MCM Comic Con London Review - Day 3

Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending MCM Comic Con London, the UK's largest pop culture event, which took place at the ExCel centre.

Having attended New York Comic Con back in 2013, this was my first major Comic Con since then and my first on home soil, so the opportunity to immerse myself in the culture and unleash my inner geek for 72 hours was very exciting.

Here is a roundup of the events on Day 3, the final day of the Con (Sunday 28th October)

Day 3

• Funko
• Chris Claremont
• The Dark Knight Retrospective panel
• #SaveShadowHunters panel
• Outlander season 4 preview
• Critical Role
• Into The Spider-Verse preview and panel

The final day began with the one activity I had wanted to partake in since I saw the frenzy on the opening day - visiting the Funko stand!

It was clear that this one probably the number one draw of the Con, outside of the Critical Role panels... but we'll get to that in a minute!

Simply by walking the floor at the ExCel, if you were not aware of the name of the event you were attending, you would not be surprised if it was called MCM Funko Con. Beyond the compact Comic Village area where all the artists and dealers were set up, the overwhelming majority of the independent stands were selling a wide variety of Funko POPs!

It was a real insight into the insane popularity of these toys which was the subject of the documentary Making Fun: The Story of Funko (available on Netflix) and a glimpse into the slightly murkier world of the second hand dealer market for these toys, particularly Con Exclusives, which the doc doesn't explore.

So armed with my trusty Starbucks (with the name Devos written on the side), I marked out my territory early at 8.30am to allow for a straight shot ahead to the Funko stand and landed in the first 10-20 people in the queue who were very excited about getting their one shot (is that a Hamilton reference?), yet I couldn't help but smile and stifle laughter at the rage and indignation shown when the crowds discovered that certain exclusives for Fantastic Beasts and a Ghost Rider Doctor Strange were not available having sold out on the Saturday. You have never seen so many grown adults with the hashtag #FirstWorldProblems on their foreheads shouting about how it was a "disgrace" and Funko should have had a certain amount of each one available for each day of the Con (a fair point to be honest) but as someone not particularly interested in FB, I must have ended up looking like Ryan Gosling when it was announced Moonlight had won the Oscar instead of La La Land.

(Full disclaimer: I have secured a Ghost Rider pop which is why I could afford to laugh because I could immediately visualise the dealers at the Con who had scooped up these Pops on the Fri/Sat frantically scoring out the prices and writing new inflated ones to capitalise on the demand!).

Heading over to the main stage, I had the time to pay a visit to a comic legend in the form of Chris Claremont (X-Men, Wolverine) who was kind enough to sign my copy of X-Men #1 from 1991.

This was the very first comic that I bought and it opened up a whole new world to me and I was fortunate enough to tell him this which he thanked me for but lamented that it was one of his final runs on the characters but I flipped it round and said that it introduced myself and many others to the X-Men and his work in his back catalogue which he found a comforting thought.

From one comic legend to another as I took my place in the Main Stage area for The Dark Knight panel by DC which featured, among others, Frank Miller the mind behind The Dark Knight Returns, Year One and Daredevil.

Moderated by DC editor Chris Conway, the panel hosted a staggering array of talent from Miller to Tim Sale, John Romita Jr, Brain Azzarello and Frank Quitely (who I hadn't realised was Scottish until he started speaking in thick Glaswegian accent!).
They talked about the legacy of the character; their first introduction to him (for the majority of the panel it was the Adam West TV show),

Here's where the fun begins...

By the end of the panel, the stage area was completely full. It was standing room only and even then it was at capacity.

Before Saturday, the Main Stage was simply that. The Main Stage. However following the chaos yesterday over the Critical Role panel (with hundreds of fans or “Critters” as they are known denied access due to the room being a capacity), today it had become London’s Hall H with fans camping out in the hall from 10.00am for a 2.15pm panel.

It made for an interesting situation. As per other conventions, the hall is not emptied after each panel. Therefore the only way to secure your place for a particular panel is too grab one early and stay there till the event. This means you are guaranteed to see the panel you want but it does mean that you could have people sitting in on panels they have no interest in and at the same time denying entry to others who want to see a panel on prior to Critical Role.

