Ok, on to the fun! Welcome to the first day of The Twilight Convention - Los Angeles at the LAX Marriott :) I had heard about the convention for Twi-hards while standing in line at the Twilight Experience in San Diego...another event for Twi-hards (who'd have thunk, right?) and thankfully, the hubs decided that this was to be my gift for Christmas...and my neice Megan and Jessica decided to join in the fun! Of course, the chance to meet any of the stars of Twilight may have helped swing their decision towards going ;)
I had no idea what to expect, apart from loads of screaming, and almost all things Twilight. We were immediately greeted by the "Salute To Twilight" wall image and other Twilight/New Moon related banners and posters. It was a little overwhelming at first...and I have to admit, I had to get the "what am I doing at a Twilight convention?" thoughts out of my head. This convention was only going to be as fun as I made it - so, positive thoughts were the best chance I had at a good time!
Here's one word of advice - be prepared. You can bring any food or drink into the auditorium as long as you pick up after yourself. This means you can actually pack your own lunch/snacks/bevvies before you go - savings you lots of money. Otherwise, you'll do what we did...hit the hotel restaurants for lunch/snack and spend $$ for a soggy hamburger.
We checked out the vendor hall - admittedly I was timid to take a picture of this room because at this point, I had no idea what I could/couldn't take a picture of. But allow me to describe it...there was a booth of sci-fi/fantasy/movie posters (not all Twilight related), a Twilight inspired jewelry/t-shirt booth, Native American jewelry, a booth that sold different types of contacts and did air-brush tattoos, the Hillywood Show booth (a talented group of youngins who do amazing parodies of hollywood films), Twilight/New Moon merchandise (including a bunch of Pocket Edward's family), an Official Twilight Convention merchandise booth, another Twilight inspired jewelry booth, the hand model from the Twilight book cover (I have NO idea what she did), an Official Twilight Convention booth with images that you could purchase to have signed by the talent (MAJOR MONEY MAKER!) and yet another Twilight inspired jewelry booth. We purchased our pictures that we were to have the talent sign...I opted for the $15 picture of all the cast who were attending the conference whereas Megan and Jessica opted for separate pictures. Oh, and in case you're wondering - of course they take credit cards :)
Please excuse the pictures from Day 1...my camera is relatively new so I was learning as I went. I was fiddling with everything...from using the built in flash (nope), using an external flash (nope), and using no flash at all (yep). I had to switch to Manual Mode instead of Automatic so I had to rely on some patience and other people's flashes in order to capture the image correctly. In all, I took over 500 pictures...and around 200 are usable...I will NOT add them all here...cuz wow, that's a lot of pictures. LOL! I'll only choose the ones that I think are the best.
The first guest of the day was Tinsel Korey, who plays Emily, Sam's fiancee in New Moon. Don't remember her? She had a small part in the movie...after Jacob's secret is let out of the bag, Embry and Jared take Bella to Emily's place...where she serves the boys and Bella up some home-made muffins the size of volleyballs. Tinsel seems to be an absolute sweetheart...taking the time to answer all questions that the Hillywood's chose on behalf of the audience.
Tinsel brought a painting that someone in New York had done of Sam and Emily (I think it was New York) and was hoping to be able to auction it off. Unfortunately I have no idea what happened to the painting but I definitely thought it was beautiful. We always see artwork of Bella/Edward, Bella/Jacob...but nothing about the love story between Sam and Emily.
Next up was Justin Chon who plays Eric Yorkie, a human who goes to school with Bella and the Cullens. He is the first one that Bella meets on her first day of school...the first one to fall head over heels with the mysterious new girl. Poor Eric. In the books - his character sorta falls by the wayside as Angela starts dating Ben after her date with Eric to the Fork's High School Sadie Hawkins type dance. In the movie version, Angela and Eric go to Junior Prom together and end up dating...different, sure...but what a way to keep Justin Chon in the movies, right?
