Pros and (Comic) Cons

The pun in the title of this Hope Nicholson-edited anthology from Dark Horse is that while “Pros” relates to the many professionals who contributed to it, it’s also full of prose as well.  It’s basically a fifty-fifty split between essays and comics about the convention experience.  So on one hand we’ve got shorts like “Only in…” from Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming, where the former recounts the time he saw Horny Mormon Julie from “The Real World” tackle a very drunken Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D. while he was being interviewed at the con.  On the other, there are essays like “A First Time Moderator’s Worst Nightmare” where a Canadian TV host Morgan Hoffman finds out she’s going to be moderating a panel for David Hassellhoff and nearly has a breakdown preparing for it.

Those are examples of the kinds of stories I picked up this anthology expecting to read.  What I wasn’t expecting was the wide swath of “What do cons mean to me” and “Survival Guide” entries — mostly hailing from the essay side of the book.  At best they’re a bit dull and at worst I feel like I’m actively being lectured at. It was a chore to get through those bits to more entertaining stories like how Kieron Gillen and Julia Scheer’s history of the “Thought Bubble” dance floor.  Or surprising ones like finding out how “Something Positive’s” Randy Milholland met his wife in “Love at First Con.” Or reading about how Tini Howard went to Katsucon in 2002 on a broken foot while cosplaying as Yuffie from “Final Fantasy VII” (and even included a picture of herself in costume from the trip).

The best ones make a point about the special appeal of cons while telling an interesting story.  Kris Straub probably does this best in “Connections” which is how he relates the time some rando wound up having dinner with him and his webcomic friends to the time that he wound up singing at a hotel bar with “Star Trek’s” Avery Brooks and Jonathan Frakes.  While this story is probably the best of the bunch, there are also plenty more that I think are worth your time. That’s why this anthology is worth checking out, even if it is weighed down a bit by all the lecturing.