I spent Saturday afternoon at NY Comic Con again. Here’s some raw footage of some of the cosplay.
Category Archives: movies
It’s a subdued NY Comic Con
So I made it to NY Comic Con 2021! I hopped on a plane and got myself to NYC.
It was a bit subdued this year, the massive crowds weren’t here. They Comic Con people, Reed Pop, have been very good about covid protocols and I guess regulating the amount of people permitted into the event is one of them.
It’s all the excitement of every year, just with less people.
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NY Comic Con
I was supposed to be in New York today for the start of NY Comic Con, but I’ve been delayed, due to a family issue. Hopefully I can get there this weekend.
I am all set for my visit to the Jacob Javits Center. There is an app called “Clear” where you enter all your covid info – you have to scan a copy of your vaccine card, then scan your driver’s license, then take a current photo of yourself and then scan yourself live, to show that the photo you snapped is you!
They’re being quite careful, but still, thousands of people will be there shoulder to shoulder.
My cousin Michael is there already, he is showing his work at a booth, he’s a cartoon artist. And the photos are making me “homesick” for Comic Con.
A friend asked me yesterday what the big deal was – same thing year after year. I couldn’t explain it. It’s an experience. From the moment you get on the 7 train and see that most of the people on the train are dressed as a character from tv, movies or the comics, to the large crowds exiting the Hudson Yards train station, heading west to the Jacob Javits Center.
It’s electric. The whole four days are electric. Indescribable.
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Cocaine Cowboys
I started watching the 6-part Netflix show, Cocaine Cowboys: The Kings of Miami. And to my surprise, I know so many of the characters/people. I’ve lived in Miami most of my life, so this all transpired during my lifetime.
I’m friends, well, let’s say I’m friendly with one of the dealer’s sons. I know two of the women, who are now Real Housewives of Miami. I know them through a good friend, who is good friends with them. I know one of the lawyers, I work out with him at the gym, and so on and so on. They even mention and show old videos of my own little neighborhood in the show.
So many of the news stories, I remember seeing on the tv news at the time.
The 1980s, my favorite decade, was a wild time in Miami. I was of course removed from al of these drugs things going on, but they were always front page news at the time. And the people I know from the stories, I know now, I didn’t know then.
I love the part in the show where one juror says that Willy and Sal, the drug kingpins didn’t look like gangsters to her when she saw them in court, she said, “The attorneys are the ones who looked like gangsters.”
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New York Comic Con is back
So New York Comic Con is back! From October 7-10, 2021, the Jacob Javits Center will be alive again. Until recently it has been used for some sad and unpleasant things – you may remember it was turned into a hospital during the very dark days of covid. And until recently it was a center for vaccination shots.
I guess it will feel weird being there and thinking of all that, but in the end, it will be back to what it was meant for – events. Comic Con was cancelled last year, so it will be a big welcome home event this year.
I’m looking forward to Comic Con. And of course, being in NYC in the fall is an added bonus. This past summer there was still a lot missing. There wasn’t much in the way of service and I don’t think NYC is ready for visitors yet. Plus the weather is either 100 degrees or raining every day, which doesn’t help in making it a great summer experience.
That being said, I did spend a lot of time with friends and family and I did a lot of things from going to the Hamptons a couple of times to visiting Little Island, Governors Island, Coney Island (a lot of islands), seeing the fireworks and of course doing the Van Gogh Experience, among so many other things.
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In the Heights
I saw “In the Heights” the other night. Loved it.
I think it is probably the movie of the summer – it’s got everything – singing, dancing, a big presence and it’s fun.
I’ve been all over NYC, but never to Washington Heights, I always plan to go to see one thing – the Little Red Lighthouse at the foot of the George Washington Bridge, but I never seem to make it. You just take the A train or the #1 and you are there.
I’ve seen it from the Hudson River many times, from the Circle Line (the lighthouse and Washington Heights).
I’ve been to Spanish Harlem many times – by accident the first time. There’s a museum up that way, the Museum of the City of New York. Every time I’m in the city, I go to the museum. I take the #6 train and get off at 103rd Street and walk through the Spanish Harlem neighborhood and end up at Central Park, where the museum is, across from the park on 5th Avenue. But along the way, you are immersed in a great culture – the food, the murals, the bodegas, the schools and hospitals, there are many hospitals up that way.
The first time I went to the Museum of the City of New York, it was to see the Roz Chast exhibit. I figured out how to get to the area and I’ve gone back dozens of times since.
I’ll be in NYC soon and of course I’ll visit the Museum of the City of New York, Spanish Harlem, and Washington Heights. New York is back, as is most of the country, and I’ll be enjoying so much of it, having not been there for such a long time. The last time I was there I had to leave a little early because a nor’easter was coming!
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Pretty in Pink
I watched Pretty In Pink yesterday. Yup – Andie and Duckie. 1986. How I wish I could go back to that era – my favorite time. I was flipping through channels and there it was in all it’s 1980s glory.
Watching it was like a time capsule – the sayings, the places, the fashions. I don’t think I saw the movie since the ’80s, so it was nice to see.
