Never Seen It Podcast

Never Seen It Podcast: San Diego Comic Con 2026: A Recap

Episode Summary

We recap our unforgettable trip to San Diego Comic-Con 2026, sharing the biggest highlights, funniest moments, celebrity encounters, can't-miss panels, cosplay culture, exclusive collectibles, and the realities of surviving one of the world's biggest pop culture events. From Hall H to the Gaslamp District, we break down what made SDCC 2026 special, what could be improved, and whether it's still the ultimate fan experience.

Episode Notes

Join us as we dive into our complete San Diego Comic-Con 2026 recap and discuss everything that made this year's convention unforgettable. We share our favorite panels, celebrity sightings, Hall H experiences, cosplay, collectibles, after parties, and the incredible atmosphere that turns San Diego into the center of pop culture every summer.

We talk about why San Diego Comic-Con remains the gold standard for fan conventions, whether another city could ever replace it, and how the Gaslamp District, transportation, hotels, and community all contribute to the experience. Along the way, we share hilarious stories about navigating the convention, surviving the heat and humidity, debating airports, discovering great food, and even the infamous convention-floor hygiene discussion.

We also discuss exclusive collectibles, celebrity encounters including Ryan Reynolds and Johnny Depp, Hall H culture, the biggest pain points of SDCC 2026, and the moments that reminded us why we keep coming back. Whether you're planning your first Comic-Con or you're a longtime attendee, this episode is packed with stories, laughs, and honest opinions from fans who experienced it firsthand.

If you love Comic-Con, movies, TV, comics, cosplay, collectibles, filmmaking, and pop culture, this episode is for you.

Episode Transcription

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Welcome to the Never Seing Podcast, the only podcast called Never Seen It That's worth listening to.

With us tonight, Mr. Arnie, the One Man Party is here.

Arnold Kalango, Mr. Daily Dares, aka.

Filipinozia.io, aka.

Alex Caligo the Brothers Calo.

Mr. Ghost Nerd 88, aka.

Justin Holden, Mr. Donnie Applesey, aka

Donnie Guzman, the Cousins Calo/ Guzman.

And then there's me, Boots Too Big, aka.

Adrian Dat Torre.

Tonight, we're discussing

a recap of our recent trip to San Die Diego Comic Con 2026.

This was my first time going to Comic-Con,

and I didn't actually go into Comic-Con, which I almost feel ashamed

to say, but at the same time, I experienced a lot.

First of all, let me just say, I fucking love San Diego.

San Diego's such a great city.

The vibes were immaculate.

It's exactly what you would expect

for that kind of crowd at that time of the year, even though it was hot.

Like, the Gland District is right there.

It's perfect.

They're talking about it, I was reading, oh, San Diego renews Comic- Con T at least 2030.

I'm like, where else would they go?

You know, I don't know.

I feel like the gas slamp quarter is like the perfect place

to go after for drinks, for food, for partying, for whatever, which we did.

We did a good amount of that.

Played a little bit of a little bit of, what is what's a basketball game called?

It's called basketball.

It's called something else in that coin out place.

Oh, no.

Skeet basketball.

Skekeetke basketball, yeah.

Arnold, he's got you got some swishes in right, Arnold?

I I to remember correctly.

Johnny beat me, and I'm wholly up to it.

I'm really ashamed of.

Oh, yeah.

Johnny Arnold got 24.

He didn't quite hit the 30 to add that additional five.8.

Oh, 288.

That's right.

But he didn't quite cla.

The 30 that needed to add on the extra five seconds. to get more points.

But Johnny did.

And he ended up like 38 on his first try.

Well, you know what?

Yeah.

He was using a different hoop, which I feel like the one that I was using

like the rim was.

It was an old shaped..

You can't blame the rim.

You can't blame was a shaped rim, right, Arnold?

Because, you know, once I get it rolling, You can't blame the rim job?

There you go.

Yeah, exactly.

Don't blame the rim job.

All right, around?

That's the thing about Comic- Con.

I feel like it's all encompassing in San Diego.

Like San Diego becomes a character in and of itself, right?

And I got to hang out with Arnold, with Alex, with Donnie, with Justin, with Amber.

Like, we were all there.

And then some.

We had like your guys' normal group of people that go, we'll give them a quick

shot at Lance and Clark and Johnny and Kay

and, and Adura and a

couple of Aduro's friends whose names I can't remember right now.

OG.

We were all there.

OG O. Yeah.

His cousin.

And then I think OG's girlfriend.

His cousin.

Yeah, Ey.

Yeah.

In fact, check out our social shows right now.

We posted a bunch of content, a bunch of videos and pictures.

Adura had like four costume changes.

It was great.

He was a Blood Panther.

Also, Vader Logan Kendall.

Chef Logan Kendall.

Chef Logan Kendall, yes.

F

guest of the show...

Find them on Instagram.

He's a fabulous chef.

Yeah.

And a fabulous hang, right?

We all got to hang hang out.

Yes.

So I feel like I experienced a lot of what you would

experience going to comeicon, even though I didn't actually go into the convention center.

I got to interview some interesting people outside the convention center, and that was fun.

So, yeah,

I would say for me, 8 out of 10, easily.

The only reason why I knocked it it down is because of the weather.

I fucking hate the weather.

It was muggy and hot, so, but whatever.

It was it was super humid and honestly humid.

That's not.

I was sweating my ass off.

I think I lost a lot of water weight this week.

Super blame it I'm the super El Niino.

Yeah.

But the vibes were great, though.

We went to the, what was it?

The Adult Swim Rave laser show DJ party?

Yeah, just did some like after parties after every

at the end of every day.

It was great.

That was fun.

You know, I had to walk to the nearby hotel to use the restroom,

but it was a quick walk, thankfully.

Every Everything is right there.

That's the other thing I really want to touch on.

When it comes to public transpo, San Diego's got your back, man.

You take that little, that train that goes from the hotel to the convention center

I mean, you know, what, what else can you ask for, I think?

But yeah, I almost didn't miss having a hotel right next to the convention.

Almost.

Almost.

Kind of makes you feel like a New Yorker.

Probably not.

But it could almost make you feel like a New Yorker if you're so inclined to feel like a New Yorker.

But yeah, overall, I had a great time.

I think the best part for me was hanging out with you guys and getting to spend some quality time.

I met Donnie for the first time in person, so thank you, Donnie, for hanging out.

Yeah.

We got to commiserate about certain things and talk about certain things and have fun

Got to had a little hop over to Vegas for a day.

We had some breakfast day.

What was the name of that place?

Give him a quick shout out.

I forget the name of that. burrito place.

Oh, Silid's.

It's like Mexican infused with Filipino content. burritos.

I think San Diego has one, too.

Yeah, that That's where they originally came from here.

Yeah.

Okay, okay, yeah.

And I will.

But like San Diego, Vegas gets all the like the cool like

Yeah.

chain restaurants.

Right.

You know, they all kind of kind of like seem to like eventually make their way.

They even have, what's the name of the Hawaiian restaurant?

It's like their first,ippies time they've done.

Yeah, zippies there.

Zippies.

Zippies, yeah.

Well, what Vegas makes up for in restaurants,

it lacks in the airport because the San Diego airport is modern and beautiful

and just modern airport.

And then you go to Vegas airport and you're like, what the hell is this place?

Like, there's fucking slot machines everywhere.

And it's like, That's crazy because I actually love the Vegas airport more.

Actually, the only airport I love more

than the Vegas airport is probably the Burbank Airport because it's still small.

I just like how small and like it is on the Burbankport.

It was my first time in a fan of San Diego Air airport.

I know San Diego's airport.

I was like, damn, dude, this place is small for for such a big, like area.

It was like, damn.

I was surprised at the size of it.

Well, the interesting fact about

the San Diego airport, it's the only

international airport that has just one lane.

Really?

Yeah, there's no, you know how like a lot of airports have multiple landings st.

Denver is shaped like a Nazi symbol.

That's.

Look from a map.

Look at it from a map.

It's.

I believe you.

I believe you.

You know, that makes a lot of sense, Alex, for all the delays,

man, I suffered I suffered through the plain delays this year, both and, man.

It was insane.

This was the first year I didn't have any delays.

Wow.

I went from like, we were going to like leave

Yeah.

at like 2 p.m. from Vegas, and

then we ended up leaving at like 830

or something like that instead.

So, we made it back to town like really, really late.

We made it to San Diego late.

Yeah.

Yeah, well delays made you pretty much lose a day.

The last thing I'll say about the Vegas report is that it was a gamble.

Huh?

Huh?

Huh?

No, I'm just kidding.

I'm just kidding.

But no, it was a good time.

It was a good time overall.

Yeah, but you know what?

The other thing I will say, fuck Frontier.

Don't fly Frontier, guys.

Anyone listening, I hate Frontier so much.

What a terrible airline.

It's like the, uh, I don't know.

It's like the, the

what could I compare it to?

I't There's something I can't even compare it to right now.

It's just just a bad airline.

And then Denver, they don't even use a jet bridge.

You have to go down a level and you have to walk onto the tarmac to get onto the plane.

It's like the prison bus version of airplanes.

There you go.

I felt like I was in prison at times.

The way the people, the, what do you call them?

The people that board you and stuff, those agents, they're like, all right, everybody, get in line now.

It's like that kind of shit.

So, yeah, they'll yell at you.

But anyway, whatever.

Frontier, you know, they're never going to sponsor this show, so don't worry about that.

But I want to talk to you guys about your experiences.

Arnold, let me talk with you, my friend.

Oh, go ahead.

Oh, no, I was just saying, what's up, Lance and Chet?

Oh, they're in the chat frontier.

Arnold, let me start with you.

What What was your was your highlights

from SDCC 20266?

Highlights.

So,

that was really cool to go to

the drifter panel.

And even before that, it was like, what Tell us about that.

What's Drifter?

Drifter is with Soon Kang.

So the Asian dude in the Fast and the Furious series

uh, you know, the super cool guy who, um, who

ended up, Jadut ended

up beating his girlfriend in the movie.

That guy, Sunung Kang.

So he's having a movie called Drifter That's Coming out Soon.

And that was a really cool panel.

What did he say?

It was like a love poem

about. all things. car community.

He had to bring bring in all the people that he, a lot of

people that he cared about, people in the car world.

Let's see.

Oh, but before that, the panel before that, because

it was in Ballroom 20, it was like colliders something.

But it was like a bunch of directors and stuff that

I think it was a great panel to sit in on

And just for like up andcoming directors

and writers, producers to hear

from them, their point of view, just of like struggles

and things of how it actually is in that world.

There was a lot that you can

learn from, and be inspired by.

And, you know, so those

are a lot of the cool things. like you get in, you get, I got into

that extra early so that way I can get, I was like in the second row for the drifter panel.

And so I secured some seats for the crew

That was that Thursday that Thursday crew?

Yeah.

Pitrew.

Is it called the pit crew?

Because it just smells bad all the time?

Make sure that everyone.

Yeah.

You want some smelly people in the c.

So is that smell extra smelly.

Oh, man.

That's not good.

I mean, you'll be walking around and it's like, man, it's barely 8.30 in the

morning and somebody's, did they not shower or what?

I was

I was in the AEW panel and I was sitting in the second row.

