A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Panel OR Things I Would Have Heard at Comic Con, If I Was There

Supernatural:
“Too much love, too much love!” -Jared Padalecki

 

Captain America/Avengers Love Fest:
“I demand a most warm welcome for the man reprising the role of Bruce Banner, Mark Ruffalo!” -Robert Downey, Jr.

“I thought it [‘Inception’] was the most ambitious movie I’ve ever seen. And then I thought, “Marvel is going to put all its superheroes in one movie — that’s the most ambitious movie I’ve ever seen.’ ” -Robert Downey, Jr.

“My first movie was ‘Henry V,’ and it contained an epic battle and a man with a very
dysfunctional family.” -Kenneth Branagh defending his qualifications for directing ‘Thor.’

“I am going to blow it. I’m not up to it.” –Joss Whedon on directing ‘The Avengers’

 

Chuck (which I don’t watch, but I love the cast of “Firefly”!):
“I get beat up a lot by girls.” -Adam Baldwin

 

Fringe:
“Leonard (Nimoy) has now retired twice. He’s our Brett Favre.” –Jeff Pinkner (producer)
*By the by, anyone hear Mr. Nimoy in ‘Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon’? Spoiler Alert! A piece of my soul died when I found out his character is a traitor. I kept
thinking, “Spock would NEVER do this.”

 

Vampire Diaries:
“Paul Wesley’s hair has its own cell number on the call sheet.” -Julie Plec

“Paul’s abs are their own conversation.” -Kevin Williamson (producer)

“The nice Damon freaks me out. I was miserable, I didn’t know what to do.” -Ian Somerhalder on goodwill, which his character occasionally dabbles in

Fan: “You seem like a nice guy.”
Ian: “I’m acting.”

 

Green Lantern:
“We’re married now, but in space.” –Ryan Reynolds to the fan who won his character’s power ring

 

The Joss Whedon Experience (yes, that’s the real title, and reason enough to attend the entire conference in my book):

“If this [table I’m sitting on] falls, it will be the BEST CON EVER.” –Joss Whedon, it was his proverbial party, after all

Joss: How much trouble would I get in if I told you my favorite actor?
Fan: I won’t tell anyone.

Fan: Joss means “God” in Filipino.
Joss: Oh yeeaah. And it didn’t before me.

“It makes me throw up in fear.” –Joss Whedon about J.J. Abrams’s Star Trek reboot movie

 

Fringe:
“In the audition [for ‘Scott Pilgrim Versus the World’] he was like ‘Here are the lines you have to do, and I noticed that you’re being trained in Tae Kwon Do. Could you just throw some kicks in there while you’re reading?’ So I was practicing in the hallway and a guy walked by and he was like, ‘Wow, they’re really upping the hall monitors!'” -Ellen Wong

 

Aloha: Earth:
“I’m really happy to be on a show that has a theme song.” –Daniel Dae Kim, who went from ‘Lost’ to ‘Hawaii Five-O’ before ‘Aloha:Earth’

 

Psych:
“SPOILER NAME, Gus can’t marry you, because he’s already married to me [Shawn]. I still think we should stay here and drink all this alcohol and eat all this delicious food, but at the end of the night he’s coming home with me.” – James Roday, demonstrating what his character Shawn’s best man speech for Gus would be like

 

Dexter:
“People were a lot more concerned about the fact that my character on Six Feet Under got walked all over than Dexter killing people. Which is weird.” –Michael C. Hall

 

White Collar/Mozzie Quote of the Week:
“As you know, ‘White Collar’ is about a very suave, sophisticated, sexy white collar criminal who CHOOSES to be bald. And there’s some other characters, too.” –Willie Garson

 

Unknown:
“You were so cute. You were a little boy. And now you’re not.” -Eva Mendes to a
fan who called her “foxy” at a past Comic Con. After his question, she told him with a hug that he was “a little young….come back in five years. “ Tad-dah!
*Don’t you love the persistence of nerdy fans?

“This is a political statement about how bad ‘Star Trek’ is to its Redshirts.” –’Star Trek’ fan

Have you been following the news of Comic Con? Heard anything funny? Comment and share!!  (Thanks to Zap2it for quote help!)

