INVADERCON!!!
SO I WENT TO INVADERCON IN ATLANTA.
YES, AN INVADER ZIM CONVENTION.
IT WAS AWESOME.
From the left, Cassie (630Kila on dA), Emily (Zazzypaws on dA), me, and Elizabeth (AngelHuskune on dA, and Emily's sister). Met them in line while getting my pass. They're all wonderful, awesome and talented<3 They had lots of great stuff at their artist alley booths so go check them out on dA if you haven't already!
From left again, Richard Horvitz (voice of Zim), Melissa Fahn (voice of Gaz), Andy Berman (voice of Dib), Rikki Simmons (voice of GIR, voice of some background characters, colorist), and Eric Trueheart (writer) at one of their panels. I got all of them to autograph my DVD box set shaped like Zim's house!
Richard! :D I love him so much~<3
Melissa! She actually sounds a lot like Gaz normally. She's like Happy!Gaz, it's kind of freaky. XD
Melissa and Richard singing a duet of "For Good", since Melissa is now on Broadway in Wicked!
Andy talks about how nobody loves Dib. Except everyone loves Dib.
Rikki! His GIR voice doesn't sound exactly the same in real life as it does on the show, 'cause it was pitched up and digitized. Still, he's a real funny guy.
Eric is absolutely hilarious, and he wrote a lot of the funniest and most popular episodes, like Bad Bad Rubber Piggy and Zim Eats Waffles. I bought an autographed BBRP script from him!
Awesome GIR costume is awesome.
DIB! Oh my god, so many Rule 63!Dibs. There was one way better than this, I thought I got her picture, but I didn't. 8( Bawww.
THIS CHICK WAS ENTIRELY PAINTED SILVER. She said it was a Robot GIR-themed looked. I like it.
Richard at his Q&A panel! That's a Zim puppet on his table that someone made him.
Rikki and his lovely wife, Tavisha. They're such wonderfully cool and nice people~
Rule 63!Zim and Rule 63!GIR. I loved these two, especially Zim's flag, it says "I <3 Earth" on the back. XD
PROFESSOR MEMBRAAAAAANE!
It's a bit hard to tell, but this Membrane is Rule 63 too. She actually came all the way from Sweden too. SWEDEN. She had an accent and everything!
HEY. MY TALLEST. HEY. HEY. MY TALLEST. HEY. MY TALLEST! MY TALLEEEEEST! MY TALLEST!!
Richard and Andy at their autograph table!
DEM TATTOOS
And that's all the decent pictures. XD; I wish my hand wasn't so shaky, I would've had more good photos that weren't all blurry.
BUT HOLY CRAP was this such an awesome con. All the people there were so friendly and fun to hang out with. I was really afraid considering the Zim fandom's reputation, that I'd run into a lot of really obnoxious fanbrats, but almost everyone I talked to was really cool! And Richard, Andy, Melissa, Rikki and Eric were all SO unbelievably nice, funny and charismatic. They loved signing autographs, taking pictures with all their fans, and answering their questions. I really hope I get to meet them all again someday.
There were so many great events, too. The first big thing that happened was there was a script reading of the unfinished episodes with all the voice actors, and they read "Mopiness of Doom" and "Day Of Da Spookies". It was just plain hilarious, especially when Melissa decided to do Membrane's voice since Roger Bumpass wasn't there.
Then there was a panel for the Soapy Waffles group, who are working on animating the scripted/recorded but unfinished episodes. They had about half of Mopiness of Doom storyboarded/put into animatics and about one minute of it fully finished and animated. They're hoping to have it finished by later this year. I can't wait to see the whole thing, because what they had so far was INCREDIBLE. It is PERFECTLY MATCHED to the original style of the series completely. They've got some crazy good skills.
AND THEN THERE WAS THE MUSIC VIDEO CONTEST. OH BOY WAS THAT FUN. My god, the winning video was just... I almost died. It was so freaking funny, and the creator of it got their award from Richard and the others. When it shows up on YouTube I'll link it!
Oh, and one of Cassie's videos got runner-up for character profile category. So much congrats to her!!
There was also a panel for Operation Head Pigeons, who are also a fantastic group who's activism projects I've been a part of in the past. Go check them out too!
There were other events I didn't get to go to sadly too, such as Invader Zim Jeopardy, Swollen Eyeballs Paranormal Panel, and the Room With a Moose panel which didn't happen because... they didn't show up. Yeah, the RWAM people did not show. To be honest, I'm kind of not surprised. They've been dead for years, sadly.
But yeah, all in all, I had a totally fantastic time. Meeting up with a lot of the people I'd known on dA for a long time but had never gotten the chance to see in person was great, in addition to just the epicness that was the entire con. It's made me all nostalgic for when I was really into Zim, and makes me appreciate again how amazing a show it is, and what kind of impact it's not only had on me as an artist and creative person, but on the animation community in general. I really hope more conventions like this happen in the future. Sure, anime conventions are nice, but we really need more events focused on cartoons from our own country. Seriously.