Amber was sitting next to me and then she kept on like, she like turned to me.

She's like, this guy smells so bad.

This guy smells so bad.

And then.

Shees bad smells, dude.

And she was like, she was it was funny because she it

was like for some reason, her whole body was blocking that smell.

But then she's like, I can't stand this anymore.

She we got to the almost the very end and she stood up and they walked to the side.

And then like, as soon as she stood up, this wall of fucking stench

hit me.

No.

And I was was like, oh my God, that's what she was talking about.

She was breathing it in and she was filtering the smell.

Her Arl and I were on the train at one point and she was like like towards the back of the train, I could see her.

She was like.

She was straight up like this.

She was like.

She like ran out of the train like a bat out of hell.

I remember Arnold?

I was like, yeah, Marieo.

I was just walking the con floor and

it smelled like fucking someone shit themselves in like a couple of little spots.

I'm like, oh my God, dude.

And Jess was like, what's wrong?

I was like, it smells like someone shit themselves.

She doesn't have like the keenest sense of smell like I do.

I unfortunately have the most sensitive sense of smell of all time.

And

the convention floor smelled gross.

There was like moments when I was sweating.

I'm like, man, oh, I fucking am super self-conscious.

So I started smelling gross.

Dude, me and Jess, we took at least three showers a day

while we were there because it was just, it was it was rough.

It was a rough year for the.

That's crazy and humidity, man.

the comic dimensions that are not have like like

good, like, I don't know, It's got AC.

No, they got AC.

Yeah, but like don't they have like a ventilation system to suck out?

Yeah, they have to..

There's certain sections of the con.

If you notice, you, you walk right into the path of the AC and

and you see a bunch of people just huddled there.

So they're all just like trying to take in the EC because it's so hot in there.

Wow, man.

See, the problem is with any sort of

event that you go to, it could be a Comic-Con.

It could be Coachella.

You.

If you go into, if

somebody stinky goes into a crowd and

it's like packed in together like like sardines, it's going to concentrate.

It's like cupping your hands

around something stinky.

And then like opening, say you open your hands, it's just going to smell even worse.

You know how there's all these, there's like tons of..

I was reading through the pamphlet.

There's like tons of panels that they do.

I saw like some filmmaking related panels and blah, blah, blah.

Why isn't there like a hygiene panel or something?

Like basic hygiene skills, like something?

Like a 30 minute like You shouldn't have to be tough and comic.

You shouldn't have to be.

You should.

You have to be.

Although I am disappointed that Old

Spice didn't sponsor the convention this year.

Oh, they were there last year.

Ice Spice?

No.

Old Spice.

Old Spice.

Ice Spiceice.

No, I have a funny story about, it wasn't Old Spice.

It was Axe.

I remember I went to E3 when they were like still industry only

And the second year

I went, which, the first year I went in 2009, the second year I went in 2010.

And when I went to second year, I

guess the stench and smell was so bad from some people that they

actually had axe body spray.

actually like give out free little

sticks of deodorant to everybody that came into the convention floor.

They literally, they had people out there, just a row

of people just handing out little sticks of deodorant and little like test

size, like body sprays at the same time.

So everybody got fucking

axe, like the deodorant sick and the spray.

It was crazy because it was, the first year I remember, I was

like, the stench was stanky.

You know, you know what they should do?

Like, I know that, um,

people aren't allowed to walk the floors and

hand out flyers and freebies and stuff like that because like it

does cause a sort of congestion because people start,

they'll see, oh, they're handing out free stuff and they'll go run running towards that person who's like handing free stuff.

However, I think they should make

an exception for a deodorant company.

So every time like they walk past somebody stinky, be like, here you go.

Here's some ax body spray.

HLP has a great idea in the chat.

He's like, you guys should make your own brand of deodorant and hand that out asCC.

That's not a good idea.

s That's been something, though, that like, I think we've talked about like a whole new.

Can we drop ship from China, like a thousand sticks of deodorant?

We'll do car.

I feel like we all smell like cedar wood.

You know who doesn't know who doesn't smell this gang?

Because I spent the whole weekend with you guys, and if anything, like Arnold, every time you

came out of the bathroom, it was like a wave of fresh beach scent coming off of you.

Like it was like a nice, I don't know what you were using in there, but

every time you came out of the bathroom, I was like, oh, wow, that smells good.

Arnold Arnold go back in there and come back out. smells a combination of degree

deodorant, Bath and Body Works,

Lotion, and Tommy Bahama Cologne.

And I was thinking, you know, you see people with those neck fans?

Keep cool.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

They should have these, but also air

purifiers installed in them.

So that way, you know, it also it cools you.

But then when it gets a little stinky, you turn on the air fire mode.

Some people that love air.

Some people, there's no air purifying.

There's not enough air purification that can remove their stench.

They just need a take a fucking shower.

Just take a fucking shower..

I will say this, though.

And want to brush socks.

I don't want to shame people

who do legitimately have a medical issue.

Oh, no, no, no, no.

Yeah.

There are people who have a legitimate medical issue

where they just can't help but stink.

That's fine.

Yeah.

I get it.

But if you are like consciously going

to the con and not showering and not changing

your undies and not putting on deodorant,

you are the problem.

You are the cause of all of our dread of

of like walking through a, of like a crowd

of people that we need to go through, but you're the one

that made it so stinky and horrible for us.

I had a roommate who is like, the perfect demographic for like Comic- Con.

I don't know if he's ever been, but this is years ago, obviously, in college

And he, we would have to remind him to take showers.

Like, I'm not even kidding.

He'd build up a funk and be like, oh, oh, dude, are you, uh, what's the last time you took a shower?

Oh, three days ago.

Yeah, you might want to take a shower of there, but, and it was bad.

Like he'd walk out of his room and his room would just, he'd get a whiff of like, just stale

like air.

And that shit lingers on everything, like your clothes, like your bags.

Everything.

And you're sleeping on that shit.

Yeah.

You're sleeping on.

The reason why it stinks is because it's it's bacteria.

Yeah, exactly.

HLP says you call it the

Never smell It a trademark.

I love that idea.

You should actually just drop ships some deodorant.

Yeah, pass those on.

Let's move on from the stench top.

Yeah, let's move on from the stench.

Arnold Arnold, was there anything else that you

thought was good that you'd like to mention before we go on to somebody else?

Comic- the bathrooms and the Comic-Con and the convention center

for number two, for the very first time ever.

And they were clean?

Well, it was okay, but,

you know, I. That That was a good memorable experience for you.

Is that what you want to talk about?

It was Because it was my first time ever, you know, I

always had the luxury before.

I was like, oh, I'm going to go to the hotel real quick

because those were like close by.

But this time I was like, I

wouldn't make it to the Hilton Bayf front or the Marriott Marquee.

I was like, I got to go..

The night before, it was a lot of hard liquor.

So

you know, Arnold, let me ask you this.

Let me ask you this.

What's one thing if you could change about Comic-Con, what would it be?

What's one thing?

I thought we were going to hold out to the.

Yeah, we could say, let's think about, Arnold.

Let's say that. had a pin in that, like Sam used to say..

Let's put a pin in that.

I had a great time.

Let's pass it on.

I had a great time because you had a great time.

You had a great time.

I love the fact that Arnold..

It's like, you know when you go to like a party, like a Chuck E. Cheese

and they used to like have like the coins and then they hand out the coins to all the kids.

Like, here's coins for you to play games.

I like that Arnold.

We gave him his tokens and he talks about like

Drifter for one, which is a good thing to talk about.

The second coin he spends it on is talking

about having to take a shit at the convention.

So you used your token

talk about taking shit.

Hey, man, you know, it's human nature.

You can't, it's fine.

You're allowed to spend your tokens on whenever you want to.

I thought you were going to talk about me when I was passing out tokens at the coin op.

That was a very memorable part.

That was a fun..

That was fun.

Because it was like supposed to be emo night.

And then Adura was like, oh, it's Emo Night.

I'm ready to mosh.

But then when we walked in there, I was thinking like there would be a big space

for people to mosh, but it was like like an 8 by

eight little area next to the billiards.

And I was like, it was mostly just like a bar and games.

That happened a long time ago when we went to coin

Up and I was like, oh, that's because when you guys all talked about

that you were going to coin Up, I was like, oh, that's weird because like the last time

we did that, they advertised similar things and then nothing was going on.

It was just a bunch of people

hanging around, walked. walked out.

Yeah.

I think we walked in and walked.

Yeah, we walked in and walked out.

It was.

It's a small spot.

It really is.

Well, I think the difference between

that, though, that time and this time, there were actually a lot of people this time around.

The last time we went there, it was pretty dead.

Let me ask you guys this really quick.

Do you think that you would have as much fun

if the Comic-Con wasn't in San Diego?

Like, if it was just some other hypothetical city.

Like, would you would you have as much fun if you weren't that close to downtown, do you think?

I feel like I wouldn't have as much fun.

It would still be a fun time.

Right.

But there's that sort of like element of like the cosplay happening.

You know, there is like, you know, just people who are a lot more

like-minded.

So any conversations that you would have at like

the bar would more than likely be,

well, revolve around similar interests.

And that's saying that that's necessary to have

a good time, but it's more likely to happen.

Gotcha.

Arnold, what do you think?

If someone who likes to party and have fun, I mean, would you have as much fun if the gas lamp wasn't right there?

I mean, the bar scene,

the gas I' scene, that can kind of be replicated, but I was thinking more like,

close by, you've got the Comic-Con Museum than the Comic-Con

International, the headquarters is right there.

You've got so much the Comic-Con

community already

built in there because it's been there for so long.

And so if they were to move it,

I don't think it would it would be hard to replicate that.

Justin.

I think we've had this discussion in the past.

I think with our pre-Cic-Con discussion,

I think that we all had, something like that, our expectations.

And I think you shared a similar question on that episode as well

But, you know, going out there this time

around, not having been there for like 70 years, I can't,

I can't really picture this convention to be anywhere else.

Gas lamp is such a key part to the convention center.

Because there's so many like different kinds of bars.

All of the bars get together to participate,

whether it's like they're just doing like regular clubs.

Like there's a bunch of cool DJs that were out there, you know, doing their thing.

Unfortunately, couldn't get to see a lot of them, but

there's always like some like really cool shit going on.

You never know who you're going to run into when you're doing like there was

one year with the whole Dante Bosco doing,

doing his DJ Rufio thing where

he dresses up as his character from

the movie Hook and he DJs.

It's like crazy.

And so you not only you get to perform, but I'm sure he, he

was like out there, you know, meeting and greeting everybody and having a good time with everybody at that same club.

Like, it's crazy You never know.

Like this year, like, uh, the, the actor that

plays Vecna, he was DJing at at some place.

It's crazy.

Like, uh, And if you try

to put this convention somewhere, see it, I'm sure it'll

be like pretty big and I'm sure it'll be successful and everything.

But like what's going to happen outside outside of that?

Like, like, you can't walk.

Let's take Vegas, for example

You can't just go and walk to the convention center.

There's There's such a large area around the

convention center that it's almost.

It's the impossible.

It's strip, though, right?

But it's not walkable.

It's definitely not walkable.

It'll take at least like 25, 30 minutes for you to walk from..ver.

