Super Megafest 2011 happened last weekend on November 19th and 20th at the Sheraton Hotel in Framingham, MA. With Thanksgiving happening in the U.S. on November 24th, 4 days after the convention, I had a very busy week and some bad allergies so, I didn't get a chance to talk about Super Megafest 2011 until now.
Super Megafest is a smaller convention compared to the ones I attended in the past year. But as a wise Jedi once said, "Size matters not." As Super Megafest had a great guest list which included Patrick Stewart who made an appearance on Saturday. I didn't get to meet Captain Picard but for the lucky people who did meet him, they assured me that he's awesome and nice. Maybe I'll get to meet him at future conventions. I did get to meet Sean Astin (Samwise Gamgee of Lord of the Rings) again. I first met him at the Museum of Science of Boston a while back. He autographed his book There and Back Again: An Actor's Tale and Rudy for me all those years ago. This time, I finally got my copy of The Goonies and the insert of Return of the King signed. I also chatted with him for a bit and was able to sneak in for a photo op. He's super nice and down to earth. It might not seem like much reading my testaments here about how nice the celebrities are but, once you get to meet a snarky and jaded celebrity you'll be more appreciative with the nice ones. I also met the man who donned the Sauron armor in Lord of the Rings, Sala Baker. We got to talking about how he wanted to play professional basketball but ended up being an actor. He was excited to be in Boston and wish he had more time to explore. He especially wanted to go to the Museum of Science. Alright MoS, my former employer, I'd plugged you a few times at the convention and on this blog. Where's my commission? At least send me some free stuff. I also got to shake hands with Jeremy Bulloch, the badass bounty hunter Boba Fett from Star Wars. Moments later, I realized I forgot to bring my Boba Fett Star Wars trading card for him to sign! WTF?! Ugh! EPIC FAIL! If I never get to see him again, this will haunt me for the rest of my life.
I got Mickey's and Peter's autograph so far
Peter Tork of the Monkees was there as well. He still has his humor and was very nice to his fans. He also played in the Saturday night concert with his current band, the Shoe Suede Blues. I'm not going to lie, my expectations for the Saturday night concert was very low and I was very wrong to expect that. I thought I'd made a mistake while waiting in line to get into the concert. For the most part, Super Megafest was well coordinated but, there were some hiccups and waiting for the concert was one of them. As I was waiting in line, I saw my cosplayer friends pile into the hotel bar and I was wondering if I should skip the concert. I heard a lot of yelling and laughing coming from the bar and was losing my patience with the wait to get into a concert that I didn't have high expectations for. I could be in the bar sharing silly shenanigans with my cosplayer friends! I was glad I waited though. Once the concert started it was fantastic from beginning to the end. My mind was blown as to how awesome it was. Yet, I still wanted to spend time at the bar though. Only if there were two of me. If only...
More about the concert and Super Megafest after the "JUMP!"
Concert
Peppertown preforming Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds
There were four bands at the Super Megafest concert:
Niki Luparelli and the Gold Diggers performed first. They had a really nice jazzy sound to their music. Niki Luparelli performed a really interesting cover of Britney Spears' Toxic in french. Check out the video that I found on youtube. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do.
The second band is a Michael Nesmith (Monkees) revival band called, Loose Salute. Named after Michael Nesmith's album. The band mainly played Michael Nesmith's music during his solo run and they played them very well. For good measure they performed Pleasant Valley Sunday and it was excellent. I can't find any information online for Loose Salute.
The third performance was Peter Tork (Monkees) and his band, Shoe Suede Blues. They performed a lot of their original blues music and some of them were actually pretty funny. Funny blues, it shouldn't work but it did. They also performed a couple of the Monkees' hits, I'm a Believer and Daydream Believer. At one point during Daydream Believer, Peter Tork stopped singing and the band stopped playing and they just had the audience sing the chorus. It was such a beautiful experience, it sent shivers down my spine. They also performed a bluesy version of Last Train to Clarksville. I liked the song so much I went to Peter Tork's booth and bought the album the next day. As a bonus he personalized it for me!
The last performance was amazing and saying that it's amazing compared to the previous three other bands is like saying that I had a great meal and this is the awesome dessert that topped it off, and that strawberry fields full of awesomeness was: Peppertown! Peppertown is a local Beatles cover band. They played and sounded just like the Beatles. They got the whole place rocking! What a finale! Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds was one of the crowd favorites, along with Ticket to Ride and Twist and Shout. I was sitting in the third roll and I noticed Niki Luparelli in the first roll rocking to Peppertown without a care.
Check out the Link below, you know the drill: Peppertown
The other guests at Super Megafest 2011 included Anthony Michael Hall, Tia Carrere, and Daniel Logan (young Boba Fett). There were a lot more other guests and a good amount of vendors. For a smaller sized convention the guest list was pretty good. A few familiar artists showed up, like Sara Richards and Hannibal King. I had a chance to talk to Hannibal King a bit more this time. I'm thinking of asking him and Sara Richards to do some art for me. I don't want to go down that road of collecting art though. It'll eat up a good chunk of my paycheck.
Another fun event at Super Megafest was the Costume Contest. Fun, even though it was organized poorly. All the cosplayers and anyone who wanted to watch the contest were crammed into one tiny room. The judges even ran out of numbers for the costumers. A disheartened Joker was turned down from the contest. Somehow, it made me sad to see an unhappy Joker. Aside from the drawbacks from the coordination of the event, the costumes were awesome. I especially liked Blaster from the Transformers. He was a working boombox and played several theme songs including the G.I. Joe The Movie Theme when Cobra Commander, the Baroness and Destro walked into the room. The Hulk was one of my favorites too. He had glowing green eyes and was so huge I wondered how he'd got through the door. The judges were as impressed as I was because they declared the Hulk as the winner. Or maybe they were intimidated by him.
Being a smaller convention, I could just spend a few hours at Super Megafest and be done with it. The biggest reason that I stayed for the full weekend... and the thing that raised the awesomeness of the convention exponentially were the cosplayers. This is the first convention that I'd been to where the cosplayers took over. There is a tight group of costumers in New England and because of this they were able to organize meeting up at Super Megafest and they made the event into their personal party. The band of masked heroes, Ghostbusters and Pop Culture Icons (Mr. T) embodied the spirit of the convention. The entire experience was totally surreal. At one point when I was standing in the lobby of the Sheraton, 1960's Batman ran in with a bomb that he's trying to get rid of. Then outside Mr. T was battling Black Canary as Link was taking a picture of them. While to my left, R2D2 meets the Ghostbusters of New Hampshire and, to my right Doc Brown was just getting out of the Dolorean. The convention was occupied with cosplay epicness! I met up with Spider-Pool (Deadpool disguised as Spider-Man) at the Vendors Area and told him that he had nice boots. He high fived me! Then down the hall, Darth Vader, Voldermort and Bellatrix
Lestrange were having a meeting and probably planning something evil no doubt. Talking about evil alliances, I also saw Emma Frost and the Baroness together. That's a force to be reckon with but, when I asked them to pose for a picture they were more than happy to do so. We have got the best cosplayers in the world right here in New England. There were no ego trips and no snobbiness. If you wonder why I love these conventions so much, the cosplayers are always my answer. They are a great bunch and once you meet them you'll know what I mean. They took over Super Megafest and turned it into Super Megafun!
Here's a link to my "Hello Youtubes" videos of Super Megafest 2011 that I uploaded. The videos has a bit on the Costume Contest and some performances from the Concert: Super Megafest 2011: Videos
Follow these links to the Super Megafest and the Ghostbusters of New Hampshire websites: Super Megafest
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