YES, AN INVADER ZIM CONVENTION.
IT WAS AWESOME.
From the left, Cassie (630Kila on dA), Emily (Zazzypaws on dA), me, and Elizabeth (AngelHuskune on dA, and Emily's sister). Met them in line while getting my pass. They're all wonderful, awesome and talented<3 They had lots of great stuff at their artist alley booths so go check them out on dA if you haven't already!
From left again, Richard Horvitz (voice of Zim), Melissa Fahn (voice of Gaz), Andy Berman (voice of Dib), Rikki Simmons (voice of GIR, voice of some background characters, colorist), and Eric Trueheart (writer) at one of their panels. I got all of them to autograph my DVD box set shaped like Zim's house!
Richard! :D I love him so much~<3
Melissa! She actually sounds a lot like Gaz normally. She's like Happy!Gaz, it's kind of freaky. XD
Melissa and Richard singing a duet of "For Good", since Melissa is now on Broadway in Wicked!
Andy talks about how nobody loves Dib. Except everyone loves Dib.
Rikki! His GIR voice doesn't sound exactly the same in real life as it does on the show, 'cause it was pitched up and digitized. Still, he's a real funny guy.
Eric is absolutely hilarious, and he wrote a lot of the funniest and most popular episodes, like Bad Bad Rubber Piggy and Zim Eats Waffles. I bought an autographed BBRP script from him!
Awesome GIR costume is awesome.
DIB! Oh my god, so many Rule 63!Dibs. There was one way better than this, I thought I got her picture, but I didn't. 8( Bawww.
THIS CHICK WAS ENTIRELY PAINTED SILVER. She said it was a Robot GIR-themed looked. I like it.
Richard at his Q&A panel! That's a Zim puppet on his table that someone made him.
Rikki and his lovely wife, Tavisha. They're such wonderfully cool and nice people~
Rule 63!Zim and Rule 63!GIR. I loved these two, especially Zim's flag, it says "I <3 Earth" on the back. XD
PROFESSOR MEMBRAAAAAANE!
It's a bit hard to tell, but this Membrane is Rule 63 too. She actually came all the way from Sweden too. SWEDEN. She had an accent and everything!
HEY. MY TALLEST. HEY. HEY. MY TALLEST. HEY. MY TALLEST! MY TALLEEEEEST! MY TALLEST!!
Richard and Andy at their autograph table!
DEM TATTOOS
And that's all the decent pictures. XD; I wish my hand wasn't so shaky, I would've had more good photos that weren't all blurry.
BUT HOLY CRAP was this such an awesome con. All the people there were so friendly and fun to hang out with. I was really afraid considering the Zim fandom's reputation, that I'd run into a lot of really obnoxious fanbrats, but almost everyone I talked to was really cool! And Richard, Andy, Melissa, Rikki and Eric were all SO unbelievably nice, funny and charismatic. They loved signing autographs, taking pictures with all their fans, and answering their questions. I really hope I get to meet them all again someday.
There were so many great events, too. The first big thing that happened was there was a script reading of the unfinished episodes with all the voice actors, and they read "Mopiness of Doom" and "Day Of Da Spookies". It was just plain hilarious, especially when Melissa decided to do Membrane's voice since Roger Bumpass wasn't there.
Then there was a panel for the Soapy Waffles group, who are working on animating the scripted/recorded but unfinished episodes. They had about half of Mopiness of Doom storyboarded/put into animatics and about one minute of it fully finished and animated. They're hoping to have it finished by later this year. I can't wait to see the whole thing, because what they had so far was INCREDIBLE. It is PERFECTLY MATCHED to the original style of the series completely. They've got some crazy good skills.
AND THEN THERE WAS THE MUSIC VIDEO CONTEST. OH BOY WAS THAT FUN. My god, the winning video was just... I almost died. It was so freaking funny, and the creator of it got their award from Richard and the others. When it shows up on YouTube I'll link it!
Oh, and one of Cassie's videos got runner-up for character profile category. So much congrats to her!!
There was also a panel for Operation Head Pigeons, who are also a fantastic group who's activism projects I've been a part of in the past. Go check them out too!
There were other events I didn't get to go to sadly too, such as Invader Zim Jeopardy, Swollen Eyeballs Paranormal Panel, and the Room With a Moose panel which didn't happen because... they didn't show up. Yeah, the RWAM people did not show. To be honest, I'm kind of not surprised. They've been dead for years, sadly.
But yeah, all in all, I had a totally fantastic time. Meeting up with a lot of the people I'd known on dA for a long time but had never gotten the chance to see in person was great, in addition to just the epicness that was the entire con. It's made me all nostalgic for when I was really into Zim, and makes me appreciate again how amazing a show it is, and what kind of impact it's not only had on me as an artist and creative person, but on the animation community in general. I really hope more conventions like this happen in the future. Sure, anime conventions are nice, but we really need more events focused on cartoons from our own country. Seriously.