Unless like you got the parking.

But if we have a convention the size of San Diego Comic-Con, that's not going to happen.

And then the transportation is going to be slow.

It's already slow now.

Like, I think the way that San Diego has it set up,

they're prepared for it because they deal with this every single year.

And, you know, and the cities follow suit.

And the cool thing is, is that all the streets connect to the convention center.

You can't get lost either.

Like, while, anywhere else, like, I think everybody would get lost, frustrated.

Yeah.

Can I make a quick break?

That's why they always call it the San Diego Comic-Con campus.

Can I make a quick bid for Denver?

Right.

Here's my take on this.

The convention center here is right downtown.

There's a train stop right in front of it

and it's also very walkable.

Denver has a pretty decent- ish nighttime scene already,

so you're not far from bars and shit like that.

And unlike Vegas, it's relatively,

you know, cooler here in July.

So just putting it out there.

Denver will be.

So where are the yachts over there?

There's no yachts in down.

Well, here's the, unfortunately

I was watching the San Diego Comic-Con unofficial

blog podcast last night, and our friend,

David Lanser, the chief of the communications

at San Diego Comic- Con. the show.

I heard this for the show on two episodes.

They talked about this.

It isn't just putting it in an area that

would suffice, like actually have kind of a walkable thing.

It's about having one

the same amount of people,

like being able to fit the same amount of people in the convention center.

Like it was 150,000 need

to be able to fit into that convention center.

Yeah.

Plus whatever 50,000 extra that are roaming around.

And it's also has a lot to do with the hotels

The hotels play a huge role.

Like, they say a majority of

the hotels need to be able to house

like the attendees.

And so you say 100,000?

It can be 150, 150,000.

Okay.

So apparently the Denver conventions center are currently due up to like 30,000 people.

Okay. that wouldn't work.

That wouldn't work.

They even test tested

like WonderCon as like a,

LA.

Like Justin and I went to that.

And it was not, they

tried to make it like do things outside.

They had like food trucks and all that sort of stuff.

But it just didn't

feel like even now.

Like even in Anaheim now.

Like, I think the only thing that

happened during the WonderCon in Anaheim is

that everybody goes to Disneyland and Disneyland's packed afterwards.

Because guess what?

When they do WonderCon, they share some of the Disney

parking lots that's out there.

It's crazy.

It's absolutely insane.

But there's also no other outside activations because the

only things going on around that general area is

just like hotels and, you know

uh timeshares and, you know, things like that.

So like Anaheim can barely and handle WanderCon.

I will say Denver downtown Denver is a nice nightmare to get in and

out of whenever there's anything going on.

A guy shits on the street and you're going to have traffic for 30 minutes down there.

It's so bad.

And I say this as someone who's listening.

Is that guy Harnold?

What?

Is it's because people slip on it and then they fall like a cleanup job?

They look like Sub-Zero and he sprays ice underneath the guy.

But like I said, we have the tray system.

And there's nearby hotels with their own exhibit halls,

and you have two stadiums downtown as well that you could do to that..

Just saying.

The thing is, it has nothing to do with the. logistics?

logistics.

Like you just said

30,000.

That's not going to suck.

Well, like, try to send everybody from like to

5,000, so still don't.

It does not hold.

And then on top of that, like,

the proximity proximity from

San Diego to LA., that pipeline,

it's easier to get people from LA without having to fly them in.

Yeah, that's true.

You know?

Like I have, I have friends.

I have a friend who works for Amazon.

She comes down to LA to San Diego from LA

to the.

Is a two-hour drive or a three-hour drive from L.A. to San Diego Two and a half.

And is that just the five all the way down?

Okay.

Or what is that?

Yes..

Okay.

For the those of you that don't know, we call it the five.

We don't say I five.

We don't say interstate five.

No.

But

That's not bad.

That's a day trip, basically.

it's only a two and a.

So if you're only going for one day, you, you wouldn't even need

to stay stay in a hotel, I guess, if you' coming from LA.

I think the only, I

was going to say, I think the only comic conduct can like hold a torch to San

Diego, attendance-wise would be like New York Comic Con, NYCC.

Oh, okay.

And the thing is, too, with that?

Like, I think that once you leave the

convention center, there's no possible way to do outside activity activations.

Oh, yeah.

For New York?

New York.

But they get their attendance is higher.

They get like 200,000, but they don't have like megaels.

Which like that.

Like all the star powers in.

I've never been.

I've that's Epstein Island.

Oh, okay, okay.

It's a jet.

Definitely not.

They' honestly was there though you, like they don't have anything like that.

All the mega panels are going to be in San Diego Comic Con, so it's

definitely catered to a totally different market..

They would probably put like mega panels in like Med and Square Garden in if it's in that area.

I don't know New York very well, so I'm just saying it talking out of my ass.

Oh, it's in Manhattan.

I just say, I was just thinking because the proximity of San Diego Comic

Cono Hollywood, you're definitely going to have a stronger presence when it comes to like celebrity power and stuff.

Yeah.

If that's There were some highlights this year for you, Donnie?

Oh, well, speaking of celebrities, there's a lot of people present that I came across.

Some I didn't even even know.

Like I high-fived Ryan Reynolds at one point and didn't even know it was him until I read about it.

You did that?

Yeah, well, because I thought the costume,

the quality of his costume was amazing.

Later I learned it was actually Ryan

Reynolds.

I also thoughts a question, that's the studio making that for him, right?

He's not like doing that on his own.

Yeah, 100%.

Like, it was totally, like, he could tell it was like official, but I was just like, I had no idea it was him, right?

So like two days after we left the con.

Yeah, yeah.

I ran into Johnny Depp.

I was looking right at him.

And I was wondering why everybody was there.

I had no, I had never even heard about the scr thing, so I had no questions.

I walked away.

I didn't even take a picture.

I was like, who is this?

Why is everybody taking a picture?

Amber and I walked by that.

That was Johnny Depp.

On Wednesday, Amber and I walked by right.

We were like, what are these people doing out here?

And we were like, we walked right in front of.

That's exactly exactly what I said.

Yeah, if we had stayed like an extra five minutes longer, we would have probably seen them too.

I looked at him, but I still didn't recognize him.

I walked away after staring at him for a little bit.

I was like, I didn't even take a picture.

I just thought that it was like you looked at him and you're like, what are you looking at, old man?

Who asked for asked for

Ebenezer screwrooge movie.

Who's this for?

That's what I want to know.

Who asked for this?

Like Ebenezer, man.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean People are chopping at the I wrote at the Oregon story.

Hey, I need another remake.

Their tangling is literally.

Before he was Scrooge, he was Ebenezer.

What?

Like, he's always been Ebenezer.

What are you talking about?

Like I don't know.

It just seems silly to me, but I get it.

That's his name.

Is it like a prequel to him meeting the ghosts or something?

Is that why they say it like that?

You'ing like, oh, here's this.

Here's his really fucking.quel to the ghost grumpy old guy

that before all the events of him changing happens.

Yeah, exactly.

Isn't him meeting the ghost a prequel to his life already?

Why do we need another origin story for this guy?

What if they made it in three parts, but every time

he visits each ghost, it's a one movie.

Oh, okay.

That's hilarious.

I could see that, actually.

Like, that could work.

That could work.

It's own little cinematic universe, the Ebenezer Scrooge cinematic Universe.

Phase one.

Phase one?

Kevin Feige, eat your heart out.

Donnie, what's one thing you would change?

Oh, no, I' keeping that in mind for the end.

Keep that in mind for the end.

But let me ask you this.

What was a pain point for you this year?

A pain point?

Yeah, like, what was like something that like highlights versus lowlights?

What was like something that you were like, oh, man, that sucked or I wish I could have gone better.

Man, to be honest with you, I really don't have much complaints this year.

Like, I've been to a few of the, not as many as Arnold

and Alex, but I felt like I could navigate through it easier.

Everything I wanted to see, I was able to see.

I did exclusive as were of the thing for me.

Like I couldn't really land anything that I was trying to get, but at the same time, I didn't really

plan so well, right?

I slept in most of the day.

I just kind of leisurely, casually just strolled through,

but I wasn't really trying to secure any exclusives, like,

you know, as much as I tried in to pass, I wasn't waking up early to get in line and stuff.

So, yeah.

So I guess that would be my ppoint.

But

what, what are the major pillars of Comic-Con?

You have panels, you have like the

people and Costumes and stuff.

You have like buying stuff, right?

Like, exclusive, whatever stuff.

I wouldn't say exclusives per se.

Not per se.

Like, I don't think that's, like, that became a thing later on

Okay.

So that's not.

You wouldn't consider that one of the big pillars of why you would go to Comic- Con, no?

I mean, the Collecting in general is always a pillar.

That's like collecting, collecting, meeting

and, you know, just generally having fun.

I like that.

It's to have joy, you know?

Like being around community, like, having

a joyous time and like, like,

like collecting the stuff that you love, you know?

And that's kind of..

I think panels is a big one, for sure.

But that's community, though.

And I'm glad I'm glad you say that because

the Hall H panel is like the panel to go to.

And if I'm understanding this correctly, people are waiting outside in

line on Friday to get a badge to

go into the panel for the next day, I believe, is what was going on there.

It was a long line.

Let's just say that.

And I didn't understand what was going on to. until I read about it later.

I saw that line.

Yeah, we saw that.

People..

Yeah.

We walked right by it.

I was going to say, people love to be like the first to see something.

You know what I mean?

Like, oh, exclus, oh, I can preview this. before it comes out.

That's what I wanted to ask.

Is Hall H like the Coachella of Comic-Con where you, you have

to go there for the gram, for the social media, where people genuinely want to go there because they just have to see

whatever the big exhibit is.

I would say it's more so the specific panels.

I wouldn't say that hull H as a whole.

It's not just for the gram.

I think it's for like senior

favorite actors and having the opportunity because they do have like

time slots where you can ask them all questions and things.

And sometimes if you're lucky, if they do

it, sometimes if you're like the first whatever people,

they give like free stuff, sometimes before you

go into the panel room or sometimes they'll be like, hey, you have something

taped to the bottom of your chair, grab it.

And it's like, you know, Oprah, you know, giving everyone a car type of deal.

It really depends, but I think it's mostly there for people.

Well, one, yeah, they definitely want to be like, you

know, first ones there to see, you know, and also to get like their

the closest as possible spot or chair. season

their favorite actors, maybe getting free shit,

and asking questions.

I think that's pretty much it for the whole stuff.

It's's There is a FOMO aspect to it, but not a lot of people really care.

They just want to be in the room so they can see like

what the plans are for Marvel's next phases or maybe

like I went and I got to do a H thing for Terminator

Dark Fate and they brought out like Arnold Schwarzenegger.

They brought out Linda Hamilton and some of the newer like

actors for that movie. and I was like, wow, this is really cool.

I actually get to like watch them in

person live bey on stage talk about their movie.

It's a pretty wonderful experience, honestly

So it sounds like it's more than just bragging rights.

And then you get the historical pop culture moments of speaking of Ryan Reynolds

showing up as Deadpool, right, in the middle of that panel.

And he was talking to the cast on stage, saying, oh, Kim, is there room for me in the movie or something like that?

