#billy west

Futurama S1 E 2 The Series Has Land

"You want some attention?" "Just keep me healthy and happy~" "I'd rather have gone to the moon." "This is inane." "Funny things about the Transistor... let's see. You can get in, but you can't get out. How 'bout that. You can get in it but it's a one-way street, a one-way road." "We're gonna need a bigger net." "...Can we go home, yet?" "Hey! How's your-- God, these pretzels suck-- How's your day been, buddy?"

Where do I start? God what a weekend. Saturday was very overwhelming for me because it was super busy, and hot as hell, and I was sort of wearing cosplay so felt very self conscious.

DAY 1

The first person I spoke to was Kristine Sutherland and I absolutely bottled it. I said I was dressed as Ripper and she looked at me like I had three heads 🤣 I said that I was gutted she didn’t get to be in the musical episode and she said she wasn’t, her voice is for the shower. She signed my pic of her and Ripper “to Morgan, for Giles” 🥹 Then later on when I had my photo with her (I’d had a beer at lunch to calm my nerves) I apologised for earlier because I was so nervous and she gave me a big hug and told me not to apologise for it and then we had the pic.

Next pic was Amber Benson. I was first in the queue because I had diamond pass (because my anxiety will not let me deal with queues). As soon as I walked in she was like HI! She was so warm and friendly. But you get literal seconds and then you’re out, so I didn’t get chance to speak to her. I spent a good while walking around the main lobby looking at things, getting my pic with a few cosplay. Did some people watching. Saw Peter Capaldi but they were charging so much for a pic I didn’t bother, but he was BUSY as hell. So much so that they moved his slot back an hour.

I watched a Q&A with the coach from high school musical? He was okay, but honestly I didn’t know who he was. Then I went up to sit in what was essentially the Buffy room. And I just sat watching, enjoying the air con. Kristine, Amber and Felicia were so busy all day! Claire was sat alone for a fair bit of it, in the end after watching Claire look bored on her phone, I went over to have a chat. I said “hello Ben, I mean Glory, I mean Claire. I don’t want anything but I saw you were alone and just wanted to say hello. Blah blah traffic jam on M4 etc etc” she was okay…I dunno not really on my radar of characters that I love, but appreciate the effort she made both to come to Wales, and to chat to me.

Julie Benz wasn’t as busy as I thought she was going to be, and she spent a lot of time looking at herself 🤣 I didn’t bother going to her to chat as I didn’t really have that much to say. I don’t watch Angel, and I’ve barely seen any of Dexter so…but again, appreciate the effort of her coming to Wales.

I noticed the queue for Felicia had gone down so decided to have a chat with her. Got my pic with her, she was very sweet and kind to the girl in front in the queue. She signed a Funko Pop box and unfortunately when it was handed back it got smudged, so she took some extra time and a LOT of care cleaning the ink off and resigning it, without rushing the girl - it’s little things like that that make her special. I thanked her for coming and said it was strange to see all these people that I’ve known since I was 6 or so, and that I loved Dr Horribles Sing Along Blog and I can’t wait for The Guild and well done for that! She was lovely. 💙 she kept stroking my arm and going “aww” 🤣

Then I headed down to the main auditorium to catch Peter Capaldi, that’s when the announcer said he had been moved back a slot and Noah Schnapp was on instead. Noah was lovely, very young. Most of the audience were kids. He tried to learn how to say the long train station name in Wales, terrible lol. But he was genuinely quite funny and honest. Again, he’s very young so I couldn’t really relate to a lot of his stuff (music taste etc) but he seemed nice enough, I hope he grows up to be a lovely man. He said he was filming something in the autumn that’ll be being released next year.

In the end I was exhausted and starving so left before Peter Capaldi came on. 🤣

Day 2

I got a little bit of extra rest before heading to the con. First port of call was Tony Robinson who only appeared on the Sunday. I grew up watching him on Time Team, Blackadder, and some of his other documentaries, so I couldn’t pass up the chance. We did a pic and I thanked him for coming, a nice chap.

Then I found myself gravitating back to the Buffy room 🤣🤣 I can’t imagine why! Anyway, Kristine waved at me because she recognised me from the day before, and Amber only had 2 people in the queue so figured it was my chance to talk to her. Wow, I’m glad I did. She remembered me from the day before as I was first in for official photos, I thanked her for coming, and told her that this was my first con and that I suffer with anxiety and it’s taken me forever to get to a place where I was comfortable with the busy/crowds of a con. She asked how I got to that point, I told her little and often, gradually getting bigger until things didn’t seem to overwhelming. She said they can be very overwhelming and said she saw a lot of people with noise cancelling headphones on. I told her I was okay with the noise, it was the movement and feeling trapped. I told her if she saw me leaving the panel later don’t worry it’s just because I’m anxious, not bored. I told her about Slayers audible coming out at the perfect time because I lost my gran and it gave me something to look forward to in that time. She said Disney were awkward about the rights hence why there wasn’t anymore than the 1 we got 😥 I told Amber I was sorry for her losses this last 18 months and I was gutted I never got to meet Tony. She seemed sad and said that he was so kind. I asked for a hug, she gave me one but it was very gentle, not like a bear hug 🤣 then we had a photo, I told her my middle name is Amber. Then I thanked her and gave her another hug and left.

I caught some more panels. WWE, Billy West, some other folks. Then had photo with Claire and she was like “HI! Again.” 🤣 then managed to catch 20 mins of Tony Robinsons panel before my photo with Julie. I could relax a little then. 2 hours until the Buffy panel.

The panel was good, nice to see all the girls together. Felicia joined halfway through and bought some energy with her. I’m sure there’s a video online of the whole Q&A. I got up and asked a question, my mouth was like sand. I really wanted to ask about their favourite memory of Tony but I didn’t want to cry in front of everyone, and also didn’t think it was right to railroad the convo, so I asked a general Buffy question. “Where do you see the show going after the final episode - if you ignore all canon comics etc. would they go to England and rebuild the council?” They didn’t really answer, just started talking about shared graves, and turning ashes into jewellery 🤣 it was all a bit of a blur tbh.

I left straight after the panel because I wasn’t interested in Starship Troopers, and I had a lovely 2.5 hour drive home, which turned into a 3.5 hour drive him thanks to a wildfire in Brecon Beacons.

The end. Thanks for attending my Ted Talk 🤣

More pics to follow 💙