The Cheesecake Factory

Now I love cosplay, I really admire the people who go all out and dress up as their favourite characters from television, books, games and film.  My friend Sarah Jane and I have intended for last couple of years to dress up for the MCM Expo in London but either I don't have the nerve or we run out of time to come up with anything.  We did make awesome Lego Star Wars t-shirts last year but this year we decided to go one step further and actually dress up.  Now we haven't gone crazy but I'm really excited about our idea as I have been wanting to do it for a while.  We are going as cheesecake factory waitress' from The Big Bang Theory.

We are currently preparing everything we need to get; it is surprisingly hard to find a mustard V-neck sweater vest so if any of you see one on your travels please let us know.  We also have a little extra surprise along with the basic costume, which I am so excited about and have already started making so watch this space.

Do you think we can convince the boys to dress as Howard, Leonard and Sheldon??

MCM Expo Autumn 2011

It's Expo time again and for the first time I got to take Graeme so was very excited.  This October's event (or should I say last October, still catching up!!) was even bigger than the Spring (read about it here and here) and so much busier but still just as fun.  One big change the hall had been reversed and an extra Memorabilia room added which disorientated me and Sarah for a bit but we soon got used to it.  I was on a bit of a mission to find some manga I was missing and is now out of print so headed straight for the manga stands with Sarah, Graeme and his friend Ben were determined to buy lots of Magic, it's a card game, don't ask.  Here are our adventures below...

There were a lot of Star Wars characters this time around, and Graeme has great fun meeting them all.

He wore the right top for it too, Tide Fighter...

There were some big names as always I got this sneaky picture of Warwick Davies, have you been watching his new series with Ricky Gervais, Life's too Short.  I just love it, so funny, so cringe worthy, so brilliant!!

I got a photo with Ian McNeice who plays Bert Large in Doc Martin and had come dressed as him.  But then decided to pose as Winston Churchill; it was a tad confusing but nice to meet him.

We bumped into some very colourful characters, I just love the Cookie Monster. The costumes of the Mad Hatter and March Hare were amazing and so detailed.

This troop of characters was great even if I only recognised the Jack Skellington costume from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

This really take me back, they had a Robot Wars demonstration stage set up at the back of the memorabilia hall.  My brother, Dad and I loved this show when I was growing up. Oh and a Dalek decided he wanted to join in too.

Everyone had to try out the suit of armour set up on this medieval stand, It's just a shame Sarah and Ben were a little short.  I just love Graeme's expression he looks terrified haha!

Outside there was lots of posing going on, so the perfect photo op to capture as many costumes as possible in one go.  I didn't realise at the time, but seriously what is that guy wearing on the right? Cover yourself up man, well at least I hope it's a man!!

I was also on the hunt to find my Uni house mates Fay from Parfay and Jodie from Tangentine who I knew had a table together in the Comic Corner to sell their own work.  It was great to see them as it has been nearly a year and of course I had to buy their new comics which I read straight away. I love their different styles of artwork, Fay has drawn a short story about young street urchin named Marci.  Jodie had a collection of short stories and some of her artwork, she is an amazing artist, I am definitely going to have to get some of her artwork for when I move out.

I have pinched this photo of them both from Jodie as I was silly not to take one myself. Hope to see you both soon!!

Lastly I treated myself and bought some some artwork from Movie Art Prints.com.  The artist Andrew Timbs recreates scenes from film, tv and theatre using digital vector illustration programs from scratch, none of it is photo manipulation.  I couldn't decide which I liked the best and ended up buying an AT-AT from Star Wars and a huge artwork of the toys from Toy Story all falling out of a box.  They are printed beautifully in high quality and come on foam board so all I need to stick them up is some velcro, so quick and easy.

MCM Expo Spring 2011 - part 2

...continuing from yesterday here are some more awesome cosplayers we spotted at the MCM Expo.

How amazing is this Alien costume, everyone wanted their picture with him, we all felt bad for the army guy with him as the Alien was getting all the attention.

I thought it amusing he had a collar on, I thought nothing could keep the Alien leashed!!

These two characters are from another anime and manga series I have read, watched and loved called Chobits.  The girl in white is Chi, the other is Freya.

Lara Croft and a huge gun!!

Sarah's favourite snack, Pocky!!

I bought quite a bit at the show, including the rest of Scott Pilgrim series, the graphic novel of Pride and Prejudice (I'm very into Jane Austen at the moment, just finished the book).  The craft your own Star Wars book, which is for children but when has that ever stopped me!! I also bought a new manga called Dragon Heir by a group of English writers from Sweatdrop Studios.  I bought Telling Tales last year which was great so had to get another this year.

Scott also decided to buy a little purchase for his brother, I have been informed that this is the Gunblade from Final Fantasy VII.  We had to make sure it was 'ok' so had a play outside!!

Scott looking menacing(ish).

Sarah a little gay.

Me stroking the sword.

Some other cosplayers decided to join in!!