All of those John Hughes movies ARE the 1980s. I think the Simple Minds song, “Don’t You Forget About Me” from The Breakfast Club, is one of the THE ’80s songs. It always brings me back there when I hear it. Always.
The Brat Pack, Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Culture Club, George Michael, Prince, Guns ‘n Roses, Bon Jovi, Van Halen, Duran Duran, Tina Turner, Cyndi Lauper, The Police, Def Leppard, Metallica, Talking Heads, REM, etc. So great.
Cheers, Alf, The Golden Girls, Night Court, Hill Street Blues, Miami Vice, Moonlighting, Remington Steel, thirtysomething, Dynasty, Unsolved Mysteries, Dallas, etc. Such great tv, too. And movies – Ferris Bueller, The Outsiders, Moonstruck, Field of Dreams, Heathers, Top Gun, Weekend at Bernie’s, St. Elmo’s Fire, and of course all the John Hughes movies.
I sometimes think that when we die, we can then travel through time. Like if we want to visit a time and place, we can go there. I would visit the 1980s, I would start on January 1, 1980 and live it through to December 31, 1989 and do it all over again.
Too enveloped in your work to know there is a quarantine going on?
Today’s comic, which you can see in larger format at TomFalco.com relates to how I feel. I work from home, so this shelter-in-place thing has not been too difficult since I’m doing what I usually do – stay at home and work – my regular work/job is not happening due to the shut down, but I have been drawing. And I’ll bet this is the same for so many people who work in a studio or even are addicted to things like games.
I have a cousin who is a gamer and has many followers and friends on YouTube, I don’t know his site or I would post it here, I’m not sure why I don’t know his site name, but every time I am was going to ask him, he was busy gaming and a lot of the time he was live online and I didn’t want to interrupt. But anyway, he could be gaming for hours and not really notice being quarantined. He makes a living at it. Yes, he makes money from playing games online!
A cartoonist, an artist, a cook, an architect, a writer, a designer, etc. Whomever is envelopes in their work and not really noticing the outside world is the guy in this cartoon today.
As for my gamer cousin, his brother is a performer in New York.
My cousin TJ Fox who is a musician, has been doing bi-monthly concerts from Long Island on Facebook. This Saturday, May 9, will be the third Saturday night he’s doing “Live from the Living Room.” It’s free at his Facebook page here: facebook.com/tjfoxmusic it starts at 8 pm (eastern time) and usually goes for two hours. You can request songs, he plays the guitar and sings.
If you go to the site now, you can see past concerts.
It’s become a thing with me now. I really look forward to it. I’m a create of habit, do something twice and it’s a thing from now on. What I enjoy aside from his talent is we all chat along as we listen and it’s broadcast from their Hamptons house which I sort of get homesick for since I spend some time there each summer. I’m hoping to be there this summer.
TJ is quite big up north. So many times I’m walking around NYC and I see his name on a sandwich board or marquee – “TJ Fox here tonight!” He performs in NYC and Long Island mostly. He’s also written and performs his own music as well as so many things you already know.
Hollywood, the beginning
I’ve been watching this 13 part documentary about the film industry just called, “Hollywood,” it’s on YouTube. If you’re bored these days, this is something you might like. I’m still trying to catch up with Shameless and I love watching Breaking Bad, which I never get tired of, but this is something you don’t have to really think about and it’s enjoyable.
It’s great if this subject interests you, it starts from silent films and explains how it all begin in Ft. Lee, New Jersey and then ended up in Hollywood, CA. Each episode is 50 minutes or so and it’s mostly scenes from the actual movies they are talking about with commentary and interviews from people such as DW Griffith, Louise Brooks, Hal Roach and so many old stars and directors from the time. Since the documentary was filmed in 1980, many of these people were still around to discuss the time and the films and you see the movie footage of what they are discussing.
It’s interesting how actress Lillian Gish and writer Adela Rogers St. Johns, who thinks she was part of it all, feel that silent films were the be all and end all and when sound started, it was the beginning of the end of the art. Seriously.
Here is the first episode and from here you can go through the rest of them.
I’ve been watching it on tv where I have the YouTube app, so it’s more enjoyable on the large screen.
Caronavirus is our Jaws
Mayor Vaughn wants the beaches open.
I was watching Jaws the other day. I don’t know if it’s my favorite movie, but I must have seen it 100 times. Every time I come across it on tv, I stop what I’m doing and I watch.
I happened to turn it on in the exact scene that reminded me of Florida these days. Mayor Larry Vaughn of Amity Island in Jaws wants the beaches open for July 4th through the whole summer, while the police want the beaches closed to protect people from the shark, the mayor wants the beaches open; sort of like the dolts in Florida these days who feel the beaches should be open, just adding to the spread of caronavirus.
No sheltering in place for these idiots.
The reason I like Jaws is not about the shark, the part I like is the little beach town in New England and that point in time, the mid 1970s. I love that. It reminds me so much of the Hamptons where I spend part of the summer with my cousins and I am hoping to be able to be there this summer, but if these idiots in parts of Florida are still spreading the virus by opening beaches and other businesses, who knows what summer will bring.
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