by Amy K. Bredemeyer
Saturday morning could have been Once Upon a Time, followed by Futurama, The Simpsons, and Family Guy. But, I woke up at 6am to consider heading down to get in line for Ballroom 20 (Hall H was busy with the big movie panels and all) and took a look at Twitter. Things didn't look fabulous... in fact, it was already starting to be doubtful that I'd get into that room, and I hadn't even considered the fact that Warehouse 13 was in that room before any of the things I was thinking of seeing even started. So, I made the executive decision to roll back over for another hour and a half, then truck on down to the Con.
I spent a couple of hours on the floor, hitting up various booths and grabbing swag (including FOX for the poster tubes and ABC's The Neighbors for a shirt and a "new name). Then, I ventured next door to see the Batmobiles exhibit, the Hobbit video game testing, and then into downtown to see what was going on. Jonathan and I apparently hit the Grimm area at the only down time they had all weekend, so we were able to meander through at our own pace.
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer |
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer (you can see the Gandalf hat and my "Danica Patrick" nametag) |
We made our way through the throngs of the gaslamp quarter, deciding to pop into the CNet party for a bit (again, lucky on the timing - less than 10 people were in front of us in line! and BATMAN was the DJ!) and getting a ton more swag, including some Science Channel bags.
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer |
By 4pm we were in 6BCF for The Following Screening and Q&A. I'll talk about the pilot itself another time, but here are a couple of highlights from the panel, which featured Kevin Williamson, Kevin Bacon, Marcos Siega, and James Purefoy.
- Kevin Bacon wanted "to play a hero who had some complexity" and "a darker side."
- Kevin Williamson alluded to the fact that the second episode hasn't even been written yet!
- They were surprised with how much gore they got away with... they shot it as a cable show and then toned it down as required.
- Kevin Williamson: "it turns out, Kevin Bacon has chemistry with everyone!" (as if the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game had never taught you that...)
Next up in that room was the Person of Interest Screening and Q&A, which was a little different, not being a brand-new show and all. [sidenote: I didn't really care about this all that much, but it was in the room after The Following and before Revolution and MythBusters, so I wasn't prepared ahead of time.] After the typical updates like the return date (9/27) and the DVD release date for the first season (9/4), we jumped right into some Q&A with panelists Jim Caviezel, Michael Emerson, Taraji P. Henson, Kevin Chapman, Jonathan Nolan, and Greg Plageman.
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer |
- Kevin shared that he'll hear people say, "hey, I like you on that show. Try not to get shot."
- As a child, Jonathan Nolan realized that nobody watched the security cameras all the time in London, and in Chicago there were no cameras, so he began to wonder what happened to the information collected, which is where the idea for Person of Interest came from.
At 6pm we were treated to Revolution pilot screening and Q&A, to promote the new fall NBC show. Again, we'll be covering the new pilots at a later date. The Q&A with the panelists (Eric Kripke, Billy Burke, Giancarlo Exposito, Tracy Spiridakos) was very short, and the most interesting moment had to be learning that Billy is learning his swordsmanship from the guy behind The Pirates of the Caribbean.
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer |
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| Photo by Jonathan Bredemeyer |
- all of the cast members are sick of being asked questions related to Kari.
- There are some myths they'd like to tackle but they can't because of danger/expense, like the Indiana Jones refrigerator theory when it comes to nuclear weapons. There are others that insurance has just turned down - like going over Niagara Falls in a barrel. And, sometimes, insurance is picky about WHICH one of the cast members can bust the myth! To debunk the idea that falling through canvas awnings would break your fall, they turned down Adam but allowed Tory to do it!
- Adam's motto is that "failure is always an option."
- They were all kinda surprised at the outcome of the blind driving experiment. The amusing part was having Jamie drink and then give instructions to a blind driver - he drove like he was drunk!
- They get letters all the time from people disagreeing with myths they've covered, like ice bullets, split arrows, and even the plane on the conveyor belt.
- It would have required too much precision to use curved mirror on the Archimedes Death Ray.
- when asked if they would test some pregnancy myths, Kari says that "one of you guys can knock someone up. I'm done."
- Adam's favorite thing to blow up is a hot water heater.