I didn't watch it, but I heard.

I will say though, like it's it's it

has a lot, like Hall H has the mystique.

It has a mystique, but

overall, it has a lot to do with

whatever specific panel you are trying to get to.

Like, for instance, what Justin said, people are

like, really, really wanting to know what the Marvel panel

is, you know, what they're going to announce.

And because they've created this whole like sort of

aura mystique around going to see..

And they do it well because like what they do is like, if you notice,

if you ever watch their panels online, they never do a

Q&A. They never do a Q&A. And they're very vague with their answers.

And that's that's how they keep it.

But they do what they do is they give you

like a lot of cooler reveals to

satiate the, you know, the whole like idea of asking questions at the end of a panel or whatever.

As

opposed to, say, for instance, like, last year when I went to the

toxic Avenger panel.

It was easy to get in.

It was very easy to get in.

I walked in.

I didn't have to stand in line.

And so that being in Hall H,

it didn't really, the mystique around it surrounding it, it was

definitely something that like the allure to go see the hall H panel.

It's like, oh, you got to go to Hall H.

Yeah, I got to go to Hall H, but I didn't go to like a

panel where I had to stay and stay overnight.

Like the next day when we Donnie and I tried to go to

what is that, Tron?

We tried to get into the Tron panel and the line was just like capped.

They would not let anybody in.

Like the rest of the day, we almost got there, but we never did we never did.

And then

so it's just basically really all about who you're wanting to see.

If you have a press or a media pass, do you get to.

No go in?

Chris Chris Gore couldn didn't even get into a hage for Marvel.

Chris Gore?

You know what?

This is the only year I've been to Comic-Con that I didn't meet up with Chris Gore.

You know, Every time.

Every time I've been to Comic-Con, I've always been like.

I don't know if you're familiar with F thread or., you guys know that guy?

Not really, kind of sort of.

I know.

I just I just, I've seen him in a bunch of

different places and I always say hi, and he always says hi, Ben.

I see him on YouTube all the time talking about screenwriting.

So he's like semi- well-known.

For me, that's how I know him.

Anyway.

If it's the same Chris Gore, a guy with like a white hair.

Platinum white hair.

Yeah. loves Batman..

Nobody here wanted to go to Hollywood H this year or what was the thought on that this year?

You guys?

Because you could just watch the replay later at night.

So you so you're like, yes, you're like, yeah, no sense in waiting in line for minutes.

Unless you're want to score with some of the free stuff that they might be given away.

No, I wanted to go see the Pan's Labyrith panel.

I really wanted to see that..

I wanted to see the space..

Yeah, S..

Spaceballs would have been really cool and I heard it was really fun.

I heard Spaceballs was really fun.

I heard Rick Moranis got a standing ovation.

Yeah,

yeah.

Because, didn't somebody, P Rick Moranis like, he

comes out from hiding for not hiding, but he comes out to public for

the first time in 20, 30 years and some guy in New York punches him.m like, that's fucked up.

But, you know, I think he's getting his.

No, no, but that was in New York.

It wasn't at San Diego.

No, I. That' Let's be transparent.

This happened in New York.

Yeah.

So that's nice that he's getting his flowers in San Diego now because he's been through a lot.

That's where I'm getting at.

But yeah. good for Rick Moranis.

I always wondered what happened to him like in the 2000s, I was like, what happened to Rick Moranis?

And it turns out he was like trying to focus on family and shit.

His last movie was, Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves, I believe.

Was that the last one?

That was his last movie and then he retired because of

you know, situations.

But yeah.

I can't wait for spaceballs too.

I fucking love that movie.

That movie is so good.

Mel Brooks.

Is he the guy, did he like kind

of retire because he went to just take care of his dad?

Well, yeah, it was family related.

I don't know. it was his dad specifically.

He went to take care of his kids

and I don't really want to bring up his personal stuff on

the podcast, but it has to deal with his wife and then him having to go take care of his kids.

Oh, I'm thinking of a different guy who

was doing a lot of movies like back in the day.

he ended up writing a book about it.

So Interesting.

It's probably not his.

Oh, I have to add that to our Amazon shopping list later.

But, yeah, no.

So Hall H is a pretty big event and what else did I have?

I mean, there's so much else to talk about.

That's Hall H. isn't all of it.

Isn't Right, right, right.

Well, there you go.

Well, there was that controversy of like the Hall H on Saturday

There was like, so there were more wristbands

given out than actual space on Saturday.

And they're usually

I was watching and I was watching this, they were discussing

this on the San Diego Comic-Con u official blog with David Glanzer.

And he was saying like, they're still investigating

what's what went wrong.

But it's like an all hands-on deck sort of like

situation to trying to figure out what happened

But what they

think may have happened was their..

at least I don't think this is what they think have happened, but this is what their speculation

is, that more wristbands were given

out than their at was actual space.

Now, I don't know how that happened.

They don't They don't know how that happened, but it's just.

But there was also this thing where people were kept were like,

like explod they were getting upset saying like

it says that these wristbands guarantee

And then if you go over the verbiage

of the actual, like clause

for it, it says, it doesn't really guarantee and they have the right to

um, I don't know, like, like, I

got to find that the verbiage for it, but it basically says it's like, it doesn't really guarantee.

It doesn't really guarantee.

No, you're just getting a chance to go.

To touch on that too.

I remember my first and only haul H experience

there was actually a sign that I read.

And Again, this was years ago.

This was years ago, but still, there was a sign that I read that

says that you may not be guaranteed entry.

They do post signs like that in the line.

I just don't remember at which point of the line that it says,

I think even at the beginning of the line, or at least the beginning beginning where the canopies are usually.

But there is a sign.

There is a sign, and it says on that sign that you are not

guaranteed to get into H, regardless, you

know, and I think that just, I think that generally means that even

if you have a wristband, you're not guaranteed to get into it, and I can see how that happens.

There's people that are getting in line with the, with

the knowledge or it should be reading with the knowledge saying

that you might not get it.

Even though you're in line, you might not get it.

So, I mean, that's my experience from the past, though.

The thing I heard, because I was watching a little bit of that with the

with David Glenzer, he said that

the amount of wristbands that they had purchased,

that Comic-Con had purchased for Hall H

for Saturdays, for it was less

than the amount of people that was allowed.

That's correct.

That's.h It's always less than the But

some reason there was more, they ended up being more than the capacity.

So they're like, where do these extra wristbands come from?

And they also said he also said that

then?

they purposely make it's difficult

to replicate the wristbands.

Like, at least you can't replicatelicate them on the fly.

Like you really have to put a lot of effort

into making these response.

So do something different like personal branding,

you know, they feel like you really want to get in.

Okay, it's not a stamp.

Okay, it's going to burn

Okay.

Hey, well, well, question.

I mean, Marvel's such a big swinging dick in all this.

Why don't they just put up like a big ass tent somewhere outside of the convention center?

Is that possible?

No, that's not possible.

or is that not doable?

I'm just thinking of ideas here.

So then I make it easier, you know, some temporary structure.

I mean, they didn't have extra room on the grasses here.

There's like only one or two activations out there..

Yeah.

Yeah.

Hall H is huge, though.

There you go.

Yeah, Hall H is like holds over 6,000 people.

It holds up.

Yeah.

There's It's one of those things that

I remember in the conversation on the podcast

last night with David Glanser, he was saying that they

are trying to figure out solutions

to be able to, accommodate more.

And that's the problem.

It's like, I think you could try, like, say they add two and more.

Again.

You know, yeah.

They should just make up all-H arena.

30,000 people.

Put them in.

Everybody fight.

Put them in in Pecco Park, right?

How far is Pco Park from the convention center?

It's like a block away.

It's like a block away.

It's a no-way. six to nine minutes block.

Yeah.

I' I've seen comments online saying, you know,

they recommend like doing it all at Petco Park.

I'm like, you have enough seating

more than enough seating for that than in Hall H, man.

Like, that And it'd be cool too, because they have like

giant screens in there..

Well, the problem is you have to still buy buy out the stadium,

even though they do, they don't send they don't have any games there.

It's You're basically having a private event at Petco Park.

And Comic-Con can't like, they

aren't willing to afford putting carpet back into the connection.

They' nonprofit, right?

They'.

They are.

International.

It's need is is a major donor to

to pay for it.

Like you?

No, not yet.

Oh, yet, not yet.

One day.

Did you just come have the panel at our house over here?

Yeah.

We'll do it in the backyard.

Yeah, I like that.

It seats $10,000?

I'm sure I can make it work.

I'll just move some things around.

Hey, hey, hey, get your hands off that statue's penis.

Well, love the merchandise.

Let's talk about activations really quick, just really quick,

because I was outside the convention center.

I saw lines for the Percy Jackson, for the Paramount thing, for the

oh, I forget what else there was out there.

There was a bunch of stuff going on.

Blue animehem.

Yeah, and like I read later, I was reading on Reddit that

people were like, yeah, you wait like two hours in line for the an activation.

It's like you get a pin and a swift kick in the ass and you're out the door.

So it's like, wasn't really worth it this.

You're like, I feel like the general consensus, that year for the activations

was like, that's a lot of years.

No, that's not true.

I

That's a lot of people just poo-pooing on Comic- Con, right?

Yeah, exactly.

Reddit likes the poo-oo on, like, everything.

Big poo poo on this show.

Of course.

The thing is is that, you know, you don't have to wait in that line.

Right?

If you feel like it's not worth it for you, then it's not worth it to you.

Don't do it.

I think what the hell is Percy Jackson

What is that?

It's a book.

Oh, okay.

And it's also a movie series.

I thought it was like a Harry Potter movie series of movies.

I never Interpussy Jackson.

Yeah.

It's kind of like in the same veins as like Harry Potter and things like that.

You know, Lord of the Rings.

I don't want to compare the team.

So it's not Harry Potter, but it's like Harry Potter.

Pussy Jackson's in the same vein as one.

It's like Water Harry Potter

It's like it's Harry Potter.

It's a show on Disney Plus.

Are people watching this?

Like, is it popular?

Do people like it?

They wouldn't They wouldn't do an outside excavation if it wasn't popular.

Well, I'm only asking, because who the hell asked for Ebenezer Scrooge and we have Percy Jackson up here?

The studio did that..

Where's like, I don't know.

Where's like a Pcy Jackson is based on like Greek mythology,

I think, like they're talking about all that stuff.

Where was the Odyssey?

Yeah.

That's a big movie this year.

There was no Nydra.

There was no Odyssey.

The one, that movie was already been released..

Two, That's Not the audience.

Oh.

Christopher Nolan should show up and be like, hello, I'm Christopher Nolan.

I' He's show up for Batman

Has Has he?

Okay.

Yeah.

Arnold and I were at one of the early, the first Batman.

Batman begins.

That's Batman That's like 06, bro.

Damn.

And then Gladiator

stuff right.

Glad Iator?

Gladiadiator.

Glad.

Glad Glad Eater.

Wasn't George Lucas for the first time at Comic Conon last year?

was that last year?

What long was that?

Okay.

What was that for?

Was that for the George Lucas Museum in L.A.?

Or was that for something else?

Okay.

Yeah, because I like, I'm looking at these act activations and I'm like, I've never heard of these friends franchises, you know, like, I don't know.

