launch when they had a certain number of films available and then add to the catalogue later.

By now some of you might think I’m being a bit picky with my selection of films so I’ll list off the films that I know aren’t available yet, so you know it’s not me. So here is a list of unavailable films:

  1. Iron Man 1 & 2 
  2. Kill Bill Vol.1 & 2
  3. Pulp Fiction
  4. The Big Bang Theory Season 1, 2, 3, 4 (Ok maybe this isn’t a big film, but I wanted to watch it)
  5. The God Father 1, 2, 3
  6. The Terminator 1, 3 and Salvation
  7. The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolution
  8. Batman, The Dark Knight, Batman Begins, Batman Returns, Batman Forever, as well as, all animated movies
  9. Gladiator
  10. Robocop 1, 2, 3
  11. Aliens Collector’s Edition T

There are some big holes in the current Netflix selection. I know that if I had kept searching, I could have found more big films that aren’t on this list.

All in all, I have mix feelings about the service. I like that there are some films that I can watch this month for free, but I’m just wondering how long it will take Netflix to fill in the gaps. Hopefully within the month many of the films on the above list will be available, because Netflix could be a really great service if they can bump up their selection.

Monday, September 20, 2010

Is Facebook Working on a Phone?

facebook_logo I can’t see them making one. But maybe that’s just me.

Rumors started swirling over the weekend that Facebook, the popular social network, was working on a mobile phone. All of these rumours were all started by TechCrunch, who reported that an insider had given them some information that Facebook was developing their own mobile phone operating system and were apparently working with a third party to create the hardware. All of this has been denied officially by Facebook, but it doesn’t really mean that Facebook isn’t working on something.

TechCrunch last year was the site that broke the story that Google was working on their own mobile phone and so they do have some credibility when it comes to finding the inside scoop. But I find myself not believing this one. What would Facebook gain from having a phone?

Then again, the same could be said about Google creating a mobile operating system and ultimately a phone. Google has worked to get people increasingly into their ecosystem of produces so they can make more money. Could this be Facebook’s motive for a Phone? Given a lot of the changes that have occurred to Facebook over the years, I have to believe they would want to be in more places, so that Facebook becomes a larger experience for people in their daily lives.

But one has to think the part of this must be partly involved with Google, and Apple to a lesser extent, trying to build social networks. Just how Google made the move into the Apple dominated mobile business, Facebook maybe set to try and move into Google and Apple’s business space. Well that is assuming the rumours are true.

As for the Facebook phone being a low end device that does data, I have to believe that Facebook learned from Microsoft’s mistake. The Kin earlier this year, flopped partly due to the fact that they had expensive data plans attached to them. The Kin phones were great, but no one in the low end market was really interested in spending high end data rates to get the phone. I would have to imagine that the Facebook phone would have a similar challenge as the Kin, since to access Facebook you will need to have data and if a major cell network isn’t willing to cut the cost of the data plan, I can’t see the Facebook phone even having a chance of survival.

Then again, maybe with time Facebook may find a solution to the data plan dilemma. Until they do, I’m calling this rumour a bust. What about you?

Friday, September 17, 2010

New Twitter

newtwitter1

One has to wonder if it’s a bit too late.

Chances are if your reading this your probably already a twitter user. But for those that aren’t familiar with Twitter, Twitter is essentially a social networking site were users share everything from what they are thinking to what they are doing at the moment, all in 140 characters. The 140 characters limit by the way first started with the notion that users would be updating their feeds via text messages from their cell phones which had a limit of 140 characters per text message.

Since the launch of Twitter back in July of 2006, Twitter always seemed to embrace the idea of being simple and easy to use, and thus resisted the impulse to add new features. In many cases, Twitter has simply been a backbone for third party applications. Because of this, many people access Twitter via their cell phones. I know that I mostly see Twitter via my Blackberry. If I wasn’t blogging I don’t think I would ever go to the website via my computer, but I know that there are a lot of people that still do, so perhaps it’s a good idea for Twitter to start to do something to keep people coming to their main page.

