Ottawa Comic Con...

I got up early to go to Ottawa comic con with deakat, and I must say, I've had a fantastic time.

• Got art from Dave Ross: a portrait of Magneto and a portrait of Gambit. I am thrilled. They will go on my living room wall as soon as I can afford frames. I also really enjoyed talking with Dave and his wife Judy, who is a three-dimensional artist. Such interesting people.
  
  
• Went to Neal Adam's talk. He isn't at all what I expected, though he's rather like my mental image of Jack Kirby. Or a Jack Kirby character. He was particularly interesting on artists' and writers' rights, and the future of the comic book industry in terms of technology.
  
  
• William Shatner's talk. Utterly entertaining - but he always is. I don't think his memories of living in Ottawa in his youth, in a state of utter poverty, are happy memories.
  
  
• There were some wonderful steampunk art, costumes, and technology - all elaborately rationalized with descriptions of the engineering and purpose for anyone who would listen. Great fun.
  
  
• There were many dealers, but none of them had the particular graphic novels I was looking for, or the British lead figures of Marvel characters, or any merchandise relating to The Avengers movie. There were a few attractive items: like a Captain America doll that I could never afford, at almost $300, but oh, so very beautiful.
  
  
• I saw Jamie Bamber - his talk is tomorrow. He is even more gorgeous in person on television. Is that possible?
  

The place had its problems - I think this is the first show held in the CE Center, which is out near the aiport, but not very near the airport - it's more or less the middle of nowhere. There were no water fountains, and only two places to buy sandwiches, with, but I didn't try it. Instead I headed overland to the new Hilton Garden Hotel, which is about half a kilometer away - only to find that their restaurant was closed. The concierge, trying to be helpful, suggested I take a bus to South Keys to find an open restaurant. I had no illusions about how long that would take. Turns out the hotel sold salads in its "pantry" - I would have called it a tuck shop - so that was fine for my lunch. I would have stayed at the con for the masquerade if there'd been any way of getting a meal, or even a drink, but since there wasn't, I skipped it and the later panels and came home for supper. Which is why I am here now.

Somewhat inadequate washroom facilities, too. I saw a woman who was waiting in line to get in being refused access to the washrooms inside, and told to "use the bushes". What bushes? And once inside, the washroom I used (in the main hallway) had only three or four stalls - for how many thousand women? I'm told the one inside the dealer's room was bigger. I would hope so.

30 Days of Marvel: Day 17: Coolest Marvel apparel

30 Days of Marvel: Day 17: Coolest Marvel apparel

For us? For the fans?

On thing I think, and have always thought, is that most of the outfits sold as comic book merchanizing are either for little kids, or kind of ugly. Ugly in a dorky way. There are some fine T-shirts (and many ugly ones), a few good ties, some watches - but on the whole, the comic book apparel I have seen looks like dorkwear. Stuff adolescent males would wear before they develop any taste or colour sense. Me, I'm not impressed.

There could be Marvel-based apparel that looks both attractive and adult, even dignified. Or glamorous. Something along the lines of Nick Fury's coat, for example. There's so much potential there: fan see it, on pages like GeetTyrant or the Tumblr comic book fashion pages.

Best I can think of is Wolverine's leather jacket.