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This weekend was epic. I just wanted to do a quick post recapping all of the craziness that was Comic Con '09.

Comic Con Vid Cast will be posted later today, we will also be posting the full video of each panel later on in the week

[singlepic id=216 w=320 h=240 float=left]The night before we left for CC, I received a confirmation E-mail from the NBC rep that we were going to be able to interview Yvonne Strahovski (“Sarah Walker”), Josh Schwartz (Executive Producer) and Chris Fedak (Executive Producer) on Sunday before their panel. Rob, CB and I proudly entered the press room to pick up our press badges, etc on Saturday morning at approx 9am. As excited as we were, we decided to take a few minutes to figure out a game plan for the day's events. While we were there, we overheard one of the members of the CC Team  mentioning the fact that Daniel Dae Kim was now going to be making an appearance on Sunday to do a press conference. As quick as we could we contacted ABC to RSVP. Their contact was on location all day and would only be reachable via Email (Thank you blackberry!) Before we knew it, we were off to the first panel: Watchmen, Terminator: Salvation and Friday the 13th. **STAY TUNED: Full Videos of the panels will be available on the site later this week** Dave Gibbons was brilliant and very articulate. You can just see the brilliance in the man as he speaks, and McG (Terminator: Salvation Director) knows how to command a room. Derek Mears (The actor who is playing Jason in the up-coming Friday the 13th) looks as creepy with the mask off as he does with the mask on.

[singlepic id=219 w=320 h=240 float=right]After the amazingness of the Warner panels, we decided to check out the floor and do some man-on-the-street interviews. It was awesome to see how excited everyone was about CC. We had a few standard questioned we asked and then we dove right into the listener questions that we received on the forums, over E-mails and on twitter. The costumes were fun, there was a big buzz in the air. Saturday was completely sold out and people were EVERRRRRYWHERE (a la Cleveland Style).

After checking out the floor, it was back to the IGN theater for Pixar's first look at their next film Up. After seeing 5 clips of this charming movie, although I hate to admit it, I believe Pixar has done it again. With out going into to much detail, Up is the story of Carl Fredricksen, an elderly man who longs to escape to South America. As many of us have seen, he does this by moving his house using thousands of helium-filled balloons. He eventually finds out that he has a stowaway on board, a "scout" named Russell who is eager to get his "helping the elderly" badge. Along the visually stunning landscapes, we get to meet some more fun characters. After Up, we were shown the trailer for Surrogates, and dozens of male and female models who seemed as if they were only void empty shells, creepily came around to pass out business cards to each of us prompting us to visit a website, where we could get our own Surrogates.

After a long first day, we decided to get some R&R along with some food-ski.  We Celebrated the night away with some good friends and even did a little karaoke. Saturday night, I got an e-mail from ABC. 3 words: 11:30 room 1D05. We were in for the Daniel Dae Kim Press conference.

Sunday morning came all too fast, but we were pumped! The first thing on the agenda was going to be the round table Chuck interview. After some slight readjustment to the interview room, we were under way. Yvonne, Josh Schwartz and Chris were seated in the middle of the room (all of 2 feet in front of Rob, CB and I) where they fielded questions from the 10 or so people who were interviewing. Besides our own questions, we asked Colleen and Jay from ChuckCast if they had any they would like answered. I believe that between all of us there, we had most of them answered. Yvonne is even more beautiful in real life then she is on TV. She seems to sparkle ::sigh::

After that we ran off to what we thought was going to be the Daniel Dae Kim press conference. When we entered the room they asked us which ad medium we would be recording with, and when we said we would be filming, rather then us doing a round table discussion, they allowed us some one on one time with Daniel. We have the audio from the round table as well, which we might discuss on this weeks episode with special guest Sue. Daniel was extremely nice and even recorded an opening bumper for us!

[singlepic id=218 w=320 h=240 float=left]The whirlwind day continued on with the Dollhouse Panel at 1pm. One quick note here, people began to line up for Dollhouse at 9am. Those Joss fans are dedicated! Joss was amusing and whimsicle but he really didn't talk a lot about Dollhouse. The conversations ranged from that, to Buffy, peppered in a little Doctor Horrible and a bunch of Battlestar.

