This past weekend I went to, surprisingly, my very first regular ol' comic book/general nerd stuff convention. The con in question was "Wizard World" in my very own hometown of St. Louis. I've been doing furry cons professionally for seven years now so I'm pretty used to them; I know how they work and what to expect. It's no secret that I'm a terrible furry, I don't do a lot of furry things and don't really like most furry art or stories, so going to a con that had a lot of stuff that I was genuinely interested was a breath of fresh air. However not all was well at Wizard World so here's my run down of what I liked better at each type of con. Please feel free to un-follow me over these incredibly mild opinions OR leave really brutally dull and snarky comments below.

The rundown:

1. The con goers: if you switched every fursuiter at a fur con with a guy in a Deadpool outfit the two cons would be virtually indistinguishable. Smelly people, clueless chatterboxes, alpha-nerds, and all the other things that annoy me at a fur con were here as well. Comic con is the winner in this category however due to an influx of smoking hot Harley Quinn cosplayers instead of fursuiters wearing questionable pairs of boxers.

Point: Comic Con.

2. The Art: This is a tough one for me because I rarely ever buy any furry art because it looks very samey samey all too often (thin lines, big eyes and usually no background [please don't send me counterexamples, I'm not speaking in absolutes here you fool]) to me BUT at comic con I saw more photo painting and background tracing than I could believe. One booth at comic con was headed up by an "artist" whose entire line up was just photo traces of promotional art work (he literally had traced one of the Netflix slides for the new "Daredevil" show.) I was also distressed by the sheer amount of fan art on display, a lot of artists were seemingly incapable of coming up with original content, though they might also just be stifled by market pressure. On the MAJOR plus side I got to meet Ethan Van Sciver and J.O. Barr, though at fur cons I've met Stan Sakai and James Gurney, all incredibly talented awesome guys.

Point: nobody. Tracing at one con and derivative, background less mush art at the other means we all loose. Amazing pros like the ones I mentioned above are wins for everyone.

3. Networking potential: I'm always on the prowl for new connections and potential cool people. At furry cons I've lined up some awesome clients but have been either outright ignored by publishers (I was told my comics "weren't porny enough". Cool, good talk. Way to raise the bar) or even shadow banned from certain publications (artists don't like that I beat them at cons and thus, shit talk me to their friends.). At this comic con hugely successful artists and publishers were exceedingly polite and seemed genuinely interested in my work. I may make more money at fur cons but having publishers and artists act like human beings was a first.

Point: Comic Cons.

4. Artistic Freedom: I mentioned earlier how next to no one was doing original work at Wizard World and that it was sad. There may be no good furry comics etc...but at least some people are trying. Plus: as bad a rap as furries get for the whole porn thing I've noticed that the vast majority of my commissions aren't pornographic (I don't object to porn, I just don't want it to be all I do. That would be incredibly dull.) and that people are usually excited to see my take on their subject matter. I vastly prefer this to drawing endless fan art.

Point: Furry Cons.

5. Crazy People: at comic con we had some weirdos but furry has them beat by a mile. Hell, those goddamn chihuahua men alone are crazier than anything I saw at Wizard World.

Point Furry Cons.

6. Actual Comics: there weren't a lot of comics for sale at Wizard World and the ones that were were marked up heinously high. At furry cons there are comics for sale but I've only seen a scant few I'd even consider "good" come out of this community (Blacksad didn't come out of this community, it doesn't count).

Point: No one. Locking art behind price walls and being incapable of producing it are just two shitty sides to the same awful coin.

7. Deciding vote: there isn't one. It's an arbitrary tie because if I announced a "winner" I'd have to read more uninformed opinions than I care to, it's a dubious way to incense people and get a reaction out of them; really just manipulative. I made it a list/competition format so people MIGHT consider reading it. If you need a summation of my thoughts on the matter here it is: I love comics more than any other art form so I'm pretty critical of a lot of the aspects of them, including the venues I find them at. The furry community has been and will continue to be a great place for me to practice my craft in an environment of near absolute artistic freedom. The furry community could stand to expand its taste buds however; I want the most out of this community and meeting the incredible craftsmen who work outside of it has inspired me to only push my own art further and, hopefully, to push others too. This isn't an "us vs. them" thing, despite my ingenious framing device. "Us vs. them" is a dullard's way of viewing the world when we could be learning and bettering ourselves by analyzing other communities, genres, and individuals.

Feel free to take this as a hostile attack on your favorite genre (it's not).

-Bone