SDCC- PREP!

We take a look back at SDCC prep.

San Diego Comic-Con is this week and you should already be well prepared...unless your drunk. It's a daunting task that requires A LOT of preparation and scheduling but it's well worth it. For those who may need some help, here are 4 things to know BEFORE you leave for SDCC.

CHECK YO ITINERARY YO!!

I've heard the horror stories. People with Hotel accommodations booked MONTHS ahead of time, show up to SDCC only to find out their hotel has no reservation for them. This one should have been done weeks ago, but it's still not too late. Call or email your hotel to verify your reservations!! ALWAYS!! If you have an email reservation but the hotel doesn't have you in the books, they can work with you to straighten it out. Odds are they don't have any rooms left, but you could get lucky if it was 'their' mistake. If not, they can work with other hotels in the area to try and find you appropriate accommodations if any are available. I have seen rooms at the Bayfront and Marriott still available for $700+ a night, but if any hotel snafus should arise that are 100% your hotel's fault, they may be able to get you that $700 room for a 'SDCC block price'. Don't quote me on that, but I have heard of some getting treated very well before.

Same goes for your Airline. Check your flights. You're less likely to have a dropped reservation with the airline, but it's always good to verify you bought your tickets. I had a dream once that I bought airline tickets. when I woke up I "had" to buy airline tickets but for about 2 hours I thought I already did. Don't get old I guess is the morale of that story.

 

PLAN YOUR PANELS

Whether it's your first time or 13th time, you'll know just by looking at the SDCC PROGRAM SCHEDULE that theres hundreds and hundreds of options when it comes to panels.

Have a Plan A, Plan B and Plan C ahead of time. While usually your Plan A is good enough, there are times where you're shut out completely from what you want to see. Hall H can be treacherous (luckily this years "wristband" plan will let attendees know if they'll make it in or not) . Hall H has become iconic with waiting. Not only do thousands wait in line, but people rarely leave once inside. If you're under the tents at the start of the first panel of the day, odds are you'll be in that same spot hours later. Since they don't clear out Hall H after each Panel, people will get in line EARLY to sit through most of them to get to the good stuff. This leaves most sitting around not doing much of anything. Why waste your day on the lawn when there SO many other great options at Comic-con? My Plan A usually consists of Hall H, Plan B would be Ballroom 20 if anything good is going on, but since Ballroom 20 is most peoples Plan A, I'd be forced to resort to Plan C which are the lesser know panels scattered throughout the convention center. Check out a 'Star Wars Oragami' panel, the 'Goonies reunion' panel in the Indigo Ballroom, or 'Falling Skies'. Into Cosplay? theres several Cosplay/costuming panels during the convention. Theres also a great SDCC app for Android and iPhone/iPad. The app lists all the panels in the program guide and allows you to make your own schedule. It also has maps of where everything is.

 

PLAN YOUR NIGHTS

While you'd be perfectly fine playing it by ear for San Diego nightlife, you could also research restaurants in the area. Into a certain cuisine? Why walk around hoping to bump into it when you can know ahead of time what restaurants you'd like to dine in. Some even give discounts to badge holders. SDCC's official website has great resources to plan your dining options for each night. Here it lists all the restaurants in the Downtown area. You can find out right away whats close to your hotel (if you're staying downtown) or how far a great Thai place may be. Got some little rugrats in tow? Check out these kid friendly restaurants. Having a better idea of where you'll be eating at night, may help alleviate some of the stress of the day. There are also a TON of offsite events that happen at night. Check out the 'SDCC Unofficial Blog's' calendar of offsite events. You may be surprised at what's happening after the con.

Going to SDCC on a budget? Then don't listen to anything I just said. You know what you're doing and I should be taking advice from you. I'll be broke after SDCC.

