C2E2 Day 3

Here is a recap of C2E2 Day 3. It is being written a day late for reasons which will be made clear at the end. :)

I got to C2E2 early enough there was only a short line to have our photos taken with the Infinity Stone Glove. The photo was taken before I thought to do the Wakanda arm cross. If I got glove away from Thanos in real life I think I would give it to someone in Wakanda leadership because of all the superheros I think I would trust them the most.

My first panel was on "The Legacy of Asexuality and aromanticism in media" which went over some of the lingo and then discussed many of the stereotypes. There was a discussion about how in asexual communities there is aromanticism erasure. The 5 or 6 ace characters in canons were explored. And how we in general want explicate representation not if you squint and cross your eyes and hold your breath you can see it representation.

Next I got a free "ok hot dog" at the Cards against humanity table. I then went to what was to be my last panel on Comics as Therapy. Which discussed some good comics to deal with mental health issues such as Archival Quality a comic which looks at depression and anxiety within a ghost tale. I have requested it through the library but it is new enough that the library is still waiting for its copies. Another graphic novel recommended was "Lighter then my shadow" which deals with eating disorders. The panel was more focused on how to use such comics in the classroom and such comics were suggested as a way to support students who are struggling and to give them a way to voice what they are feeling by asking what parts stood out, what characters they liked. The panel was hosted by http://popcultureclassroom.org/ an site whch helps teachers use comics in the classroom.

Next I went back to hang out a bit more with my Robbie Thompson which was fun. Yes I clearly fan-girl hard around him. I may have already hear many of the stories he told other fans I still loved hearing them. And I got this photo with him, the photo happened to be taken by one the artists for Robbie's run of silk which is extra cool. So yes once again Robbie Thompson Rocked. :)

 

Finally I was a hero and donated blood for the first time in my life. They have a blood donation station at C2E2 and many donate. But that makes sense since so many fans really are superheros in real life. But this led to a bit of an unwanted adventure. In hindsight I realized I had eaten very little all day and had had little water, so lets just say my body was very unhappy with me and I discovered how nice the nurses there were and latter how nice CTA employees can be. Lesson Learned.

C2E2 Day 2

Today I cosplayed at Loki. (or everyone's first guess Pikachu so I guess I was Loki Pikachu?). As I have said before I am flexible with my cosplay. You can see whatever character you want to see. I won't say you are wrong, though I might say what I was trying for instead. Let your imagination rule.

First Panel was on American Gods. The good news is season two has started filming. I also have to say this was a very giggly panel. They were laughing the whole time. The process for auditioning for Shadow Moon was like 16 different audition tapes, Neil Watched about 600 and there were about 1,200 audition tapes in the end.


Shadow talked about how he developed the character to make it able to be filmed, at first he was too book like. I liked when he said for example when you dead wife appears in your room you lose your shit instead of the beautiful poetry Neil Gaiman wrote about loving her no matter if she is dead or alive.

There was a funny story about how calm and mild-mannered Yetide Badaki is. At one point with one of her costumes and makeup a security guard thought she was just someone who wandered in and said she could not go onto the set and she said ok and waited outside until someone was like whatever happened to her, where is she?

There was a discussion about how American Gods shows how we can believe in more than one thing, we can believe in what we need at the moment to survive. And that we need both the new and old gods. The old god represents the human touch that the new gods sometimes are lacking. And the whole point of the show is that we "believe into being." Ricky Whittle said if he could be any God he would be the God of chocolate.

Yetide spoke about how she got into acting because of the stories the elders used to tell in Nigeria. Ricky said for him it was not nearly as noble, he was studying law, and when he was given the opportunity to be on TV he first thought was all the girls he would get.

The panel ended with a hilarious description of working with green screens. A lot of you are seeing a buffalo and he is so big, bigger look up, and side to side, the other said too, look higher, no you looked to high it will all work post-production.

I stopped by My Robbie Thompson's table in artist alley. And he remembered me. :) We talked a little about Silk and poor J. Jonah Jameson at the end of Thompson's run. I also gave him this year's poems (one an accounting of my writing this year, one a response to advice he gave last year in response to a question.) I did not get to spend too much time because I was hurrying to the next activity but I hope to stop by again tomorrow. I do not often get to hang out with one of my "best of writers, best of dreamers" :)

Next up was Getting a free autograph from Mark Millar which I had won. And it is cool he signed my autograph book but I know why I don't bother with autograph autographs I waited in line for close two hours to take advantage of my free autograph. 

