MegaCon Fan Days Pt 2: Hobbits and Dwarves and Cosplay, Oh My!

(Click here for part 1!)

Let's wrap up MegaCon's Fan Days with some costume contest winners:

(Lady Sauron!)

And a big Disney group:

I'm especially impressed with the two characters from Treasure Planet. See them?

That's Doctor Doppeler beside Belle, and Captain Amelia is behind him.

Here's a reference shot, since it's probably been a while:

You've also gotta love the matching Gastons. Ha!

On Saturday John and I attended John Rhys-Davies' panel, who stepped out in a dapper three-piece suit and proceeded to dispense life advice to the audience in that oh-so-elegant voice of his:

Mr. Davies is a class act through and through, and was especially wonderful to his younger fans:

This little girl told him, "I want to be an actor when I grow up." 

Davies looked at her gravely for a moment, then said, "My dear, you can't be both." 

 :D

He then invited the girl up on stage and proceeded to give her all kinds of acting advice face-to-face, which was just about the sweetest thing ever. Look at that smile on her face! Ah! Love it.

Of course my favorite part was when someone asked what Davies' favorite scene was from LoTR. He answered, in Gimli's voice, "TOSS ME." 

And then, "Don't tell the elf!"

Ha!

K, back to cosplay:

These three brothers were perfect as a flying Ring Wraith and Merry & Pippin post-fireworks-explosion.

And here's a grown-up Ring Wraith:

This is actually a very clever trick: the cosplayer's head is at shoulder level, and the hood is built up to make him taller. I only realized when I spotted him adjusting it a moment later, and saw his face down low in the cowl. Otherwise, I'd never have known!

A life-sized Chewbacca:

Love that head tilt.

And a fantastic Rocket Raccoon with one of the prison inmates:

 

 The inmate is carrying a prosthetic leg, you guys. Best gag prop ever? I think so.

Speaking of props, let's talk about Billy Boyd's panel next, which had this memorable moment:

You may notice that the girl with the mic has a Gandalf hat, Harley's giant hammer, and a big Scooby Doo - and also that everyone is laughing.

So, in a nutshell, each person could only ask one question, but this girl wanted to ask two. Billy's solution was to let her ask the first question, then dress her up using various props from the audience, and then act like he didn't recognize her.  It was really funny, and only got better when the girl busted out in a terrible British accent to play along. Ha!

Billy was a rambler, but so entertaining no one really cared if he only got to half a dozen questions through the whole panel. Well, I take that back: *I* cared, but only because by the time someone asked him to sing "Edge of Night," - the one thing I DESPERATELY wanted to hear - he'd used up all his time, and so just sang the first word. Arg!

Here's a video of Billy singing  at another panel last year, so you know what I'm talking about:

The singing is at the very end, but I find his talking about the song pretty interesting, too.

Later Billy walked the convention floor, and stopped at my friend Charlie's art booth. Charlie has a little kids' parody book called If You Give A Hobbit A Ring, and Billy agreed to read it on camera for him! How sweet is that?? Here's Charlie's video, if you want to see it.

Ok, let's wrap up with a little more cosplay:

An impressive Kylo Ren and lady Sith lord.

This Claptrap even did a little robot dance for us:

And here's the littlest Cammy from Street Fighter:

I just recently saw Inside Out, so this made me laugh out loud:


It's Riley's imaginary boyfriend! And his pose is spot on. 

And finally, here's my favorite fan encounter from Fan Days:

 Ruh-roh.

The one with the machete is Christian, who somehow recognized me even in costume. It's funny, when his face first lit up I thought he just liked my mask, but then he asked, "Are you Jen from Epbot?!" and made me feel like a rock star. :D

So naturally, I suggested he and his friend threaten me for a photo.

(I'm attempting to look scared up there, but was grinning so much it didn't quite work.)

You guys have seen a lot of my costume before - here are the detail shots of the headpiece and mask I made, and here's how I wore it last time:

This time I swapped out the skirt from my White Rabbit cosplay, chopped the jacket in half to wear over a gold brocade steampunk corset, and then eliminated most of the accessories to streamline the waist. (Looking at this now, though, I may go back to the orange skirt next time.)

I'll end with a few beauty shots John took as we were leaving the center:

I'm wearing my light-up steampunk flux capacitor pin - remember that? And would you believe it still works?

I so rarely want to be photographed, but this costume - the mask and headpiece in particular - makes me feel pretty.

I'm tempted to write a post on how empowering a mask can be. Maybe some other time, when I'm not battling off this ear infection/cough fest nastiness. 

K, that does it for Fan Days! So maybe now I can work on getting the final batch of my Dragon Con photos posted... eventually. o.0  Heh. Aheh. Oy.