The new Twitter is coming pretty loaded. Some of the new features are the ability to embed pictures and video in your feed, as well as, a customizable side bar that you can create for your followers, mini profiles so you can click on a user and see his profile, and an ability to find related content by clicking on an author or story.

Personally, I’m excited by Twitters new emphasis on their main page since I always wonder how these guys ever plan on making money. When I log into Twitter I don’t see ads of any kind. Sure they have those sponsored tweets, but I don’t see them too often. And so my question over the years, as the site literally started falling over because of its mass amount of users, how will these guys ever make money. The New Twitter looks like it could possibly answer that question. Well at least I hope it does. So what do you guys think of the new Twitter?

*** By the way, those interested in seeing Twitters new ad just view the video below.

 

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Tourist Trailer

Man this looks good.

Johnny Depp is probably by far my favourite actor out there. He seems to have this unique ability to be able to play anyone, but he doesn’t necessarily get the credit for it. This does come partly from the fact that Johnny usually ends up playing similar characters in many of his films from Pirates of the Caribbean to Alice in Wonderland, he seems to like to play a somewhat strange character. So it’s really nice to see Johnny Depp take on a role were he plays a normal guy, which from the trailer it appears he does a really good job of. Paired with Angelina Jolie who also always does a really good job, I think this film will be a real knock out when it’s released in December. Especially if “The Tourist” lives up to its action themes.

So what do you think?

VIA

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Pokémon Grows Up

 

 

 

For Live Action anyways

Growing up I remember the Pokémon being a show aimed at kids featuring these often cute looking creatures that were capable of doing different things based on their particular species. But there appears to be a move underway to mature our cute friends.

Above you will see a trailer for a possible upcoming film for Pokémon. I know that it’s a bit hard to make out, but the poster of this video apparently attended a secret showing of this film trailer and managed to record the last 30 seconds of it. From the trailer you can see some pretty adult violence and our favourite cute looking Pokémon mingled in between. The trail does make for an interesting concept, but I’ll discuss that in a minute.

But first, I think I should answer the question as to whether or not if this Pokémon trailer is a fake, which it is. Unfortunately some film sites jumped the gun on this one and reported it as if it could be real, but I took some time to track down the original story (which you can read here) and found that it confirmed that the trailer was fake. In the Internet age unfortunately fact checking hasn’t become the norm and I’m sometimes guilty of it myself, so I can’t blame anyone for running with this story.

Perhaps this rush to report comes from some long time Pokémon fans wanting to see a more mature film. Over on The Movie Blog, Rodney seems to have a slight attraction for the Pokémon and went as far to say that an updated more mature concept like this made sense since the Pokémon audience has grown up. This is true. Anyone that started watching Pokémon when it first started are now adults and so for there to be some mature themes throughout a Pokémon film would make sense since the audience is older now. That being said, I don’t think it’s a good idea to potentially cut off a new audience. By maturing the Pokémon, it creates a situation where parents may not want to bring their kids to see a Pokémon movie, which would a giant oversight by the film’s producers. Family films do very well at the theatre and so for Pokémon to not be a family film, would be a huge mistake. By remaining family friendly, adults that grow up with Pokémon will feel inclined to bring their kids to the theatre to see the new film. Kind of like the way parents may have brought their kids to see Transformers or GIJOE when they recently released their films.

So to mature the Pokémon from a marketing perspective is a really bad idea. And besides, how many adults are really interested in continuing to keep up with the Pokémon. It was great when you were a kid, but as you get older you have a lot more concerns that I don’t think most adults will find the time for Pokémon. What about you?

