WonderCon 2005 preview (archived)

For the complete skinny on countless hours of "fanboy" programming, head on over to www.comic-con.org.

This year's Comic-Con—held at San Francisco's Moscone Convention Center Feb. 18-20, 2005—touts among its many "Special Guests" Neal Adams (famous artist of Batman, Deadman, X-Men, and other titles), John Cassaday (currently wowing 'em on the Astonishing X-Men title penned by Joss Whedon), Harvey Pekar (American Splendor, My Movie Year), painterly pop artist Alex Ross (Kingdom Come, Superman: Peace on Earth), Kevin Smith (comic writer, filmmaker, and "Silent Bob"), William Stout (illustrator for page and film), and stalwart con-goer Sergio Aragonés (Groo and Mad magazine), among many others.

And that's just some of the "Special Guests." How about the celebrities? Headliner Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and the aforementioned Astonishing X-Men) escorts Nathan Fillion, Adam Baldwin and Summer Glau, the stars of Whedon's Serenity (that's the big-screen version of the terrific "failed" TV series Firefly). Douglas Adams associate Robbie Stamp carries the banner for the feature film version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which Stamp executive produced. Cole Hauser represents for Sony's The Cave, and Paramount starts beating the drum for The War of the Worlds. The "Dr. Doom" is in: Julian McMahon, that is, stepping up for Fox's highly anticipated Fantastic Four. Elisha Cuthbert (24) mixes it up with legendary producer Joel Silver to promote the WB's House of Wax. WB also lets the Bat out of the bag with Christian "Batman" Bale's only convention appearance. Steve Sansweet, head of Fan Relations at Lucasfilm, and Peter "Chewbacca" Mayhew will herald the arrival of George's last feature hurrah for Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith.

There's literally tons more doin' at Comic-Con this year: a celebrity-hosted tribute to Will Eisner, a panel from the good folks at The Charles M. Schulz Museum, the Cinefantastique/CFQ Summer Movies Preview, and the first ever WonderCon Masquerade (hoo boy). 'Nuff said? No, sorry: I'll be back in this space (same bat-time, same bat-page) to blog all that Groucho surveys.