My second panel was #BlackComicsMonth: Inclusion in comics. The takeaways were:

• No matter how many awards the industry looks through black comic creators. 
• It is all about knowing someone, who lets you in the door 
• As a POC you always have to be better than everyone else even to be noticed 
• In order to break in it is important to already have an audience which you will be bringing with you 
• The comic industry likes to leave money on the table. You may be selling out of your comics but they will keep saying we don't think there is a market 

A story that highlights the double standard in comics is we learned there was a white male editor who was known for literally biting people, yes really bitting people, and kept working on comics where POC who are writing really good comics are told there is no market for their work, and if they say anything are called difficult. One panel member talked about how she brings a "big black dude" to go with her simply so the white male executives look at something besides her chest. Having the big dude just standing nearby forcing the white guys to be professional even if only out of fear. Which shows there are still major issues within the comic book industry.

There was also a discussion on how if you are writing a diverse book you may have to front load it and tweet about how you are writing about POCs etc especially if it is in a genre that traditionally has had no representation to build an audience.

The last panel was one on Hispanics in Comics which many highlighted the fact we need more voices in comics and we need new characters not just "slapping on some brown paint".

C2E2 Day 1 Part 2 Mental Health and Superheros

So I feel like my last panel for Friday "The Value of Mental Illness, Finding Resilience in Pain" deserved its own blog post. I attended this panel because I went to a similar one last year which I really enjoyed. While I was a bit sad Robbie Thompson did not crash the panel like last year I am glad I went again.

Generally, there was a discussion about how comics are real life in high relief which is useful when working with patients in therapy. And this idea that we all want to connect to something.

When the panel was asked who they would like to work with, in therapy, one responded with Superman. And there was a great discussion about how Superman despite common appearances is a very complex character. The question becomes how do you connect in "a world of paper mache and spun glass". There was a focus on his loneliness, and how he is "worshiped but not accepted" and how he always feels like an alien (because he is). In addition, the emotional strength that is needed to be super was explored. The one comic creator (the rest were therapists) wrote a comic at one point where instead of Superman being adopted by the Kents he ends up in and out of foster care and ends up turning into a major villain instead. It was also determined that Superman uses Clark Kent in order to connect, and that connection needs to be authentic, and that if Superman was able to somehow not feel like an outsider he would remain Superman and would stop being Clark.

There then was an interesting conversation about Batman and how there is nothing that would make him give up the role. He would need to have permission not to be responsible for everything. And that he took on this coping mechanism as a response to his parent's death. (It was suggested that the reason he took it so much harder and got so much darker, then say spiderman was in part because of age and part because Bruce Wayne led a very sheltered life before where bad things did not happen. Spiderman instead grew up in a community where bad things did happen so it affected him differently. He saw bad things occurred before losing family.) There was a great comment about how superheroes can't take time off, unlike say a firefighter or police officer who gets time off and generally does not spend all that time of feeling like they should be
out on the streets instead.

The role of fantasy was also explored. Fantasy both gives us a break from the world and gives us a safe space to work things out. In terms of writing about mental health in a sensitive way (Which can be hard because comics work in shorthand focused on external not internal conflict):

• Important to name things
• To make meaningful must work through
• Has to affect others (family/friends)
• There is a fear "What am I without my trauma" so when people get better they get scared and go back to the old ways

Finally, the comic creator spoke to the fact that people say the answer is simply to open the doors and more diverse creators will show up but they tend not to because they have no seen themselves in those roles. This is changing but it will still take time to have the numbers of diverse creators as we want.

C2E2 Day 1 Part 1

Today marked the beginning of C2E2 for 2018.

The very first thing I did was make my purchase for the weekend. This year's purchase was Puerto Rico Strong: A Comics Anthology Supporting Puerto Rico Disaster Relief and Recovery. Normally I wait a while but I knew I wanted it and was worried it might sell out. This is the second year I have actually bought something at C2E2 but like last years "Love is Love" it is for a good cause.

Today I went cosplaying as The doctor and my first panel was "She's The Doctor: Regenerating a time lord" which explored what having a women doctor might mean. I loved the comment that it made sense because it was "statically improbable that the doctor would have been white and male after so many regulations." Which makes total sense as a comment when you think about it, it is like a family only having male children going back 13 or 14 generations. 

