This past Sunday I was in Philadelphia to attend the Wizard World convention. I haven’t been to a Wizard World since 2015 when I met Stephen Amell and Katie Cassidy of Arrow. My convention experiences lately have been at Eternal Con and Heroes and Villains NY/NJ with some smaller shows sprinkled in. Philly drew me back this year with an appearance from Matt Ryan who is currently DCTV’s John Constantine. Ryan originated the role on NBC’s Constantine TV series then reprised the role in one of the few good episodes of Arrow Season 4 where he restores Sara Lance’s soul. This led to a voiceover role in the direct to DVD Justice League Dark and a more permanent return to the character for the latter half of Legends of Tomorrow’s 3rd season as well as a regular role for the forthcoming fourth season. Lastly, the CW Seed is running a Constantine animated series with Ryan voicing the role again. One of the other draws to Wizard World for me this year was another appearance from Charisma Carpenter, whom if you remember from past columns is a a major favorite of mine largely because of her role as Cordelia Chase in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer franchise. The celebrity side of things was pretty stacked with guests ranging from Charmed, Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings actors to Justice League castmembers Ray Fisher and Ezra Miller as well as Bucky himself- Sebastian Stan. The comic creators didn’t seem as prominent as they had been in years past and there were very few comic book vendors overall. That aspect of the show needs to strengthen itself again since it is technically a comic book convention. You could say I am a part of the problem with my own love of meeting the actors that portray the characters I adore which some would say leads conventions like this to shift their focus on comic books to media guests, but the majority of the special guests are genre related so there is a place for them as well though I don’t believe it should eclipse the vendors or creators like it seems to at certain shows.
Anyway- Matt Ryan is pretty awesome- I kind of knew that going in as I had met him very briefly at the screening for Justice League Dark that was done here in NYC about a year and a half ago. He was super nice and appreciative of his fans and I was able to get a picture with him, which he took himself. I congratulated him on his series regular gig for Legends and went on my way. Definitely recommend meeting him if you like Constantine and/or devilishly handsome men.
Charisma Carpenter’s line was less busy from the last time I saw her, but she has also been doing conventions longer and I went on a Sunday which is typically a quieter time anyway. Charisma is as beautiful as ever and though our interaction was brief, I was happy to see her and get a new shot for my collection. 
Briefly:
Two new Funko POPs will arrive this week with the release of Pickle Rick(no arms version) and the first Vertigo POP- Death! I think both should be very popular and they are also both Previews Exclusives- so they will be out on Wednesday.
Avengers: Infinty War Basic Wave 2 will be in. I won’t have a lot of these in stock because the shipment was split, so hopefully the remainder will be along soon. Figures in this series are: Gamora, Scarlet Witch, Dr Strange, Iron Spider, Falcon and repacks of Iron Man and Captain America. These are the less poseable figures that are geared towards kids but they should still be popular as quite a few of these characters were left out of the main Marvel Legends line. Series 1 figures still in stock include: Thor, Black Widow and Star-Lord along with a Rocket and Groot two pack.
That’s it for me this week!
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