While we were standing in line two hours before the convention hall opens, I noticed people with the Friday On Site Newsletter, which contains details of the day's events as well as any last-minute changes/additions. I decided to leave the line (and my friends) and go look for a schedule. Once I found the schedule, I read that various celebrities were going to sign autographs after their panels but the only way to get that opportunity is to find Comic-Con workers who were carrying bags of raffle tickets and the way to win is by blindly drawing a winning ticket from the bag. (Note: access to autograph signings have become increasingly difficult at the Con due to its popularity. And even though the random ticket method is flawed, at least its a definite way of knowing if you get an autograph or not) So I was fortunate enough to draw a ticket for David Boreanaz, mostly known for his role as Angel in the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel. My wife is a huge fan of Buffy and of its actors, so I gave her my wrist band that entitles you to the meet & greet. Obviously I got bonus points for that. :) But my fortune doesn't end there. I was fortunate enough to find the line of people who were drawing to win autographs from Natalie Portman. She's making an appearance for her next film, V for Vendetta. And I was even luckier to be able to draw a winning ticket. Yes! I was so excited and I couldn't believe it. Apparently there were only 100 winning tickets and by the time I got in line and won, I got the third-to-last winning ticket. Unbelievable.

I was able to catch up to my friends and get my seat in Hall H, which was filling up quickly. The first presentation was by Warner Bros and they started with V and brought out Natalie Portman, producer Joel Silver and original graphic novel co-creator David Lloyd. They showed a trailer of the movie and then began Q&A. Not surprisingly, most questions were directed towards Natalie. I stayed for a few minutes but had to leave to get in line for the autograph signing. I missed the presentations for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire which my friends said was really good and they had a Comic-Con exclusive look at movie footage. The crowd really responded to that. I also missed Tim Burton's Corpse Bride but missing these wasn't a difficult decision in comparison to meeting Natalie in person. I did make it in time to catch part of The Fountain with Rachel Weisz.

Meeting Natalie Portman was MY HIGHLIGHT of this year's Comic-Con. She was very nice and friendly as you hope she would be. She offered her hand to everybody as they walked up to her and shook their hands. She talked to everybody and was full of laughs and smiles. Unfortunately they did not allow photographs and there was quite a bit of security around. When it got to be my chance to meet her, we shook hands and I immediately said how incredible it was to meet her and that she has been so nice to everybody. She was thankful and responded that everybody has been so nice to her thus far. I also mentioned how I liked her "totally unique" moment that someone asked her to do in the panel, which was a reference to a scene her character, Sam, does in Garden State. She laughed about it and didn't feel so unique about it since the moment she did was quite similar to the one in the movie. I said that was ok because I liked seeing her do it. I also asked her if she was doing anything for Star Wars that day because it was also "Star Wars Day" at the Con. She said yes, and that she was going to do a photo session for Star Wars but had to leave in the early afternoon to catch a flight. I also asked her about any word on doing another Professional and she responded that she would like to do another movie but its only internet rumors that it will happen. She even asked the director, Luc Besson, but he told her that there are no plans to doing a sequel. Natalie said that maybe its good that she doesn't do it because expectations would be so high. I agreed with her and said you would probably want the audience to keep wanting more. And she also agreed with that statement. We had paused somewhere in our conversation so she could sign my print (pic) and asked me for my name. We had exchanged a few more words and I told her it was nice to meet her. Then I moved on to David Lloyd and he signed a mini-poster for V for Vendetta. I also shook his hand and we talked for a bit about the movie and how great the trailer was and how excited we both are about the movie. And then I left the room. Ah, what a great few minutes that was...I could have gone home and missed the rest of the Con and that would have been alright with me.

The next panel was called "Trailer Park" which is just where the Con plays movie trailers one after another for about 30 minutes. There were a few brand new trailers for movies we've haven't seen yet and some movies had new versions of trailers. A movie that I particularly liked was Domino, starring Keira Knightley. Its loosely based on the life of Domino Harvey, who I just found outtragically died last month.

The Sony panel was next and it featured Zathura. It was written by Chris Van Allsburg, the author of Jumanji, so when people first see this trailer they'll think that this movie is like Jumani In Space. The director of the movie, Jon Favreau, came for this panel. He brought along a brand new trailer and a clip from the movie and did a Q&A session. It was interesting to see and hear Jon talk about himself and his work. He explained how Hollywood is fickle and how he does work of what Hollywood wants him to do at the moment. After the recent success of directing Elf, he has been given directing roles. When he was younger and was acting in Rudy, he got a lot of acting parts. After Swingers he was pursued to write scripts. I found a new respect for him as an artist after that, and not just associating him with Vince Vaughn. The next Sony movie was The Legend of Zorro. The trailer was the only thing shown and nobody came for it, so the most entertaining part was when the trailer was first played, it was at 2x speed, so not only was the video fast but the audio was as well, and we ended up watching the Alvin and the Chipmunks version of the trailer. Very funny. It was replayed at normal speed.

The Disney Panel was next and presented the new Pixar/Disney film, Cars. Various Pixar animators involved in the movie came to talk about the movie and also talked about the 10th anniverary of Toy Story and its new DVD. The first in-house Disney CGI feature film, Chicken Little was presented as well with an short clip and a Comic-Con exclusive trailer. The most entertaining part, however, was the presentation of Sky High and one of its stars (and Comic-Con favorite) Bruce Campbell, along with director Mike Mitchell and screenwriter Paul Hernandez. Many Q&A questions were directed towards Bruce and he was very funny and the audience loved him. He even threw money out to the crowd at one point. He "paid out" the panel for saying Bruce was their favorite person they worked with on the film, and the crowd got into, yelling his name and he responded by throwing a bill at the audience.

The last panel of the day was the "Lucasfilm: Star Wars Spectacular. Steve Sansweet was the speaker and talked a little about Revenge of the Sith and also about upcoming projects to be released by the various Lucas divisions. The panel was more of a commercial for "Star WarsIs Forever" and a recruitment session, as Sansweet presented a video on the new consolidated Presidio campus, the Letterman Digital Arts Center, in San Francisco for Lucas' various divisions, and they hope to hire more than 300 people to staff various jobs, such as video games and TV projects. Its an impressive campus, for sure, but I was expecting something more spectacular at this presentation. They played a deleted scene from Episode III, and that was cool, as it was another scene that tied the first-released trilogy to the one just completed, and made the story a little more complete. There were also video montages on the international release of Episode III, and of the Celebration III held in Indianapolis. It was all very interesting, for a Star Wars fan, but for someone like my wife, who isn't as big as a fan as I am, wouldn't find it too interesting. Fortunately for her, she wasn't there and she got to go meet David Boreanaz.

And there went Friday at Comic-Con. Quite a day of upcoming movies, but that wasn't even half of it, or even the best of the Con....well except for Natalie Portman.

Here's pictures from Friday at the Con. Big thanks to our friend, James, for providing lots of these pics with his new digital SLR camera.