Flew out on Thursday (August 20, 2009), arrived at Burbank airport around 5pm and took a shuttle to the hotel. First thing I noticed was how close the hotel was to the airport — the ride was only about 10 minutes. Certainly better than when I took a shuttle from LAX in 2006 which lasted at least two hours. Checked in, went to my room on the eleventh floor and opened the curtains to reveal Universal Studios. Seeing the gray metal globe spinning from my hotel room window was pretty cool.

Got word that everyone was haning out on the 24th floor and headed up. It was good to see friends again. Hugs all around and then envy as the view from the 24th let you see even more of Universal Studios. You could even see right into the WaterWorld spectacular which just so happened to be going on at the time. Watching fireballs and flaming planes from above.

Once we hit the magic number of 17 we decided dinner was in order and headed out to eat. Never before had I been to City Walk. What a trip. It was like Disney World and a mall combined together. We went to an Italian place that served up very large portions. Good food, good conversation, although one needed a bullhorn to communicate from one side of the table to the other. Available pens and a blank back to our paper placemats gave Mara a chance to draw. That was fun, to a point.

After dinner we went back to the hotel, checked out the rooms we’d be using for the con, then I crashed for the night.

This is a video I took while the cast for the radio play at this year’s Gathering of the Gargoyles radio play assembled and received scripts prior to rehearsal.

We had 16 professional voice actors in the radio play with another 12 or so fans filling out the cast.

The script is an original piece written by Greg Weisman in which the Gargoyles and Spectacular Spider-Man universes cross-over. Greg says he wrote it over the course of three days with very little sleep just before the convention. Everyone agreed it was a success.

Marina Sirtis remarked afterwards that she enjoyed it and was disappointed this would be the last con.

The six-issue mini-series Bad Guys is now available for purchase at slgcomic.com. You should also check with your local comic book shops as it should be arriving in their stores tomorrow.

This brings together all six issues together; that includes a few issues which were left unpublished in single comic format!

Bad Guys is based on a Gargoyles spin-off that Greg Weisman has planned out back while still working on the TV series. An animatic (a rough animation) was even produced to help pitch the show to Disney. Unfortunately the show was killed before they could finish the animatic. However, Greg paid out of his own pocket to complete the animatic and now fans who go to the Gathering will get to see it themselves. A very cool piece of Gargoyles history that you can only see at the con.

I wanted to highlight a piece of the community that I think is fun and anyone can get involved with.

Gargoyles Watch is a LiveJournal community where members watch a given episode of Gargoyles and then discuss the episode. It’s a lot like the old Gargoyles mailing list days where a new episode would premier and we’d start firing e-mails through the mailing list talking about the episode we all just watched and try to dissect any hidden meaning or implications for future story developments.

What makes Gargoyles Watch different from those old mailing list days is we already know how things turn out. We have the benefit of knowing what’s to come of the characters and the story and get to see the seeds of future story arcs being planted along the way. It gives a new appreciation to the kind of meticulous planning that went into the show back in those days at Disney.

Anyone can get involved in Gargoyles Watch. A basic LiveJournal account is free for anyone with an e-mail address. Even if you don’t want to create an account you can still follow along, read the discussion, and enjoy the show all over again.

The long awaited second half of the Gargoyles: Clan Building Comic is now available for purchase through slgcomic.com. This volume includes issues 9 through 12 which have never before been published. These unpublished issues include the first peek at the Timedancer story line where Brooklyn gets caught up with the Phoenix Gate. This should include a peek at Brooklyn’s mate, Katana. There has been literally over a decade of speculation about here and for the first time we’ll finally get to meet her.

The book should also be hitting the streets today (Tuesday, Aug 11) so call around your local comic shops and see if they’ve got a copy in stock. If not, they can always order you one (which isn’t a bad idea as it brings it to the attention of the shop owner) or you can always order one online.

Be sure to buy several and share them with your friends.