DCon 2018: The Move To Anaheim

 by Jonathan Bilski

DCon, it remained. It was bigger, was in a new place, had a lot more people, but it still had pins with boobs on them. DCon or for those uninitiated, DesignerCon is a convention of art, toys and fans for such things, all coming together to get some cool new stuff to put in their pads or on their desks....on their desk at work if human resources says it's okay. It's a mix of beautiful, gross and playful pieces that'll make you got to any ATM and cry as you withdraw way too much money. Damn you, Japanese toy company Tomenosuke!

I'll be going over some of my favorite booths, the change of being in Anaheim and any other little nods and notices in the rundown of the event.

Christoper Lee's Rhino Beetle

It's really hard to even know where to begin, much like the convention itself. There's just hundreds of booths with different artists selling different goods. I wouldn't know how to really to categorize or improve it, maybe put all the plushies over here and the clothing over here, but you have booths that do both or more.

As per, somehow usual, we checked out Christoper Lee's latest work at his Beast is Back booth. He was selling a cute new vinyl beetle toy. Giant Robot and Genuine Haha, DCon classic booths were neighbors and selling all kinds of goodies.

Then the game plan was to just go up and down each row, trying to take it all in.

We had to stop and check out the giant cereal bowl. Gotta give a few claps to Funko. They were selling their own cereal with toys in them at DCon this year. So, they created a super market booth to show off all their cereals based on different characters. It was eye-catching and the giant cereal bowl to take selfies in didn't hurt.

Now the booth an idea was mocked throughout the convention. It's funny to see artists either paying homage to what Funko is doing or just ripping them off for their own fun.

Mondo was at DCon for the first time selling limited edition posters and a quite cool Jonesy the cat t-shirt from the original Alien film. They had a huge line waiting to buy stuff. We weren't fans of anything to grab right then and there, but it was still great to see Mondo merch up close and in LA.

Hero Complex might be there closes competition showing off their own movie poster collection. We always love seeing their stuff too. Gallery 1988 was there, but seemed like they didn't really want to compete with the other two well-known galleries who make great movie posters for cult and classic movies. They didn't seem to bring a huge selection and had a pretty small booth.

-Anaheim

Wasn't really that bad, for those who live in the valley or LA to commute to. It's an hour and a few minutes to get there, but not the worst traffic. Two major gripes below, but nothing about DCon itself, just the convention center.

Really, we needed the space. I walked the length of the convention on Saturday. I mean we went past every single booth and stopped at a few in about 6-7 hours. There was so much to look at from so many artists or galleries or vendors that it could no longer fit in its old home at the Pasadena Convention Center. We lost fairly cheap parking and access to really good food when we left Pasadena.

-Two Major Gripes

1. I'm not sure why, but the parking lots for the convention center were not open, at least on Saturday, when we went. The direct lot, recently built for the convention center was closed-off and we had to park at adjacent Disney lot for $16. Then a 13-minute walk to the convention center.

2. Food in the the convention hall is utterly overpriced garbage. It's not tasty and it's way too much money.

-Back to booths

April O'Neil showing it all

-Jurassic Park

Looking as pretty as Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) with his shirt off in Jurassic Park was an art show devoted to it. I loved the concept of having I.D. tags from the park, being the info for the artists and their pieces. The giant T-Rex statue didn't hurt either.

-Dragon Ball

There was a surprising amount of anime love and a clear longing look into the eyes of Goku. We saw some amazing fashion for Dragon Ball. The stuff there...I wish could be carried in Hot Topic. Native Gold sold out of it's wonderful pink Dragon Ball ladies shirt featuring the many women of Dragon Ball. David Baker had a some great art and pins based around the show.

-Check on the Kickstarter for Cutthroat Cuties pins. Sadly, for the Sailor Moon fan they won't be ready by Christmas. Steve Minty is behind them and really anything he makes is just great to look at.

Yu Yu Hakusho from Native Gold

-Gaming

There wasn't that much to do with gaming other than few booths. Pac-Man came to represent. Not much need for a Pac-Man basketball, but damn does it look cool.

The rest of the convention was just the bombardment of other great work to check out.

 -FYE sold Reptar Bars and yes, they do turn your mouth green.

-Tomenosuke was selling an DCon exclusive Mimi The Cannibal Girl figure. It's a collaboration with the Japanese artist Utomaru who based it off the movie, Cannibal Holocaust. It's depicting a rather horrible death scene, but she made it look like a chibi anime character.

Just a ghostbuster dog on a containment unit

Felt witch head from Head Lopper comic

-Really loved the fruit girl prints by Harumoto Sato.

So wanted that bag