VIA

***UPDATE:  It has been pointed out to me that the article from Shogun Gamer doesn’t say that this Pokémon film trailer is fake, which I agree it doesn’t.  But the fact that the trailer came from a fake e-mail,  seems to suggest that it isn’t real.  At least it suggest that for me. I’m also supported by the guys over at Kotaku  who have called the trailer fake as well.  Lets face it,  Pokémon would never release a mature film like this one.  I know older fans would love to see it,  but I don’t see it happening.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Happy Birthday Mario

Many of you may not know this, but yesterday was Super Mario’s 25th anniversary. It was yesterday, 25 years ago that Super Mario first appeared on the Famicom in Japan. Before this Mario had appeared in Donkey Kong and Mario Bros., but it was with the release of Super Mario Bros. that made Mario a household name. Super Mario Bros. went on to selling over 40 Million units in the last 25 years. What is uncertain however is whether Super Mario Bros. sold over 40 million units because of its bundling with the NES systems.

One fun little fact is that Super Mario was the best selling videogame ever up until Wii Sports came out and was bundled with the Wii. Perhaps more games should come bundled to the console it does seem to work out for these games. In any case, happy birthday Mario, may you enjoy many more gaming years.

VIA

Monday, September 13, 2010

Microsoft Gets Aggressive

Well sort of.

As you already know, Windows Phone 7 series phones are just around the corner, and with that Microsoft has started to gear up their advertising for this new series of phones. But what you might not know is that Microsoft over the weekend decided to kick it up a notch with an all out iPhone funeral and a Thriller dance.

Well technically, this event wasn’t intended to be a marketing ploy. According to an update to the story, Microsoft’s communications VP Frank Shaw, stated that these kinds of parties are common in the tech community and are designed to let employees blow off steam. Thus this aggressive display wasn’t intended to be seen publically.

I just have one question then? What happened to the good old days, when you would rent out a bar or dining hall and bring your employees out to dinner or dancing? Perhaps I’m just a little behind the times, but I would much prefer a standard dinner to having to work on choreography to perform an elaborate dance routine. I have to wonder if Microsoft is really trying to soften the blow so that they don’t look so aggressive. Aka Microsoft knew this would become public but they don’t want to publicly seem so aggressive, which a good idea is by the way.

Don’t get me wrong, I would like to see Microsoft be more aggressive, but to public state that your phone is the iPhone killer is a really bold statement which you have to deliver on. If Windows Phone 7 is not on par with the iPhone in any way, it would fall below consumer expectations and would be seen as a disaster even if the phone was a really good phone. The fact that Frank Shaw came out to state that this was simply an employee event was a good idea, at least in my opinion. So what about you?

VIA

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Google Instant

In case you missed all of the excitement yesterday, Google officially updated their search yesterday with Google Instant. Well perhaps not too exciting. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to have a faster search engine, but what I find is more important is being able to find what you’re looking for.

Google in one of their press videos stated that you be able to redefine your search based on what your results are, as you type in your request, but I still don’t see how that may help me to find more obscure items.

Hopefully once Google Instant goes live here in Canada, I’ll be proven wrong about the service and it will be amazingly easy to find what you’re looking for, but I just don’t see it.

VIA

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Is Streaming the Future?

Apple_TV

I hope not.

As many of you already know, Apple TV received a bit of an upgrade last week at the Apple event. The new Apple TV comes featuring an upgraded UI and no storage. Including no storage into this device is a pretty bold move on the part of Apple. People are use to the idea of owning their own content, but it appears Apple is attempting to sell people on the idea of simply renting it.

Sure Apple is not the first to do that, Netflix and other online services have been running streaming services for some time now. But what makes Apples approach different is that they don’t have a subscription model. Certainly the Apple TV can stream Netflix or YouTube, etc., it’s just that Apple themselves have not come up with a subscription model and I have to wonder why. Perhaps Apple isn’t really interested in the content. After all Apple is hardware company and perhaps their interests are in selling the Apple TV itself. Which is kind of what they’ve done with iTunes, were most of the money goes to content creators.

That being said, one disappointing feature of the Apple TV is its streaming. Apparently, Apple TV will only stream in 720p. Which is good for most people, and is really not too surprising since I have found that streaming, although its improved over the years, still isn’t as close to what you can get if you have the content locally on the device your playing from. This is why I’m a little disappointed that there is no storage on this device. Apple TV in my opinion has taken a step back, as it seems Apple left out the storage to please content creators that wouldn’t mind you renting their content.

