Fan Expo Vancouver 2012

Fan Expo has finally taken over the west side of Canada and as a big name convention in Canada, it had to be checked out.

The pre-registration pick-up line was long but moved quickly, although it was ridiculous to see how there was absolutely no line for the on-site registrants. The convention pass was a mere glittery wrist band, or a stamp on the hand for single day passes. The simple wrist band made it transferable, which was nice (whether transferring was even allowed or not is another story). The convention *was* the exhibition hall where practically everything was held: autographs, photographs, dealers, and artist alley. They had one relatively giant area broken off from the hall and one extra, smaller conference room upstairs that were used for panels. The smaller room was way too small for the people they should've expected to show up so if you weren't lining up early, you have basically missed your chance. And if you missed your chance and had already strolled around the exhibition hall enough times, you've just set yourself up to be bored for the rest of the event. The dealers present were of a nice variety, mostly focusing on comics, and then there were the other geeky cultures covered. Speaking of other geeky cultures, the anime cosplaying crowd were the most prominent (an excuse for them to dress up?), but there definitely were a number of awesome old school appearances from childhood cartoons as well.

The sketching panels, which featured a few named comic book artists per panel, were the most interesting at the event. While questions were asked, they sketched and by the end of it, they had an amazing piece of art which they gave away to the audience. Other than that, we chilled out at the Bongo Comics panel to cheer on Space and rolled our eyes at the Anime Revolution panels.

I think it's pretty safe to say that the event was successful so I imagine we'll be seeing them again next year.