Finale Season Recap Part I

Before the summer season gets into high gear I wanted to take a minute to take a look at some of the finales that we saw in the past couple months.  I was going to do a “Top 5” type list but then I realized I’d have more fun with a looser structure.  This ended up being significantly longer than I expected so this is the first of two parts.  I’ve tried to keep things vague but minor spoilers do lie ahead!

Most Satisfying: Justified, “Bloody Harlan”
By the end of its first season, Justified had become one of the best dramas on TV.  It had action, great characters, Timothy Olyphant, and one of the most well-developed relationships on the air in Raylan (the aforementioned Olyphant) and Boyd (Walton Goggins).  Season two took that winning formula and made an even more compelling story by introducing us to the Bennet clan.  Mags (Margo Martindale) and her boys (including the always wonderful Jeremy Davies) were fascinating characters who drove most of the season’s plot.  The twelve episodes leading up to “Bloody Harlan” beautifully set up all the intersecting storylines and relationships.  The finale brought them all together to produce a satisfying end to the season without any pretty bows.  I also have to say that if Margo Martindale doesn’t get an Emmy for the last scene alone there is no justice in this world.

Disappointing, but Still Awesome: The Vampire Diaries, “As I Lay Dying”
The first season finale was one of the most exhilarating and purely awesome episodes of television that year and I say that without a hint of irony.  This show has probably the fastest pace of any show right now and actually answers questions before raising new ones.  Crazy, right?  The first season left off on an unbelievable cliffhanger that would have consequences all through the second season.  Needless to say, “As I Lay Dying” had a lot to live up to.  While it did much of what the first season finale did so well (character deaths, an unexpected kiss, game-changing cliffhanger) I still couldn’t help but feeling let down.  I’m excited to see where the show goes from here, particularly with Stefan (Paul Wesley), but it didn’t carry the oomph I was expecting.

Most Quietly Effective: The Good Wife, “Closing Argument”
Here’s another case, like Justified, of an exceptional second season following a solid first season.  The Good Wife, though, had a much quieter season finale.  This show does subtle extremely well (just look at Will and Peter’s conversation for a perfect example) and the final was no exception.  Most of the episode played like a normal episode with a high-stakes case and limited time to win.  It spent some time setting up new plot lines for next year (Eli’s in the office, y’all!) and focused just enough on the fractured friendship between Alicia (Julianna Margulies) and Kalinda (Archie Panjabi).  Of course, the last few minutes were the most hyped but they managed to surpass all my expectations.  The scene was awkward, sexy, stressful, and finally joyful for both the characters and the audience.

Most Insulting: Bones, “The Change in the Game”
Just a warning: this section has a MAJOR spoiler.  From the cutesy title to the pointless case of the week to the infuriating twist, I was thoroughly unhappy with this episode.  The only part I did like was the birth of a healthy baby boy, but other than that there was nothing redeeming about this finale.  In fact, since the only other part of this episode that anyone cared about was the last minute, I’ll just focus on that.  I say it was insulting because after years of patiently waiting for these two to get together, it happens off screen and all the viewers get is, “Oh, guess what!  I’m pregnant!  Surprise!”  We saw very little change in the two of them before the announcement besides other characters commenting that there had been a change.  I feel like that’s just lazy writing.  Having said that, I will watch next year if only because I’m intrigued about the fallout.

Best Comedy Finale: Community, “A Fistful of Paintballs” and “For A Few Paintballs More”
Seriously.  This show is at its finest when it parodies various genres and last year’s paintball action-adventure episode was a breakout moment for the show.  But this two-part finale built on that in a truly inspired way.  Beginning with a Western parody and ending in a full-on Star Wars one complete with Storm Troopers and Abed (Danny Pudi) as Han Solo, this finale is the stuff hilarious dreams are made of.  The villain was a giant ice cream cone for goodness sake!  Well, a rival dean inside a giant ice cream cone, but still!  I can’t even go into all the perfect moments (look – it’s Josh Holloway!) in these two episodes so just go watch it (again) for yourself.

Expect Part II tomorrow sometime.  And in the meantime, I’m not kidding: go watch the Community finale.