This led to a situation where in order to guarantee a seat at the Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse panel on directly after the CR panel, I had to stay in the Main Stage for 6 hours! Hardcore! Good thing I didn't have anything to drink that morning besides coffee! However due to this unplanned encampment, I did miss out on the Chris Claremont spotlight and the Hasbro Marvel & Star Wars reveal panels which was a shame.

Instead I got a Save The Shadowhunters panel and the first episode of season 4 of Outlander (of which I have not watched a single episode prior to this). The episode certainly seemed to please the fans who made it into the hall but there is nothing more awkward than watching a sex scene projected onto a giant screen surrounded by thousands of people!

Finally at 2.15pm, it was main event time (for the overwhelming majority of fans) as the Critical Role team took to the stage to a reception that would have rivalled a One Direction concert!

(Again full disclaimer time: before this weekend I had not heard of Critical Role and had to speak with several fans in the queues in order to understand what it was and why it was so popular).
Standing among the fans, it was easy to see why this show, the actors and D&D has become so popular since Stranger Things brought it back into the mainstream. The kindness, humour and respect they showed the audience and people who asked questions was humbling to see. This was a San Diego Comic Con levels of a reaction.
Once the panel was over, it was time for my main event... the preview footage of Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse.
Introduced by the directors and voice of Miles Morales, Shamiek Moore, the crowd got to see the first 30 minutes of the film and the immediate reaction was "WOW!"
This is unlike any Spider-Man you have seen before... and any animated film for that matter. Inspired by Miles Morales's background and love of graffiti, street art, the film looks like a moving street mural.
The footage begins with your traditional Spider-Man story but quickly becomes a meta take on the superhero genre with references to all the other Spidey films (including the dancing scene in Spider-Man 3). This looks like it has the potential to be the best big screen Spider-Man movie we have seen and as the footage concluded just after one of the film's big twists, it left us wanting more and counting down the days till the film is released in December.

This was the perfect way to end a fantastic convention and a huge shout out must go to the staff and volunteers who kept the whole con a fun, safe, enjoyable experience... even under very challenging circumstances on the main stage.

X-Men: Days Of Future Past - review

If I were to try and sum up the plot for X-Men: Days Of Future Past in one paragraph, I might say that Wolverine is sent back in time to persuade Charles Xavier and Magneto to come together to stop Mystique killing Bolivar Trask which prompts the creation of the Sentinel program which ultimately wipes out mutant kind in the future.

Follow that? No? Doesn't matter. You could try watching all the X-Men films, including the Wolverine ones, and all the end credits stings to re-familiarise yourself with the storyline and characters but it might just end up creating more questions than answers.

An action-packed opening sequence in the future which introduces us to some new and familiar faces under attack from sentinels poses such nerdy questions like "How has Wolverine got his adamantium claws back?", "How the hell is Professor X alive and looking like himself?", "Kitty Pryde has always been able to walk through walls but how can she now send people back through time?".

But before we are given time to think too hard about these questions, Bryan Singer quickly sends Wolverine back through time and presents the audience with a shot of Hugh Jackman's naked arse in order to distract us.

As much as this is the X-Men version of The Terminator storyline where someone is sent back in them to prevent the creation of robotic creatures that will wipe out an entire race, it is also paralleled with Singer's return.

Having left the franchise after X2 in order to make Superman Returns, he returns to a storyline where he uses the characters developed in First Class to retcon the universe to alter events that he wasn't happy with in X3: The Last Stand which mishandled The Dark Phoenix saga among other things, effectively giving him a clean slate to work with in the future in The Age Of Apocalypse (which I can't help but sing to the tune of Age of Aquarius).

But you can't make people excited for the future unless they enjoy the current film (take note makers of Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice).

Luckily this instalment is the most enjoyable since X2 from the opening attack which highlights the future sentinels and new mutants including Blink whose power of creating temporary portals is used to terrific visual effect or the sequence where Quicksilver infiltrates the Pentagon to break out Magneto with the best use of bullet-time since The Matrix.

