JACKSON – While Free Comic Book Day was observed recently, a rather “super” event predated it with the Super Jersey Comic Expo at the Dome at Adventure Crossing.
The two-day event drew thousands of fans with numerous comic book vendors, guests and even comic book royalty. Larry Lieber, the brother of late Marvel legend Stan Lee, came out of retirement on the second day of the show for an appearance and to sign his novel “Chirps.”
Event coordinator Paul Brown was thrilled that Lieber visited and held an exclusive panel. Lieber is a legendary Atlas/Marvel writer and co-creator of Iron Man, Thor, Ant-Man, and Groot. “Chirps” marked his first-ever book outside the comics world after 75 years in the field.
Superman himself was in attendance, in the form of actor Dean Cain who portrayed the man of steel in the 1990s ABC TV series “Lois & Clark.”
A cast of cosplayers strike a pose during Super Jersey Comic Expo held this year at the Dome at Adventure Crossing in Jackson Township. (Photo by Bob Vosseller)
This wasn’t Cain’s first visit to Jackson. He was the top guest at Garden State Comic Con several years ago that was held at Six Flags Great Adventure and he told The Jackson Times, “I went to college (in New Jersey) so even when I flew into Newark Airport that moment reminded me of the very first time. I flew in from California thinking will I be going to college here so it gives me at home vibes.”
When asked what he was up to the actor replied, “making tons of movies. I have a movie coming out June 6 called “Little Angels” that I produced, directed and starred in and I’m shooting three other movies between now and the end of September. I’m writing, producing, directing, acting and am doing a lot of everything. I could not be more busy so I happy as a clam.”
Cosplayers were in abundance at the event and one of them was Browns Mills resident Rick Fisher who sported a steampunk style costume. “My wife is here with me and she keeps me in tow. I don’t go to all shows in costume. This is the first one in this costume.”
“We did a small show in a town in Pennsylvania and he wore a costume for that,” his wife said.
A cast of cosplayers strike a pose during Super Jersey Comic Expo held this year at the Dome at Adventure Crossing in Jackson Township. (Photo by Bob Vosseller)
“I’m just browsing for comic books today,” Fisher added.
Even other cosplayers got excited to see the costumed Number 2 Pencil Man and wanted their photo with him. “I have my own comic book table and decided to step outside for some air,” Tanner Geesey of Harrisburg Pa. said.
Geesey said his character’s creation came from an embarrassing real-life event. “I sat on a pencil and that turned into a superhero origin story and two years after that I have a comic book.”
Other costumed characters included the 1966 TV series version of Batman, the film noir version of Spider-man, Wolverine, Jedi Knights from Star Wars, Power Rangers, Ghostbusters and many others who posed for photos with attendees and fellow cosplayers.
There were many independent comic book creators that were promoting their publications such as artist Rob Flanagan and writer Michael Sammartino of Middlesex County who created Techni-Gods.
“It originally started as a video game as it was a great idea for a game concept but we’re not coders so we couldn’t make the game,” Sammartino said.
Tanner Geesey of Harrisburg Pennsylvania portrays his own comic book creation, Number 2 Pencil Man outside of the Dome at Adventure Crossing in Jackson during Super Jersey Comic Expo (Photo by Bob Vosseller)
Flanagan added, “we talked to people in the industry and they figured we should move it to a different medium to promote the story so we came up with a comic book and we came up with the idea of telling the story of side characters and villains.”
He explained that the concept surrounds the idea of monsters and a secret society who know what to do when said monsters awaken. “This is about supernatural, horror and action but within our illuminati they have not fought these ‘Techni-Gods’ in so many centuries they are the status quo, the leaders of the world secretly when one awakens, they get their ass kicked.”
“We have a six-book arc with four books currently out. I am inking and water coloring the latest one now and after this when I get home I’ll be working on it,” the artist said.
He added, “we want to do a long single graphic novel after this one is done.” For more information on Techni-Gods visit technigods.com/comic.
The husband-and-wife team of Brion and Meg Koenig of the Midnight Monster Society had interesting things to sell if you were a horror fan. They were selling T-shirts, hats and footwear with various Universal Studios and more modern age monsters on them.
Cassidy Farley, her dad Chad Farley and Brian Van Noshrand of the Collectors Confessions podcast were part of the fun of the recently held Super Jersey Comic Expo held in Jackson Township. (Photo by Bob Vosseller)
“We have stickers, hoodies, shoes and leggings, bathing suits and my husband is the designer,” Meg Koenig remarked.
“I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now. I used to do mainly stickers. We rebranded to Midnight Monster Society in 2002,” Brion Koenig said.
Being horror fans Brion Koenig said his favorite fright films were “The Thing,” “Ghostbusters” and “Jurassic Park.” “I like a lot of video games as well that involve horror.”
Cassidy Farley, her dad Chad Farley and Brian Van Noshrand of the Collectors Confessions podcast were part of the fun of the show.
“Collectors Confessions features comic book collectors and those with all kinds of collections,” Chad Farley said.
The Ghostbusters made an appearance. (Photo by Bob Vosseller)
Van Noshrand said “we started as an audio podcast where we did horror films and we found ourselves talking more and more about comic books so we decided maybe talking about comic books is the way to go. Since comic books is a visual medium we went to YouTube to feature our podcast and we’ve been around for two years now and we’re approaching 4,000 subscribers.”
Brown who also does a podcast, noted the concept behind the show came from wanting to “build a true comic centric convention the likes of those we look up to such as Baltimore Comic-Con and Heroes Con in Charlotte.”
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