Convention Mania!

Me with friend at Dr Who Museum in Blackpool

I went to my first science fiction convention this weekend. It was in Blackpool and was called Starfury Decalogy (as in the ten year anniversary of Starfury conventions run by Sean Harry). There were plenty of guests there (Sean's favourite guests from the ten years, apparently) from lots of shows like Angel, Buffy, Firefly, X files, Battlestar Galactica, Andromeda, etc. Most of the fans were Angel fans and everyone wore their show affiliation proudly on their chests (i.e t-shirts).

Here I am with Christian Kane (Lindsey from Angel)

All the guests were really nice. My stand outs for guest talks was Armin Shimerman. He is a very intelligent, witty, well educated, entertaining performer and gave brilliant answers to all the audience questions. I didn't get to meet him in person, but I gather he was as nice in person as on stage.

My personal favourites were Christian Kane (Lindsey from Angel, pictured above) and Juliet Landau (Drusilla from Angel and Buffy). Christian wasn't great on stage, but was really genuinely nice when I met him for my photo and at the autograph session. Plus he asked how to pronounce my name and said he loved it! (what a charmer). Juliet was equally friendly. That is not to say that the other guests I met weren't nice, it is just that Christian and Juliet stood out in my experience. Honourable mention also goes to Mark Sheppard (Badger from Firefly and Cecil L'Ively from The X Files) who loved my Nathan Fillion t-shirt and was very chatty.

My new best friend - Kaylee from Firefly (AKA Jewel Staite)

All the other people at the convention were really friendly and united in their love of the tv shows. There was a great feeling of camaraderie and even though there were a lot of delays and a lot of queuing, there were no unpleasant moments.

As for Blackpool. Well, it has 11 miles of sea front (mostly lined with hotels, amusements arcades, tattoo parlours and pound shops), lots of dogs, a huge roller coaster, a conspiracy museum, a Doctor Who exhibition, a sea life aquarium and lots and lot of slot machines. It also has a nice little Italian. The people in the shops and the hotel were very friendly.

If there was a down point to the convention, it was that the dealer room was poor. I expected lots of interesting stalls and a huge room full of merchandise, but it was a small room with a couple of tables and enthusiasts. I managed to pick up a few nice things all the same, but I was hoping to get some cool t-shirts (and this lovely serenity, firefly, browncoat lanyard I saw) but there were none to be found.

Now that my inner fangirl has finally been allowed to have her head, the only question is - when is the next convention?