Hapfairy

I assumed Geekchic was joking about Harrison Ford, hence the wink face? Oh well, it's hard to tell on the internet.

Would like to just quickly say something that isn't about diamond passes, lol (I know I couldn't afford one anyway) - thanks for working on some improvements the venue and the ticket system etc. Obviously there's no way to know how it will go until the actual weekend, but I still feel re-assured that you guys are doing something about it.

I already listed what guests I'd like in the guest suggestions bit so for some other stuff: - YALC! - seating areas, especially for disabled/less able folks - lots more signposts and/or a detailed map showing restaurants etc (forgive me if there was one in the programme, I never found where to get one, lol.)

Seconding Nikolaj Coster-Waldau and Gwendoline Christie. Meeting them would be a dream come true for me!

I didn't know about the con when it was in Olympia so it will certainly be interesting to see the difference!

For me, anyone from - Game of Thrones Buffy Angel Firefly Castle True Blood I think it would be brilliant if Natalie Dormer was able to attend since so many people wanted to see her. I'm sure she's mega busy, though! Also - writers. It would be amazing to get at least one big name like Neil Gaiman or George R.R Martin (though again I suspect GRRM would be way too busy). And I hope YALC will happen again even if it's a separate event!

I hope the venue change is a sign that they will be trying to remedy what happened this year. I would really like to go again, just need to be re-assured that everything will be done to prevent the overcrowding issues! I might consider going on the Friday or Sunday since people say they're less nightmarish...

Phew, that's so much stuff! Hope it is the case that she's got it all back.

I wish I'd met more of the GoT cast. And would've loved to have met Juliet Landau. I thought it wasn't worth buying a ticket for Anthony Head because I got a great photo with him as a kid, but then realised afterwards I could have got my photo signed... d'oh!

I have a reduced immune system but I have somehow managed to avoid it! Used a lot of hand gel, perhaps that's the solution...

Agreed, everyone I spoke to was friendly. I love how at a comic con you can just get chatting to people so easily by saying "I like your costume/t-shirt/dress" etc - so many people with mutual interests!

Having redone my fire warden training recently at work I can comment on this. Fire exits are supposed to be kept closed at all times EXCEPT in the event of a fire to allow emergency egress from the building. Sorry, I don't think I was very clear, I was referring to people saying the fire exits were chained up or blocked off. Not just closed. There were exits at the side opened to let people out at night, not sure if they were fire exits or not but it seemed silly to not use them throughout the day.

The two people dressed as Jon Snow and Sansa Stark were amazing! They looked spot on, I actually did a double take when I saw them.

That's a good idea. The only problem would be the queue jumpers. Anyone jumping the queue would not get scanned as the crew member with the scanner would have already been to that part of the queue making it easy to enter the event without paying. And what are we to do about the queue jumpers problem ? Everyone hates it, but nobody says a word. People walking past hundreds of attendees that have been queuing for hours to be with their mates. Those already in the line should not encourage mates to find them. We all see it. It's unfair and just NOT ON! Get to the end of the queue like everyone else. How can this be enforced ? Well in festivals they have this and it usually works by you get a wristband when your ticket is scanned, then you just have to show your wristband to get in. The only problem with that is that it can be difficult for people to wear a wristband if they have a costume on, and equally some people might abuse it by saying "my wristband is under my costume".

Positives: - Variety of guests - High quality guests - SM Twitter - Too Tall's FAQ - Crew - Variety of stalls - YALC! The talks, signings and stalls were all great. - The book zone in general - VTs (I only got one but it worked out very well as I came back around 4pm and got my autograph within minutes). Negatives: - Overcrowding - Lack of information for queue - Sound quality of talks - Crew lack of knowledge/miss-communication (eg we were told to queue in the wrong place then asked to move) - Lack of organisation/signage - GoT surprise guest - Claustrophobic layout - Lack of seating - Women's toilets shut causing massive queue - Difficult to get food or water - Photoshoots only lasting a few seconds (guess this inevitable with big guests so not too worried about it.) Edit: forgot to say, thank you for putting this thread together!