Whatever the case, having no local storage and having streaming options do solve one problem. In my opinion, in that most people don’t want to own everything they watch. I have a friend that has “acquired” a lot of movies over the years and so he ended up with boxes and boxes of DVDs, which became a mess to deal with and now that Blu-Rays have come out there is problem as to what to do with all of those DVDs. Not owning the content solves that problem, just as long as the streaming service comes at a decent price.

With Apple’s rental service, not owning your content could get really expensive fast. So I’m hoping Apple come up with their own subscription service soon, since other players can stream Netfilx and Youtube too and they also come with built-in storage. Even the Playstation 3, Wii and Xbox 360 can stream Netflix, so I’m not sure why anyone that owns these devices would want an Apple TV. Then again, maybe that’s just me.

What do you think? Are you buying an Apple TV?

VIA

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Machete Bombs

machete_poster_01 What happened?

Back in 2007, Robert Rodriquez and Quentin Tarantino got to gather to release their double feature film, Grindhouse. Although it didn’t do so well at the box office many people were impressed with the Trailer for Machete. So it was no surprise when it was soon after announced that Machete would be developed into a feature film which released this past weekend. And if you are like most people, you probably didn’t notice or just didn’t care to see it.

Machete unfortunately only made $11.3 million this past weekend to come in at 3rd. My question is what happened? It seemed that a lot of people were looking forward to Machete but when it came out their interest was gone. I had one friend that commented that he felt Danny Trejo is only a side character and couldn’t hold a movie. I know that some reviewers also didn’t like it, but overall it seems the film did hold up as it holds a 71% on Rotten Tomatoes.

I have to wonder if Machete suffered from some Scott Pilgrim syndrome, where by the film failed to market itself. Whatever the case, I hope Machete can recover from this bad weekend. But I feel that it is unlikely that it will.

VIA

Windows Phone 7 is coming

But is this a revolution.

Yesterday, it was reported on a number of sites that Microsoft had released a teaser for their upcoming Windows Phone 7 devices. And you know what? I’m looking forward to Windows Phone 7. Listening to guys like Paul Thurrott and his Windows Weekly podcast I’m hearing a lot of good things about Windows Phone 7. And, it does help that they are adopting the Zune UI.

For those few that managed to get a Zune HD, you will know that it’s actually a pretty good device. At least that is what I’ve heard of the device as its not available up here in Canada, (I’m not mad).

Personally, I’m glad to see Microsoft get back in the cell phone game, as Windows Mobile 6 was a bit of a disappointment for many people. Sure it did improve with updates, but the updates came a bit too late in the game. And Apple was allowed to run away with the market.

In any case, if the rumours are true we should be seeing some Windows Phone 7 devices arriving in the next few months and so I’ll leave any judgement of the phones until they come out. What about you? Are you looking forward to Windows Phone 7?

VIA

Friday, September 3, 2010

Toy Story 3 to Re-Release this Weekend.

toystory3 I’m not quite sure what to make of this.

Sure Toy Story 3 was a great film, probably even one of the best films that were released this year and I won’t mind even seeing it again. But I have to wonder about this new trend in Hollywood to re-release films. Is re-releasing a film really a good thing? Certainly many families may decide this weekend to take the opportunity before their kids go back to school to go and see Toy Story 3 again in the theatre.

Although there is a bit of a question as to whether or not families are willing to go and see Toy Story 3 this early after its theatrical run. With Avatar there was a period of months between its re-release and its theatrical run, but some theatres just stopped showing Toy Story 3 and some never stopped.

From a business stand point I can understand film studios wanting to squeeze every dime out of a film, but for use film goers I have to think that it’s not a good trend. After all, every time a film is re-released it takes up valuable theatres for its re-release, meaning that there is another film that doesn’t make it into that theatre, or another film is bumped.

Truth be told, I’m not against re-releases. I enjoyed seeing the Dark Knight re-release last year around January. I just don’t necessarily like the timing of this batch of re-releases and I would hate to see a re-release compete for theatres with new films.

