Following a cancelled con in 2020 and a limited edition in 2021, Fan Expo Canada 2022 returned in full force with a four-day event. I attended two of the days, Friday and Saturday, and had an eventful time.
As always with conventions, I have a few missions. As I was covering Fan Expo Canada for WWAC, I wanted to get some cool pictures of cosplayers but I also wanted to attend a few celebrity panels.
Friday
My mission to take pictures of cosplayers turned out to be harder on Friday since most visitors had come dressed casually. There were a few exciting cosplays though and I managed to get some pictures for our Instagram. But I would have loved to have taken more.
The problem was that I spent most of my day in line. This was for my second mission—to see LeVar Burton and Brent Spiner. As a lifelong Star Trek fan who spent a lot of my time crushing on Geordi LaForge, I could not pass up the opportunity to see them. I also wanted to get a great seat. And that meant queuing up an hour or more in advance.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned about Canadians, it’s that they’ve never seen a queue they didn’t want to join. Since I moved here, I’ve spent so much time queuing! So it was at Fan Expo Canada.
But sitting and then standing in line was worth it. I got to sit for a bit after rushing around the enormous MTCC North side looking through vendors. I also got to chat with fellow Star Trek fans and was offered some chocolate by a lady who was a nurse and very concerned about everyone’s blood sugar levels. Plus, I got to shake hands with another lady’s very adorable stuffed animal, and got a compliment on my cute jumpsuit in return.
Oh, and I did get a great seat to see both Burton and Spiner. From the TNG cast, I’ve seen Sir Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes (also at Fan Expo a few years ago), and now Burton and Spiner. It’s amazing how similar their senses of humour are. You’re never quite sure whether they’re pulling your leg or spinning a yarn, which calls for much laughter and some confusion.
Burton was soft-spoken and highly appreciative of the audience but it took him ages to actually get started because the audience would not stop applauding his presence. I think we were all genuinely delighted that he was there and this was our way of letting him know. During the Q&A, he dropped words of wisdom about being caring about your fellow person. He also mentioned the strong education-forward attitude of the Burton household, spearheaded by his mother, that had led him to Reading Rainbow and his podcast, LeVar Burton Reads, which sadly, he revealed, will end with Season 11. He also let slip a couple of details about his return to Picard Season 3 and promptly stopped when he learned some people were recording him. Oops.
Burton did also drop a hard truth about how he was able to get into the role of Kunta Kinte in Roots—he channelled his experience of growing up as a Black man in America. It brought the mood down in the room but it was a truth that needed to be shared.
On a funny note, during the Q&A, a fan asked if LeVar Burton was related to Richard Burton—he isn’t, but Burton did joke that his family referred to the late actor as ‘the white sheep of the family’. Cue rapturous applause.
Spiner ended up talking about his mem-noir, Fanfiction, quite a bit, which most of the audience hadn’t even heard of. Many ended up purchasing the book while at the session, which Spiner was most impressed by.
Both Burton and Spiner spoke warmly about the Star Trek: The Next Generation cast but also shared the reality of needing to work and make money. They were both asked about memorabilia they took or stole from set, which Burton referred to as ‘liberating’. Burton ‘liberated’ his visor while Spiner walked off set in one of his film uniforms, having learned a hard lesson when his fellow cast mates did the same on the last day of shooting the TV series, but he had left his uniform on the lot.
Following Spiner’s session, I had no energy to continue doing anything else and went in search of dinner. But between the Fan Expo, a Blue Jays game, and it being Friday night, it was tough to find options.
Not that there wasn’t food at the Expo. Both North and South buildings had a food court serving pizzas, hot dogs, burgers, and sushi. But there was limited seating, making eating sushi nigh impossible. Maybe I’m getting old, but pizzas and hotdogs twice in one day doesn’t hold quite the same appeal as it did in my early thirties.
Food wasn’t the only thing I struggled with. The heat inside was not comfortable. The MTCC may be huge but there were thousands of people congregated around the vendors. The atmosphere was stifling, sticky, and sour with sweat. After two and a half years of the pandemic, I keep forgetting what it’s like to be around so much humanity. It didn’t help that very few people were wearing masks. Cons in other countries appear to have mask mandates but not Fan Expo Canada. COVID is far from over but we’re expected to act like life is back to normal. I was double-masked throughout.
I don’t know if the vendors were also unaware of how many people would be returning to the Fan Expo but some smaller vendors seemed overwhelmed at times. Vendors were also selling out of items and it was only the second day. I missed out on a gorgeous Miles Morales poster which I saw in the morning but was all gone by the afternoon. I made up for it by buying some other posters and a Miles phone cover. It’s been a while since I geeked out, I thought I deserved a few treats.
Saturday
The plan was to queue up for Katee Sackhoff’s session the moment the con opened its doors. Eschewing a leisurely weekend breakfast, we downed a protein bar and took the two subways to the MTCC. But there were already 40 people in line in front of us. How?
At least they let us in much sooner so we could sit in relative comfort inside the hall. What a relief.
Sackhoff was a joy in her session. Far bubblier in real life than her reticent characters, Sackhoff shared how close she remains with the casts of both Battlestar Galactica and Longmire. She was effusive in her adoration of Grogu, and the amount of Grogu-related merchandise she now owns. There were a few questions about her character in Another Life and it was interesting to hear how her take on the character changed before and after having her own child.