The Doctor fighting a dinosaur-like creature 

The panelists are excited about the possibilities for new types of stories such as having more female friendships. And while there is a deep hope that there is a more diverse writing staff behind the scenes the mere fact that The Doctor is Female is important. As one panelist said "You can't do what you can't see" and discussed diversity in other contexts and that she "Did not realize that I needed that representation, not just the next generation" 

Also, there was a comment about the importance of a diverse supporting cast so the lead does not have to carry all the diversity. And there was a real hope that the show does well consider female-led works carry more weight. if they do poorly it is blamed on the character being female, unlike male characters who get many more do-overs.

Next up was a panel with Mark Millar who was a nice guy (and had a sweet accent :) ). I am not as familiar with his work (except he seems to have written the comics that have become the Marvel Movie Universe) but it was still a fun panel. He discussed how growing up he brother told him that Batman/Superman were real historical characters so he became very invested in the stories. 

He also talked about how we are living in the world we always dreamed of where obscure characters are now in movies as big as or bigger than star wars (like Black Panther, Guardians of the Galaxy etc). He mentioned that all his work is based on something real (his life or the life of others).

He mentioned how you never know where a franchise will go saying one idea he had at 16, he pitched at 26, and came to be when he was 33. He is now working with Netflix who seems very hands off and always gives him lots of creative control. 

Next was Zoe and Wash from Firefly who acted like an old married couple in real life lol. They discussed how in the beginning they were basically given a short outline by Weadon but no script before they said yes. Wash pointed out that Firefly fans are different from other fans because when he forgot the exact wording of a line during the panel no one shouted out and corrected him like in other fandoms

Interesting Zoe talked about how she often felt she was in a caper show and the other characters we in a ship show because she was always on missions with the boys. There was a question about comfortable/uncomfortable costumes and Zoe mentioned roles where she had to be literally sewn into an outfit and cut out each night. Basically, women still have a ways to go. Funnily the characters that both Zoe and Wash would like to play more of are romantic roles. And both are surprised how long Firefly fans have gone on and how much charity work they do.

I went to a panel on video games in books (mainly because they were giving away free books) which was interesting and the take away was book allows readers to get inside the heads or the characters they play and allow for more emotional connection explaining the consequences of one battle on the characters.  

I also went to a great panel The Value of Mental Illness Finding Resilience in pain on superheroes and mental health. This panel with is the topic for C2E2 Day 1 Part 2.

Other notes: This year there are very few places giving away free books :( but I am still getting a good amount of free stuff including a cool signed poster for the American God's Comic. 

John Legend's Jesus Christ Superstar

To start out I am a cisgendered white female which impacts my thoughts on representation. I do not claim to speak for others or in any way minimize other peoples lived experiences.

I found that the multicultural cast for tonight's Jesus Christ Superstar featuring John Legend impacted how I saw and related to the whole story of Jesus.

In the song above the line “do you care about your race, we must keep in our place” stood out for me. Given the multicultural casting of the show, this production hit home for me in a way that the story of Jesus often does not. This casting made this story feel very relevant and real and something that might have occurred historically. 

Judas and Jesus' views on the next steps for their movement reminded me of the types of debates that occur in the Black Panther Universe. 

• How do you bring about change? 
• Can you have a too charismatic of a leader? 
• What methods should be used? 
• Should you stand tall or keep your head low?
• Is it better to fight or live another day?

Another line which stood our was “They will crush us if we go too far” and "remember Jesus I want us to live" which is especially poignant in a day and age where Black Men/Black Women/Other POC/LGBTQA individuals are killed by systems/police/everyday citizens. Where it is all too true if you stick your head up at all (like simply having a taillight out) you have a markedly less chance of surviving. 

Later the religious leaders sing about how Jesus must die but when I listened to the lyrics I realized they make good points even if their conclusions are wrong. Jesus was whipping people into a frenzy while they were under an oppressive regime. By the standards of the day, Jesus would have been just begging for the Romans to come in and punish everyone. Again throwing Jesus under the bus was the wrong choice but I can understand being afraid for your community. 

I realized that I find it is hard to imagine a world where the traditional image of Jesus as a cisgendered white dude (and this is not historically accurate he would have been middle eastern but most portrayals to this day still make him a white dude) would be crucified. Whereas it is easy to imagine a POC being crucified because today on an almost daily basis POC’s are crucified.

