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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 3, 1989)
For Battalion reviewer, AggieCon 20 proves wildly diverse, entertaining By Keith Spera REVIEWER Depending on whom you talked to, the impressions and opinions ex pressed about AggieCon 20, Texas A&M’s big science fiction/fantasy convention that ended Sunday, could be wildly divergent. Eight-year old Leslie Becker, emerging from the dealer’s room, had one word for it: “Weird.” Her 12-year-old brother, on the other hand, raved about how the room “was full of cool stuff.” I knew something mystical was afoot when the complete lyrics to Led Zepplin’s “Stairway to Heaven” appeared in big chalk letters on the sidewalks stretching from Hart Hall to the east end of the library on the morning the convention started. Over the course of four days, Ag gieCon was sometimes strange, sometimes confusing, usually fun and always interesting. Except for a semi-serious threat from an AggieCon worker aimed at a fellow Battalion staffer (“tell us who discontinued Bloom County, so that we fnight hang them,” which be came moot when I pointed out Bloom County was back in The Bat talion), Thursday proceeded un eventfully. Conference attendees were still studying the schedule of events and had yet to get into cos tume. Dealers were still setting up their wares. Fantasies had yet to be- gin. Sitting on a bench on the second floor of the MSC, smoking a ciga rette and checking out the conven tion’s schedule, Judith Ward, 54, waxed nostalgic about her eleven years of attending AggieCons, and other sci-fi/fantasy conventions. “The first two years I came to Ag gieCon, I didn’t say a word,” she said. “I was awestruck to see and meet the people whose books I’ve read. I found out these people wouldn’t bite me, and got to know them. Now every year is sort of like a big reunion.” The reunion really got rolling on Friday. The center of the convention (or “con,” if you’re hip and cool) was the Dealer’s Room. It was here that you could buy anything from the latest sci-fi paperback and collector’s edi tion comic book to handcrafted jew elry, Star Wars action figures, post ers of unicorns and demons, and just about anything else having to do with medieval characters or space men. This was also the place where a fun little cross-section of people pa raded through to find that right gift for themselves or a loved one. A pale, thin, 12-year-old boy with glasses debated whether he should purchase “Black Wizards” (“an army of ogres and zombies guided by Bhaal, the super-deity of death and destruction, threatens the gentle Ffolk while the puppet king acquies ces,” according to the synopsis on the book) or “Streams of Silver” (“Bruenor the dwarf, Wulgar the barbarian, Regis the Halfling, and the dark elf fight monsters and magic on their way to Mithril Hall, centuries-old birthplace of Bruenor and his Dwarven ancestors”). A father shelled out $100 for a hand-painted set of “Blood Bowl” characters, which he planned to give to his 10-year-old son. The dealer who sold the game it Fhe first two years I came to AggieCon, I didn’t say a word. I was awestruck to see and meet the people whose books I’ve read. I found out these people wouldn’t bite me, and got to know them. Now every year is sort of like a big reunion.” — Judith Ward, 11 year Con attendee said Blood Bowl is a game “sorta like football, except it features humans vs. orks, which are similar to gob lins.” 1 ammy Davis, 25, decked out in a long black dress with a huge pewter unicorn hanging from her neck, said she spent more than $400 by the sec ond day of the convention, spending most of it on cassette tapes of medi eval music and “filk” tunes. Filk mu sic involves taking known music and putting unusual lyrics to it, Davis said. “An example would be a song that uses the Oscar Meyer weiner jingle and has lyrics about Star Trek,” she said. Fantasies don’t come cheap these days, a fact allowing those who deal in sci-fi and fantasy knickknacks to make a tidy living. “I quit collecting and started deal ing about 10 years ago,” dealer Rick Colon, 30, said. “This is a real profit able business. I used to own a record store, but this is a better business. When times are hard, people won’t buy for themselves, but they will buy stuff for their kids.” Colon’s display offered several hundred comic books, ranging in price from $5 to $150 (with the first edition Green Lantern being one of the more expensive items), some wargame sets and several action fig ures, including a 10-inch Boba Fett (the bounty hunter from the “Star Wars” series) fetching a $75 bounty of its own. Who is the hottest guy in comics right now? “It’d be between the Wolverine, the Punisher, and Batman,” Colon said. “I think that the Batman movie that is coming out will push him over the top.” Strolling about the dealer’s room on Friday were a whole host of char acters in costumes. At least one cos tume was for practical, besides plea surable, purposes. Barry Austin, 19, an AggieCon worker, was decked out in a black cape and tights, and said he was por traying a warrior wizard character featured in one of his favorite books. One of his reasons for the get-up was “to blend in to the crowd” (which says a whole lot about the general appearance of the AggieCon Ken Smith, 34, of Austin, checks out the merchandise for sale in the dealer’s room in the MSC at AggieCon 20 Saturday. Smith said he frequently attends conventions like AggieCon. offer, and won the keys to co-host Becky Matthews’ car, which some how were given away at several other points in the evening, much to her dismay. The first two