VIA

Thursday, September 2, 2010

FanExpo 2010 Report

Or should I say FailExpo 2010.

Personally I would love to tell you how much fun I had this year at the convention, but the truth is my weekend got a bit messed up, and so, I’m still a bit raw and angry about it. So you may see that coming through as I do this report. Sorry about that.

Day One

PICT0460 Day One of the convention actually didn’t go to badly although it got off to a late start. On Friday, those that bought a deluxe ticket in advanced were supposed to be allowed to get in at 2pm, 2 hours before the actually event opened to the rest of the people. That unfortunately didn’t happen as I got in around 3:30 pm, which wasn’t bad. In years past, the convention never use to get started on time, and so I was used to having to wait a bit longer than the normal starting time.

Once inside the convention I spent my time walking around to get the lay of the land, as there weren’t any really interesting panels going on that evening. At least there weren’t any panels I was interested in seeing. But one thing I picked up on was the fact that we might have some problems on Saturday with overcrowding, as it was evident that there were congestion issues starting to happen.

Saturday typically is a big convention day as most of the panels and guest are there on Saturday, so I was a bit worried that the convention might get shutdown this year. I took a picture Friday evening of the convention which you can see below.

PICT0509 As you can see there were a lot of people already there on Friday evening.

Day Two

PICT0482 Day Two of the convention started off well enough, but it unfortunately turned for the worse. I arrived at the convention around 11:30 and began to line up for the Tron Legacy preview, which was awesome I might add. The Tron Legacy preview was a bit of a commercial for their upcoming games, as they had one of the producers for the game come down to promote the games. Following the game demos, we had the opportunity to watch a couple of trailers for Tron Legacy and view a scene from the film in 3D. For those interested the scene showed what happens to Sam Flynn when he first enters the Tron universe. It was a quite impressive scene that showed some of the expansiveness of the Tron World. After the clip, they brought out Actor Bruce Boxleitner for an interview and Q&A with the guys from the Space channel’s Inner Space as moderators.

Following the Tron Preview, I headed to the Stan Lee Q & A, which was a very interesting panel, as Stan Lee can be quite a personality.

PICT0011 After the Stan Lee Q & A the trouble started. The convention volunteers wanted us to exit the hall since there was a Adam West & Burt Ward panel happening in the same room afterwards and because of this there was already quite a big line waiting to come in. Once outside the hall I realised nothing was moving. This was a bit of a problem as we were on the basement level and had nowhere to go. I started to think to myself that if anyone started to panic this could become a bad place really fast, as there was probably a crowd of around 100 or more people going nowhere all confined in a hallway. I tried to go through into another convention hall when I saw a FanExpo employee came out and he kind of pushed me back. (Which wasn’t really cool.) He was however nice enough to inform me that they weren’t letting anyone go upstairs.

When they finally starting to allow people to leave the basement, I remember looking outside and seeing a bunch of people pressed up against the glass wanting to get in. It looked like something out of a zombie invasion. As I went outside to give my friend his pass which I had bought for him on Friday so that he wouldn’t have to wait in line. As I exited, I was never told what was going on. Apparently the convention had reached capacity and thus they were not letting anyone in. So when I exited I was stuck outside, regardless if I had paid. I ended up waiting outside for about 2-3 hours to get back in. My friend who had a day pass never got in until 5:30pm even though the convention was supposed to close at 7 pm. I missed all of the panels I wanted to see in the afternoon and my friend missed seeing Stan Lee, who he came specifically to see. All in all, we were really disappointed at this year’s convention. The extra hour they announced that the convention was going to be open for did not help us out in the least.

Day 3

PICT0060 Day 3 was a slow day, as most of the big panels happened on Saturday. I attended the Sendhil Ramamurthy and the Micheal Dorn Q&As as well as the Udon 10 year panel. All in all, it was a nice way to end the convention.

As for whether or not I will return next year to the convention. That all depends on what Hobbystar (the company behind the convention) decides to do about what happened to me Saturday and what changes they decide to make in the future to prevent Saturday from happening again.