Our member and current Vice President of the Milwaukee Time Lords, Carl Féthière, has created a video of images taken at our 20th Anniversary Dinner, which was held August 15th, 2009. This is our first club YouTube post. You can help out by joining YouTube and posting a comment.
This weekend has arrived! Dragoncon 2009 begins as of Thursday at 4:00 PM, the time that registration opens. After nearly a year of planning this trip, all that is left is travelling to this annual gaming & fantasy convention. I still have my MARTA card, which I saved and thought to place in my wallet so I don’t forget it.
Last year, I was the sole Milwaukee Time Lord member in attendance. This year, my sister, Debbie Frey, will be with me. The cost is less more me this year. I found a cheaper hotel that is closer to the Chamblee MARTA station. Gas prices are much lower this year. At home I’ve seen prices around $2.54/gallon, whch is much better than over $4/gallon. I observed price drops as I travel southwards. Also, my sister paid for half the hotel and expenses. And this year, some help from mom. Thanks!
Last year, I also brought along ads to place on tables. This year, I am printing up ad cards, which require less hand processing than our MTL flyers. I was able to place six ads on one page, multiplying the number of cards. It’s still much less than the anticipated 30,000+ attendance, but I intend to mainly target the Britrack area, where I am most likely to find Doctor Who fans who may be interested in our club. We still publish a printed newsletter that includes a summary of science fiction and general tv/movie news. We mostly communicate with each other by email. I don’t know of any member who has a Twitter account or any other “New Media” online presence.
I will be driving to Atlanta, following the same route as before. Last year was a learning experience driving all through the night for the first time and longer than I ever have within 14 hours. We’ll stop at least four times, perhaps more if needed. I used both Mapquest and RandMcnally sites to plan the trip this year. I liked the RandMcnally print out format much better as a navigation aid and the maps were smaller and used less ink. It’s hard to be precise, however, when selecting stopping points. I was unable to select the Lake Forest Oasis as a stop, since the map site uses cities as stopping points. Lake Forest, ILL was as close as I could get.
I hope to take lots of photos this year. Last year I had a credit card sized camera that was powered by USB cable and had limited power and memory. This year, I purchased a Kodak EasyShare camera from an Office Depot bargain table. If I have my laptop with me, I can transfer images once memory is full. This camera used two AA batteries. I hope to switch to rechargable batteries once I get through the ones I got. I practiced using the camera at various events and situations this summer. I have a travel tripod which I can use to get timed and low light photos.
I will post images from this blog along with a summary for each day. After registration, I am really looking forward to a Star Party being held at the Bradley Observatory. There is a banquet at 7:00 pm and a lecture at 8:00 pm.
There is sure to be video recordings posted at YouTube so you can enjoy some of the panels. Do a search on “Dragoncon 2009″. Add name of your favorite series to narrow search. There are Battlestar Galactica cl
On August 26th, 1989, the Milwaukee Time Lords founded its private organization from a band of Renegade Time Lords, which was a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee student club. (Non-students could be members, but not officers.) One of our founding members, Ed Hochman, obtained use of this residence hall meeting room at the Bradford Arms located in Milwaukee, so that we could begin with the business of establishing our club.
That evening, we agreed to the “Milwaukee Time Lords” as our club name. We named our club newsletter “The Relative Times” and our fanzine (no longer being published) “Qui To Time”. We had our initial by-laws drafted by our official parliamentarian, Christopher Cebula, also our official contact with our public television station, Channels 10/36. We had a board of five officers and a few committees established.
Then something happened that changed our business meeting to a Q&A panel meeting! Earlier that summer, Polariscon I in the Twin Cities, Minnesota featured two Doctor Who celebrities: Sylvester McCoy and John Levene. One of our members worked at the convention as a “gopher”. Connections were made and Mr. John Levene arrived as a guest at our club meeting!
Amazing! Right? How often does that happen? Here’s a photo taken and used in our club’s first newsletter. (Hence in black and white — better color submissions wanted!)
This is our 20th anniversary. We celebrated with a night out on a dinner cruise with Edelweiss from 7:45 pm to about 10:15 pm. The boat tour was very interesting and the food was excellent.
MTL Members: Tell your club memories here or join our blog and post your own stories. Let us know how you found us. If you attended the cruise, share your stories and photos here.
In the spirit of the lines exchanged in Doctor Who: Time Crash - All my love to long ago — and to the days yet to come. We’ve accomplished a very difficult challenge — keeping a science fiction club alive during the days of no new Doctor Who up through the current series. If anyone else has accomplished a continuous run for 20+ years in science fiction fandom, let us know!
Also thanks to the excellent service of Edelweiss Boat Tours. It was probably our best event in our 20 year history, next to our founding day surprise event.
I checked the latest Doctor Who news a day after the Wisconsin State Fair event to see that some of the San Diego ComicCon panelists were still in the area. At least one looking for work! (I think you can guess by now who that could be.)
I have the BBC Doctor Who news feed in my Yahoo page. You can get yours if you go to the news site and get instructions and the link there. It’s very handy in making sure you get the most current and accurate news.
The item that caught my attention was the BBC Wales broadcasts in two parts of reports from Russell T Davies, Julie Gardner and David Tennant regarding their experiences at ComicCon and subsequent ventures in Southern California. (I grew up there back in the 60’s and 70’s, up to 1974.)
Start here to read about David Tennant’s Tales from Hollywood.
Apparently, that stint he did as Casanova opens doors for him, as you will hear when you download and listen to the two part report.
As with the previous Doctor Who panel, I have the Torchwood panel here for you to enjoy without you having to hunt YouTube for all the parts. There are lots of Children of Earth spoilers here, so if you have not seen this yet, you might want to wait until you have (it’s on DVD by now).