 

PACK YOUR BAGS

I may just be anal, but I pack my bag the day before I leave, then I unpack it, then I pack it again. I do this so I know ahead of time what I forgot because I WILL forget something. You may be better at packing right before you leave, it's totally up to you. But make sure you've got everything. Shirts, underwear, bathing suit, socks, more underwear, shorts, pants, extra shoes just in case, sunscreen etc.. Knowing ahead of time what you need is better than rushing to remember what you need at the last minute. 

Another thing you'll want to do is 'charge your electronics'. If you get to the con late, you may not have time, or may even forget, to charge your stuff once you're there. Make sure it's all charged before hand so you don't get screwed once you're there. This is especially important for those making long trips to SDCC. That long flight, car or bus ride, or even train could get boring if you forgot to charge your crap. Check out our previous post here for things you should bring. There may be an item you never even thought of bringing that could come in handy.

Now you know.........and.....

4 Actors you know but probably can't name

Ever watch a movie and see an actor and say "that dude/chick is in EVERYTHING.... what the hell is their name???!!!?" Who know who they are...kinda. You see them in every movie, you can even name all the movies, but you just can't think of their name.

Yeah, well this happens to me a lot, and happened recently when I stumbled upon these folk... you might be thinking "who?" If you know any of these names, congratulations.... you're a much better person than I. If you didn't, now you will. (but you'll probably forget tomorrow anyway)

4. Missi Pyle

Missi Pyle was born on November 16, 1972 as Andrea Kay Pyle in Houston, Texas and was raised in Memphis, Tennessee. Pyle has had a significant career in many films and television series. She has also established in parallel a singing career as a member of the band Smith & Pyle with actress Shawnee Smith.

Pyle has started an acting career playing a minor role in comedy film As Good as It Gets (1997) starring Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt. Her following notable roles were in science fiction parody film Galaxy Quest (1999), Home Alone 4 (2002) where she played her first role as a villain, Tim Burton films Big Fish (2003) and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) starring Johnny Depp and Christopher Lee, Just My Luck(2006) starring Lindsay Lohan, and Soccer Mom (2008) where she had a double role. Pyle has also played guest roles in many television series such as Mad About You(1992) also starring Helen Hunt, Frasier (1993), Friends (1994) in the episode "The One with Ross's Teeth", Ally McBeal (1997), three episodes of Two and a Half Men (2003), three episodes of Boston Legal (2004), Grey's Anatomy (2005), two episodes Heroes(2006) and two episodes of The Mentalist (2008). Pyle is also an occasional voice actress, and has voiced characters in one episode of series Family Guy (1999) and two episodes of American Dad! (2005).

 

3. Joe Lo Truglio

Joe Lo Truglio was born in Ozone Park, Queens and was raised in Margate, Florida. His childhood revolved around collecting Mad magazines, shooting horror movies on a Super 8, fishing in his backyard canal, and drawing homemade comics. He graduated Coconut Creek High School in 1988, where he was a member of Thespian troupe 2617, and there, along with classmate Russell Scherker, in category Duo Scene at Thespian VII district competition at Santaluces High School, snagged the coveted "Critic's Choice". The scene performed: the screwball, banter-laden opening scene of "Say Goodnight, Gracie".
He attended NYU Film school where he met his future colleagues and co-founded the cult sketch group, "The State". Also during this time, he indulged in "Jagger-Induced, Midnight Sidewalk-Stencil Missions". After a short run on MTV, he and his cohorts were pistol-whipped by the realities of network television.
After The State's hiatus in 1996, he hunkered down in Hell's Kitchen and immersed himself in commercial, video-game, and TV episodic work. He found a local watering hole, played poker, and trash-talked LA, where, ironically, he would move to 10 years later.
Around the millennium, with "Wet Hot American Summer" and "The Station Agent", independent film work came back into the fray. It was all coming full-circle, the only missing element being a Super 8 camera. Now, he balances writing and producing web series and firebranding its originality over mainstream media with bike rides and matinées. He relishes jumping back and forth between studio and indie flicks. You may remember him from such films as Superbad, and I Love You, Man. He currently stars as Charles Boyle in Brooklyn Nine-Nine 

