Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, preview night, sdcc

SDCC: About Last Night… Impressions Of Preview Night Of The Con

Published Thu, 12 Jul 2012 20:05:46 -0500

Last updated Fri, 13 Jul 2012 03:49:28 -0500

Alex Wilson writes:

Preview night is not as much of a mad house as the other days. The show floor isn't as full, The lines move a bit faster, and the smell isn't anywhere near as terrible as mid-day Saturday, trying to move through the film studios' booths.

Still, every year, over 100,000 people get together and celebrate what they have in common, geek culture. It does not matter if you're here for the video games, studio movies, network television, action figures, or just plane old comics. We all have a shared experience and it's willing to wake up when some people are just getting to bed and wait in line for unbelievable amounts of time to get a small glimpse at that thing we love. We are all geeks. We love long lines and slave Leia costumes. The over priced food and show exclusives. From the extraordinarily cute girls to the extraordinarily obese men. We are all family and this con is our family reunion, bringing us together, every year for some fun in San Diego, to forget about our lives for a few days and have a chance to be part of this amazing industry that we have supported, nurtured and ultimately created. We are comic con.

This year's preview night had an interesting flair for some fans waiting in line for the show floor, around three hours before doors opened. An un-named man gathered everyone's attention who was waiting in line and started with one of the worst phrases you could say to a crowd of people you don't know.

"I'm not going to hurt you!"

Everyone's attention was on him while he started yelling that he need sixty two dollars and seventy five cents to pay for his medication and that medicine, if you're wondering, is Lithium. For those who are unfamiliar with this drug, it's to treat people with bipolar disorder from having episodes of mania. Everyone in the crowd stair awkwardly at the man, each other, and the completely baffled staff that stood there with faces of confusion and fear. (I bet they didn't cover this in Comic-Con staff orientation.)

The question that was on my mind was how he had gotten this far in the convention center without a badge. Had no one noticed a frantic man wandering around the convention center? Why had no one noticed he had no badge? Who let him in the convention center at all?

Security took a while to respond and once they arrived they did not treat the man with force but simply tried to coax the man to leave but this tactic took more than a few minutes to accomplish. The man I was standing next comment that for the first ten minutes he thought the man was part of some studio campaign, promoting a show, but as minutes ticked by and the man repeated phases it became apparent that this was no show, as many of us had assumed at first, but this was a real man, screaming for medication, and yelling he wasn't going to hurt us.