Sundays at a convention tend to be the slowest, most sedate days. The final day of
All-Con 2014 proved to be no exception. The halls were relatively empty when the day's events officially started at 9 am. Deadpool had very few people to serve his famous flapjacks. Then again, given the reason why said flapjacks are famous, most people were reluctant to take them anyway.
Still,
Jedi Cole and
Rick Gutierrez of
United States of Geekdom were ready to kick the morning off with All-Con's most popular early morning zoo podcast -
Jedi Cole's Morning After. The fact that it's also All-Con's only early morning zoo podcast is not important.
What is important is that dozens of people - fighting either hangovers
or the sleepless nights caused by the people in the next room over who
were up all night earning their hangovers - turned up to eat from tiny
cereal boxes, enjoy a few laughs and win prizes like a never-emptying Guinness baby bottle!
Immediately afterward, the same room hosted
USG's All-Con Wrap-Up show. Joining Jedi Cole and Rick in commiserating over the awesome weekend were
Hey Kids Comics! co-host Andrew Farmer and
Cult Film Fanatics host Roy Buckingham. I also got to speak a bit about my experiences doing panels and podcasts with these gentlemen. Hopefully I'll be able to do the same again next year.
After that, I had to dash to my final two panels of the weekend - a double feature of
Secret Origins: The History of American Comics and
All About Arrow. With my final bit of hosting duties discharged, I had some time to take one final batch of cosplay photos. A shame most of the cosplayers had departed at that point and a goodly number of people were already packing up to go.
Still, I did discover one lively group of Gothamite Steampunk Cosplayers downstairs waiting in line at the
Neither Noir booth, who were willing to camp it up for me while waiting for their shot before the best professional cosplay photographers in Dallas.
I should note that this was one thing about All-Con this year that I think much improved on previous years. This year,
Neither Noir was allowed to set up shop in the lower lobby, near the information booth on the ground floor. I think this helped to eliminate traffic problems on the second floor, where they had previously been set up on a corner before the grand ballroom most of the big events are held in. In times past, it was not uncommon to have complete bottlenecks every hour, on the hour, as events let out only to run into a wall of cosplayers eagerly waiting to have their pictures done. This year, I don't recall seeing or hearing about any similar problems in the lobby.
That is, I think, the best summation of
All-Con 2014. It was an improvement on previous years and it was a good time all around. I can't wait to see what 2015 has in store!
