welshcurly3

We thought the same but went for it. The pic comes out a lot better than it looks. The angle does make it. Read some comics off the table in sheldons spot!

Kevin Conroy! We at the right age now to get all our BTAS stuff signed!

You're missing the point autograph wise..You could easily get autographs from the non-diamond pass guests as most of them had open queues, so a gold pass didn't give you any help there and for diamond pass guests you needed a VQ ticket, again no gold pass help there. So the gold pass has become pretty useless for the autograph collectors. For photoshoots the same thing. Yeah, you go in first, but if you buy your photoshoots quick enough, which is now extra easy with Etickets being sold, you'll get batch 1 tickets, who go straight after the golds, so you won't be waiting that much longer either. Goodie bag had a few old trinkets, Chill out room consists of a few tables, chairs, sweets and water and was closed during talks, photoshoot vouchers were handy thanks to the last minute rule change, but autograph vouchers were useless. So no, I didn't think I got value for money on the gold pass this year, unlike last year when that pass actually helped with the biggest guests. So I hope next year improvements will be made to make that pass worth it again. But with a gold pass you can join any queue depending on your movement (unless the guest is doing something else). You can dictate your plan without worrying about what VQ number's are being called etc. You can plan on your terms. I accept your point about the biggest guests from a collector's point of view. Would the collector be doing this for personal financial gain or just another name for his collection? The genuine fans of that guest should come first. I suppose your hinting at what is the definition of a "big guest"? With the greatest respect to Bill Paxton I would imagine there are only some DIE hard fans out there that thought a Diamond Pass was a must. Previous years with a Gold you could join his queue anytime (and perhaps only paid £45 for his autograph). I get it and accept it but that is just one guest out of how many? Of course it has been mentioned before in the forum the cost of the diamond pass enables these names to come. I personally have no interest in Robert Englund (no disrespect) and would be very disappointed if I found the gold pass price has increased to cover all triple A names. Least this way its fair and flexible to cater for all tastes which is key.

I don't understand this hate being generated for the gold pass. The argument is that I have spent £225 on a gold pass and someone else has spent £x on a day/weekend pass. Both people have a chance of getting a VQ ticket for a Diamond guest. So what is the point in spending £225? If you are going to an event just for that one person then yes a gold pass is not for you. I am under the distinct impression that the people who are complaining are those that genuinely collect autographs. A diamond guest is going to be someone that has an aura, someone whose work means a lot to many people. In this case legends relating to BTTF and Aliens. Surely you buy a pass to meet that person because you simply have too. Only the individual can describe what that means to them, regardless they will feel the price tag totally justifiable. My point is the idea is not to buy a diamond pass just because they are a big name guest. The gold pass enables you to meet these people after the priority is given to those who believe its something off their bucket list (so to speak). I was a gold pass holder and did not buy any diamond passes. This was a complete mistake on my part. Honestly what put me off was the comic gold/comic silver/gold passes/silver pass fiasco last year. It was very confusing and I thought the Diamond could have been of the same ilk. How wrong was I and Showmaster's put together an excellent package. When the guests were announced I just had to buy photo shoots with MJF (in delorean) and Sigourney with the power loader. I had to buy the BTTF reunion and Aliens talk tickets. I went straight away to get VQ tickets upon (10 min early) entry and because of my Gold Pass I had autograph's for Christopher Lloyd on the Friday and Sigourney on the Sunday. It was my decision to chance autograph's by using the gold pass as I felt this was less of a priority than the photo shoots. I knew MJF would be out of the question for obvious reasons. It is going to be a life long regret not going to his talk. The gold pass made the above stress free and enjoyable and arguably that can only be achieved with a gold pass. Every other benefit of the gold pass existed throughout the event. I am afraid the price point argument is irrelevant. Im sorry but that's life. When money was tight for me I simply couldn't entertain the idea of even looking at events like this. Bills came first and I simply watched taped BTTF and Aliens instead. Fans save their money for this. And as for rocking up at noon, walking straight to Ms Weaver to get an autograph simply because I have a gold pass, the name and the event is too big for that.

Excellent summary I am still pumped from the weekend and have to be cheeky, any rough idea when tickets go on sale for next year

Does anyone know if there is anything from the weekend going to be part of the special features? I looked through the amazon listing but couldn't see anything.

I agree with you on this. People should have a lot more respect for others. The trouble is if you speak up and make a fuss often you are seen as the bad guy just for simply creating a scene. Its an awful smell and the smoke clings to your face and clothes. Again its common sense.

