Month: September 2015

Salt Lake Comic Con 2015 Summary

According to the founders, this year’s Salt Lake Comic Con had over 120,000 attendees, breaking their previous record. Thanks to better management the traffic moved smoothly and everyone was able to enter in a timely manner. Wider lanes in the main hall meant less congestion, and overall it was a very smooth event. SLCC also broke the Guinness World Record for having the most comic book costumed characters assembled in the same place. Which I guess… is something.

Here is a short summary of the panels I attended.

Designing the Starships of Star Trek Panel

This panel was hosted by John Eaves.

John Eaves is a designer and illustrator best known for his work on the Star Trek franchise, starting with Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. He served as a production illustrator on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Enterprise and was involved in all four Next Generation movies, specifically being responsible for the design of the Sovereign-class Enterprise-E. He also worked on a variety of films, such as Top Gun, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Valkyrie and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. – Wikipedia

John Eaves showed a number of design art pieces from Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Generations, First Contact, and Nemesis, and all three of the new Star Trek films. One thing that was interesting to me was when he said they used to receive a full script of the show or film, but with the secrecy today they only receive a 4 page summary of the parts they need to work on. He said he did a lot of design work for a character named Alice, only to later learn that it was Kahn in Into Darkness. ~

At the end of the panel he said he didn’t only work on Star Trek. He said that he had just finished working on Captain America: Civil War, and that he would be starting on Guardians of the Galaxy 2 on Monday, September 28th.

~ Some of these details may have come from the State of Trek: Looking Ahead to Star Trek at 50 Panel, I can’t necessary remember.

Ian Somerhalder Panel

I can’t tell you much about this panel, other than it started 30 minutes late (making it only 20 minutes total). Ian Somerhalder finally appeared on stage, answered a few questions, and departed.

Con Man Web Series: Sneak Peek Panel

The panel opened with guests Felicia Day, Sean Astin, and P.J. Haarsma. Alan Tudyk, who was on location in London for an unnamed role in the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens movie, was meant to participate live via Skype. When the time came to get him connected, he suddenly appeared on stage. The audience went wild.

Con Man is a crowd funded web-series starting Alan Tudyk and Nathan Fillion, with guest stars of Felicia Day, Sean Astin, and others.

Wray Nerely (Tudyk) is a struggling actor who starred as a spaceship pilot on Spectrum, a canceled science fiction series that went on to become a cult classic. Wray’s good friend Jack Moore (Nathan Fillion), who starred as the ship’s captain, has become an A-list movie star. Frustrated by Jack’s success and his lack thereof, Wray travels the science fiction convention circuit, makes appearances at comic book stores, and visits pop culture events. He navigates the odd people and incidents he encounters along the way while learning to love the fans he has. – Wikipedia

The panel showed two clips and premiered a trailer for Con Man. Based on those clips, it looks like a very funny series. The series is available on Vimeo on Demand starting September 30th.

Disney Infinity 3.0 Panel

I asked if any of the playsets deviated from movie events, and if so, were their stories canon. I received this reply:

The TWILIGHT OF THE REPUBLIC PLAY SET is a completely new story which went through all the approvals and is considered canon along side the movies, cartoons, and recent novels.

The panel also gave away 900 free Disney Infinity 3.0 characters to the participants of the panel. I received a Darth Vader figure. Later I came back and saw they hadn’t given them all away, I asked why not and the man behind the counter said they’d probably have extras, so he gave me a second figure, Sam Flynn, from Tron Legacy.

Minority Report – Pilot

Minority Report is set 10 years after the events that took place in the Steven Spielberg directed movie, but instead of Tom Cruise attempting to prevent crimes before they occur, it’s Meagan Good who’s serving up her own brand of justice as Detective Vega.

Minority-Report

The show opens with a recap of the events of the movie and origin of the three Precogs. It then jumps 10 years into the future, where we learn at least one of the trio as left their island sanctuary. That island living was good for them, because they are all a lot thinner and more attractive.

Precog Dash is back in D.C. trying to make it on his own. He has flashes of murders, but he doesn’t get the whole picture (he needs his twin to put the pieces together). After witnessing a murder 40 minutes in the future, he dashes (pun intended) to try and stop. He arrives just a moment too late.

Enter Detective Vega (Meagan Good). She is a homicide detective investigating the recent murder. She lives in the shadow of the now defunct Precrime (the first fifteen minutes has several news reports in the background stating how things have become worse since Precrime closed). Murder is back with a vengeance in D.C. and Vega can’t help but marvel at the days when unnatural deaths were extinct in the nation’s capital. As she is leaving the scene of the murder she is followed by Dash. After an encounter in an vacant stairway he gives her a drawing of the killer. Vega is able to run down the killer with the image and begins looking for the mysterious informant. She easily finds him (no one can hide in the future!), moments before he has another Precog episode about a murder to take place the next day. Vega and Dash team up to stop the murder of a prominent politician and his wife.

Here are some things I noticed about the show:

  • Dash’s murder insights come in a variety of timeframes. From several seconds, to forty minutes, to a day, but not the four days they enjoyed in the movie (for premeditated murder).
  • Minority Report, the film, is famous for predicting several key technologies, such as multi-touch interfaces and breeding crack babies who can see the future. This pilot tries to capture that magic; with HUD contacts, small surveillance drones, and the future of advertising.
  • Dash’s twin brother doesn’t look much like him as an adult (in the kid flashbacks, they are identical).
  • They did manager to get one actor from the film. Daniel London reprises his role as Wally the Caretaker, at least for the pilot.
  • The show seems to be going out of its way to make sure we know that Meagan Good is a woman.

Overall I thought the pilot was okay, but I feel like the detective with the none-cop partner has been done. I’m thinking of Sleepy Hollow, Forever (canceled), Castle, Bones, Due South, Rizolli and Isles, Fringe, just to name…a bunch. Are there any detectives out there who are partnered with other cops?

Anyways, Minority Report. If you loved the movie for all the elements that weren’t Tom Cruise, you might like the TV show.

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