Comic-Con - Wow!

For the last four days (five if you include the preview night where those who paid for all for days got to see all the booths before anyone else) I've been attending the Comic-Con here in San Diego. It is a immensely massive gathering of people who come to see comic book artists and writers, TV and movie producers, writers, actors and directors.

I've seen Zack Snyder who directed Watchmen, 300 and the upcoming Watchmen, Kevin Smith who did Dogma, Chasing Amy, Clerk I and Clerks II among others, Frank Miller who did Sin City and the upcoming The Spirit, Judd Apatow who made The 40-year-old Virgin, Knocked Up and produced a hell of a lot more movies. The actors I've seen include Benicio Del Toro, Samuel L. Jackson, Billy Crudup, Seth Roegen, Jaime King, Elizabeth Banks among many others. Last, but not least I've met some of my favorite comic writers and great idols of mine, Brian Azzarello and Brian Wood who did 100 Bullets and DMZ respectively.

Nearing its end, I've managed to learn a lot about comic book writing and the ways to get into the industry. It's not at all as easy as it seems. Daniel Knauf, the writer of the amazingly awesome TV series, Carnivàle, said that you had to keep writing, but one of the most recurring pieces of advice was that it was likely that you'd need to publish a novel before getting into the comic business. This complicates matter further for me, as I'm unlikely to ever publish a novel here in the US (hopefully, it'll happen some day in Denmark and if that ever happens, it's unlikely that any of the big comic companies will ever know of it). But I haven't lost hope yet, and there may be a time when I'll try to pursue writing a comic book. Perhaps some day in the future when I've written a movie script that's been picked up (yeaaaaaaah right, keep dreaming!).

In any case, I'll enjoy the last couple of days here in Comic-Con before returning to L.A. where I'll stay for exactly one week before going back to Denmark August 4th.