Yeah.

I just thought this.

And that's the thing.

Like it's not about you knowing about them..

It's about you going to them and discovering stuff and

then and then like being curious.

You know, it's it does do fan service.

Like Pcy Jackson does have its fans.

It's not like they're they're going to go there and like not have fans.

But it's also to help build

the fan base, you know, like it's also like,

if you look at it, it's like, it's goodwill towards the fans.

Like a lot of this stuff is just just like really,

if you go to a Comic-Con, if you spend the time and spend the money, it's goodwill

It's like, you know, I'm glad you're here.

I'm glad you enjoy the show.

Here's something for you.

Like, to show our appreciation, you know?

And, you know, and it, yeah, it's unfortunate

that like you get like people who aren't fans of going in line to go to these things

But that's also what you want.

Don't you, like as a fan, don't you want your, the thing that

you love to grow and actually stay around?

And, you know what I mean?

That's, it doesn't make sense to be all like, oh, I can't get in.

Well, you should be glad that people are interested

For sure.

HLP says it's like in this commercials without the TV.

That's a good NHLP.

You know, I liked the peanuts activation.

It was pretty cute, and I was able to do that on Sunday

since they capped the line on Saturday.

Like early in the morning, too.

Like, they didn't even open the line was kept

But I got to do it on Sunday.

And it was cute because it was like you got to adopt a Snoopy or adopt, you know, the brothers and sisters..

Do you have your Snoopy's handy?

You show those early?

I do.

Yes, I did share them. check out the merch.

These were so cute.

They were like $35 each.

Oh, why am I so blurry?

Yeah.

What we got, I got Snoopy and Spike.

Yeah, Snoopy and Spike, they're plushies.

Spike Super Seven

Very cute.

And.

They had all of them.

It was cool.

They' Yeah.

That was my favorite part.

I got a few other things like magnets and a couple of hats and stuff.

I got Alex, one of the hats.

But yeah, it was it was super cute because it was like an adoption drive.

But

and everything was like decorated out and everything.

Yeah, there's the hat right there.

So before we start to wrap her up, let's, I want to

hear from you guys, what were some of your favorite cosplays that you saw this year?

Arnold, let me start with you.

Favorite cosplaylays.

Oh, man, that was pretty cool.

We saw that.

I think I was with you, Donald and Alex,

a big robot guy.

Oh, yeah.

Mattron?

Thatron...

That was pretty cool.

Last year, we had the big Galactic cap.

I mean, Galactus.

This year was

the Big Tron.

Let's see.

Other cosplays.

I mean, gotta shout out the Homiadora.

Yes.

Hi, I'm Big Cat.

With his legit star Darth

Star.k Georgie from Star Trek?

Well, he's Star Trek every year.

That seems to be like that's his base, the clay that

kind of warms it up, you know, started getting into it.

next day is Black Panther and then Darth Vader.

That's when you know, you get people who are like, oh, can I get a picture?

Can I get a picture?

Which that's, for me, that's my.s he's tall.

He's like one of the taller Darth Vader's I was looking at invention.

I'm like, damn, dude.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

That's one of the reasons I wouldn't want to cosplay.

Why not?

People's that way, because you get people who want to to stop and..

I could see you as Ned from Spider-Man, Arnold. best friend.

There's a Ned?

Yeah, and Spider-Man, the new Spider-Man movies.

Oh, yeah, I remember.

I could see best the one Toby Maguire?

No, it's the Tom Holland movies.

You mean Tom Holland?

Tom Holland, yeah.

You knew that.

Which I went to

Yeah.

You knew this.

the bureau party.

which I did not see Tom Holland there.

And I had to pay for the beer.

He was asking for for it, too.

You, where's Arnold?

I know Where's?

I want to be Donald.

Tom?

Yes, I'll be right there.

But then he was gone.

Yeah.

Zendaya was asking for you too, apparently, by the way.

Yeah, right.

So Tom better watch out, you know?

Snatch her up.

I feel like when you go to a convention

and you're going to be cosplaying dressing up or whatever, you have the

a little bit of the bit

of the thing in the back of your head that tells you, you're probably

going to get stopped a bunch of times, depending on what you're wearing.

If you're going for super extravagant, like

legitimate, like almost to the cosplay, yeah, you're going to get stopped.

I think that's why a lot of cosplayers do that anyways because they know they're going to get stopped.

They want to get stopped, that also is like a great way

for them to get like recognized as well.

A lot of them want to make cosplay a career because

they travel to different conventions as well

So cosplay, it's a big thing, and I

think a lot of people dress up specifically so they can get done attention.

At least the times that I've dressed up, like,

I remember went to Level Up Expo here in Vegas and

I dressed up as, it was just an inflatable Godzilla costume.

I had people stopping me all the time, wanting to take pictures.

And I met a bunch of people too.

A lot of people that I'm like friends with still, you know?

I don't know.

You could make a career out of that.

Yeah. absolutely.

One of my friends Tina explores.

She had some really great cosplays,

and she goes there. there and

is prepared for people to ask to get a picture with her.

Teenage.

What does she dress up as?

Oh Chan Li

Spider-Man, Wolverine.

Also my favorite. your close friend Tina Explorers.

What's her real name?

Another one of my friends, Athena Kami.

This was the first time that I saw her

show up there.

She was a Chariz

Poke World?

She was also Venom.

Venom, which was really, you know, and they're prepared to take pictures and video

you, that people are going to ask.s.

Video too, huh?

Huh?

Video 2, huh?

But yeah, because, you know, they're like, all right.

shoot the venom or shoot the spider webs or

like... throw a fireball or

Shoot some webs.

Yes, yeah.

Yeah, you know, you know.

Web slanging.

You know, let's see that those clocks protrude.

Shoot that water gun.

Yeah.

Yeah..

Donnie, what was some of your cosplays?

Your favorite cosplay you saw this year?

Yeah, I don't know if it was the same one that you guys were talking about, the

Transformer, but Galactus from Marvel that was huge.

That one was really awesome.

The big purple one.

And then I saw in a really good Shea costume as well, cosplay as well, that stood out to me.

Where's that from?

Jira?

Shea from He-Man.

Shra.

Oh, Shiro.

Shiro, sure, sure.

I didn't

Oh, really?

Okay.

What about what about you, Justin?

Was some of your favorite?

Yeah, I'm going to pull up a video of it, but is

when I was at the adult swim thing and my favorite cosplay was the

dude dressed up as Sailor Moon.

I don't know if you could see..

Oh, I saw that video.

Yeah, the video of them dancing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yo, that was my favorite.

It was pretty funny.

There was a lot of cool ones, though.

There's like this giant, like, I don't even know what it

was from, but it was like this giant robot

um, that was walking around with like a fucking, I don't know.

It was cool as hell, though.

Um, there was a, there

was a, a cute, like fuzzy cppy bar that was at one of the booths.

I thought that was like super cute, but that artist like

mostly like focused on their art surrounding like capyberas.

But it was, it was the cutest capyera outfit that I I've seen

Was it Adura's, Darth Vader is always like super impressive.

It's just because he's tall.

I saw like a really silly like job of the hut.

It was like very

I don't know.

It looked like that it was meant to be like one of those blow-up

Jabbaa huts, but maybe the blow-up device, the the fan wasn't working.

So instead you could see all like the tubular

you know, spheres inside it from the outside.

It was pretty funny.

I didn't get to walk the convention floor a whole lot.

Oh, the group of skelet, like different

skeletors, like Chef Skeletor and soccer player Skeletor.

Those are pretty funny.

Oh, there was one.

I haven't posted this one yet, but it's from SpongeongeBob.

It's like that old lady in the wheelchair.

I don't know if you guys can see it.

Probably not.

But it's like the old lady in the wheelchair and she's like, chocolate!

You'll have to send those to the, I'll send those out to you guys.

Put them in the show notes.

Also, the lady that was dressed up

as Bloom from Winks Club, like she was really cool

Yeah.

There's a lot of cool stuff.

Did you guys see the, I don't even know where it would have been from.

It was I saw an old guy walking around.

He was like, prically barefoot, practically shirtless.

He had some kind of contraption attached to him that was like his costume.

I don't know what it was, like a big

tube or gun thing or something.

And he was walking around like it was huge.

It was like this big thing attached to him.

And he was like completely barefoot, walking around outside the convention center.

I saw him at one point.

Do you guys know?

Did you guys see that guy?

Was his head like a pot and he was wearing like white undies?

Yeah, he was practically naked, yeah.

So So that character, okay, so that guy,

his username is called Let Me Solo Her.

And it's Solo her?

It's in reference to Eldon

Ring because that there's a there's and it might be

the same person, but there's a guy that's on plays

Eldon Ring. who tries to like

do like challenges.

So pretty much he has no armor, no nothing.

He just has that pot for a head or whatever.

And he goes around in his solos.

Fuck, I forget what, what her name is.

She's one of the like, uh, crazier like bosses that you go fight.

And, uh

so he calls Let me Solo her because he

uses absolutely no equipment, maybe like some sword or whatever, to fight her.

And then he beats her.

Like he he kind of, he's kind of sort of known as like more

or less a challenge runner, a speed runner, for video games

But his character in the game is dressed like that intentionally.

Is it this guy?

Yes.

That guy.

I don't know.

Is that who you're.

That is it.

Well,

I don't remember if it..

He had like some kind of contraption on like this side of his body.

Oh, he was like, Well, this guy was walking

the convention floor and I I didn't take a picture of him because he was it dressed like this?

No, no, no.

The one with the pot on his head.

Yeah, the one that that's Let Me Solar or whatever.

Or Let me Solo them.

Yeah.

No, I wasn't that guy.

I remember seeing that guy with you, Justin.

Yeah.

That guy's great.

I love I love You know what?

I love that cosplay.

I forgot one that I really liked it.

I forgot one that I saw that I really liked.

It was like a guy dressed like Mega Man, but eight-bit, but only from the side view.

So when you went to the other side, it was like you could see him.

It was like, it was just only from a side profile where he had a costume on.

Yeah, all the Metroid one.

They also have like a D as well or something like that.

Let's see.

What were, see, that big robot guy, I got a video and picture of that big robot guy right there.

This guy?

Yeah, that guy's from Tron.

Oh, that's from Tron?

I had no idea.

I haven't seen Aries yet, so I don't know anything about that character.

Wow.

What else we got?

This is some of the top costumes.

I wonder is huge is like the big purple one.

Who's this guy right here?

Andre the Giant, specifically from Princess Bride?

I think I'm going to guess.

I't to see if I seen any of my friends in there.

Lat.

Vampire Lestat.

Vampirelessat.

Got the Chihuahua.

Tina.

No, Tina's not there here.

Tina, Tina.

No.

You got to go to OF for that.

Yeah.

What's that?

of.com.

It's of.com, Arnold.

Let's see.

That's great.

Steps.

That's great.

Oh, wow.

We're kind of getting lost in the weeds here.

Well, I saw that Bowser there, too.

Actually, I think I might have a picture of them.

Yeah.

I saw this guy.

There's a lot of dig.

I was going to say nitral circles, a lot of digital circus stuff, which, by the way, I'm going to.

Okay, I feel like I feel like I

understand the fansom for Digital Circus, I guess, but I don't like it.