Fringe was the final panel of the day and of our visit to Comic Con. It was amazing to have the whole cast there[singlepic id=220 w=320 h=240 float=right] Originally, only a few of the actors were schedule to make appearances. You can really tell that they all get along well and really enjoy what they do. There were some great conversations including "games" that they have built into the series. Did you know that the observer is in every episode? Or that the pictures that appear at commercial breaks are actually a code? They also talked about the grossest thing they have had to deal with on set.

Overall, the whole weekend was amazing. Rob and I were up until approx 4am trying to edit and post out the video. I can't wait until everyone has a chance to see it. I hope that everyone has as much fun watching it as we had filming it.

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     Over all we met and connected with a lot of great people. Behind the scenes Rob and I both went through good times and bad, through it all the community on the forums and twitter were always there to back us up. I just wanted to say Thank you to all of the good people that have crossed our paths this past year. Everyone has really helped form our show into what it has become today.

     Looking ahead to 2009, we have a few ideas that are beginning to take form. Rob and I are going to continue inviting people to guest host. We have some great people lined up for '09 kicking off during episode 39 with Chris from Boston. Also making appearances in '09 will be Sue and Robin from Trivia War, as well as listener Rob.

     2009 can hold limitless possibilities, on the down side there is potential for a SAG strike, and analysts believe that the country will continue to be in recession for another year. On the up side, as of Jan 20th we will have a new leader who is inspiring hope in the country. I wanted to leave everyone with a paraphrased statement that John Norton from MetroBuzz made during Trivia War's 12 Days of Christmas "This year universally was a tough year, 2008 isn't going to be on anyone's list of best year's ever, forget about the tough year, we are hopefully heading in the right direction now, it's a new day think of '09 as a brand new day, forget the past and it's time to start something new."

CHRIS

Wanted to hear all the time:
The Poky Little Puppy by Janette Sebring Lowrey

Couldn't put down:
Choose Your Own Adventure Series

ROB

In Mom's lap:
Cars and Trucks and Things That Go by Richard Scarry

As a big kid:
Goodsebumps:  Welcome to Dead House by R.L. Stein

MEG

At bedtime:
Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats

Curled up by the heater at the library:
The Enchanted Forest Chronicles by Patricia C. Wrede

After the Panel Rob and I were able to sit down with Jason and Grant to ask them a few more follow up questions. We were also able to find out their true feelings about a certain paranormal show which happens to run on A&E.

The Spirit is a film based on the comic book by Will Eisner, it is being directed by Frank Miller ( The 300, Sin City) the cast will include Gabriel Macht as the title character, Eva Mendes, Samuel L Jackson and Scarlett Johansson. Frank and Eva were both on the panel. They discussed the direction in which the film is going to go, Eva Mendes talks about her role in the film and they have a Q&A session.

Star Wars was the first topic of discussion they showed clips from new Star Wars video game: The Force Unleashed they also played some interviews pertaining to the creation of the game. Next Sansweet brought out Seth Green and Matthew Senreich the creator of the Robot Chicken: Star Wars special. The interview with Seth and Matt, tells of the origins of both Robot Chicken and how they came to create the Star Wars special. Finally Sansweet showed clips of the new Star Wars: The Clone Wars film. He also spoke about the series that will air on Cartoon Network and TNT shortly after the movie release.

Sansweet then went on to talk about the Indiana Jones franchise including: The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones, Lego Indiana Jones and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones has another series of DVD's releasing soon, they are also planning on releasing a special edition of the original Indiana Jones films. They showed footage of Lego Indiana Jones and the trailer for the upcoming Indiana Jones film.

Wall-E like most Pixar films is jam packed with amazing animation. The film itself seems to have very limited dialog with the film surrounding a small trash compacting "appliance" named Wall-E and his mis adventures. It was described as "what would happen if there was no one left on earth and someone left one of their appliances still on." Wall-E's adventures bring him to meet a bunch of friends including his cockroach friend, Eva and Mo.

The Prince Caspian portion of the panel was mostly a Q&A with Ben Barnes who plays the title character, William Moseley - Peter Pevensie, Trumpkin who is a new character in this film portrayed by Peter Dinklage, and also producer Mark Johnson. They made the announcement of when the third Narnia film will be released and they answered questions from fans of both the film and the books.

When people think of America, certain ideas come to mind; apple pie, the American flag and, of course, Baseball on an awesome spring day. A few of us went to Yankees stadium for the Yankees vs. Red Sox game on Thursday, April 17. Yes, the Yanks lost and they are morons for keeping Moose in for the whole game BUT this is not what the post is about. No no my friends, this post is about how ridiculous going to a simple baseball game has become.

