This weekend, Dark Horse Comics Assistant Editor John Schork braved Kumoricon, Oregon's largest Anime and Manga Convention. After he came down from his Pocky-high he wrote this illuminating post about his time amongst the Otaku. John, tell the kids at home about your weekend.
For eons, the curious have used immersion as a strategy to forcibly reach an understanding of previously unassimilated or undeciphered information. The most famous example of this, Diane Fossey, spent eighteen years among gorillas. And thought it’s still a heated point of debate as to whether or not she became able to bench press twice her own weight, she developed a working understanding of their social groups and primal customs. In The 13th Warrior, a movie I love despite it’s Rotten Tomatoes Fresh Rating, Antonio Banderas’ exiled Arab poet learns the Norse language over the course of a handy, evening-spanning montage. If zoological deities and action movies of dubious distinction have taught me anything, it’s that jumping into the deep end of the pool is a great way to weird up your weekend.
All I knew heading into Kumoricon 2010 was that I was about to spend Labor Day weekend completely surrounded by a group of mostly costumed, mostly young people I had almost no understanding of in the bottom level of a parking garage in downtown Portland. From everything I gathered, it seemed like I was either in for Otaku Heart of Darkness or the parade scene from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off furnished by teenagers in Dragonball Z costumes instead of Chicagoan extras. As it turns out, it was somewhere in the middle. Except being the uncommon specimen it is, Kumoricon’s definition of “somewhere in the middle” is a giant robot with the tail of a fox, the face of a doe-eyed Japanese teenager, and 3,500 chrome rocket boosters emerging from it’s fur-lined fuselage to scream-belch miles of vertical rainbow clouds and send itself into the stratosphere. Even if you have a nice, safe spot to watch from, it’s hard not to be blinded by the blast.
Almost every convention-goer I saw or talked to was freaking out about a book, freaking out about a toy, or freaking out and glomping (Grab, Latch On, Maintain Pressure) someone because of their costume. I wouldn’t have been surprised to have come around a corner and found Tony Robbins self-assuredly pumping smile gas into the ventilation system.
What I did find around almost every corner, were con-goers genuinely thrilled beyond compare to be surrounded by like-minded, equally stoked colleagues. In addition to that, the exhibitor space was appointed enough that the stigma of plying the company wares in a parking garage evaporated in minutes. There were artists and vendors from all walks and corners of the media there to supplement the excitement with manga, toys, statues, games, wall scrolls, t-shirts, DVD’s, and of course, swords. If one wanted a Ramune, the ubiquitous, baffling, and tasty soda with a marble in it, to compliment their Pocky, they could make it happen at Uwajimaya’s booth.
I had no idea what to expect going into Kumoricon. But I was met with fanatic love for Dark Horse, a ton of amazing costumes, dozens of high fives, a couple things I had to talk myself out of buying, and the most shockingly clean bathrooms I’ve ever seen at a convention.
Thanks to the fans, the organizers and volunteers, the high fivers, and the Hilton’s custodial staff. Seriously, those bathrooms were incredible.
--John Schork, Assistant Editor
John Schork is the newest full-time addition to the Dark Horse editorial department. His favorite manga series is Gantz.
Now in it's eighth year, Kumoricon is the largest Anime and Manga themed convention in Oregon, drawing over 4,000 attendees annually.