I don't like it.

I don't like the fandom either.

I think I think the show is annoying.

I'm sorry if you like Digital Circus, but

What's digital circus?

It The amazing digital circus.

Maybe you should ask your son after the podcast.

He does have this.

I didn't see many of these ones.

That's great great.

Look at that.

Lots of cool cars, plays.

Oh, I saw that Ghost Rider.

Yeah.

Squirrel girl.

A lot of the time also was spent in.

Blockbuster video employee.

Oh,, I took a, I have, well, it wasn't this lady exactly.

I interviewed this guy.

I have

a picture of someone dressed up as Gladys from Weapons as well.

Yeah, Blade.

Yeah, a lot of cool stuff.

A lot of cool political things.

Several blades this year.

All right.

Alex, really, before we wrap her up, what was your favorite cosplay for me?

Oh, I saw that Gladys from Weapons.

That was pretty good

There was a lot that I enjoyed.

Nothing really stood out to me, but I did go

see one of my favorite cosplayers at the Frazetta Girls

panel, and I got her her to sign my cosplay

cover that she did for Vampirella.

That's Erica Fett.

Got to meet her.

Super awesome person.

Like she does a really cool podcast

about crypto, like crypt zoology.

That's what it's called?

Oh, I thought crypto.

No.

No.

Who cares about that?

She

does a cryptology podcast and

it's kind of kind of mythical creatures and stuff like that.

And this, that panel, it was really cool, like a really cool panel.

She did, they talked about Frank Fzetta, the artwork that he did and like

the inspiration of like, that

women and, you know, like how like

it helped with the female empowerment

movement and anything like that, even though it was just kind of like a side.

It wasn't something that he was purposely trying to do

but like, it really empowered a lot of women to like,

you know, embrace sexuality, embrace

the, the uh, you know, that's great, Arnold.

I thought that was really cool.

That's cool.

And she was a, like, she's an awesome causelayer.

If you don't follow her, check her out.

Erica.f

Um, I don't think she really does cosplay a lot.

Although she still like does design costumes.

She just mostly focuses on her, her podcast.

But yeah, I kept for that think of anything else, I think.

There were a lot of cool moments, like

the calm that I like we barely scratched the surface of the con.

I kind of think we kind of went on a tangent on stinky people.

You know, I was talking with somebody with.

Oh, actually, I was talking with

with Chris, Milkman America. about Comic-Con.

And, you, I was like, I was thinking about it.

I was like, there was nothing really like super extravagant,

like, you know, a certain panel or certain, meaning a certain celebrity or it was

for me, it was doing,

having this Comic-Con experience with,

you know, with friends, with family, with cousins, and doing

that together, that to me, just made it even better.

That was

what made it really special for me.

That was definitely a highlight for me, too.

Like the fact that we were not only

getting together once again, but like,

you know, having people who haven't gone in a while or it's their first time going was great.

Like having Justin back in the fold with us, like it

was it was awesome to have him as part of a group again

for the first time?

Yeah, no, and yeah, you.

Like other friends who like

got to go, like Logan, my friend Noah,

it was cool to see them see Comicon experience through their eyes.

That's one of those things.

You know what I mean?

And I think that's that's one of the things I really, really really wanted to touch on.

And I think it's an important thing to touch on

Like, as funny

and like all the stuff that we were talking about was, I

think it's very important to like note that there

are people who are like shitting on like, oh, this is, I'm not going to Comic-Con anymore and anything like that.

And it's like, they've lost sight of what it really

means to go to Comic-Con, you know?

Like, they concentrate on too much on like being

able to get the exclusives and like how crowded the flora was.

But I think that's that's the whole point.

Like

like I like I even said, isn't it great that other

people are enjoying stuff that she you enjoy?

Yeah.

And isn't it great that

I was watching a thing on like how movie

theaters are popping off again.

Like somebody drove to go

watch the back rooms, and the parking lot was full, you know?

And that's an amazing thing.

Like to go to a movie theater and see the parking lot full,

it hadn't been like that in a while.

And it's cool to see that happening.

And that's the same thing with Comic-Con.

Like, I think that's like so important

Like, the fact that like it sells out every year and

that like people go even not knowing what's

going to be happening at the con, you know,

they go because they want to be around around the people.

And even, yeah, it's hard to walk around and yeah, it can

be hot and yeah, it gets stinky

And, you know, like the food and other

goods in the gas district are like

actually literally 35% more than you could get anywhere else.

However, like the

experience of going to Comic-Con is something that

cannot be replicated anywhere else.

We talk about this earlier in the show, like trying to

move it to Denver, trying to move it to anywhere else to Vegas.

You cannot replicate this.

It's something so special.

And that's why people want to come every year to this event.

It's

it's, I can't say anything more.

And if it were to move to a different, I don't ever want

to go to it in again because it's not going to be the same event.

Like going to coming to downtown San Diego,

having a city, like a part of it, the gas line district,

it's got its old element, but then you go to the other side of the convention center and

you're right by the marina, seeing the water

And there's something like rejuvenating in about being out there.

You know what I mean?

Like being by the water, being by, you know,

and, and like, there's no other feeling like that.

Like when we were at the adult swim party

like, that, that vibe,

that, you can't replicate that.

No, You're enjoying this great party, outdoor party.

DJ Light Show.

You've got like, you see the rap on

the Hilton Bay front for the American Horror Story.

Then all of a sudden you're like, oh, these fireworks going on

in the distance.

Was that for what was going on the radio show?

Yeah, that was for the Funko event.

And it just kind of added to the element of like

joy and wonder for that event.

And it's kind of like

there's so many,

been so many times where I've gone to the con and like,

man, this this is the kind of thing I can't replicate it.

Like when Justin and I went to go see Anamaguchi at

the House of Blues that one time for free, I could

we'll never replicate that.

We'll never replicate that.

And that lives in my mind, in my memory

like, and holds a special place.

It's it's it's irreplaceable.

You know?

I agree.

A lot of the lot of the unique shows that we

just happened to stumble upon when, you know, like the first

five years of me going to San Diego Comic-Con,

I was a broke bastard, man.

But I made it work, man.

I was I made.

I like other major cultural events.

This is relatively affordable, right?

Like you can't even get into the Super Bowl unless you're paying thousands of dollars.

Right?

Like, isn't this like, what is it, $1 hundred bucks a day or something like that?

Arnold was telling me.

Less than that.

Less than that.ess than that.

So you could go for a day

for less than a 100 bucks.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You't do that with the Super Bowl.

Yeah.. although it is hard because of the lottery system.

But I's a lot.

For the tickets, yes.

Yeah.

Especially if you didn't go the previous year, it's a lottery.

I don't know that.

So not everybody gets to go.

Yeah.

That's an interesting.

You might not even get it the whole week.

You might get one single day or like me, I only got two days.

for the convention.

Yeah.

I only got Thursday and Sunday, and thanks to Donnie, we snuck in on Saturday.

Anyway, but it's all the unique stuff.

It's all the unique stuff that happens during the convention center.

You You don't have to spend a dime.

You really don't.

I mean, on tickets, yeah, if you want to go, but you can literally just go

out there, give yourself a small little budget and kind of just work with that.

You know,

and it's because of like the group that going with friends.

And it was able to make my

experience a lot better because I was able to see these cool,

free shows where I fun in. because you guys had fun.

You know what I'm saying?

I'm in real deb mode.

I'm like, if you guys are having fun, I'm having fun, baby.

Consider this.

Like, it's like, you could just buy the ticket ticket

and not have to spend a dime other than food

and your lodging, right?

Like, you don't have to buy anything.

You could go to all the panels, you could could go to all the activations that are free

and still have an amazing time.

Like, you could go to that you could go to the

the film festival that they host.

You could deal to all the like, there's a pinball room.

There's a hosted by Stern Pinball.

Are people peopleball wizards there?

I don't know.

I'm sure I'm sure there are.

Only one way to find out.

And then, and then like this year they had like Nintendo

was back and they had their room where you could play like, like

like Ninto Switch games, you know?

And then the free visor that they give you, you can sell

that on eBay for 35 bucks You can sell

some of the pins that they give you on eBay.

All of the free swag..

But I'm talking about the fun stuff.

You I'm not talking about like the work you have to do at.

I don't know's professional flipper.

No, no, no.

The stuff that they give you for free.

You can recoup a lot of your spending and

the trip.

But I'm just trying to make money.

Bro, I, okay, like, just

to touch on what Arnold's talking about, I remember the year that they

had like the Castle Rock activation and they had like the borderorderlands

three activation as well.

I like I got my hands on a bunch of that

stuff and then I was able, and it was all three, by the way.

It was like a Castle Rock like hotel key keychain

and then some like posters and masks and stuff from Borderlands.

I was I kept some for myself, but I also flipped the ones that I didn't want

And I made my money back on that too.

It was pretty funny But yeah.

It's not It's not about that.

It's not remember I found a stack of Walking

Dead stickers back in the days when walking Walking Dead.

This was like around the time when

when Negan, you know, like they ended the season where.

Yeah, when it was so popular.

Before they' they didn't know who he killed.

Well, so I found found a stack of like Walking

Dead stickers about that, like that thick, sitting on top of a trash can inside

the convention center, I grabbed it because I was like, oh, cool, Walking Dead.

All right.

Fortunately, that's where it belonged.

Well, back then, one of

those stickers was selling for like 15 to 20 bucks each.

What?

So then I sold a lot of, I sold I made

ton.

We're in the wrong game, boys.

We need to get to the sticker game or something.

S some stickers.

You know?

No?

I'm being also.

Okay.

We have stickers.

We have stickers.

If you guys want the stickers, You have stickers. us up.

And I got this cool hat, thanks to Alex.

Oh, Ask me about my current reads, baby, there we go.

Can you see that?

Is that good?

There you go.

Hey, you look good in.

Thank you.

You's the color..

I like the color.

You should wear a hat.

No, I should wear the hat, yeah.

Why is it so flat though?

It's like it's like a plain.

You could put a plate in.

That's a flat bill.

You off of this.

I' Sam you wear his hatended like side.

I mean, I'd be like, Sam, the sticker's still in there.

He's, oh yeah.

He's like, no.

I'm, you to take it off you?

Is that a cultural thing?

Is that like the sticker must?

Is that aesthetics?

I don't know what that's about.

I take them off.

I don't like it.

It's a sticker thing.

Yeah.

Some people like it.

Um, What's the name?

Wesley.

He made custom stickers for his hats the ones that he made.

And they were actually pretty cool.

I would kind of like keep it on just for a little bit.

You know, just because it would look cool.

Well, I realized that you can keep the sun

out of your eyes and it holds back a little bit of the sweat.

And if your hair is long, like mine is right now, the little hair I

have left, you don't have to worry about brushing your hair as much.

Exactly.

Apparently there's utility to wearing hats.

I'd have thought it was just like a vibes thing.

You know what I mean?

So,

HLP messs about stickers.

We got some stickers.

HLP, will send you a whole pack of stickers and you can leave them on top of the trash can.

No, I'm just kidding.

We'll send you some.

Who's in charge of that is the purpose of inventing hats in the first place?

place?

Yeah, well, that's what I didn't realize until I started wearing a hat.