Your eyes are not deceiving you...yes, that is a gnarly tattoo on the boy's chest. It's MONGO! No, he didn't lift up his shirt...he said that there's no way that we'd want to see his skinny chest...just skin and bones. But he did show us the uppert part of it by pulling down the v-neck part of his shirt. He explained that it's "his angel" - abstract of course.
Justin is such a character! He really wouldn't sit still...kept getting up out of the chair and walked around the stage - made it REALLY hard to take pictures of someone without a flash while they walk around the stage. Thankfully, he did sit down every now and then. Jessica asked a couple of questions...first, she asked him who his favorite Korean bands are (of course, I don't remember at all - Jessie, do you remember?), another was to say something in Korean (I think this was her question) and the other was what does he look for in a girl. His answer to that was interesting...he wants a girl who's not high maintenance but who can glam it up when she needs to. Someone who could pull out a medical kit on the Titanic when it's going down...random, right?
Recognize this girl? Yep, it's Tinsel Korey. She came out during Justin's Q&A session and sat in the VIP section. Later, she got the mic from one of the Hillywood peeps and asked Justin a question, as Krystal. In the funniest voice and too-cute mannerisms, she asked him how he was able to cry during the Romeo & Juliet scene in New Moon (unfortunately he'd already answered that question a little earlier but it was pretty funny to see Tinsel and Justin interact).
The last New Moon cast member of the day was Justine Wachsberger. Who? Yeah...it took some people a few minutes to figure it out too. Justine was a last minute addition to the convention - she was added to replace Bronson Pelletier (Jared). Still haven't figured out who she is? She plays Gianna, the Volturi secretary who knows the Volturi secret but who is hoping will one day become one of them. Yes, she has 1 line..."buon pomeriggio" - which means good afternoon in Italian. Yes, that's it...and yes, she did A LOT of interviews to discuss her character...gotta give it to her though, way to work it girl!
She spent the majority of her life growing up in Paris, yet has no accent to speak of...in fact, the only accent I picked up from her was Valley Girl, like totally gag me with a spoon why don't you? She said something in Italian and Drew from the Hillywood gang told her that whatever she said sounded way better than Justin's Korean earlier.
The Q&A session was the shortest of the day...only 30 minutes, but seriously it felt so long. I dont think there were many questions in the box for her so the Hillywoods came to the audience so that people could ask her questions personally. The questions were rather weird...favorite flavor of ice cream, how was her scene, how did she prepare for her role...but one good thing that came out of it...she herself mentioned that her role was a "blink and you'll miss it" kind of part...so at least she acknowledges the fact that she's barely in the film. Although she does hope that she will come back in Breaking Dawn - at which a bunch of us were like, ummm...what? Gianna's not in Breaking Dawn. I guess it's just wishful thinking...and maybe another way for her to keep hanging on to the Twilight Saga's coattails for a little while longer.
The day ended with an autograph session with Justin and Justine. We were all really hoping that we'd get Tinsel Korey in our Preferred Weekend passes but unfortunately Tinsel was an addition $30 - so we opted out. The funniest story of the day...Megan and Jessie didn't buy Justine's headshot to have her sign so they couldn't figure out anything for her to autograph for them. I told Jessie to have her sign her ticket - she was going to scrapbook it anyway...so it made sense. Well, apparently I had forgotten to tell Megan before we went to get their autographs. Justine's handler reached out to Megan to get her article and Megan said, "oh, no thanks, I don't have anything for her to sign". LOL! The look of confusion that went over Justine's face was classic...I think she was totally thrown for a loop. Then poor Megan felt really awkward because she truly didn't have anything...that's when I told her to have her ticket autographed...and although she moved on, we still joked with her about Justine's reaction. Oops...guess I could've made that situation a little better by sharing my bright idea. But it's ok, made for an afternoon giggle ;)
Did you enjoy Day 1 of the Twilight Convention? Well stay tuned...Days 2 and 3 are still to come...Day 2 is full of Wolf Pack goodness and Day 3, well that's the day for the yummola Cullen family!! Check back often, you never know when they're going to be added :)
Catch ya on the flipside :D
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