One again, our man Mike "SD Comics" Walker is on the scene in his home town of San Diego to bring you the best all over look at the wonderful madness that is SDCC! Mike has been going to the big con since the late 1970s, so you be hard pressed to find a better guide short of Mark Evanier. Speaking of Mark, he linked to the the best "What to expect if I go to SDCC?" guide online by Tom Spurgeon so we’re linking to it too.

And now here’s Mike with his awesome look at today’s setup activities!

SDCC 2007 Preliminary Report

I went down to the convention center today to pick up my exhibitor’s badge. Because I’m basically a nosey bastich, I took a stroll around the exhibit hall and watched while companies were setting up their booths. Here’s a few thoughts on what I saw today (And bear in mind that SDCC is in the REAL early stage of the set-up process. They don’t even have the carpet laid down yet in some parts of the exhibit hall).

1) When strolling around the San Diego convention center on the day before the day before SDCC, you have to be careful not to get run over and smushed by a forklift. Seriously. Look both ways before you cross the aisles, fanboy. And listen carefully for the tell-tale "beep-beep". It may save your life. The guys who put these exhibits together do not dicker. And they don’t let anything slow’em down.

2) My Kingdom for some air-conditioning. Yes, it’ll be on tomorrow. But that doesn’t do the poor bastich’s who are busting their humps in there right now any good.

3) No Star Wars Pavillion. YES!! HAR!! Over the last few years, I’ve gotten sick of Star Wars and all the precious space that Lucas takes up in the exhibit hall. The Jar-Jar Binks Brigade will have to go get their fix somewhere else. MAWHAHA! May the frackin’ force stick it in your ear!

Okay, booth by booth …

MATTEL
As promised, they’ve done a total redesign of their booth. It’s huge. There’s lots of love for DC. They don’t have any figures displayed yet, but I saw two posters that you may find interesting. One said "The DC Universe Coming in 2008". The DC logo was used. It was basically a starscape background with the silhouettes of a lot of different characters in the foreground. I’ll take a picture tomorrow. Also, there was a double-sided poster that said "DC Universe Battle Figures". One one side of the poster it said "Round one: Batman Vs The Joker". On the other side it said "Round two: Superman Vs Luthor". I have no idea what that’s about, but I guess we’ll find out tomorrow. They have lots and lots of display cases so I think we’ll see plenty of DC stuff.

DC DIRECT
I saw Matt Kellor, Syndee Barwick and Shawn Knapp. They look to have the same amount of display space that they had last year. Nothing on display yet. Shawn says that Jim Fletcher won’t be here this year. He’s currently in China and won’t be back in the States until Sunday. Georg Brewer will be in town tomorrow.

MARVEL TOYS
Hang on to your arse, but Marvel actually has a booth this year. Yes, I was shocked, too. I think this is the first time they’ve had a booth at SDCC since the pre-bankruptcy days. There were some glass display cases there, so it looks like Jesse finally has a home at San Diego. And yes, the rumors are true about the Iron Man movie armor. The Stan Winston designed Mark One armor was proudly on display. I can’t wait until you guys see pictures of that. It’s so damn cool. The more I see of the Iron Man movie, the more I can’t wait to see it.

HASBRO
Nothing on display yet in the way of figures. However, they’re going to give Indiana Jones a lot of love. They have some life-size movie props on display, including the Well of Souls and the Ark of the Covenant. Pics tomorrow.

DISNEY
The Disney booth looks like it’ll be the talk of the show. They have a 40 foot long replica of the Black Pearl from the Pirates of the Caribbean. Fans can actually walk around inside. Again, pics will be forthcoming.

– Mike
(Preview night report will be posted tomorrow!)