The heavy metal doors open, and people dressed in detailed costumes of iconic characters flood the building. They meet up with their friends, shop at booths with custom art or rare collector’s items and see celebrities who play some of the most influential characters in fiction.
Galaxycon is a yearly convention appearing in the Raleigh Convention Center. I went with my father this year and had a great experience with the countless things you’re able to do there. We went early in the morning, and before we knew it, it was already 4 p.m. .
The convention broke a record high of attendees of 50,000 this year. It isn’t really much of a surprise given the fact that they had iconic celebrities appearing there like William Shatner, Billy Dee Williams, Christopher Lloyd and Peter Cullen. The crowd was so large that it was hard to move around the convention center or be able to see the panels we wanted to see.
With every con, you’ll find a number of fans dressed in cosplays of the characters they love. A common thing I would see would be cosplayers dressed as characters such as Spiderman or Doc Brown and meeting the celebrities that play them. Some cosplayers had costumes that stood double the size of an average human.
The celebrity we were most excited to see was Peter Cullen because Optimus Prime was a key character in my childhood. He is a canadian actor who not only voices the transforming red truck, but he also makes the noises for predator and the voice actor for Eeyore. As soon as we stood in line for his autograph, I instantly realized how many fans there were of his. The line lasted 3-4 hours long, and the heat was blazing hot inside the Convention Center.
We were the last ones in his line before they told people to leave because he had to go to his photo ops. Cullen was a nice, sweet old man who was well worth those four hours standing around. Plus, the line wasn’t all bad because an Optimus Prime cosplayer took pictures with people in line with his detailed costume that was over 7 feet tall.
The convention holds many panels that different hardcore fans go to see. We went to go see William Shatner’s Q&A panel, and I wouldn’t really call it much of a Q&A, since he didn’t answer very many questions. His most notable role was in the iconic series, Star Trek, which my Dad really loves.
As soon as he took the stage, he put the entire spotlight on him with his countless hilarious and interesting stories. It was a bit of a letdown to not hear him talk about his role as Captain Kirk because of the Sag-Aftra actor strike. However, it was pretty funny to hear him try to bounce around his roles.
One of his most interesting stories in the panel was him talking about his experience going into space with Jeff Bezos. He described the vast darkness of space as being in a completely dark cave. The whole experience gave him a revelation that life on Earth is precious, and we need to keep it safe.
One of the main attractions at every convention is the booths, and the booths were in the main area in the convention center next to celebrity autographs/photo ops. In these booths you’ll find custom art from numerous talented artists, so we got a few art pictures from our favorite characters from Star Wars. You’ll also find rare figures for a cheaper price than you can find on ebay.
A few booths sold custom helmets, armor, swords and weapons. While it’s nice buying merch from mainline companies that are sponsored by the films and television shows they make the merch for, sometimes it’s better to get fan merch from the fellow fan community because they are more aware of what the fans want and are willing to give it to them. Companies care more about business, but with these booths you can explore what fans are able to do and get things hand made rather than from a factory conveyor belt.
Overall, the convention was a blast, and I would highly suggest fans of science fiction like me should go the next year. However, that doesn’t mean Galaxycon is without its flaws. When we went in the line for Peter Cullen, they didn’t do a good job at keeping the line organized, so people that weren’t even a part of the line would get jumbled in with everyone in the line.
Also, they denied people that weren’t able to get their autograph refunds for the autograph they paid for. So if you’re trying to get an autograph make sure you arrive early. They also put Ming-Na Wen on a small stage without thinking of how big she was, so her room was overfilled.
If the management at Galaxycon fixed those few things I would say this convention is a perfect convention to go to.