I only met Lena and Summer but they were both super smiley and friendly, pretty impressive given how busy they were!

Think I might be one of the lowest spenders, lol.I got a £25 autograph and a £20 photoshoot. Came home with £20 left! Ran out of time to do anything else and was too overwhelmed to buy stuff from the stalls, though they looked awesome.

Thanks for this response Jason, I think it has cleared up some things but not all. Like others above have said, I'd really like an explanation for what went wrong with the GoT screening as many people are disappointed. I'd also like to know why the fire exits were closed, creating both a big safety issue and not making use of a good exit point - and also why the women's toilets were blocked off on one side. I think I spent longer queueing for the toilets than I did for the guests! Please consider guests with chronic illnesses etc for whom access to toilets, seating and water is even more important. I think only doing pre-ordered tickets for the Saturday is definitely a good idea. And yeah, e-tickets are the way forward. I've been to many festivals that had huge amounts of people and they use the system of e-tickets and wristbands, seems to work well. Put that together with some big signs telling people which queue to get in and it'll go smoother. But yes, a "bigger boat" is a good plan. Also I agree that is completely sensible to pre-order entry tickets, but I know some older people and people with kids who went to London because they wanted to get into the YALC. These were people who don't know about comic cons and all they had to go on was the website which said there were loads of entry tickets on the door.

I don't really mind if mods feel they have to delete stuff, it's their job after all. But I think most of us are just really worried that what we've said might not get passed on and the same issues could happen all over again. I'm hoping that once SM have recovered from the event that we'll get some responses. Also re: the comment above that the problems were mainly with people who wanted to meet Stan Lee, I don't think that's necessarily true. My friends and I weren't trying to meet him but we still suffered a lot from the overcrowding and queueing issues. I did have to miss out on a lot of what I wanted to do.

Thanks for this response, David!

Yeah, I mean if they'd said at the start that they were sorry but there was no surprise guest and/or they'd had to change who was appearing, I would have been totally fine with that. Instead we got the silly teasing of "the surprise guest is here and someone will meet him on stage" only for it to be a piñata! And I agree about the queue as well. We asked the staff around the area and they said to queue up inside, then a security guard came over and shouted at everyone to get out - I don't remember him being rude or anything but he seemed under the impression that all of us queuing were doing it against instructions when we'd actually been told to stand there.

Despite all the problems with the con, have to say YALC was the best bit for me! Loved the free swag stand, the beanbag area surrounded by books, the Waterstones stand, the book bloggers... Since it was so busy I only got one autograph from Patrick Ness but he was lovely, and I caught the last half of the fantasy talk which was fun and interesting.

I think it's unfair to say many of us are just trying to complain... I've said in posts about stuff I enjoyed, the YALC was a huge highlight and I was grateful to meet a couple of guests. But that doesn't solve all the huge safety issues with overcrowding or the smaller issues like the Game of Thrones talk not having a surprise guest as advertised. Personally I'd really just like some reassurance from SM that they know all of the problems and what steps they'll take to fix them. They did make an attempt but kind of upset everyone by implying it was "fiction" in the title. But honestly I never complain about anything and I hate the fact that on this occasion I really feel I have to. Would love to just say that it was brilliant and I really enjoyed the book zone and the volunteers were helpful to me, but that would be ignoring a huge part of my experience.

I could hear the guests but I couldn't really hear the episode at all, just putting the subtitles on would have easily fixed that. On the main site it still says "The surprise guest is not signing at all, not throughout the day and not after the screening." Well, they weren't lying...

I enjoyed the screening (though subtitles would have been nice) but I really would appreciate an explanation for why there wasn't a mystery guest. Even if it's just that they pulled out at the last minute. When the host said "it's Jack Gleeson!" it seemed like a lot of people cheered thinking that was actually true. But nope, just a piñata... which while funny, was really disappointing! I wonder if Jack Gleeson was really supposed to be the guest, it would make sense with the episode that was chosen.