Avast me Bronies, for it is I, Captain Illustrious Q, the bald headed scourge of Equestria Daily! Tremble before this lord of all pirates as he brings you tales of his latest adventures on the stormy HASCON Seas!
So if ye be brave of heart, be sure to venture forth below the break for tales
To start out with folks, the US Marine Corps is on hand to drum up support and donations for Toys for Tots! Remember Christmas is less than three months away, and there are a ton of disadvantage children who will be going without getting something under the tree without donations from you!
And of course what better way is there is there to drum up donations than at the convention run by one of the largest Toy Companies in the world!
And I am not kidding about this convention being run by Hasbro! It's surreal having Hasbro's corporate office right next to the convention center. Though it makes it convenient for those VIP Ticket holders to get tours of the building!
One of the best parts of staying at the Omni Hotel, which is on site and connected to the Dunkin Donuts Convention Center is being able to look out the window and see the Hasbro Logo glowing on the roof top of the offices. Absolutely incredible!
And of course no convention would be complete without running into MLP Cosplay! And right outside the main entrance of the convention center, was one of the youngest and cosplayers of everyone's favorite Muffin Mare! She and her mother look ready to and willing to tackle the convention and see what pony goodness lies within...
Pony Goodness like the stuff available at Enterplay's booth in the upstairs exhibition hall!
Enterplay has two specials going on right now at the booth in the exhibitor's hall (upstairs on the 5th floor). The first is this Super Value Pack (the box is a mock up which I cannot confirm or deny will be making its way to retailers later this year. The bundle contains 2 theme decks, 24 packs, 10 special foil cards (the ones which were generally sent out in fandom support packs to stores around the globe and other desirable cards) including one ultra rare card, and one how to play guide. So basically you get all of the above (which is over a $100 value) for a mere $25!
If you play the MLP CCG Game and you're at HASCON this weekend, be sure to stop by and pick up this incredible value!
Now the second big bundle which is going on right now with Enterplay is something very limited! You see those 6 sea pony cards on the table in the lower right hand corner? Well, Enterplay made 50 of each of those jumbo sized cards and they are available at HASCON! How do you get them you ask? Great question, and I have the answer!
All you have to do to get the full set of jumbo cards is purchase three posters from the Enterplay booth! The jumbo cards are oversized productions of the soon to be released My Little Pony: The Movie Trading Card Set cards #F10 - #F15! So if you want to get your hands on some of the Movie Set Cards early, and really have something unique in your card collection be sure to stop by and pick it up!
THE MAKING OF MY LITTLE PONY THE MOVIE
Sorry it took a little while to update this blog! I just got out of the My Little Pony: Season 8 Sneak Peek Panel (keep an eye out for a post from Borg in a few minutes) and before that one was The Making of My Little Pony: The Movie.
Unfortunately, Hasbro was really strict on on the NO TECHNOLOGY active during the Making of Panel, so there will be no pictures for this part. However, I take some extensive notes about the panel. So let's get started!
The panel began with a brief introduction video where the cast of the movie introduced themselves and their characters for the movie, and what each actor liked about their characters. The video was rapid fire, and filled with a lot of familiar faces!
After that Ed Lee, a writer for Littlest Pet Shop, walked out onto stage and introduced the panelists. The panelists on the panel were Meghan McCarthy (Executive Producer), Andrea Libman (Voice Actress behind Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy), Cathy Weseluck (Voice Actress behind Spike the Dragon), and Jayson Thiesson (Director, My Little Pony: The Mvoie).
After the whole panel was on the stage, Ed dropped a bombshell of a reminder on the audience that My Little Pony: The Movie will premiere in 4 weeks!
The entire audience gasped in surprised! We had all forgotten that the movie's premiere was so close!
Ed then started leading the panelists through his questions. Starting with a question for Meghan and Jayson about how did she feel when she found out she was going to be working on the movie! Meghan answered with a the question with a single word--Nervouscited--to great cheers from the audience!!!
For Jayson, he was excited to work on the movie! It was a crazy opportunity--he knew the film was going to be a lot larger in scope--but he felt like the franchise was supposed to be there on the silver screen.
Ed then asked a question to the Andrea and Cathy asking if their approach to acting in the movie changed at all from what they were doing on the TV show.
Andrea (Pinkie Pie Voice): It was the same! *laughs heard throughout the arena*
Cathy: There was a lot of time to experiement with the characters and play off of each other that we don't get an opportunity to do while recording the show.
Andrea: It was really cool to take that extra time with experimenting with how a scene can come together to make the film really special.
It was at this point that Meghan presented Cathy and Andrea with "concrete slabs" of the hoof and claw prints of Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Spike like all the movie stars get to do in Hollywood! This was followed by a showing of a movie clip! This clip was both familiar and very different to those who were in attendance of the MLP Panel at SDCC last year!
It was incredible to be able to go from a script read and then to see the final product! So much fun!
Ed then asked, in a fairly round about way when comparing the Mane 6 to superheros, what Cathy and Andrea thought of the ponies being superheroes. Of course this was just a segway into the real topic he wanted to talk about! For one cannot have superheroes without super-villains! And so Ed asked Jayson about the Storm King!
I unfortunately was a little behind in my hand note taking, so I missed what he had said specifically that made the entire audience laugh. However there was another movie clip waiting in the wings just to be seen which had all of the films villains plotting away! What were they plotting? You'll have to wait for the movie to see it!
But the clip did showcase the amount of the incredible special effects which will be in the show! The effects showcased in this particular clip were all hand drawn! I honestly wish Hasbro would release the clip of this one, so you can see what I'm talking about, but it is amazing!
And speaking of amazing, Ed led the panel into a discussion about the music of the film. Everyone on the panel gave huge props to Daniel Ingram for his work on this the movie. What's he's been able to accomplish with the full orchestra for the film, and with Mike Vogel and Meghan writing most of the lyrics has given My Little Pony it's time to be awesome!
Which just so happened to be the title of the song clip they showed immediately following that clever name drop. I'll give you three guesses as to which pony sung that song, and the first two don't count.
After the song played Meghan made an offhand comment about how she expects that song to become one of the songs constantly played at other conventions aside from HASCON. I think we can all take a pretty good guess as to which convention she was referring to!
From there the guided interview ended with a question to Andrea and Cathy about what would be the next epic adventure for their characters?
Spike: What another one!? But we just got back from this one!
Andrea is excited that when the movie is released the whole universe of My Little Pony has opened up! Lots of new locations, new creatures/species who aren't ponies can now be used in telling lots of new adventures in the future!
After that the kids QnA opened up. It was filled with the usual questions you would see asked at a My Little Pony panel. However the first question out of the gate was a question directed to Andrea and Cathy, and it was something I know Seth would get a kick out of.
Question: How would your characters react if Starlight Glimmer became an alicorn?
Spike: Great. More work for me.
Pinkie Pie: Oooo! Sparkly!
Needless to say the entire audience cracked up! And it was like that for the rest of the panel.
*Update in Progress*
Be sure to check out this post frequently throughout the day, as I will be updating it periodically with Live HASCON Coverage!!!
