The weather forecast promised lots of rain over the Easter weekend for Southern California. But the downpour on Saturday, March 30, had little to no effect on the fans gearing up for day two of WonderCon at the Anaheim Convention Center.
Parking filled up quickly at the convention center lots. After 11 a.m., Anaheim Police Department officers were directing attendees via loudspeaker to the nearby Toy Story Parking Area at the Disneyland Resort. Tourists were treated to the curious sight of umbrella-wielding Stormtroopers, high fantasy elves and Deadpools crossing Harbor Blvd.
See Also: See more WonderCon cosplay costumes from the fun-filled first day
Having booked a hotel stay, Josh Chavez and Courtney Baze of Whittier, and Courtney’s father Clint Baze, avoided dealing with the long parking lines. They were dressed in mashup cowboy costumes from the “Spider-verse,” and didn’t have any special preparations for the rain “other than bringing umbrellas,” said Chavez.
A look at the wet WonderCon in the Anaheim Convention Center on Saturday, March 30, 2024. (Photo by Diya Chacko)
“Rain absolutely would not stop us from coming to WonderCon,” he said. “Whenever the last convention ends, we start looking forward to the next.”
Normally, the area near the “Ocean Fountain” in front of the convention center is a favorite for staging photoshoots. WonderCon organizers planned ahead to make spaces inside the center available to cosplayers looking for backdrops, while not interfering with the flow of traffic on the floor and to the various panels scheduled for today.
Inside the panels
At the “It’s Alive! Designing Sci-Fi, Horror, and Drama Film and TV” panel, VFX supervisor Marshall Krasser was asked about a very different kind of rain. (Minor spoiler alert ahead!)
The panel discussions included those devoted to TV shows like “Euphoria” “9-1-1” and “The Fall of the House of Usher” at WonderCon in the Anaheim Convention Center on Saturday, March 30, 2024. (Photo by Diya Chacko)
The infamous acid rain shower party scene he and his team designed for the “Masque of the Red Death” episode of Mike Flanagan’s Netflix series, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” was the product of days of painstaking research in order for the effects to look as real as possible.
“I hope the government doesn’t monitor my internet history,” he joked. “I was doing a lot of searches on ‘how to burn a body with acid.’”
During the panel, Krasser, “Euphoria” sound editor Austin Roth, “Traitors” casting director Jazzy Collins, and other entertainment creatives discussed working behind the scenes of their shows, what they were attempting to accomplish with certain techniques and what inspired them to go into their various fields.
Seeing the original Star Wars movie when he was 15 years old changed his life, Krasser said.
“The ship flew over my head, and I could just feel the vibrations,” he said. “I knew then that was what I wanted to do.”
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