On a slight downer, apparently Sackhoff has been trying to return to The Flash as Amunet but they won’t let her back. She has no clue why but it’s unfortunate because Amunet was a very funny villain. And someone did ask whether Sackhoff had met Dirk Benedict, who played Starbuck on the original BSG. They had met but following the meeting, Benedict wrote a misogynistic article about Starbuck being played by a woman so Sackhoff hasn’t bothered meeting him again.
A number of the Q&As tried to wrangle details about Season 3 of The Mandalorian but Sackhoff was tight-lipped, as most Disney actors are. That didn’t stop people from trying though!
After Sackhoff’s session, we had just 15 minutes to get to the Superman & Lois panel, which was in the same room. But without a VIP pass, we had to exit and re-enter. Come to think of it, I’ve never actually asked if the rule applies to press. I just assumed as much since we queue with regular ticket folk. Though we ended up seated a ways back, it wasn’t the worst view of Tyler Hoechlin and Bitsie Tulloch. They were affable and sweet, and had their own little in-jokes. The moderator threw it open to the floor pretty quickly. The majority of the questions were about Superman. In these panel sessions with two guests, one invariably gets less attention and when you’re seated next to Superman, I guess the attention’s going to be on him but it would have been nice if there had been some questions for Tulloch. Also, I’m not sure why the moderator wouldn’t wait for Tulloch’s answers instead of just swiftly moving on after Hoechlin had answered.
There weren’t many insights to take from the session though Hoechlin’s recreation of heat vision was hilarious. Despite repeated questions, it turned out that neither actor had heard of any rumours that Supergirl would be appearing in Season 3. They also didn’t address the recent exit of Jordan Elsass, who plays Jonathan Kent. They did mention that the HBO Max saga hasn’t affected them so far so they’re just working as they normally would.
The session was followed by another mad dash, this time for the DC’s Legends of Tomorrow panel with Caity Lotz and Jes Macallan. Despite the talk being over an hour away, there were already 20 people in line. Again, I ask, how?
If I thought our food problems on Friday were annoying, Saturday was worse. Not only had we barely had breakfast, but we had no time for lunch. We managed to snack on a biscuit or two while queuing, but lunch was out of the question. While I kept our place in line, my sister ran upstairs to grab us pizza slices. Tough luck. The food queues were so long, she gave up and returned. We snacked on cheese and hoped our grumbling tummies wouldn’t disrupt the session. We are officially getting too old for this shit.
The session itself was fun and it was obvious that both Lotz and Macallan had a ball playing their characters, though Macallan did complain about how boring her outfits were till she got to join the time travelling team. Apparently, neither has managed to ‘liberate’ any of their nice clothes, which appears to be a running theme for actors.
They also spoke passionately about fighting for their characters to have a more believable relationship and seemed genuinely touched by the audience’s piercingly-loud appreciation for AvaLance. Funnily enough, Macallan revealed she had no idea what a ship was until she was told about AvaLance. And Lotz was the one to explain the concept to her.
I’m not sure why but both the Superman and Lois and Legends of Tomorrow sessions felt short and I came away wanting more. But I doubt we’ll get more of the Legends. The show has been cancelled, though neither actor allowed anyone to use that word. They much preferred saying it was on hiatus but I’m not going to keep my hopes up. They’ve already moved onto new projects so who knows what’ll happen next with the Legends.
With the sessions for the day done, we decided to leave the North building entirely and head to the South food court. It was so jam-packed inside, we took the outside route to go to the next building. It was way faster.
But once inside, we found that the South building was also teeming with humanity and the food lines were bonkers. The sushi stand had run out of sushi and the pizza lines were snaking around the block. However, I found a hotdog line which was much shorter and we soon had a hotdog each and a bag of Doritos, which we had to eat sitting on the not-so-clean floor by the speeder bike. While we tucked into our first real meal of the day, Anthony Daniels, aka C3PO, randomly walked by us. It was the Star Wars section, but still a bit surprising to see one of the guests wandering the halls.
We had more energy after eating so we walked through the stalls and artists’ alley. The overcrowding was deeply uncomfortable and seemed worse than when we had been to the con pre-COVID. It honestly seemed like there were more people than the con could handle.
We planned to leave soon after but found ourselves drawn to a session on making a successful podcast, since our podcast died a sudden death. It was insightful and fulfilling. Honestly, as much as I loved being able to see the TV stars, all that time queuing could have been spent attending these smaller but more engaging sessions instead. I’d rather run from session to session than spend hours standing in line. I can imagine this is a convention thing but I wish there was a better way to enjoy these panels and see the stars as well.
And with that, our stay at Fan Expo Canada 2022 came to an end (after queuing for the escalators, of course). As much as I would have loved to go another day, my back and heels say otherwise. And I need a day before the hectic work week starts. As always, I felt at home amongst my fellow geeks, even when I didn’t know which character they were dressed as. I got plenty of compliments on my Ahsoka bag because I was among people who recognized what it was. I got to see people I’ve admired for years share fun anecdotes and make me laugh. But I was also hungry a lot of the time, very hot, and extremely tired. The overcrowded arena was unpleasant and I do wish there had been some kind of mask mandates in place because COVID is lurking. As excited as I was to be back amongst my people, I’d say this year was a mixed bag for me.