Now it's my whole personality.

You know what I mean?

I need something to decorate my head

And it seems no other purpose.

All right, fellas.

Well, unless anybody has anything else, I think we should get on to the final question of the night.

Arnold will start with you.

What is one thing you would change if you could about Comic Con, Arnold?

What's one thing?

Did you ask this?

give us a head heads up, heads up?

I I gave gave you the whole show to think about your response, yeah.

I didn't

So what is it?

What' be one thing?

That's one thing you would change about Comic-Con.

If you were God, what would you change?

Bigger.

Make it bigger.

Okay, okay.

I like where your head's at.

That's fair.

Instead of like I said, instead of haul H, just like a H

that hold 6,900 people, make it a Hall H Arena.

Hall I. Don't even stop there and go to Hall J.

You know?

Oh, just call it

Hall.

Hi. go, HI.

There you combine the two of them.

You know, 6,900 plus 6,900.

You know, you figure, it's like, what, like, go call it 15,000 people.

It would hold.

Go big go Aire Arena over here

and, you know, have a little one of those built,

then it kind of solves a little bit.

Maybe.

I think that's a good idea, honestly.

I'm not even joking.

Like, why not go bigger?

You know?

Can you expand into the marina?

Can you like do what they did in New York and like fill in some of that

water with fake land and just kind of build on top of that?

You know?

Well, they actually were, like, they were in talks

about expanding across that direction.

I don't..

The people who own that land just sold that land to another restaurant.

Because they were they were waiting for that Joe's

crab shack to come down to like the lease to go up and it to go up.

And like people were going to buy that land.

But I guess somebody swooped in and is going to turn it into a new

restaurant, I guess.

So, I don't know. you.

But then, you know, like that's, I don't know.

What would you change, Alex?

What would be your big change?

My big change?

If you could change anything about Comic-Con.

I

would change a thing, to be quite honest.

There you go.

I think that's like the fact that it's what

it is, makes it special.

And like, I think if you're make space

for more, you have to consider the fact that here's the thing.

The state of Hollywood, they're like broke.

That's why they're weren't as many like activations outside.

That's why you saw like American Horrorror Story 13.

they opted for ice cream trucks.

They didn't do big like the big activation like they did last year.

They didn't have like a tent pole show like Alien

Earth to revolve everything around.

It was like this show that has been around for years

like this is their 13th year and

like they couldn't afford to bring anything big to it.

And like, I don't think there's like a huge fan

base now or like people are like that vested in it these days anymore.

So like to the to promote American Horror story

there, it was like kind of like a, what do we do with this this area

Right.

And we don't have a lot of money.

Let's give ice cream.

You know what I mean?

That's kind of like.

It didn't take a lot of manpower.

It didn't dots for your troubles, sir.

And it's like,

You know what I mean?

that's the whole thing.

You try to expand, like, you're just going to have even more empty space.

Gotcha.

So you're saying keep the status quo.

You know what I mean?

Keep the status quo.

I think just keep it where it is.

And let it's it's going to ebb and flow like.

It always does.

And hopefully Hollywood gets better.

You know, like, that's the whole thing.

It's like, when did we have the

last like huge push in Hollywood?

And that was like around the late 90s, early 2000s.

You know, you look at like things like The Matrix.

You look at like all the films that were coming out of that era, Lord of the Rings

You know, that was a huge, huge deal during that time.

But now it's like, we're waiting for that.

We're on the cusp, I believe.

And we're just kind of like trying to like

navigate through this whole, like AI generated

And I I think that like, it's just going to collapse anyways.

We're on the, like the cusp of it, like

kind of like this generative AI stuff,

like kind of being, you know, like,

we're going to lots of people, lots of creatos are going to see that this is

not the end all be all for us and we're going to like, you know, push to create new

stuff that doesn't rely on AI.

I think AI is a tool

that we can use, but it's like not something that

um we should let control

the creatives, the the creatives control the tool.

I agree. 100% on that.

um Well, great.

Yeah.

Justin, what would you change about Comic-Con if you could?

Um.

I'm on the same lines of not really changing it at all.

I would say maybe change

the placement of security access, maybe.

Not

not so I can like sneak in or nothing like that.

No, Wait a minute.

When you do the security placement outside of

the convention center, it's like you just have a couple of security

guards checking for everybody's badges.

I feel like that could be done

in a different way in a more efficient way.

I think it really leads to a lot of bottlenecking all this time.

I don't know if it's if it's because you should probably like

block off more of that road or something.

I don't know, maybe put ramps so people so there's

no like tripping hazard for people to walk through there.

But there's like different points of the of the front of the convention

center where I feel like it's really annoying and really inconvenient

Um where you have security just checking

everybody's badges and then, and then it gets bottlenecked because someone's like,

oh, I have a QR code and I need to go pick up my badge.

And they're like, okay, we want to see your QR code.

You kind of have to have that ready.

Even before you get to the front of the convention center, it's like

uh, and it's not that it's like that crazy or anything.

Because like you, you know, as long as you have

your shit ready to go, you should be fine.

But I feel, I feel like as far as congestion

wise goes, I think they just need to change

the way the format that they need to do that.

And maybe even expanding the road of harbor a little bit.

That's what that road is in front of the convention center.

It's harbor, something like that.

I think they just need to block off maybe a larger portion.

I would say like

I would say, you know, and it sucks.

I know it's the hotels that are like, hey, you can't do that because we have a

hotel here and we want people to, you know, valet or whatever.

But they should work out a deal with Marriott or

something and cut it all the way off to the, you know, end of that block

of Marriott and cut it off all the way to the end block of

the Hilton Bayfront and

just make that just a congregation so everybody can like walk through it.

Now, maybe there's like safety issues there in

regards to that, but I don't know.

I feel like they could do that a little bit better.

I just think it creates a lot of unnecessary congestion.

There's a lot of people coming in and out of that place

and I think they can fix that.

I think one other thing, too, is,

and, you know, maybe fuck me for saying this, but

if there are outside activations,

I think some of the outside activations should consider having

a badge holder.

It doesn't matter what day.

They should have a badge holder lines or something.

Like priority for badges.

Priority lines.

I agree with that.

That's.

It's like T-ck.

It doesn't even have to be like VIP because I know the line's still going to be long.

But it would also draw the crowd out of the convention center

It will also draw the crowd for those that don't have like all the days.

You know, it would benefit people that are like, they

have badges and maybe it's only for Sunday.

Maybe it is only for Sunday, but they can go on like Wednesday,

Thursday to the activation or, you know, Friday, Saturday, whatever day they want to go.

As long as they have their badge, they have like a priority line for badge holders specifically.

It doesn't have to be VIP.

It can just be a standard line.

It's just you have people without a badge, people with the badge and

that I feel like that would encourage outside activations to pop up a little bit more, too.

They can handle that kind of like the single rider line.

Yeah, exactly.

Like a single.

You have to like really watch for that because they can usually just be like,

hey, let me use your pass real quick so that way I can go on that.

Yeah.

But at the same time, no, they can still scan, they could scan the badges.

Oh yeah have the leaders.

Oh, it's already been used today.

Yeah.

Oh, that's true too.

I mean, I'm I'm sure

You could do that.

it would probably take some finagaline to get that

to work for all the things.

But yeah.

The cool thing is when, like in

that podcast as well, like with David Lanser, he was saying that

all most of the activations that pop up around the convention center during that time

they are approved activations.

So they could logistically do that, where they have like

the scanners to scan your badge and be like, they're

because they are partnering with the cons because they have to like

they have to, for the logistic purposes, they have to get approval for certain things.

Like, say, for instance, they can't just have Nike pop up.

It's like, why are you here?

Why is Nike here?

It's like, you have to get like approval to be in

the area of sorts, you know?

Like,

that's kind of the whole thing.

Like when, because a lot of those pop-ups occur

in or around businesses that are adjacent to the convention, and so there's like sort of approval

for that.

Like, for instance, like, like, like one thing that, like the

downside, like what you're talking about, like closing off the

street up to like the Hyatt or the Marriott.

The one thing is because they work out deals for rooms

like a lot of that sort of stuff goes into play.

Like, so like, are you going to close off the street and in front of us?

Are you going to have access like our hotel guest?

And if they they say, no, we're going to close that off,

that could affect their relationship and the ability

to block off rooms for

the convention and getting better deals.

Because they want to be, their whole purpose of like doing

the room block is to make an affordable for

their attendees to go.

Because like like David Glanser was saying, like the

first time he ever went to Comic Con, like

like over 40 years ago, he like

had only $ 48 with him.

And that was back then it was enough for food to buy

stuff and to like also like, you

know, spend money, you know, spend money on lodging.

Like that that like all

like, went to that.

And so if things get less

affordable, you know, or like less rooms are available, that makes it a lot

less likely for people to want to work with Comic-Con.

Was that pretty much it for

your you, Justin, as far as what you had changed?

Or Did you have more you wanted to add?

No, I think generally that was pretty much it.

Honestly, you get

what you want to get out of Comic-Con, you know, going into it.

You know, don't and Alex is right.

Go to Comic-Con with friends.

It's the best way to experience it.

Get a hotel room together.

Sure.

You're going to have to like sleep in like with like five other people.

or whatever.

But it's so that's what creates those memories.

It's like some random bullshit that happens in the middle of the night.

You know, like, like someone's shitting in the bathroom and stinks out.

I got to see you.

It's memories, man.

It's the memories.

I' never see you dancing and I got to see, and I got to say, you got some good moves, Justin.

Bro, I probably danced just as good as Donald Trump

I just I'm just tripping.

No.

And I'm not going to take up much more of the

time, but it's just like, you know, the haters that say

that, you know, that the convention isn't worth it, or

that it's just they're not going to go anymore.

Good.

You know, let someone else go then.

Let someone else have a good time, you know, because

if you're going to be a negative Nancy about something

that obviously people are still going to hundreds of thousands

of people are still going to go to, that's just, that's more of a them problem.

You know, you wanted to go and chase

whatever it is that you wanted to chase

whether it's toys, moments, and whatnot.

But that's not the ultimatelyately, that's not what the convention is about.

It's a celebration of comic books and fandoms and

cosplays and friendships and connections.

It's not about, it's not about the material things.

It's much as this convention is about, you know,

material things, it's not really about that.

It's about the memories that you make

while you're there and the different experiences you have while you're there.

And that's.'s for me.

And the stories that the creators make.

There.

The stories that the creators make.

Because it's a comic convention for comic books, and that's ultimately what it's all about.

Thank you for for that, Justin Donnie.

What would you change?

Yeah, personally, I

think it would be cool to see later panels.

I know there's some like this year they had some that went up until 9 9 p.m.

They were more like adult content anime panels, right?

But I would like to see

more variety for later panels.

Like last year, Alex and I went to one that was pretty late.

I think it was like seven, 730, but it was showcased Filipino heritage and identity in pop culture.

And I thought that was a good panel and there was a pretty decent, pretty decent turnout.

But to have more in evening hours, I think it would help

kind of clear out some of the congestion that happens earlier on in the day, right?

Because now people have to be strategic about what they're going to do, what they're

going to go see, and it kind of spreads it out a little more. because it's pretty early.