Panelists: (left to right) Russell T Davies, John Barrowman, Eros Lyn, Julie Gardner
This one is in seven parts.
Enjoy the panel!
If you missed ComicCon 2009 or the Doctor Who Panel or were there and want to see it again, I have arranged a set of YouTube clips conveniently for you. It can take some time and effort burrowing through the ComicCon YouTube video posts to find all the video clip parts.
Here, I present to you the Doctor Who Panel, featuring Russell T Davies, Julie Gardner, Eros Lynn and David Tennant. The first part of the panel features questions by the moderator. Later, questions were taken from the audience. The usual procedure at these panels is to have those asking questions line up before a microphone so that everyone can hear the questions.
The panel was recorded for a Doctor Who Confidential, so expect to see a professionally edited version I suspect in the next Doctor Who video release.
Enjoy the panel in the comfort of your home!
(Also the two trailers referred to in the panel are as pop up links at the bottom of this post, which you can pull up when the trailers are run during the panel, so you get that experience, too.)
TRAILERS
End of Time
The list has grown considerably since the last post. If you are fans of Star Trek, Babylon 5, Battlestar Gallactica, Farscape or Firefly, this year’s line-up looks great! The Dragoncon site lists guests alphabetically, so you need to scan through the list if you seek guests for your favorite series. The guests are by TV series.
Star Trek
John Billingsley
James Cawley
Robert Duncan McNeil
Kate Mullgrew
Leonard Nimoy
Dwight Schultz
Garrett Wang
Dr Who/Torchwood
Eric Roberts
Eliza Roberts
Battlestar Gallactica
Dirk Benedict
Aaron Douglas
Richard Hatch
Alessandro Juliani
Kandyse McClure
Mary McDonnell
Edward James Olmos
Kate Vernon
Babylon 5
Bruce Boxleitner
Claudia Christian
Stephen Furst
Tracy Scoggins
Farscape
Claudia Black
Virginia Hey
Lani John Tupu
Stargate-SG1
Michael Shanks
Firefly
Ron Glass
Other Guests
Catherine Bach
Trace Beaulieu
Julie Benz
Bob Bergen
Michael Connell Biehn
Jennifer Blanc
Barry Bostwick
Doug Bradley
Charisma Carpenter
Bill Corbett
Bruce Davison
Lexa Doig
Peter Facinelli
Charles Fleischer
Louise Fletcher
Paul Goddard
Dean Haglund
Kane Hodder
Richard Kiel
Traci Lords
James Marsters
Paul McGillion
Jason Momoa
Michael Nankin
Jasika Nicole
John Noble
Mary Jo Pehl
James Randi
Alan Ruck
John Schneider
Helen Slater
Kristy Swanson
Michael Welch
Hold on to your sonic screwdriver or whatever in the Doctor Who universe you cling to because here’s the Easter Special trailer to tingle your inner Time Lord. Get set for a ride that places a busload of ordinary people in a very extraordinary environment and their only hope is the Doctor.
Doctor Who Easter Special: Planet of the Dead airs Saturday, April 11, 2009.
You can find a large set of images at David Tennant’s website for your desktop. Go to this page that is set up for the special.
I have been through the Dragoncon guest list and it looks like an excellent line up for science fiction and fantasy fans. I have noted that the front list is much shorter than the list you see when you select “Current Guests” under “Guest List”.
Here, I have organized it by TV series (main series guest is known for). I think it will make it easier for those deciding to attend based upon number of their favorite celebrities attending.
Got any others you plan to see? Are there any major updates since I posted this? Reply with your support for your favorite guests and why you want to see them.
Bablyon 5
Bruce Boxleitner
Tracy Scoggins
Battlestar Galactica (old and new versions)
Dirk Benedict
Kevin R. Grazier - science advisor
Richard Hatch
Kandyse McClure
Edward James Olmos
Doctor Who
Eliza Roberts
Eric Roberts
Farscape
Virginia Hey
Paul Goddard
Firefly
Ron Glass
Star Trek (any series)
John Billingsley
Robert Duncan McNeil
Anthony Montgomery
Kate Mulgrew
Leonard Nimoy
Garrett Wang
X-Files
Dean Haglund
Other guests that looked interesting (with links this time) as I scanned the list include:
Richard L. Altstatt
Kevin J. Anderson
Catherine Bach
Michael Connell Biehn
Jennifer Blanc
Barry Bostwick
Bruce Davison
Peter Facinelli
Alan Dean Foster
Paul McGillion
Alan Ruck
John Schneider
Chicago TARDIS now has two guests listed as confirmed! Chicago TARDIS is a convention held every year in the Chicago, Illinois for Doctor Who fans. This year it will be held November 27-29, 2009 (Thanksgiving weekend). The hotel is The Westin Lombard Yorktown Center, located in Lombard, Illinois.
The two guests confirmed are: Paul McGann (The Eighth Doctor) and Daphne Ashbrook (Dr. Grace Holloway). There are “many more guests t.b.a.”.
As of today and up through November 15, 2009, Reserved Seating is $135, Regular Membership (weekend) is $75. 1 day is $35. Children 6-10 is $25 for the weekend. Children under 6 free when accompanied by a paid adult. You can order by mail, fax or online.
The hotel selection is excellent. Last year, the first year the convention was held at Westin, the service was great and the location perfect. It is next to a Target and across from a shopping mall. The food court is located on the near side towards the hotel so it is not too far to walk.
With the coming to a close an era with the Tenth Doctor, it will be a very special time to come and participate in the celebration of your favorite television series. Don’t miss this one!