Approaching TFNation

With less than a month to go before my girlfriend and I head off to Birmingham for TFNation 2018, I figured it'd be worth making a note of what I'm looking forward to, what I'm after, etc.

As with previous years, I've bought a weekend ticket but won't be getting there till late evening on the Friday (cheaper travel after 7pm, and all that!). This means I'll be missing all the Friday panels, and probably won't be in time to attend the 'Notorious (Zombie Related) Erotic Fanfic Show', presented by DC Douglas. I'm pretty ambivalent about most of the Friday stuff anyway, so it's not a massive loss. Similarly, I didn't pay the additional cost for a ticket to the Stan Bush gig on the Saturday night. While I liked the soundtrack to TransFormers: The Movie as part of the movie, and even though I bought the soundtrack on vinyl back in the day, it's not really the sort of music I tend to listen to these days.

Last year, I gave the whole Saturday evening's entertainment a miss, even though part of me was keen to attend the script reading, at least. After having a panic attack the morning of the first year's event, which utterly ruined the whole experience for me, I probably wouldn't have attended TFNation 2017 at all were it not for guests like Bob Budiansky and Venus Terzo. I may attend this year's evening event, if only because it has a definite end this time, since they have to clear the room for Stan Bush.

I'm not blown away by most of this year's guests - Bob Budiansky is a pretty hard act to follow, to me - though voice actors always have great stories to tell, and I am keen to see what Mairghread Scott and Aaron Archer have to say. Since I'm not really into the comics (I bought both 'Last Stand...' and 'Sins of the Wreckers' a while back, and didn't enjoy them as much as TFNation 2017's print-form final chapter for TransFormers Animated), I may drift into the other artist/writer panels if they sound interesting, or if there's any indication of what'll be happening once IDW's current continuities are closed off.

As for what I'm after... Nowt in particular, to be perfectly honest... but I shall be on the lookout for any new Studio Series or Power of the Primes figures, anything I don't already have from Titans Return, Generations and TF Legends. Of course, if I see any items from my Want List, I may well take the plunge. Chances are, there will be a lot of impulse buying, as TFNation often features lots of surprises... Particularly with Third Party figures. I keep telling myself I'm not collecting Masterpiece anymore, but I recently bought MPM Barricade, the new G1 toy-style MP Megatron is most definitely on my radar and MP Road Rage is quite appealing.

Any surprises in the traders' section of the hall are unlikely to include any of my 'Holy Grail' figures... I recently obtained one of them (GF Chromia White Version) via ebay, having not seen it available for years (I believe the last time I saw it was as part of the DVD set, around the time that first came out in Japan!). I did see an incomplete Tako Tank at last year's event, but didn't (and still don't) have the space for it... and would prefer it complete, if at all possible. G1 Sky Lynx is another one I don't really have space for, but I'd want to be sure I was getting one that was complete and in working order. BotCon 2006 Darksyde Megatron rarely appears outside of eBay - the last time I saw him in the wild, I believe, was at a convention many years ago, when he was priced the same as the whole BotCon 2006 boxed set, approximately £250 at the time. I'd be willing to pay a reasonable price for him, but not £1,000+.

There's also oddities like Armada Overload, which I've quite recently decided that I'd like to own, because I've got a complete and intact Armada Superpants Prime again, and picked up a second hand Armada Jetfire not long after taking the photos of Timelines Astrotrain in Superpants mode. Black repaints always catch my eye... and, of course, there's always Femme-Bots.

I'll probably have a scoot round the Forge - I picked up a couple of posters last year, from Nate Phoenix on DeviantArt, and very nearly picked up some stickers for my girlfriend on another stand... This year, she'll have the opportunity to peruse them herself.

As mentioned, I'm ambivalent toward the comics, and the majority of non-transforming TransFormers merchandise just annoys me. Even the RID2015 Bumblebee Bath Set I saw in a local B&M - which is thoroughly appropriate to the idea of attending a convention such as this one - is of no interest. I have pre-ordered the little story book whose proceeds are going to charity, along with this year's show t-shirt, after missing out on last year's.

On the subject of t-shirts, I'm attempting to sort out a 'Cool Your Jets' t-shirt to wear for the event, but the people I'm using at the moment have messed it up twice in a row, so I think I may have to look into an alternative printing method...

And, finally, following my discovery last year that the restaurants in Resorts World decline walk-in patrons when they're even slightly busy, I'll be sure to make bookings for both Saturday and Sunday evening...