Outside were just as many cosplayers as inside, just love this Power Ranger, just standing watching proceedings.

These guys are from Final Fantasy I think??

Godzilla, talking to two halves of a Unicorn.

We also spotted an interesting game of skipping.  Where else would you find Kick Ass, the Jolly Green Giant, Picachu, Alice in Wonderland and Naruto skipping together, it was a great sight to see.

To finish the day we decided to get ice creams, yum!!

I also decided to pose at the riverside, it was really windy!! Ok so maybe I am persuaded to dress up next time.

MCM Expo Spring 2011 - part 1

Sarah, Scott and I decided to go to the MCM about two weeks ago so had no time to plan costumes (I would have wimped out anyway I know!!) But we wanted to add a bit of geekyness to our attire so Sarah and I decided to design some freezer paper t-shirts.  Our first idea was 'Titwatch' t-shirts to advertise my blog, but I just knew cutting out all the letters with a craft knife would have taken ages and we were making them the night before.  So instead we went for Lego Storm Troopers from the same design I used for Graeme's painting.  To add a bit of mixture we made Scott a Lego Darth Vader which turned out amazing thanks to Rachael's painting skills, thanks for the help!!

This is my second time at the MCM Expo and one thing I have realised is that Sarah an I are not as big geeks that we sometimes think we are.  I didn't recognise half of the cosplay costumes and had to keep asking Sarah who they were; even Sarah didn't recognise some though so if you spot one I haven't labelled correctly let me know!! 

I have know idea who this first group were, but I liked them!

This wasn't a cosplay it was a model from the set of Doctor Who, it's of the Tardis and the Dalek's creator Davros.

I knew who this guy was and even managed to ask for a picture.  This is from a manga and anime series called Inuyasha.  I'm proud to say that I have watched all 182 episodes and bought loads of the manga, this may be a series I have to revisit again!!

Oh I and I know these character too, Mario and Luigi.

This group of steam punk characters we didn't recognise, but the guy on the right had the best costume.  When I first saw him I really did believe that it was two people, one carrying the other in a trash bin, but no, this is one costume, awesome!!

One thing I love about MCM is how random it can be, this was a conga line we spotted making its way around the building.  And yes that is Pedobear with the Jolly Green Giant at the front, just amazing!!

Kick Ass!!

A couple of Na'vi.

As this post is starting to get epically long, i'll carry on tomorrow, but lastly Where's Wally??

Geek Week

I have a very exciting, but geeky week coming up; not only is my friend Scott coming for a visit from Munich, Yay!! We are all going to the MCM Expo at the ExCel in London, double Yay!!!!

But first I want to review the One Man Star Wars show by Charles Ross I went to see last weekend with Sarah Jane.  In a word it was AWESOME!! We also bumped into these guys in the lobby, they fully appreciated my Star Wars t-shirt so I'm glad I wore it now.  Both Sarah and I thoroughly enjoyed the show and as was written in the the description it was just one man singing all the music, playing all the characters, flying all the ships and fighting all the battles, against himself, it was odd, but it worked really well.  Charlie portrayed the characters brilliantly by taking their characteristic features and acting on these, his robotic C3P0 was brilliant, as was Jabba the Hut's lips with his arms.  At the end of the 60 minute show I had tears down my face from laughing so much.  He then sat down on stage and talked about how the show came about and how he plans to bring the One Man Lord Of The Rings show to Bracknell, I will be at the front of the queue!!

The warm up act was also thoroughly enjoyable; Danny Pensive (real name John Cooper) was hilarious. I loved Danny, he is from Sunderland and a little simple, he sung lots of very funny rhymes; I especially like the one about his goldfish.  He also told stories from his diary about his travels whilst on tour with the show.  I will admit that although I suspected that he was in character on stage, I didn't realise until googling him afterwards.   My favourite joke of the evening was in relation to the operating system Windows, who use the slogan 'Life without Walls', "well why would you need windows if you didn't have any walls?" haha!!!

So back to this weekend and the MCM Expo, this will be my second visit, Sarah and I went in October last year and saw all the sneak previews of the Avatar extended DVD release.  Just for picking up a flyer I also was given an awesome Avatar encyclopedia, unfortunately Sarah didn't pick up a flyer she was a little sad about this.  We also got to see the stars of Warehouse 13, I think I like this show for it's easy watching more than anything.  It's very far fetched and silly but that's what sci-fi is most the time and this show doesn't take itself to seriously.  I also bought lots of manga and a rubik cube necklace that works, it's great and kept me occupied on the trip home.  Sadly I didn't take photos of the day because I forgot my camera, but this time I am fully prepared and plan to take enough to fill my SD card.  You will see why I need to take so many in my later posts, if you have never been to an Expo before you are in for a treat!!

A few other things I have planned are a good old fashioned game night with the boys and we are going to see X-men First Class on Wednesday wahoo!! After seeing Thor a couple of weeks ago, which was awesome (I have always been a more fantasy than sci-fi girl!) I am really looking forward to this, I just love James McAvoy!!