It is also hard for me to imagine a white dude who would be able to truly understand the challenges and hardship of other less privileged identifications. As a white woman, I will admit I don’t truly understand how challenging intersectionality can be. But I will also say that "The temple" feels like reality. POC are pushed down until they stand up and say no more and then they are expected to "heal everyone". They are thanked for saving us from poor election results but we don't vote differently. They are told to stand tall and be a good example no matter what we throw at them. 

So I still don't know what I feel or know about Jesus as a character or historical figure or the Christianity he spawned. But this version of the story using a multicultural cast made me feel like his story could be mine. And this is coming from a cisgendered white female so I can only imagine how powerful images such as this could be for individuals in communities of POC. The power of seeing your self on the stage/screen, seeing yourself within the story. 

James Tiptree Jr. and the Biographies we Read

Thanks to Goodreads algorithm I recently read a very interesting biography: James Tiptree Jr. The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon by Julie Phillips

I was amazed at all the tangible connections I found to my own life and experiences (Chicago, Africa, DC, American University, Science Fiction, Writing under a pen name, Imposter syndrome .....)

And I realized that while I read biographies regularly Tiptree was one of the first I have read of an individual in the science fiction community.

For example, my last dozen Biographies/Autobiographies before Tiptree happened to be (in reverse chronological order):

1. Strange Fruit, Volume 1: Uncelebrated Narratives From Black History by Joel Christain Gill
2. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel
3. Are You My Mother? by Alison Bechdel
4. My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor
5. Monsieur D'eon Is A Woman: A Tale Of Political Intrigue And Sexual Masquerade by Gary Kates
6. William Henry Harrison by Gail Collins
7. Secret Historian: The Life and Times of Samuel Steward, Professor, Tattoo Artist, and Sexual Renegade by Justin Spring
8. Lafayette in the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell
9. Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow
10. Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow
11. Beyond Paradise: The Life of Ramon Novarro by Andre Soares
12. Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist by Brooke Kroeger

As I look over this list I discover these biographies are not set in my own personal experience. Which is wonderful. That is the point of reading and telling tales to experience things outside your own personal experience.

But I enjoyed Tiptree's biography because I kept thinking:

I know that place
I know that organization
I know of that person
I know that experience
I know that doubt

So for the next few biographies, I hope to read about modern-day science fiction and fantasy authors, with a focus on women, to see how they respond to the common challenges of writing and particular challenges of being women facing those challenges.

DePaul Pop Culture Conference: Harry Potter

This year's Depaul Pop Culture Conference spotlighted Harry Potter. It was another fascinating conference filled with great conversations and analyse.

My own complex relationship with Harry Potter:

After attending this conference I have been thinking about my own relationship with the texts. Growing up I never read HP, for a variety of reasons including the fact that the concept of "Boy finds out they are magical, and goes to magic school" was not original (and so I did not really understand the fuss). In addition, HP became so popular with my peers that became uncool in my mind. I liked the idea of Harry Potter because it got so many kids reading and I was all for that but I was not particularly interested in reading them myself.

My earliest introduction to HP was probably through fanfiction. Then in my late twenties I had a free month and read all 7 books before the first movie of the last book came out so I would know what was happening since my roommates were going to a midnight screening.

This was probably not the best way to enjoy the series and I struggled to connect with Harry or the rest of the Trio. There is quite a bit of teenage angst in the series which when binged really gets to be very tiresome. For me, I connected with Snape as a character the best and felt that I was Luna off in her own amazing world and not caring too much what others thought.

This personal background with the texts was highlighted for me because for many of the attendees the trio had become their friends, the characters they grew up with (and for many literally grew up with reading a book a year as they were published).

My conference experience in review:

I started the day with the 2nd half of the Panel The Harry Potter Alliance, Fan Activism, and Stories of Social Change. 

There was a great conversation about the use of Metaphors in Activism. The group discussed how Simplified metaphors used as shortcuts don't open doors/invite others to join the conversation. It was then proposed that maybe Negative metaphors (Ex comparisons to Vortamont, Umbridge etc) close the doors of conversation whereas positive metaphors (Ex comparisons to the strengths of the different houses, patronises etc) can open doors of communication and connection.

Next was A day at Hogwarts: "Magical Menagerie" and "L.O.W's (Levels of Ordinary Wizarding" with Jennifer Jones where were a couple of fun activities, a quiz, a scavenger hunt, and making creatures. 