I left from my office in lower Manhattan a little early on Thursday so I could make sure to catch the opening of the game. I don't go to a lot of games each season but when I do, I want to be there for the whole thing. With my messenger bag over my shoulder, I left my office, ready for a long weekend. We get to the stadium and wait on the ridiculously long line for security. Finally, it's my turn to get "wanded" and before the surly looking man even begins, he brushes me off to go talk to the man in the yellow coat. I go to talk to the guy and before I even utter a word, he begins "No bags allowed in the stadium." This is being said as a bunch of women all walk in with bags and the man behind me on the line is holding a bag full of what appears to be groceries. I simply asked why I couldn't bring in my messenger bag when other people were allowed to bring in bags. "No backpacks, no bags, your bag is too large, go bring it back to your car" he responds. Normally, I am fairly calm and even-headed so I figured logic was the next step. I told him that I didn't drive in and that I came directly from my office AND my bag was smaller than the bags that those women were coming in with so why couldn't I bring in mine. "You have to leave the stadium, walk two blocks and go to the bowling alley. That's where you can check your bag," he says. Ok, now I'm getting mad. I don't get it. I asked him once more, "what's the difference between what I have and what thay are bringing in?" That's when he drops it on me. "To be honest, the New York Yankees don't want men carrying purses, the largest bag a man can bring in is a fanny pack or one of those athletic bags with the spaghetti straps." First off, what is more gay than a dude with a fanny pack, and on top of it this douche is going to insult me and then use terms like spaghetti straps. WTF! So I loose my cool, ask to talk to his boss, at which time I go over then same reasoning I did with the first jackass security guard at which time he finally lets me into the game.

Finally the game can begin. I put the security incident behind me, the only problem was that there was something else behind me ... "That Guy." I'm not talking about the crazy fan or the heckler. In this case "That Guy" is the drunk asshole who has no idea what is going on around him, he just wants to yell and get attention for himself. It started out slow and easy "All F'ing Red Soxs fans are Fgts." As the game started to take a turn for the worse, so did he. "I don't even care, I am going to become a Mets fan," which would be followed by "All F'ing Firemen are Fgts." By the end of the game this steroid pumping Jerzy boy was just uselessly screaming. No words, just screaming like he was being eating from the inside out by bugs. I was half expecting to hear a "Hulk smash!!!" coming out of him. What happened to the American idea of Baseball and going to the game to have a good time? I feel like if I had children I wouldn't want to bring them to a game if they are going to be hassled and have to listen to some guy who can't control his booze curse and scream like a crazy person at the top of his lungs. With this being the last year of the old Yankee stadium, I can only hope that things for the future generations get better and not worse, and then people will have the decency to know that at the end of the day it's only Baseball.

     The Fuse party was back at Espace on 42nd.  We were there last for The Weather Channel upfront, where we were "shushed" and ate odd noodle off of grass (see earlier post for details).  We walked into the packed venue and found that the space was completely different.  There were models in bathtubs blowing bubbles (insert joke here), and the main bar was an ice sculpture carved out to look like speakers with real wiring inside.  In the main room there were windows suspended from the ceiling and an artest creating a mural on the wall.  The food situation was a little bleak but the drinks were plentiful.  The waiters and waitress (who apparently were also part time models) passed around trays of champaign with rock candy, these odd blue drinks which were painfully easy to drink and ring pops.  A warning to all reading this, combining those two drinks, beer, along with a few Grey Goose Pineapples is a dangerious combination. The masses were also given pairs of the "Kanye" sun glasses. 

     The main event of the evening was special guest Wyclef Jean who was sporting the newly shaven head look.  Wyclef rocked the house playing a mix of old and new matericals.  Midway through his set he had his sister share the stage with him to sing a very emotional gospel song.  Wyclef decided that he wanted a Long Island Ice Tea so his large scarey looking security guard lifted him on to his schoulders mid song and carried him over to the bar.  Towards the end of his set he reached out and grabbed our favorite Jewish friend Ms. Amanda, and pulled her on stage to dance with him.  All in all a good time was had by all, some more then others.  As the night wound down, Fuse was kind enough to get streach hummer limos for us all so that we would safely make it to our destinations.