Come one come all.... no wait that's not it. Um how about... A long time ago in a city far far away... no no terrible. Sheesh all the good opening lines have been taken. Let's just give it a name huh?

Armageddon Expo 2008: Where dateless nerds and anime emos collide in a long weekend at the Auckland Civic Centre, which is choc-o-block full of computer games, old school comics, cult superstars signing autographs and colourful characters up the wazoo. There was more nerdy fun than you can poke a mon at!!! (get it? Pokemon?? No? *cough* Ok well um... boy, this is awkward. Moving right along...)

Comics aint your thing? So what, me neither. How about collectibles, you know, figurines, sculptured busts etc? That float your boat? Probably cool to look at but not necessarily to throw your pocket money away on, am I right? Especially now that Mum has cut you back to $10 a fortnight due to the pending global recession (gosh parents can be so uncool!). Well never mind, because if there's one thing that you simply have to come down to Armageddon for, its the fact that you have the most perfect excuse to dress up as your favourite character from practically any media slash genre you can name. Tv, film, sci-fi, horror, fantasy, RPG, anime... the list just goes on.

In fact, I can't actually pin down what the Armageddon Expo really covers, suffice to say that whatever it is, it takes up the 5 levels of the Civic Centre rather easily. The line for tickets was out the door, down Aotea Square, past the cinemas and onto Wellesley St... and that was only at 9am! The bloody thing didn't start til 10! (Note to those who waited in that line: there's this awesome thing called the internet where you can book your tickets in a method that we sometimes call 'online booking'. See if you can pull yourself away from World of Warcraft for 5 minutes to look it up.) The four Ghostbusters were there in fine glory, most of the Star Wars crew (although I thought Darth Maul might have been taller in the flesh) and many medieval women running around.

I scored myself some Buffy graphic novels, weilded a wooden sword and even picked up a freebie or two. Can't really go wrong, especially when you can buy a whole 3 day (long weekend) pass. The things I missed out on were the eating (and bubble gum blowing) contests, the pillow fight and Neon Genesis Evangelion showing. Adam West was supposed to be a major player in the autograph signing arena, however he had to pull out due to work commitments (the damn Family Guy must be working him too hard).

So another expo over. If you missed out be sure to mark it on your Astro Boy wall calender for next year. Melbourne, your chance is in a weeks time at Jeff's Shed. Be sure to wave hi to Obi Wan Kenobi for me.

Tags: Armageddon Expo 2008