Comic Con cosplayers take over.... Toronto?

It was a busy weekend for me at the Toronto Film Festival, to the point that I haven't had much time to really write about anything I've seen. But I did have to share, in photos, the totally surreal experience of seeing Morgan Spurlock's miserably titled but very enjoyable new documentary Comic Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope. I've barely recovered from attending San Diego Comic Con back in July, but heading up to the film's premiere I was greeted by the sight of not just Storm Troopers on the street, but a row of costumed heroes on the stairs going up to the theater. These look just like photos from Comic Con I've taken many times, but I can't tell you how weird it feels to see it in a new context, like showing up at a Fourth of July barbecue attended by Santa Claus.





It was a fun spectacle, but on some level it was also feeling a little false to me. You can't really transplant the energy of Comic Con somewhere else, not even to a festival as fun as Toronto, and I expected it would be strange to be set up with the superheroes then sitting down in a film with the same respectful, quiet film festival audience (that experience was indeed strange, but more on that later). But then, a few people behind me in line, I met these two people-- representatives of the Scott Pilgrim Cosplay Team of Toronto. Yeah, you probably recognize their costumes.







When I asked them if they had attended actual Comic Con, they laughed and said no, seeming wistful about missing out on the experience. Their enthusiasm and totally perfect costumes really had replicated the Comic Con experience, right there waiting in line-- it was even better than what Morgan Spurlock had planned himself.