CosFu took on its first con coverage since the revamp at the dual convention of New York Comic Con and New York Anime Fest held on October 8-10, 2010 in New York City. With an estimated whopping 110,000 attendees for both conventions, it was by large one of the biggest conventions we’ve ever attended.
Our first overall assesement of the entire floor plan was:
1. There was A LOT of people.
2. NYCC clearly overtook NYAF.
As fans of both genres, it was nice to see the mix of both Eastern and Western culture. Because of the sheer wall of people at the main dealer’s hall, it was nigh impossible to really get a chance to view the different products on sale. The perks of the dealer’s hall, which pretty much made up 70% of the convention center, was the amount of actual dealers and industry guests. Different vendors ranging from small mom and pop comic shops to the two powerhouse comic book brands of Marvel and DC were in attendance, as well as your typical t-shirt, toy, and other variety of vendors.
There was a huge list of panels to as well that catered to both comic book, movie, music, anime fans with heavy industry and fan-based contribution. To say the least, there was always something to do at any given time before 10 PM.
As stated earlier, New York Comic Con clearly overshadowed New York Anime Fest, which had very few vendors in the main dealer’s room and a small corner downstairs of the Javits Center which was the main locale for the Anime Artists Alley. This may have to do in part with the unsuccessful attempt to bringing back an anime convention to the streets of New York, or simply due to the magnitude of the comic book industry in the United States as opposed to the smaller anime industry. Either way, it was an interesting concept to bring both together as a way to re-establish bonds or form new ones.
The Artist Alley on the NYCC side was brimming with incredible talents in the world of comic books from Adam Hughes, Greg Horn, Arthur Suydam, Cheeks, and many more. The perks of this is a chance to have one-on-one interactions (within reason) with these successful artists to pick at their brains. We spoke to Sean “Cheeks” Galloway, the main character designer to “The Spectacular Spider-Man” about the status of the show where he told us that due to Marvel Studios and Sony not seeing eye-to-eye with how the Spider-Man franchise was being handled, had to stop production. Shame too. But this sort of interaction with established artists in the industry is something you don’t see too often with anime conventions in the United States and something that maybe should be picked up so artists who are trying to get a break in the industry can have a chance to talk to those with more experience.
The Masquerade is one of the highlights to any anime convention, and with a trip to Japan as the grand prize to the winner of the Yume Cup, a lot was riding on this to be ran as smoothly as possible. But it wasn’t. The show started with a concert by Minori Chihara, singer and voice actress, most known as the voice of Yuki Nagato from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. She had a slew of fans cheering her spirited performance on, waving their glowsticks in unison to the beat and making her feel very welcomed. There was a deafening roar with the introduction for “Hare Hare Yukai”, with people dancing in the aisles alongside Chihara-san and her two backup dancers dressed up in Haruhi Suzumiya costumes. The masquerade soon began after the mini-concert, with what was told to the audience would be 10 minutes ended up being over 30 minutes, causing the audience to become a little restless when there was no music to really keep people entertained. Uncle Yo’s introduction was one for the record books, establishing that ongoing motif of East meets West and how people around the world dress up in a “costume” everyday, either for work, for their culture, or anything in general and that no matter what, cosplayers should continue to wear their costumes proudly. The reaction from the crowd was incredible. Good job, Uncle Yo. The masquerade itself really went on to a bizarre format: 3 skits, a few walk-ons, another 3 skits, more walk-ons, and so on. We believe that might’ve been done to extend the show to hide the fact of how few skits were on stage, which is awkward to say the least because the pool of possible winners for such a big prize like a trip to Japan was greatly reduced, especially considering that not all of the winners from the preliminary competitions from throughout the US didn’t perform. The general feel from the audience though was pretty much restless with this format and the lack of skits, and when the winners were announced, over half of the audience was gone by then. This is something that the organizers should consider for next year’s competition. By the way, the winners of the Yume Cup are a pair from Texas, who did a funny skit dressed up as Princess Zelda and Ganon from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Congratulations to them, we will try to grab an interview with them soon so they can share their comments with us.
Overall, there are things that should be changed to ensure the safety of attendees for both NYCC and NYAF, either extend the amount of space that the conventions cover or establish an attendance cap. The Yume Cup/NYAF Masquerade should consider accepting more skits to entertain the audience, because there are plenty of people out there who do want to entertain but not necessarily want a trip to Japan.
For more information on NYAF/NYCC, please visit their website.
To check out more pictures from the events, please visit CosFU.org’s gallery.
