THE OVERVIEW

The south hall of the Von Braun Center in downtown Huntsville was packed to overflowing with celebrity guests and vendors, making it clear the show may have outgrown the space, I’ll talk more about that later.

Among the big name guests were George Takei, Steve Burns, Tara Strong, Paige O’Hara, Jonathan Frakes, and cast members from the 80’s sitcom Saved By The Bell and the 90’s sitcom Home Improvement. The big ticket seller though was very clear, Melanie Zanetti and David McCormack, the voices of Chilli and Bandit (or Mum and Dad) on the international hit show Bluey.

While Friday and Sunday were full of wandering, meeting vendors, cosplayers and guests, they were relatively manageable. Saturday however was insane, mostly because of the Bluey panel occurring at noon. Throngs of parents, children and people of all ages who are touched by Bluey swarmed the hall. And it made sense, as the following day the highly anticipated 28 minute special “The Sign” was due to drop of Disney+.

I was blessedly able to snag a place at the back of the panel to observe. Moderated by Expo founder, Jeremy Long, they Some of the more heartwarming moments definitely involved the long line of little kids who had to be held up to the microphone to ask their questions. David even had a puppet of Bandit’s in show altar-ego, Unicorse. Probably most touching was the adults who all had beautiful stories that had led them to being fans of the show. Huntsville Expo filmed the full panel and it’s available here.

There were clearly some flaws, most of it being the space constrictions. There were multiple events happening at the VBC at the same time, making parking a nightmare, with on site spots not even guaranteed for vendors. And the fact that it was all forced to be packed into one space meant that the two main panel rooms were separated by a folding wall, making it almost impossible at times to hear the panel you were actually attending. 

The lines were so long for autographs at times that they did have to start having lines for waiting in line in the hallway outside. The volunteers and staff of the Expo were doing all they could with what the VBC gave them and it seems as though they are finally going to be given an additional hall for next year’s con. 

And while overwhelming at times, the whole con was an incredible experience that I’ll gladly attend again. Here’s to HSV Expo 2024! You were a hell of a show. Next year will be even better!

THE COSPLAYS

I myself decided to go in costume Saturday and Sunday as Professor Lupin from Harry Potter and Gale of Waterdeep’s Hand from Baldur’s Gate 3, respectively.

And I was not alone, with cosplayers from a wide variety of fandoms showed off their stuff. Below are photographic highlights!

Sorry for the audio quality; our usual recoding methods didn’t work and this is what we had to work with.

You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows.

The Emerald City Video Podcast is a periodic podcast hosted by entertainment journalist Russ Burlingame, with a rotating cast of hosts who used to work at the Emerald City Video store in East Syracuse, New York. The store was once awarded by the Video Software Dealers of America as the best small video store in the U.S. Though it closed in 2009, the store’s legacy still touches the daily lives of a lot of the people who used to work there, and the Syracuse community as a whole still has a lot of fondness for its memory.

The idea behind the podcast, which launched in 2016, was to bring the discourse you would get at a video store — talking with real humans about your movies, rather than trusting in an algorithm — back to…well, if not the world, or even Syracuse, at least to the guys who maybe missed that human connection the most: a bunch of pop culture junky loudmouths who used to run a really cool video store. Over the years, the Emerald City Video banner has flown over a number of themes, including specific episodes about TV series like Riverdale and Psych.

If you like what we’re doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos, memes, and nonsense. You can support us on Patreon, too, and do things like requesting custom episodes and the like.

Be back for more by noon on the fifth day, and please — always remember to rewind your videocassettes.

You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows.

The Emerald City Video Podcast is a periodic podcast hosted by entertainment journalist Russ Burlingame, with a rotating cast of hosts who used to work at the Emerald City Video store in East Syracuse, New York. The store was once awarded by the Video Software Dealers of America as the best small video store in the U.S. Though it closed in 2009, the store’s legacy still touches the daily lives of a lot of the people who used to work there, and the Syracuse community as a whole still has a lot of fondness for its memory.

The idea behind the podcast, which launched in 2016, was to bring the discourse you would get at a video store — talking with real humans about your movies, rather than trusting in an algorithm — back to…well, if not the world, or even Syracuse, at least to the guys who maybe missed that human connection the most: a bunch of pop culture junky loudmouths who used to run a really cool video store. Over the years, the Emerald City Video banner has flown over a number of themes, including specific episodes about TV series like Riverdale and Psych.

If you like what we’re doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos, memes, and nonsense. You can support us on Patreon, too, and do things like requesting custom episodes and the like.

Be back for more by noon on the fifth day, and please — always remember to rewind your videocassettes.

While you all are getting over those food comas, let’s take a second and once again declare to the world: Happy Jacksgiving! Because, while it may have been Thanksgiving on Thursday, it was also Jack’s birthday.