Despite switching between the two time frames and featuring as many characters as you would find in a tweet, the main focus of the plot is the younger versions of Charles and Eric, who are further at odds than when we last saw them in First Class.

James McAvoy really gets to stretch his acting legs (pun intended) with the biggest character arc, starting as a drunk, disillusioned man who has given up his powers in exchange for the use of his legs (again not fully explained), completely uninterested in Wolverine's "future-shite" but must grow into the man who eventually becomes Patrick Stewart's calm, noble Professor X (with whom he shares a geek-tastic time-bending head-to-head).

The all-action climax helps to start reassembling the jigsaw pieces together to head towards the world already established in X-Men and X2 and it will be interesting to see if the next instalments feature the younger or older X-Men as this almost feels like a passing of the torch between casts.

An X-Cellent ensemble that successfully mutates between post-apocalyptic Sci-Fi and funky seventies blockbuster with the overall result being a bright future for the franchise.

If it was sitting an X-am, this would get a Days Of Future Pass.

4 stars

REVIEW: X-Men: First Class - Vaughn gives this franchise a reboot up the arse.

Ah, what a difference a couple of months can make.  It was only back in March that people (The Incredible Suit included) were despairing over the terrible marketing campaign Fox were putting out for X-Men: First Class.  Could it be that an insanely tight production schedule had resulted in a turkey of mutant proportions?
Fast forward to the end of May and First Class debuts to a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics hailing it as the best comic book movie since The Dark Knight.
So what's the truth?  While it is certainly not as good as The Dark Knight, it is closer to Batman Begins than Batman & Robin.
A lot of the reviews so far have made comparisons to Christopher Nolan's reboot of the Batman franchise and a lot of them are justified.  Both Tim Burton's Batman and Bryan Singer's X-Men started with the heroes already existing in society.  Nolan went back to the beginning to look at what makes a man dress up as a bat to fight crime, and Vaughn looks at the formation of the X-Men (the recruitment montage features one of the best ever cameos and uses of the F-bomb) and the pivotal moment that turned friends Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnser into the enemies they were are the start of the first film.

"I loved you in Band Of Brothers", "I was going to say the same thing!"

Matthew Vaughn is really coming into his own as a director and delivers a summer blockbuster that nearly manages to break out of the comic book genre and become just a really great movie.  The period setting allows for Vaughn to fulfill his Bond fantasies (to the extent that the villain has a secret submarine in his yacht).  Kick-Ass proved he could do action but he manages to create a fun, action-packed summer blockbuster that never has to sacrifice story or character development. 
He has an impressive ensemble cast that help provide a lot more threads in the Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon game but top marks however must go to the James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence.  Despite the iconic performances of Stewart and McKellen, their younger counterparts quickly make the parts their own.  McAvoy has an impish charm to him, using his power to get girls until fate shows him that he is destined to use this power for a greater purpose, and Fassbender has the steely eyed look of a man who could be the next James Bond, and in this film he becomes a bona fide star.
There is a moment in the film where Xavier helps Magneto achieve the full extent of his powers and the look on Fassbender's face played out with Henry Jackman's music underneath is a truly touching moment which cements their friendship which makes the tragic turn events take all the more sad.
Jennifer Lawrence also makes the most of a terrific story arc that focuses on what has always been at the heart and soul of the X-Men stories: the struggle and fight for acceptance in a world that fears what is different.
First Class is not a perfect film.  Due to the rushed production schedule (it was rewritten, filmed, edited and post production all within a year), unfortunately there are some niggling issues like dodgy CGI, Beast's make-up, missing love story lot between Charles and Moira, a couple of underwritten minor characters, and Fassbender's accent going rather Oirish at times.  But I think that if Vaughn had had a little more time to polish rounds the edges then this could have been a five star film... but unless he gets the chance to tinker with it before the DVD release then he'll have to make do with a rating of 4.5 stars.

4.5 stars