contestants to square off against one another were a big bearded guy with the nickname “Wookie” on the back of his shirt and someone else in overalls and a baseball cap complete with anten nae. They each won 20 sci-fi fan magazines. After this excitement, a trip to Duddley’s Draw in search of Aggie- Con-ers on the town seemed appro priate. None were found at North- gate, but sometime after 2 a.m., I Most of us here are social reverts. You talk to most of these people, they’ll say that they should have been born 300 years ago, or 300 years in the future — this isn’t really their time. Everyone picks their own fantasy. Instead of going off the deep end, they go to conventions.” — Barry Austin, AggieCon 20 worker the attendees), so he could be on lookout for shoplifters. “We haven’t had much trouble here, but at a con I worked in Dallas, we were catching people left and right,” he said. “Of course, I’m also wearing this for fun,” he continued. “Most of us here are social reverts. You talk to most of these people, they’ll say that they should have been born 300 years ago, or 300 years in the future — this isn’t really their time. Every one picks their own fantasy. Instead of going off the deep end, they go to conventions.” After cruising the dealer’s room, I checked out the AggieCon version of “Let’s Make A Deal,” one of seve ral game shows imitated throughout the convention (I mean, con). No sooner had I taken a seat when the leering game show announcer asked, “Who’ll give me a quarter for what’s in my right-hand pocket?” Not me, buddy. Some madman took him up on his ran into a group of them at the pop ular 24-hour eatery, Whataburger. They were just coming off of a six-hour game of Quest, a role-play ing fantasy game that had 12 teams of four running around outside Rudder fl ower, trying to figure out which characters the other group members were portraying, and then acting accordingly. “We had to save our village,” said one hungry Questor. “It was in vaded by what we thought were we rewolves, but they turned out to be vampires.” Hey, it’s a mistake anybody could make. AggieCon on Saturday started for me at 1 p.m. with Nancie’s Winds of Magic Belly Dancers. How did they fit into the AggieCon theme? “We’re more on the fantasy side of things,” said one of the dancers. “We get you in the mood for fanta sy.” Among the several well-known writers and artists in the sci-fi/fan- Photo by Kathy Haveman The Punisher, one of Marvel Comics most popular characters, was for sale Saturday at Rick Colon’s exhibit in the dealer’s room at AggieCon 20. G I Z O ’ S ‘An outdoor cafe brought indoor’ Daily Specials* Fully Stocked Bar • Signature Dips HAPPY HOUR 4-8 p.m. Weekdays 11 a.m. - 8 p.m. Saturday 846-7275 109 Boyett Northgate tasy fields who attended AggieCon was George R.R. Martin, who has written and produced several epi sodes of CBS’s “Beauty and the Beast” series. His presentation on Saturday af ternoon started off a little shakily be cause of technical problems. A cou ple of TVs had been set up to screen an episode of “Beauty and the Beast” for the audience, but no cable was available to hook them up. An AggieCon worker asked the audience, “Does anyone have a 25- foot coaxial cable?” Surprisingly, no one did. George was cool about it, however, and be gan his talk while work was still be ing done on the TVs. He chatted about how nervous CBS was about such an unusual show as “Beauty and the Beast.” fl he network’s fears apparently were un founded, because the first episode did extremely well in audience screenings. “Even though we were weird, they had to put us on the air,” he said. Cheers and applause greeted his re mark. He offered some insight into the clash of art and money in TV. He didn’t want the series to be the same every week, with the heroine Kath erine getting into a dangerous situa tion and Jason the mild-mannered beast turning into a meanie and sav ing her. “That would be the same as the Incredilbe Hulk series, with two beast-outs per week,” joked Martin. The network executives, however, wanted some degree of “jeopardy” (i.e., gratuitous violence that they think gets ratings) in each episode, he said. Several of the early shows had to be changed a bit to accomo date the executives, but Martin said once the show began to win its time slot, he had more clout and could do the shows more like he wanted. In the end, art triumphed. Across the road from the MSC, on the second floor of G. Rollie White Coliseum, was a room where fantasy became a bit more real, a bit more physical — the Lazer Tag room. Contestants armed with light- beam-emitting pistols and wearing light sensors on their chests stalked See AggieCon/Page 12 Photo by Kathy Havem Are you interested in the performing arts? Want to have fun too? Maybe you should consider MSC OPAS (The Opera and Performing Arts ^ Society of Texas A &M University) ^ Information sessions will be held April 6th in 510 Rudder and April 11th in 410 Rudder at 7:00 p.m- ion of W; shi bo ga' ga' wa to nia bet the me fer R th NE the fc of Y\ South one o larne Thi sailing s< tracts eacli y Net gan it wareh handli burgei openu produ west f Street of Shi] antic i grain iteamb tlong Manha about [few tl ■be Hu Tod: ■sm, ii hips h They ( board ftry-olc >ermar ssoci Applications for membership will be availflbk at the sessions and in the OPAS cubicle in 216 MSC after April 6th. For more information call 845-1515. % Elvis Basical '■year He 1 "Hie re ; fcs,” h ,() tildn’i An in ostello bing. Bl nse. C< c ute ol ^ditior "Warn toptioi h was ■ashbox fling all The re fld > Ma >bberies as Nation: '° u gh, : n with ; ln ’ Paul ,>Cai i b e in ! n gs,’’ C ln gpong