What was the best thing you ate this week? What are you thankful for? Shout us out in the comments!

NEWS HIGHLIGHTS THIS WEEK:

• “The Walking Dead” experienced another ratings drop in its 5th episode of Season 8. The episode brought in 7.8 million viewers which is a 10% drop from episode 4. The Season 8 premiere, which was the show’s 100th episode, brought in the lowest ratings for a season premiere since Season 3.
• Ellen Page will star in Netflix’s “Umbrella Academy” series as Vanya, the black sheep of the superfamily the series revolves around.
• CBS is developing a “Stripes” TV series. The adaptation comes from Trevor Moore, Sam Brown, and Zach Cregger from sketch group, “The Whitest Kids U’ Know,” and Ivan Reitman will even return to direct.
• Fred Armisen will write, executive produce and star in a new Spanish language half-hour series on HBO. The project is called “Mexico City: Only Good Things Happen,” and it’s reportedly about a group of friends in a “dreamy version” of Mexico City who are “obsessed with horror films and monster makeup.”
• Neil Brennan, the co-creator of “Chappelle’s Show,” is set to write and host a new Late Night series for FOX. According to Variety, it’ll be a “topical political and cultural talk show” that also has “sketches and man on the street segments.” The last late night show FOX had was “The Wanda Sykes Show” in 2009 — it lasted one season.

AARON’S LOSERS: “Saturday Night Live,” “Future Man” and “Jim & Andy”
JACK’S LOSERS: “Future Man”
AARON’S FENCERS: “Bill Murray & Brian Doyle Murray’s Extra Innings,” “The Punisher,” “The Walking Dead” and “Stranger Things 2”
JACK’S FENCERS: “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”
AARON’S WINNERS: “At Home with Amy Sedaris,” “American Horror Story: Cult,” “The Exorcist,” “Mr. Robot” and “Marvel’s Runaways”
JACK’S WINNERS: “Marvel’s Runaways,” “The Shannara Chronicles,” “The Good Place,” “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” “The Trixie and Katya Show,” “Night of Too Many Stars” and “The Last Man on Earth”

Be sure to subscribe on iTunes and comment!

Find us on Twitter: @PunchDrunk_TV, @flatlinejack and @aaronflux

Join the conversation on Facebook.

Welcome to Episode 76.
As always, #ClinktheDrink.

It’s the middle of October which means Halloween-times are in full effect. DJ SpookNasty and MC Tummy Troubles are extra loopy this week as Aaron was late to record, due to an incredible advance screening of “Thor: Ragnarok,” and Jack was already three drinks in.

Aside from discussing the important topics of the week, they bring back their Movie Corner segment and discuss the awesome horror streaming app all genre fans should check out, AMC’s Shudder.

NEWS HIGHLIGHTS THIS WEEK:

• “Game of Thrones” stars Peter Dinklage and Charles Dance will executive produce “Qausimodo,” a new TV series adaptation of Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It’s the first drama series to come out of Atrium TV — which is a new association of international streaming and telecommunication platforms that was launched earlier this year. Meaning, the show will air exclusively to a yet-to-be-named OTT overseas.
• Netflix sorta released some ratings numbers, which it never really does. The streamer says that, on average, more than 8 million viewers have watched at least one season of one series in 24 hours or less.
• Wyatt Cenac is getting his own late-night show at HBO. The project will be a comedic docuseries where Cenac goes on a “journey to understand some of the big issues of the moment and investigate real-world solutions.” HBO has given the series a 10-episode order and will premiere in the Spring of 2018.
• ABC Freeform has ordered a new docu-series titled, “Disney’s Fairy Tale Weddings” which will go behind the scenes of different lavish weddings that take place at Disney destinations around the world.

AARON & JACK’S HORROR MOVIE CORNER:
WHAT AARON WATCHED THIS WEEK – “Happy Death Day”
WHAT JACK WATCHED THIS WEEK – “Ouija: Origin of Evil”

AARON’S LOSERS: “Dynasty,” “Supernatural” and MTV’s “TRL”
JACK’S LOSERS: “Dynasty”
AARON’S FENCERS: “The Last Man on Earth” and “Lore”
JACK’S FENCERS: “Channel Zero: No End House,” “I Love You, America” and “White Famous”
AARON’S WINNERS: “South Park,” “I Love You, America” and “Mindhunter”
JACK’S WINNERS: “DuckTales,” “The Shannara Chronicles” and the Youtube Channel, ChrisStuckmann

Be sure to subscribe on iTunes and comment!

Find us on Twitter: @PunchDrunk_TV, @flatlinejack and @aaronflux

Join the conversation on Facebook.

Welcome to Episode 72. As always, #ClinktheDrink