I thoroughly enjoyed my weekend, thank you for helping me meet these inspiration people. It was an honour to meet Sigourney and Michael J Fox. The talks/stalls/cos play area - all fantastic. I had a gold pass and deeply regret not buying some diamond. The staircase was a nuisance, I tweeted a pic. But Kudos to you, this was actively managed from about Saturday 2 pm. I was on floor 3 in the lift queue and as if by magic the stairs queue just marched on down stairs. I would like to think that this was social media working to your advantage but understand why the post was deleted. I wanted to leave some feedback on two areas which showmasters made a mistake rather than clearly being caught out by events on the day. 1.)Friday gold pass queue. We were right at the front of the gold pass queue having got there about 9.30. There were four of us there, including my wife (I was the one in glasses). We scouted the arena Thursday night and knew exactly where we should queue. We were confused because we were expecting a sign stuck on the door saying "Gold queue". There was a notice for the "main Queue". We entered reception to ask and they informed us we were in the correct place. We indirectly created the YALC/Gold queue because people came to us to ask "is this the YALC line?" We genuinely didn't know so people hovered around and before you knew it "we don't know" snowballed into "i think so". Showmasters should not have put us in that position. 2.)The Back to the future cast reunion talk. First of all those people who refused to leave the previous talk were an utter disgrace. If there is a way to ban these please explore it as this had the potential to ruin the centerpiece event for everyone. In hindsight perhaps it wasn't such a hot idea to plan a show before hand as you knew 1500+ people were going to swamp the hall. Regardless I did tweet Saturday night asking for instructions (i think it was deleted) as common sense dictates not everyone can queue in that little space outside the main hall. I queued for the voyager talk and asked the crew "where do Gold passes queue?" They informed me where to go exactly. When we got to the west entrance the security guard asked us to queue (entrance facing) left of the doors. All of this info you knew and didn't pass on in some form. Thats it! I also wanted to leave some feedback that is based on my personal perception. It may be a PR disaster in being firm with people but I really don't think Showmasters should shy away from helping create a culture of PLAN PLAN PLAN attendance of these events. The days of paying a premium rocking up early morning, simply walking in and get what you want are GONE. A lot of people moan about the length of queues etc. Too bad, tough, what do you expect? I don't think there is any malice in warning people before hand that this will be a busy show where queues can be very long. Fans have seen the photos of SDCC and the overnight camping! I was in the Albion Saturday evening and people were clearly expecting to rock up get a selfie with a triple A-name, post it on twitter and leave. Unbelievable. I thought a lot of people overloaded their schedule. The argument that it was too difficult to get from A to B so I missed photo x doesn't wash with me. Its the biggest event of its ilk in Europe, what do you expect? I allowed myself 30 mins to get to to the Aliens talk and 30 mins before the MJF delorean shoot and experienced no difficulties. PLAN PLAN PLAN. Get to that area and then look around at the stalls etc WITHOUT getting in the way of the blue crew calling out Diamond/gold/batches etc. Perhaps more space was required, showmasters can see their photo sales numbers. Perhaps say split a major photo shoot up so batch 1 will be 3.00, batch 2, 3.10 and so forth. The individual will be instructed to come as part of batch 2 at 3.10pm as per the printed ticket. Photo shoots can be bought any time now (remember the queues at the sales desk last year). Pre-book "priorities" and get the "others" on the day depending on your schedule. This is the approach I took and it worked a treat. I wanted to meet Alien/BTTF/Star Trek and I could see that Game of thrones was going to be a struggle so I had to drop it. The dates of this were published what 11/12 months ago? I knew I would have to book at least three days off work to attend and did so. I knew I had to book a hotel, be up at 5.30 each morning, seek problems I had in the schedule and deal with them (just like the reunion talk above). PLAN PLAN PLAN. I understand in some circumstances people can't genuinely attend a day, something comes up,But that is not Showmaster's responsibility. Most people had 3 or 4 photo shoots (i'm unsure of MJF)? Plan around that surely, especially if you had a gold pass. My experience is that the crew are very accommodating. PLAN PLAN PLAN. All the info is in the public domain. Gold passes - excellent - Do not change a thing. Gold room was great, fantastic. (getting out of the room for what an hour for BTTF reunion talk was common sense - perhaps a note up before hand though). We saved for our tickets and bought ours Oct 14. Everybody else could have too. It is a lot of money. But everybody in the queue saved up for those, some openly admitting sacrificing other purchases in order to do so. You buy without knowing who the guests are but this is the case with every major event. It shows who wants it more and quite rightly gives the fans basically first pick. My perception may seem harsh. But my point is I studied the forums and the schedule's before hand and I got a hell of a lot out of this weekend. My timetable was in my back pocket all the time. Yes, I was confused by the layout and at times quite stressed but that is my experience of every major event I have attended. It's the flock of sheep mentality of people. Once again, thankyou :)