comic book | Welcome to Phalanxia

This was my first time attending MCM Comic Con in Glasgow even though it isn’t exactly new here anymore, this just happened to be the first time I managed to book the day off work – and it was so worth it.

My usual partner in crime accompanied me (thank goodness for wee cousins – I slipped on the footbridge and would have gone down if not for her – she saved my life guys!!!) and we managed to see pretty much everything we wanted thanks to previous con experience. We’re pros at this now.

On first impressions the event is much smaller than its London counterpart, which is understandable as it is still a new addition to the MCM lineup, but it is very well organised and the layout works very nicely with plenty of room to move between stalls even when it got really busy (once general admission crowds had gained entry). There were still plenty of areas in the exhibition centre left unused by the event so hopefully in the years to come we may see some expansion – perhaps a larger eSports or Vidfest UK area or a Pop Asia addition?

As always our first goal was the comic village. Pro tip: going here first allows you to peruse stalls without pushing through swarms of people, gives you a chance to have a conversation with the artists themselves without them feeling they are ignoring potential customers/fans, and also means that you may be the first sale for a new release which can be pretty special. I came prepared with a list of artists I knew I had to visit and managed to see all of them plus met some new artists who caught my attention with some really amazing work. There is something for everyone in the comic village so even if you don’t read comics or indies the huge variety of art styles and trinkets on offer might find a fan in you.

[I have a soft spot for zombie teddies – they need love too!]

I am particularly fond of buying mystery packs when I see them – not everyone has them on offer, but the artists that do usually pack a nice selection of goodies into a little bag for around £5-10 and they are always more than worth it. This year I bought 2. The first was from Katie White Art and had some super cute A5 prints, a sticker and a badge.

The second was from AnythingComic (my go-to for mystery pack goodness) and as always it was cram-packed with 2 A3 prints, 2 A5 prints, a handful of mini prints and stickers and a lil bag of haribo. There’s a good reason I try to find this stall every con.

While walking around the convention we noticed a lot of people carrying boxes – MyGeekboxes and Zboxes primarily. It took us a while to find the stall but when we did it seemed like everyone had cleaned them out already until the guys told us they were in the process of re-stocking. Some kind directions and a little patience later and we too were walking around carrying boxes. As I already recieve the MyGeekbox I opted for the Zbox, curated by Zavvi. These were really good value at £5 a box and although not filled with the same amount of goodies the monthly box would have they were a nice surprise.

Now time for the panels. Sometimes at Comic Con there are lots of panels we want to go to that overlap and end up with us splitting up and meeting later, others there are no panels that tickle our fancy and we just wait for the masquerade. This was almost one of the latter occasions but one sounded interesting enough to give a try. We arrived a little early and caught the last half of the Reo Kurosu panel which was a nice insight into anime production and the difficulties of editing for different regions. The Building Better Dreams and Nightmares panel was an informative talk with 3 authors about where scifi and fantasy genres can go next. They had some great advice for budding writers on the pitfalls of self-publishing, also they agreed that technology is so far advanced now it’s quite easy to predict what might be possible in the next 20/30 years making it much easier for writers to create very realistic worlds. This panel probably wasn’t to everyones taste (someone behind me seemed bewildered why we were just listening to three people talking about writing books), but I did enjoy it and I now have a couple of books added to my to-read list.

It’s almost tradition now that we stay to watch the Cosplay Masquerade at the end of the day, we were already in our seats from the last panel and had a pretty good view. Glasgow has some very talented cosplayers and lots of them took to the stage – there were also far more performances and skits than we are used to at the London con, it was a real treat.

[sorry for quality, took this one on my phone]

The nice thing about going to a con in your own city is that you can go home straight after, play with all the cool stuff you got and collapse into your own bed for a well earned rest (after you’ve tidied up all the stuff you got).

Here is my haul from this year, mostly comics and art again.