So Saturday was a blast.
Things began pretty well as I waited for the train to Oxford Circus from Marylebone Underground Station, where a bloke and his two female friends starting talking to me and got very enthusiastic about the costume. It transpired that the guy was a Ghostbusters fan, and he asked me if he could get a photo with me. After the photo was taken it also transpired that his name was Ben, which was a little spooky.
We eventually boarded the train and went our separate ways, as I made my way from Oxford Circus to the Central Line train, to Bank and then the DLR, I got a good collection of pleasent reactions to the costume, especially from a handful of children which always makes you smile.
As I took the DLR, I got a two bits of info from Mark, the first that Ecto-1 was there, and that the queues were insane.
The queue situation did seem worse this time, compared to May. Even when armed with a Early Entry E-Ticket, I still had to queue up with people who'd purchased their tickets on the day as they made everyone go through the same entrance... and the October convention seemed busier.
Still, even after being directed to the wrong place by one of the staff, I eventually got inside and made a B-line for the banner sporting the Ghostbusters logo.
As always, it's a great sight to see Milton's Ecto-1, and it wasn't long at all before I met up with Ant and Mark. I can't remember how long they'd been there, but they were already getting plenty of requests for photographs.
I briefly bid my dues, as I had some business to conduct before joining up with them for the rest of the con, and I sought out the celebrity signing area. Back in May, while walking through the ExCeL Center I'd passed almost shoulder to shoulder with Craig Charles (Dave Lister of
Red Dwarf) as he exited the convention, and I realised that having not checked the MCM website the previous night, I'd missed the chance to get my brother's
Red Dwarf book signed by him.
After seeing him listed on the website for the October convention, I knew that I couldn't let this opprtunity pass my by again, so with book stowed in my bag, I sought out his booth.
First and foremost, I was honestly surprised at the stall layout. I honestly would've expected there to have been a roped line leading to his booth, like the rest of the celebratory guests... but this wasn't the case, it was pretty much a setup of 'first come, first served'. It was nice that I didn't have to wait a hour or so, but at the same time... it seemed somewhat disrespectful to Mr. Charles.
As I got there, he vanished off briefly for a five minute break, so as I waited I used the time to purchase one of the 6X9 glossies which was one of the selected set of items you could get signed (and once purchased, allowed you to get a personal item signed) and also made sure the dealer knew that the copy of the book was not one of the ones he was selling, as at Play.com Live last year, I'd gotten it signed by Robert Llewellyn (Kryten).
Mr. Charles returned soon after, and immediately he hit things off by being very warm, welcoming and enthusiastic, and seemed genuinely happy to be there. I praised his work on
Red Dwarf and
Robot Wars, and explained that I wished him to sign the book for my older brother, Alex. I also asked, if he didn't mind, if he could sign the book twice (as Mr. Llewellyn had presigned the book, and signed it again to show it was his real signature). A class act, Mr. Charles not only signed it twice, but he signed it a third time! He then also signed the glossy photo.
I also attempted to get a photo with him, which he was perfectly happy to do, but sadly both attempts wound up being to blurry... and I didn't want to take up any more of his time because he'd already been so generous.
So if you ever get the chance to meet him, do so. He is a throughly pleasent and likeable man, and was great to meet.
With the book signing done, and with my other business concluded, I exited the convention to stow my gear away in the Locker Room, so I'd have less clutter for the time spent on the convention floor.
Unfortunately, as I sorted my bags to remove the new prop I'd developed for the convention, and the Ghost Sniffer, I found that I'd suffered a breakage. Some time during either the journey on public transport, ot at the convention, one of the Ecto Goggle lenses had popped off from the frame. It was a shame as I'd spent a chunk of the previous day replacing and testing the strap to see what I could do with it. It also stung, as it'd been a gift from Mark.
Even with it damaged, I proceeded on, checking my bags and purchases into the Locker Room, and making do with the damaged Googles. Irritatingly, this was the third thing to go wrong with the costume, but was the only actual breakage. Before I'd even entered the convention room, my yellow hose had pulled itself out of the hose connector, and the coiled cable I'd used for my Belt Gizmo had worked itself loose from the resin circuit board.
I eventually met up with Mark and Ant, and we spent the better part of three hours stood by the car, posing for photographs and with people, all of whom were really positive and enthusiastic for the costumes.
During the course of the day, we were filmed and interviewed by the crew of
Direct Edition, hopefully the segment we appear in will be featured on their
Youtube Channel soon.
As the day wound on, we were able to grab a moment to have a photo of each of us taken in Ecto-1's driver seat, which was awesome to sit in again following the film shoot at the Movieum. Sadly my photos all came out blurry (I don't know if Mark was able to get a shot of me or not), but I think theirs should be alright.
Finally, the day started to wind down for us, with Ant having to depart around half-past 2:00 as he had a gig he had to go to. Mark and I stuck around for a while longer, finally clocking off just after 3:00. We made out goodbyes, and went our separate ways, with him heading off to a gig of his own, and me taking the DLR back for my return journey.
And this is where the odyssey takes a turn towards the amusingly strange. While we'd been at MCM, Rob, Carl and Ozzie had been down at the Movieum to (I believe) help with Johnnie's zombie film project. When on the DLR home, I received this text message from Carl:
Carl wrote:The people on ur train said hi lol. Was at movieum as gb and they said they met ben king dressed as gb lol how cool
I responded back in absolute disbelief at the amazing coincidence.
Carl wrote:Lol yeh its great. And wen we said we know u part of our group. They couldnt believe it
What are the chances? The people I meet at Marylebone Tube Station would go on to either visit, or pass by the Movieum and bump into the other group of guys out in costume that day? Must be one in a billion, at least.
So all in all, we had a great day, some minor dissapointments, but nothing major.
Ghostbusters London Facebook: 
- By georgesmith
- By ravencro
- By zeta otaku