Boston Comic Con Recap #1: Con And Terry Dodson

Welcome to the first of multiple posts covering my time at this last weekend's Boston Comic Con. This is *my* show, a huge con right up the road that have attended since its inception. This show has gone from being held in an insurance building basement to selling out the Seaport Convention Center. I consider myself lucky that such a great show is in my back yard.

I went to the con with hopes of getting commissions from Terry Dodson, Jae Lee, Tana Ford, and Daniel Govar. I was lucky enough to grab them all.

I have been a fan of Terry Dodson for a long time. He is a really nice personable creator who was fun to meet. He takes a long list of potential commissions on the first day and by the end of Friday he had narrowed down the selections to which commissions he thought he could get to. I decided that the 70s costume would be fun and interesting for Dodson to draw and so asked for that Kara. Luckily, I won the lottery and Sunday morning I picked up the above piece ... just stunning!

This is pure Dodson. But I love how with just copic markers he makes the sleeves seem translucent. And the salute is a nice patriotic touch. I am just thrilled with this piece. I'll be posting the other commissions over the next three weeks on Thursday. But the rest of this post covers the rest of the con.

I definitely had a stack of comics to get autographed from creators. As I have said before, I try to stratify books for sigs. I want them to be both important to me and possibly important to comics. But the former outweighs the latter. So having Dodson sign Showcase 96 #8 (first PAD Supergirl story with Dodson art) or Rafael Albuquerque sign Superman/Batman #62 (one of my favorite Supergirl stories from that year) was important to me.

I had Mark Waid sign Flash #110 because it had my favorite cliffhanger of that run. I even got to talk to Waid about his Legion run (more on that over on a different site).

I had Sam Kieth sign Harley Quinn #0, the sixth creator to do so. I talked to Erik Larsen about his time on Doom Patrol and had him sign some of those issues. I talked to Aaron Lopresti about his Wonder Woman run and had him sign by Ends of the Earth hard cover (which he remarqued with a little Diana).

There are too many to list. But I have to end with the fact that I got David Lloyd to sign some V for Vendetta issues. V was and is a huge book for me as a reader. It came out at just the right time for me and has resonated since. I love that book. So meeting him ... well ... I think I was an incomprehensible blathering mess. One cannot look at the sun too long.

And I was able to hang around Howard Chaykin's table and have a erudite conversation with him and other fans, a discussion occasionally punctuated with curse words. Brilliant stuff as always.

This sort of access and discussion of my favorite things with the creators who did them is what cons are for, at least for me.

There were some pretty long lines to navigate over the days as the con was pretty packed. I spent a while in Sam Kieth's line. I spent a longer while in Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner's line (alas ... no Conner Grail piece this year). I spent some time in Caity Lotz' line.

By the time Sunday came along, my feet were killing me and I was pretty tired. I also admit that much of my con funds were spent on the commissions. So I didn't really have much time to actually shop for comic books.

The only thing I got myself was the Rock Candy Supergirl statue which was a mission for me.

What I was shocked to find was the number of new books on the 'wall' for the vendors. Somehow Superman/Gen 13 (Campbell variants) are now wall books fetching prices of $75. I got them in the dollar box and have them signed by Adam Hughes and Campbell.

There was the usual number of comic related celebrities at the con as well. On Saturday I went with the youngest Supergirl. She got her own Adventures of Supergirl books signed by Cat Staggs. She also met and got an autograph by Caity Lotz. White Canary is her favorite character on DCLOT. My daughter was a bit too starstruck and shy to talk much so I told Lotz how the youngest shipped Capt. Cold and White Canary all season and was crestfallen when the pairing happened and then didn't happen. It was a great moment.

I had tickets to the CW DCU panel and the guests were all smart, kind, and funny. I asked Danielle Panabaker about what it was like working with John Carpenter on The Ward. 'Panabaker and Carpenter' is like 'chocolate and peanut butter'.

So overall, I would call this con a huge success for me. I had a great father daughter day. I got the commissions I wanted. I met and talked with creators. And I even got myself a little piece for the collection.

As always, Boston Comic Con never fails to impress.