Baltimore Comic Con 2008 Highlights Reel
The Baltimore Comic Con was insanely crowded on Saturday this year. I got there around 10:30, a half hour after the show opened, to find the ticket line still stretching out the door. I had a seat and figured I'd wait it out, but a half hour later, the line had doubled. So I bit the bullet and got in line. Took me another half hour/forty-five minutes to get through it. Gah.

(All that said, Baltimore is still one of the best bangs for your convention circuit buck. $25 for a two-day pass, with some of the biggest names in comics attending. Heroes Con down in Charlotte is the only one comparable to that... and that's why Heroes and Baltimore are the only cons I go to anymore.)

I picked up a bunch of loot in dollar and 50%-off bins:
- The last issue I needed of Tom Strong's Terrific Tales. Now I can finally read the rest of the series.
- Death of Captain America hardcover
- All four of the Grant Morrison Doom Patrol trades I was missing.

Also snagged some new convention sketches from Cully Hamner, Mike Hawthorne, and Chris Giarusso. Assuming I can get my scanner to cooperate, I'll be posting those over the next couple of days.

I walked by Erik Larsen at the Image table a couple of times, cursing myself for not having a copy of Mike and Tom's El Gorgo #1 to hand to him.

Pal Mike Fogg was volunteering at art dealer Albert Moy's table, so I spent a lot of time hanging out with him and trying not to drool on all the original art.

About 20 of us took over a room in Houlihan's in the inner harbor on Saturday night. I had to drive myself home so I was, unfortunately, one of the few sober people.

On Sunday, I'd spent most of my budget and probably would have gone home early if I hadn't caught a ride in with Mike Fogg, but my friend Andie (who was also volunteering at the show) asked me to drive a couple of creators to the airport for her. So I got to chauffer Mike Mignola, Erik Larsen, David Mack, Ron Marz, Lee Moder, and Tony Hasteen to BWI. We spent most of the ride listening to what Mike Mignola really thought about Hellboy 2.

The verdict: It was another great show this year in Baltimore... even if I'm starting to feel like 2-day conventions are a young man's game. There were several times on Sunday where I just went outside and sat down with one of my new books rather than walking the con floor, and I actually would have preferred to curl up somewhere and take a nap instead.

I don't have any inside information on how many people were at the show, but... damn, it sure looked like a lot, especially on Saturday. I remember when this show was run out of a couple of tiny rooms in a local Holiday Inn, so it's cool to see that it's become such a big deal.