Next was a fascinating Academic Keynote:

"Defending Tom Riddle: The Failure of Albus Dumbledore" by Dr. Christopher Bell. 

Dr Bell started with the idea: 

It is less why Tom Riddle became a mass murder (aka Vortamont) as for why it took so long. 

He explained how in western culture the "Moral Institution" which keeps our "Primal Self" in check is "Achievement" and when opportunity is unevenly distributed this leads to "STRAIN" which leads to one of two main responses a) Harm yourself, b) Harm everyone else. (Many of these terms are based on another classical thinker who I did not write down the name of my apologies) 

He also stated that Wizarding Society is militarised distopia (filled with inequality, exclusion, exploitation, and repression where everyone has weapons (wands)). I found this a very interesting view of the Wizarding Society and for me provides context to why the action of HP occurs.

Dr Bell went on to say that Tom Riddle showed signs of having Reactive Attachment Disorder which leads to Moral Disengagement  (From either an individual's conduct, the effects of the conduct, or the victims of the conduct). And how our "Monkey Sphere" (the number of individuals we can keep in our minds and care about before they become things) for most people is somewhere around 37 for Vortamont this was 3 (Himself, Bellatrix, and Nagini)

He also stated Dumbedore misses the "point of intervention" or the moment things could be different when Tom Riddle first comes to Hogwarts and therefore through unintentional neglect is responsible to what Tom Riddle became. And seems to recognise this by doing the absolute opposite with Harry Potter who had a similar horrible childhood as Tom Riddle.

Dr Bell also presented the interesting idea that students are only put in Gryffindor if they are asked. Asking is their first act of courage. He suggested that the trio all belonged in different houses if not for the fact they wanted to be Gryffindor. Hermine = Ravenclaw, Harry = Slytherin, Ron = Hufflepuff

Next was a panel on Queer Readings of Harry Potter where the lack of LGBTI representation in Harry Potter was focused on. As was stated Fandom is not a Substitute for Canon and while within fanfiction there is queer representation it is a serious problem that it is not included in the text. Out of 772 named characters, only one is gay (Dumbledore) and that was something retcon in after all the books were written. 

The fact this was retconed in upset many because there was a feeling if this was how JK Rolins saw the character there should have been some passing reference included in the text. Also, it was seen as a missed opportunity because of how many characters are referenced in relationship to kissing someone in the text and how simple it would have been to have a few of those background characters be LGBT. There were also strong feelings around the fact that in the end of the story absolutely everyone is paired up with someone and off having kids. There was a feeling that while many did not trust JKR to have written LGBT characters well they still would have preferred if she had tried. 

Next was the Keynote: Alanna Bennett which for me personally felt different from Keynotes in the past mainly due to this year being based on a book series and therefore not providing the opportunity for a discussion of behind the scenes or how the writing process of the text goes. 

Alanna Bennett did discuss a bit about the phenomena of fandom coming up with a concept and it becoming fandom cannon. And how moving forward she hopes there can be a better understanding between Cannon and Fans. And that Cannon can learn from the Fans and the Fans responses.

(Again for me this highlighted the different responses to different forms of media, as a book series which is complete, JKR has much less opportunity to incorporate fandom. A TV show can add a throwaway line which confirms a theory or incorporate fans and fandom in some way whereas JKR can only tweet hay I like that idea. There is some wiggle room in the various spin-offs/prequels she is creating but it still more static)

Next was Harry Potter and the Infinite Syllabus: How Harry Potter has shaped education which showcased how different educators used the Harry Potter text working with elementary school aged children to multiple frameworks used with University Students (Such as a Hero's Journey, as literature, as sociology). There were some fun examples of student created projects.

Finally was The Religous Potter: Religious, Ethics, and Meaning in Harry Potter which was interesting but was more high-level Religion and philosophy. There was a discussion of how different faith traditions responded differently to HP depending on whether they used a Descriptive or prescriptive lens. 

I also picked up a copy of Time Lords & Tribbles, Winchesters & Muggles edited by Paul Booth which covers the past 5 years of The DePaul Pop Culture Conference. I can't beilve it has been 5 years nor that I have attended since the beginning. I already learned from the intro that the original Doctor Who conference was going to be a one-off event, I am glad it has changed and continues to this day.

I am really excited to read more and that will be a later post :)