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2. Al Leong

Asian American actor & stuntman has picked up a cult fan following based around his numerous appearances in high voltage action flicks from the mid-1980s onwards. Al nearly always turns up as a bad guy with his lean muscled physique, incredible agility, amazing martial arts skills, wispy black hair, and Fu-Manchu style mustache!! Best known on-screen as "Endo" torturing 'Mel Gibson' with electric shocks in Lethal Weapon(1987), as "Uli" the chocolate bar stealing terrorist in Die Hard (1988), one of the Wing Kong members in Big Trouble in Little China (1986), as a short Genghis Khan in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989), and as "Minh" the henchman punching on with 'Brandon Lee' in a blazing laundry in the climax of Rapid Fire (1992). Made his directorial debut in 2000 by writing & directing the low budget Daddy Tell Me a Story...(2000).

 

1. Peter Stormare

Stormare began his career with the Royal Dramatic Theatre, to which he belonged for 11 years. In 1990, he took a leading position as Associate Artistic Director at the Tokyo Globe Theatre and made a name for himself through various Shakespeare performances, including Hamlet. Three years later, he moved to New York City and mainly took part there in English language productions. He played Carl Hamilton, a fictional Swedish secret agent. He was discovered by international audiences for his critically acclaimed role as one of the kidnappers in Fargo (1996). He portrayed Dieter Stark in the 1997 film The Lost World: Jurassic Park and later played sleazy, unlicensed "eye-doctor" Solomon Eddie in Minority Report.

In 1998, he appeared in "The Frogger", a Seinfeld episode where he played a rogue electrician known as Slippery Pete. He portrayed Uli Kunkel in the 1998 film The Big Lebowski, as well as playing Lev Andropov, a Russian cosmonaut in the 1998 film Armageddon. In 1999, he appeared as a villainous producer and director of hardcore porn in the film 8mm. He also portrayed Gunny in the 2002 film Windtalkers and Alexei in the 2003 film Bad Boys II. In 2003, he played Ernst Röhm in Hitler: The Rise of Evil. In the 2005 film Constantine, he played Lucifer. He played an interrogator in the 2005 film The Brothers Grimm. His first major character in television was on the show Prison Break in 2005, where he played mob boss John Abruzzi. He was originally cast in Fido, but opted out of the film upon being cast in Prison Break.

Stormare voiced Mattias Nilsson in the video games Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction and Mercenaries 2: World in Flames, Isair in the computer game Icewind Dale 2, and Johann Strauss in Quake 4. In February 2006, he starred as Wolfgang in Volkswagen's VDub series of television commercials. He played the main character in the filmSvartvattnet, which was filmed in Sweden and Norway in 2007.[2] He was offered a role in the ABC television series Lost for a period of one year,[3] which he declined.[4] In the 2007 film Premonition, he played Dr. Roth. In April 2007, he appeared in the CSI: Crime Scene Investigation episode "Ending Happy".

In December 2007, Stormare participated in the Swedish reality show Stjärnorna på slottet. He appears in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 as Dr. Zelinsky, a Russian scientist who builds a time machine. He starred as Walter in the Canadian independent crime thriller Small Town Murder Songs (2010). He appeared in the music video of the song "Uprising" by the Swedish power metal band Sabaton.[5] He plays himself in the 2011 Norwegian comedy Hjelp, vi er i filmbransjen and appeared as a psychiatrist in the Swedish horror film Marianne (2011). He appeared in a trailer for the video game Call of Duty: Black Ops II, made for the "Revolution" DLC pack. He has since reappeared in most trailers for the game.

In 2014 - television, Stormare has recently appeared in episodes of Longmire, Arrow and The Blacklist. 2014 starred in the Eli Roth produced film Clown, who portrayed Karlsson.