Morgan Spurlock geeks out
Filmmaker catches transition as Comic-con evolves
There are several ways to look at Comic-con, the annual convention focused on comic-book and video-game franchises, but, for the most part, the chorus falls into two distinct camps: the starry-eyed faithful who belong to the community, and the cynical observer who sees the celebration of childlike pursuits as a sad indication of social infantilizing.
Morgan Spurlock didn’t belong to either one before he started work on ComicCon Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope. Yet, it didn’t take long before he became an avid defender of the San Diego event that draws close to 200,000 fans to its heaving silicon bosom every year.
“For you guys, it’s all about the fat guy in the Batman suit,” says Spurlock, describing the media’s coverage with disdain. “But there’s something amazing about Comic-con that goes beyond all the BS you see on TV — which is a joke,” says the man who ate exclusively at Mcdonald’s to make his movie Super Size Me.
“All you see on TV is, ‘Hey, look at all these weirdos in costumes again!’ and, ‘Golly, there’s Angelina Jolie!’ Or else you hear that Hollywood has taken over ComicCon, which you hear a lot, because Hollywood will bring their trailers to the event,” he says.
“So you might get 6,000 people in Hall H watching some reel, but while that is happening, there are 145,000 people who are not there, doing something completely different — doing their own thing.”
Spurlock says he entered the Comic-con world as a bit of a neophyte, and somewhat by accident.
“My first Comic-con was in 2009, but I’d wanted to do a Comic-con for years. I was always just too busy. So when I got hired to do The Simpsons’ 20thanniversary special for Fox in ’09, I was like, ‘We’re going to ComicCon, we’re gonna find super-fans, and we’re gonna shoot for the special.’ ”
Once Spurlock entered the convention centre, however, and saw the scope of the event, he realized there may be something more to the show than plastic action figures and saturated inky pages.
“This was a movie. This is a place. And that night, I met Stan Lee. I told him how much he had changed my life and how he gave me the courage to tell my own stories, and he said, ‘Hey Morgan, thanks! We should make a movie, you and me. We should make a documentary about Comic-con.’ Cut to a year later, and we were there with Stan and Joss Whedon and Harry Knowles. I mean, it’s amazing.”
Spurlock says it all comes down to great characters.
“Anytime you can fill a movie with great characters with great commitment and passion, you’re lucky. And these people can wax rhapsodic about their favourite characters and franchises.”
For Spurlock, this is all a good thing, because it’s an honest expression of affection. It’s also become a multi-generational pastime, thanks to the longevity of comic books and the now-30-year history of video games.
“You see parents and kids bonding over the same obsession. So now, it’s not just kids who are bonding with their friends over a shared passion; it’s whole families who are growing closer and sharing with each other.”
Communal bonding is a social necessity, and Spurlock sees absolutely no difference between bonding over brats and beers at the tailgate party for your favourite football team, and spending 10 hours button-mashing with your buds playing Halo.
“There are all these stereotypical views of what Comic-con is about — like the sweaty, smelly guy who lives in his parents’ basement. Well, you still have the guy who lives in his parents’ basement, but you’re also getting the blossom of geek love, because female attendance keeps rising.”
The changing demographic means the event continues to evolve, and for Spurlock, catching this transition in the midst was one of the reasons why he wanted to make the movie.
“I wanted to humanize these things,” he says. “For me, Star Wars proved you can have fantasy in your life long after childhood. You can take it with you, and that’s not a bad thing. You can buy action figures as a grown-up; it doesn’t mean you’re infantile. We don’t all have to watch On Golden Pond.”
Indeed, now that events such as Comic-con have broached the mainstream, we can all embrace our comic-book collections and action figures into post-menopausal years, without any social stigma.