BotCon '98 - Megatron33

BotCon was a blast! everything was great except for all the traffic getting over there on Friday for pre-registrant check in but that wasn't their fault, the 20 min drive over there took an hour.... :-/ I didn't go to the Friday night party for some odd reason so I went to the Claim Jumper instead for some ribs. Thought on Friday I did see RavagePuma and Autobot916 in the pre- reg line behind me.

The next day I got over there and had to wait in line, apparently I was standing next to Hydrad304 but I didn't know it was him, he had a cool Decepticon trench coat though. First off I didn't buy much during the convention since not much on my list was complete and loose, lots of boxed items. Also there were so many people there that the tables were to crowded for me to get in. I finally bought a RamJet and walked off and met Trixter and John Tesh...errr.. LV! Didn't see Walky though.... Throughout the day I met Raksha and GrrrlGoyle. I bought the ConQuest and Secrets of the Universe, SotU was $20! I later found out that that was the price Raksha had to pay for each on since there was a lot of color pictures so it was understandable. Bought comic issues 16,17,18,42, and 44. The other toys I bought that day were ThunderCracker, StarScream, Onslaught, Vortex, and Blast Off.

Now it's time for the exclusives, Antagony and Vice Grip. Antagony is a black repainted Inferno which it sweet, Antagony is also a female charactor. Vice grip is a blue and grey repainted Power Pinch and it looks cool to. All the exclusives sold out in about an hour or so. I was lucky I pregreistered mine. I passed out some flyers for MegatronCA's Peace Through Tyranny club, it would have been easier if I remembered who I gave them out to. I played the BW PSX game and I got slaughtered. First time I selected Rhinox since he was the best of the Maximals available and I fell down a crevasse and died. Second time I played Megatron since he was the best of the Preds (unfortunetly) and I got blown apart. (No big surprise considering BW Megs) I had a conversation with Gary Chalk. He did NOT know about the Blow it. jokes, I was the one who told him about it too! I also got him to say blow it on my cassette recorder.

I went to the Hasbro panel since that was the one they actually announced on the mic and they were great IMO. They showed the video of the commercials of TFs. Everyone started laughing when they saw the kids saying "Robots in disguise." and when one of the kids had glowing green eyes. The comment on that was "I think we are all possessed." or something like that. Also when they showed Pretenders and Action Masters everyone groaned in unison. The hasbro representatives still said they couldn't answer some questions but they at least explained why they couldn't. They did announce a collectors website for all their best selling lines in which Transformers will be included and it will be launched Oct 1. Rampage and Optimal Optimus have been pushed back until fall since they are still being retooled.

After the panel I met Scott McNeil and I had him say something into my recorder. He said, "Oooo Waspinator not know how to work microphone very well." All the recordings I got will eventually get on my web page. I left and didn't realise the voice actors panel was going to start and I went into the main room and when I found out the voice actors panel was going on I ruished back and recorded the rest of the panel with my recorder as I did with the hasbo panel. I have some good wavs that will be featured on my web page. The actors were very friendly and very accessable afterwards since they mingled with the rest of the people. Basically they talked about how they did the voices and how they got their roles, and some of their past roles and outtakes. One was when Gary Chalk had to burp in one of his lines in another show and he drank lots of coca cola, and instead of burping it bubbled up and it landed on his script and when he took a breath of excitement in, it got sucked up back in and everyone was just laughing and grossed out. Scott was just bouncing off the walls with his voices. David Kaye said he says yesss.... and noooo... because that was a twist he added to yes and no for the Megatron role. Someone in the crowd asked Scott to say "Dinobot has spoken. My rigid grill structure is bearing in on your unprotected cargo door." He just messed it up," Dinobot has spoken.... My rigid grid stucture?" Later they were signing Autographs and I got the recording of "Dinobot has spoken. My rigid grill structure.." (In your face Hooks!) Got a few other voices as well. While I was standing in line for autographs my pen broke in my hand and ink was all over. I was lucky I didn't get ink on my boxes or my BC T-shirt. I was talking to rav in line and we were just crackin up with our jokes.

The convention ended and I watched TFTM and we heard the legendary, "Oh shit what are we gonna do now?" Afterwards, it was a long wait for the script reading to start since it had been pushed back to 9:00 instead of after the movie which started at 6:30. It was worth it though. Especially when Antagony (voiced by Susan Blu) was introducing herself to Megatron as his worst enemy to which Megatron replied, "Raksha?" everyone just laughed their ass off on that one. I will post the script as well later this week. But before the reading started and the voice actors were walking onto the stage and Scott McNeil was acting like a boxer going into the ring and had David Kaye's hands on his shoulders and Vince DiCola played the Rocky theme. It was great, Benson Yee got shot by Megatron because Antagony looked on his page to find Megatron. After the reading I went back to my bro's apartment and awaited the next day.

When I got there I talked with a couple people in line and then they let us in. I went to Raksha and Grrlgoyle's tables and talked with them for a while. I talked to Grrrlgoyle for most of the day too. I bought some of Dan Khanna's EXCELLENT art work,the Soundwave picture and the Decepticon group picture. I also bought the TF JR set for $20 and two Japanese TF keychains for $25 for both, some spare parts, Quickstrike, and TF: Chronicles comic that was translated by Doug Dlin from Japanese, I also bought the comic about Primacron from Dlin as well. Bought a G2 Megatron, and I think that was it. I still have about $90 left to buy a LioConvoy or Dragon Galvatron. I met Lizard who got to be the lights guy for the MST3K showing of TFTM, which was hilarious. The G1 Cartoon panel was boring for me since I came in late and he didn't know a lot of answers for the questions that were asked and they were good questions as well. In the art contest, I was not suprised Dan Khanna placed in it, and a Transmutate figure that was made got 1st for 3d art. Lord Xiphos got 2 or 3 places in it and so did Tut. The last panel with Jon and Karl Hartman, and Glen Hallit was great. They explained all about how they ran BotCon and what were the differences in the previous ones and how they will evalute BC in the year 2000. The next BotCon location was not disclosed since they didn't know where they wanted to go but they narrowed it down to 5 cities but they did now say which ones.

Overall BotCon was just fantastic for me since it was my first. But the voice actors made it a lot better since they interacted with the fans and walked around with the fans around the dealer tables. The CD exclusive was the concert from last year. I also picked up last years comic as well. But 3H really did a great job and I commend them for that. But what really made BC special to me was to meet my friends. Now I have faces to go along with the .sigs on the NGs and nicks on IRC. I am now making preparations for myself to go to BotCon '99 and i will work hard to get the cash to go. This was a wonderful experience, and I hope to see you all there next year!