My MCM Expo-dition

A mild October morning (and when I mean morning, I mean bloody early morning, as in a 5.30 wake up and the 7.26 C2C train from my aunties house in Basildon to Custom House where the ExCel Centre lives – and then another hour and a half queueing with my so called ‘fast track’ ticket – and then another half an hour getting my Terry Farrel AKA ‘Jadzia Dax’ from Star Trek DS9 autograph). This is the 5th year I have been to the MCM Expo which means I have been to 10 London MCM Expos and the flagship Midlands MCM Expo in Telford and I love every minute of each event (well, after I get in).

As the MCM Expo now seems to be taken over by Naruto, Bleach and various other ‘in fashion Anime’ the kids are all into these days, I was really surprised to see a large amount of Spandex clad comic book characters, Star Trek uniforms and video game cosplayers that were not just from Final Fantasy 7 or 10. One of my favourites from the day was a happy fellow who was dressed as Rincewind from the Discworld… err, world. He even came with his own ‘Luggage’ who actually ate my microphone, but then proceeded to cough it up 5 minutes later. Another outfit just out of pure ‘OMG’ factor caught my eye as the detail and just downright awesomeness was incredible. I didn’t catch her name as she was so overwhelmed by the whole crazy Expo experience, but she was so lovely and she did say she would love to make me an outfit to wear and I would hardly turn down that offer.

My first ever whole costume made for someone else also made its debut. My friend Amanda wearing the original Harley Quinn costume I made for her was looking really glamorous. I also opted for a se-Quinned look as I had a feeling that Batman characters are becoming a popular costume choice these days because of the ‘Batman: Arcane Ass-ylum’ game (have you seen what Harley wears in that?). I knew there would probably be others dressed as Ms. Quinn, so I needed Amanda to stand out from the rest , and every girl needs some bling.  So comparing Amanda to the four other Harley Quinns I saw that day, Expo’s florescent lighting made her sparkle above the rest. It cost £25 to make and about two months to prepare and make and nearly everything came from Primark, but the main thing is it looked great, she loved it and looked totally fab in it.

A few super happy things happened that I wasn’t expecting this Expo. One of which was accidentally coming across Craig Charles AKA Dave Lister from Red Dwarf who was happy to talk to me, have a photo taken and seems a very nice chappy indeed. Another unexpected find was glistening on a table in the form of a Dead Space comic and along with the comic were the writer Anthony Johnston and the artist Ben Templesmith. This got me seriously excited as ‘Dead Space’ is one of my favourite Xbox 360 games and meeting the actual writer of the game I love so much was legen – wait for it – dary. We ended up having had a nice chat about how important it is to have good dedicated story writers on games, letting them have input with the designers and not just giving it to (us) designers to bodge up… they gave me a copy of the ‘Dead Space: Extraction’ comic and signed it for me, and is probably the best £2 I’ve ever spent.

After that I was in a gamey kind of mood so I dragged my mum over to somewhere where I felt at home, the Sega stand. One of the lovely Sega guys clocked me as Ulala and whisked me off to have some alone time with ‘Bayonetta’… unfortunately I was just given an Xbox pod and controller. It’s like a fun, kicky, sexy librarian version of ‘Devil May Cry’ with better camera angles and a woman dressed in nothing but her own hair.  Her own PVC hair (and they said they’d give me a free review copy – so… dibs!).  After leaving my new love that is ‘Bayonetta’ in the hands of a sweaty guy with a ‘Free Hug’ sign tied to his back I left the Sega stand and was whisked into the arms of another rubber clad individual, though this one was the one drooling over me. This Alien came with real slobber, but I have to say it was worth being drooled on as the hug was really quite comforting – probably leading me into a false sense of security before having my head ripped off, I took a chance and had the hug for another 10 seconds.

Other monstrous individuals were chained up and under lock and key, two ‘Left 4 Dead 2’ zombies had been allowed out under tight EA supervision probably to do some shopping – because the people carrying the ‘free hugs signs’ looked light on brains. One of them was carrying a severed arm so slight in appearance it could have belonged to Terry Farrel, AKA ‘Jadzia Dax’ (she’s really slim), so it was a good thing I was in the queue for her autograph before the undead crew joined the line. Though as individuals who are supposedly a threat to humanity, they were very civilized, more civilised and ironically with more brains than the annoying kids I travelled the ‘Docklands Light Railway’ with that morning.

‘Tatsunoko Vs Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars’ was playable and Frank West from ‘Dead Rising’ was one of the new playable characters. I was routing for ‘Phoenix Wright’, as he could have been the new guy in the game, but the ‘Objection’ speech boxes or western versions of the game were too big compared to the Japanese Kanji version. So unfortunately, I’m as bitter as a cup of ‘Godot Blend 107’. No matter how much I may want to shout “HOLD IT” at Capcom, there will be no Phoeeeenie for me.

London MCM Expo were also celebrating the opening of the week long London Games Festival with a full size ‘Halo M12 Warthog’ LRV and supposedly the second ever built in the world, so obviously I had to have my photo taken next to it, but it was just a shame it didn’t come with any UNSC Marines.

As Expos go, this one was good and it was great fun once I got into the hall itself. There was a lot more for gamers and sci-fi lovers than in previous years and they had a bigger space so it felt less crowded. I was definitely getting hit less by badly painted cosplay weaponry being wielded by idiots than I did in Expo back in May. You could even see and get to the stalls selling stuff so I took the opportunity to buy my Mum a Star Trek Tribble and myself a Sega pin badge that I lost on the way home, so all in all the Expo was a horrific tragedy that will be sung about, Fable 2 style, by wandering minstrels from now until the end of post apocaliptic, Fallout 3 style, time.