What time does it end at, like five or six?

It's pretty early, even though it's Saturday.

Well, the programming still does there's still quite a bit of programming that goes till nine

Is there a podcast panel on how do we apply?

There was a few panels this year, too, but I wish there

was more like bigger ones that, you know, people would kind of like...

I feel like those are just fillers sometimes. like

all the main ones, of course, happen in the daytime, but if you put some

bigger ones in the evening, I think it would help kind of spread the

crowd a little, you know, help fit it out a little bit.

But that's just my thought.

Well,

I think that's that's a very good point.

I think that's I think the only issue is like a

lot of these panelists, the people they propose

the panels, and they have to spend their own money to

give they give them the passes, but they can't they have to spend their own

money to like get the panelists there.

So that's a difficultty..

Yeah.

Also, more variety for food, I think, in in the con.

I feel like there have a lot of the same things.

Is there food within the connection?

There's there.

Yeah, there's some places in there, but, you know.

Yeah, yeah, there's a lot.

But I think there, you know, there's not much variety.

Like, it still made me want to go out.

Like, I was like, I'm just going to go a Jack in a Box.

I think there's a there's actually a decent variety there now.

It's Actually, this year it was the first year that I saw they had burritos and tacos

Okay.

I didn't even see that.

Yeah, that was in the sales pavilion.

The sales pavion.

But my issue is the price.

The price is, yeah, the price is higher.

Yeah.

You know one more.

Oh, go ahead.

I think it it's about the same as like going at it.

Like if the whole like convenience keeping on campus versus like leaving the

Yeah.

zone.

I was going to say, I know I forgot what event it was,

but I remember going to something where they offered like discounted

tickets if like you only wanted to come at night for like the last couple hours.

I forgot where I saw that.

But oh, you know what it was?

It was reading about Japan and how Japan lies like these tickets

for theme parks, like Universal Studios, where if you go in the last

two hours, it's like a heavily discounted price

But I think that would be cool to, you know, to open it up to some people

that can't afford to go to a con, you know, because of the pricing is so high.

Well, as the first time,

semiattee, I should say, the other thing I would use that I'm actually going to go into the convention center next time

actually go inside and experience it firsthand.

I feel like I have a good understanding

of what it's like in there just based on everything I've seen.

But I'm actually experiencing it for myself.

Everything outside, I wouldn't change a thing.

Like I said, San Diego's a great city.

You're right there downtown in the gas lamp

district.

And then, like, if you have time, if you're not going all days,

go to the fucking wild Island..

I can't talk right now.

The wild animal park in San Diego.

Go to Balboa Park.

Go to Old Town San Diego.

Cheetahs.

They're promoting one of the wild animal

parks like around K. I think it's called Cheetahs.

Che.

What about Bangkok or was it Hong Kong?

What is it called?

Yeah, to Chinese food.

San Diego zoo, you know.

I thought, well, the Noble Park was over in Palm Springs, a.ka, what's that?

Old living desert.

I was going to say the Springs preserve, but that's here in Vegas.

Arnold, if you haven't been in the barracks, have you?

That's the Park.

closed down.

Yeah, nothing that I know.

Health code violations, apparently.

No, Zeldas was known as the..

BC

Costa's was the classier Zeldas's, and that's gone now, too. apparently.

Catral City, Bear Club Club Cub.

Why doesn't have a nighttime?

We're not to all that.

Yeah, San Diego's a great..

San Diego's the perfect city.

They should not leave San Diego ever.

I think you're right, Alex Alex.

I think if they left San Diego, they'd lose a lot of their their audience

Because it's just that cool of a city to be in.

I was telling my friend, Jordan the other day, I said, San

Diego's like the Miami or the West Coast minus the douiness.

Like I feel there's way less douchiness in San

Diego for being a coastal city than like Miami, for example.

So

you want to get more.

If you want to to get some douiness, you have to just go to

the right beach here in San Diego, but they're usually pretty small.

Can they bring up real quick designer

con, like how they try to relocate to Vegas?

I don't know what the situation is, but this year they're bringing back

a Los Angeles version of it, including the Vegas one.

So I don't know if that..

The Pasadena one already happened.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

So, but I mean, like, they did that on top of the Vegas one.

And then they initially.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Right?

So I wonder what caused that.

I don't know of the history behind it or if they like lost, you know, foot traffic

by moving it to Vegas or whatnot.

But you know.

So I I do believe I saw like a video

they were talking about it, like how they're fans who like

miss the old designer con that took place in

Pasadena and they wanted to bring that vibe back.

And so like that's that's what they were doing.

It was like, I guess designer Con Pasadena is more focused on

local southern California, Whereas

the Vegas one is more focused, like international.

So that I think that same thing would happen or same type of

thing would happen if you did that San Diego, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

You'd lose that vibe.

Well, there we go, fellas.

I think we think we did it.

We covered pretty much everything that we were meant to cover.

I don't know what I'm trying to say right now.

No, that was a good discussion.

It was a good time.

It was good hang with the fellas, with the boys, got some one-on-one time with Alex, with Arnold, with you, Donnie.

Not so much with you, Justin, because, you know, you were a little busy

But, you know, still nice to see you in the flesh, as they say.

Justin got in so much stuff,

though, on Saturday you in, like yeah. everywhere.

Okay, yeah, let me just talk about this real quick.

Like, give me like two minutes, right.

So I only had, like I said, I only had two days, but

I was only able to go Sunday. technically my badge was

only available for Sunday because the only other day I had was for Thursday

So I got in, I flew in on Friday.

The original plan for Friday was once we

got into town, we were going to go to the hotel and then just do what we could while we were out there.

Unfortunately, that couldn't happen because of the flight issues.

Yeah, and that as well.

So I have a cram as much as I could in the

two days that we were there.

And then on Saturday morning or Saturday, went to, yeah, we went in the morning, right?

To just go pick up my badge because we missed the Snoopyy thing.

So I went, we went instead to go pick up my badge and we all

went to me, Donnie and Jess, went to go get our

tote bags and everything else that comes with it.

And, you know, we follow Donnie around and

he's like, hey, you know, we're already like where the exhibit

hall is, so why don't we just go check out, see if we can get in?

And we got, we were able to get in.

It was great.

So we impromptu was able to get our Saturday

on for at least half the day.

And then we went to go do the Candyland thing, which,

although it was cute and cool and I got a t-shirt and a magnet

out of it, probably not worth the price point for it.

And that was just to get the table.

So a little on the pricey side for just like a meal and

some photo ops and that was about it.

Then we went over to the interactive zone.

Unfortunately, they like capped everything, but we were able to meet

Bloom from a Winks Club, which was cool.

And we got to spend for like some collector cards and stuff.

I also bought like my little pony collector cards and a few other things.

And then I forgot what else we did that day.

Oh, I think we went over to the adult swim and that

was like around the time where we were like, okay, let's do the adult swim stuff

and then wrap it up, go back to the hotel, rest, shower up.

so we can go do the yacht party.

And I don't think they ever got around to me.

But the yacht party was a highlight of my night because it

was really fun seeing everybody again.

Like I said, I haven't been to this in seven years, so that's

probably just as much time as it's been since I've seen a lot of people in person.

The last time I went to Comic-Con was 2019

right before COVID, you know, and

then life happening all the time to me for some reason, couldn't

go for seven years years, but now I'm back.

And then Sunday, we actually had a full day to

do convention stuff and I was able to cram in a lot of swag

got to eat a lot of good food.

Yeah, and ultimately, I had a really good time.

Honestly, just being out there and seeing you guys was the highlight of my time there.

It was a good time.

It was a good hang, like I said.

So, all right, fellas.

Well, I think we did it.

HLP says the yawn party looks sick.

It was sick.

HLP, mostly because I was getting queasy towards the end, unfortunately,

I wish I didn't't expect it was going to happen.

I like right at the end, I was like, whoa, I got to get off this boat.

But yeah, good times, guys.

Yeah, follow us and nothing else.

Follow us and never see a podcast.

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We're actually going to do a little revamp coming up here soon.

So be on the lookout for that

Thanks to Mr. Kyle Ma and a Burns cycle for the intro and music.

You can follow Kyle on Instagram at selfiesnd underscorenderscorenderscore pets.

And yeah, any final words from the gentleman?

No?

Okay.

S.D,CC 2027.

Yeah.

It'll Yeah, we'll have press passasses.

Pressp.

It'll be official.

We'll be on location.

We'll dedicate like a day or two to actually like

talking with just random strangers.

We'll BMC Hall H one of these days.

Don't worry.

Also, for those of you who are wanting

to attend next year, make sure you create your member IDs

Do it soon.

Do it now as soon as possible because like they

tickets are going on sale.

Return registration is October 7thth.

General sales happen on November 14th.

So if you're planning on going, get your member done.

Remember ID create now.

Do it soon.

Do it now.

HLP says, no rating, no snooze meter.

Let's do it.

You know what, Arnold?

Let's do a snooze meter, because I feel like that's important in Comic Con, Arnold.

Okay.

What do you think?

Hold on.

Hold on.

Hold on.

What's going on here?

A 1Z rating.

I give it a one Z not

for, like, but for the overallall.

Because Comic-Con, it's a marathon, you know, for

all that Wednesday that it starts, you can

easily go hard that first day and just be like pooped and you're

like, I still got Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

And, you know, like for me, I went a little too hard on Thursday night

and it affected

my performance on Friday.

And you know, I rallied.

I rallied Saturday.

You know, I got up nice and early

and went went at it hard.

I got, you, I had my B vitamins.

I had all my vitamins.

I had my lions main.

Got very hydrated.

As hard as you went, though, on Thursday,

did you have a good time with Logan?

That's the important thing.

I did.

I did.

That was great.

That was I really had a good time.

Yeah, it was worth it.

It was worth it.

So it was a self-inflicted sort of,

you know, that caused the higher Z rating.

So

yeah, yeah.

You know, you got to think about these things that will affect your performance.

You know, you want to be able to perform well and last

the whole marathon.

because it..

You definitely have to perform well so you can lasts longer.

That is important.

Stamina is important.

I do agree with Arnold, though.

Stamina.

Like I have a friend who this was his first year, Noah, and he's like a very fit dude.

He runs like a lot.

And he said, like, he went pretty hard on Saturday

and he was pretty tired.

That's why he bailed on us on a yacht party.

Oh, was that the guy, the skinny guy?

Was there at the very beginning?

Yeah.

I was wondering what happened to him.

Yeah, he like got off the boat.

He was like, man, I'm just so tired.

Like, like, I couldn't, I can't make it.

I was like, that's fine.

I get it.

You went hard.

And, you know, he had a good time, though.

Definitely.

All right, gentlemen.

Well, if there's nothing else, say good night to the check.

Good night to HLP.

You got your snooze and meter.

There you go.

Thanks to HLP for the Sn Immeer music, by the way.

Isn't it always self-inflicted for the Z ratings?

That's a good question, is it, Arnold?

I know., I know.

Sometimes they'll, you know, you know, the six

tacos doesn't affect, you know, and it's just so good and you're like

totally captivated.

Yes, sir.

All right, gang.

Well, say goodnight to the gang in the chat

And that's going to be it for us.

Good night, guys chat.

Good night, gang.

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