The Portland Horror Podcast Massacre
Three Portland horror trivia hosts discuss horror movies.
The Portland Horror Podcast Massacre
Episode 004 - Takeaways from Crypticon 2026
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Our hosts spent the weekend in Seattle at Crypticon 2026. Before driving home, Jeff, Heather and Willy took some time to reflect on their experience as panelists and panel moderators, the infamous 13th floor, and what makes this horror convention special.
Written and hosted by Heather Alexander, Jeff Dean and Willy Greer.
Music composed by Willy Greer and performed by Portland band Hemogoblin.
Produced and edited by Botch the Crab.
Recorded entirely on location in Portland, Oregon.
Welcome to the Portland Horror Podcast Massacre. My name is Jeff. I am joined by my two wonderful co-hosts.
SPEAKER_03Heather Alexander and Willie Greer.
SPEAKER_01And this is a podcast dealing with the horror genre from the perspective of three very different horror nerds. We are in a different environment today. We are at Crypticon Seattle 2026, sitting in a hotel room, um, feeling wonderful after two nights of uh debauchery. Jeff, can you keep it down, please?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I definitely haven't been resurrected yet.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so basically we're just gonna have a freewheeling conversation kind of about the convention and uh what we've experienced. Uh, we've all been on numerous panels this weekend. So um, yeah, does anybody want to talk about uh Friday night, like the panels they were on?
SPEAKER_02Um, I fortunately had a few hours to kind of get warmed up. Uh I think it wasn't until six or so that I had my first panel, but I did hit the ground running with uh Philosophy of Horror, which was uh moderated by a longtime friend of mine, Dan Gildark, uh Seattle filmmaker, uh very dear, wonderful person, and he took his assignments very seriously. He fucking worked up these like PowerPoint decks to go through all these different facets, and we went deep into various people like Noel Carroll's philosophy of horror, and we added our own takes. Um it was me, Gildark, and Brian Gorham, and it was a very, very spirited discussion. Um in in general, I think like we always I well, and by we I mean me, I guess, can only speak for myself, kind of the first ten minutes are always usually a little bit awkward, but there was a flow going uh in a very short time, and the audience was very engaged. It kind of just became like a discussion rolling around the room, and this was a theme that popped up numerous times over the weekend, like getting to the very end and being like, Fuck, I wish we had another hour. We were just like we're just getting cooking.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um, which I guess is good. It's better than to end on a on a fart, just always leave them wanting more, I guess.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I I've noticed like when being on panels, there's a certain vibe between the panelists and then also the audience, and you can kind of pick up on that with usually within the first 10 or 15 minutes. Um I was lucky, like all the panels I was on this weekend, I just felt really good, and it seemed like there was a lot of um connectivity with the audience, and they seemed enthused and um entertained. Um but I've had previous years where it just kind of feels like everything everybody is saying is just kind of like dropping like a rock or something. It's like people are just kind of staring at you blank faced. So but this weekend was yeah, I thought everything went well, at least for me on all the panels.
SPEAKER_02Oh, definitely. Immediately after Philosophy of Horror, we we jumped into uh mental disorders in horror, which um I mean I'm an armchair analyst at best, but I've done a lot of research into Jungian psychology, and my input was mostly films that are allegorical for mental illnesses rather than a clinical depiction. But there were a few that I thought of, and fortunately my wife is a therapist, so she was a great sounding board, and uh she was really enjoying it, so we were nerding the fuck out about like Does any Wilkes have borderline? Oh, yeah, totally. Um so yeah, kind of the two in a row, just like heavy, deep topics, and um that was moderated by a newcomer, Scarlett Celestino, and she killed it. And I always love it watching uh you know a new panelist um pop their cherry, hit the ground running, especially if they're moderating. It's a beautiful thing to watch them go, oh hey, I can do this.
SPEAKER_03I should get you a copy. I think it's I think it's called Monsters on the Couch, and it's essentially um analyzing movie monsters and what kind of affliction, mental affliction they have. Um I would love to read that. Yeah. I'll get you a copy. Uh yeah, my panel on Friday was a softball, it was uh comfort horror, which was the easiest uh panel that I had. I didn't really have to do much. You didn't have to do any prep. Yeah, and I actually saved prep for uh my Adam and I have been in Seattle since Tuesday, um, because we came to Seattle to see a couple of concerts, we saw Halloween, uh, and then we the next day we saw Queens of the Stone Age. And so we've been here for a while, and I did uh prep for that panel on um Thursday while we were at the hotel. Um and I'm grateful for that because my other well, two other of my panels were a beast. Um and then yeah, so it went well. I I didn't get the um audience experiences like you two did. You know, ever all the audiences were great, but they were barely interactive, so yeah.
SPEAKER_01And that that was Friday night. Yeah, but you felt that way for all of them this weekend.
SPEAKER_03Pretty much, yeah. Um there was some good discussion at the end of um the witchcraft one, I think. But yeah, it wasn't like I don't know, it wasn't spirited, it wasn't but I I only gave them about like ten minutes, you know, at the end and there wasn't a lot of conversation happening during the panel.
SPEAKER_01So I was sitting in on your uh witchy uh w woman panel, and I thought like everybody the audience was like really engaged. Yeah. Because you were really kind of it was like a very kind of scholarly panel where you're going through the different eras uh of um feminism. So I think people were really, you know, kind of engaged and listening to what like they're learning something. Like certain panels, like the one I did, like, hey, I liked it, it's more like you bring up a title and people are like, oh, you know, yeah and so it's a different type of.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and I I mean I liked the the scholarly uh aspect of of the two that the two my two panels that were um really difficult, but I d also missed the the kind of fun and camaraderie of the kind of panels that you were on um this year, so I might try to mix it up a little bit next year and make sure that I have some.
SPEAKER_01I thought last year that when we did um the movies that made me, that was fun, right? Because I think the audience was you know kind of.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I'd like to figure out something for the three of us to do next year that would be similar to that.
SPEAKER_01Um one thing and this is like a a real kind of art form, I think, is like scheduling certain panels for a certain type of or time of day. Like I think the scholarly panels are better early afternoon and the more spirited ones in the evening. Yeah, later in the evening. I I just think that that would because sometimes, you know, by the time it's like eight or nine o'clock, you're like, I am tired. Oh yeah, you know, I don't want to lecture.
SPEAKER_03You didn't have any panels on Friday, right?
SPEAKER_01I had zero on on Friday. I listened to uh sat in on one of Willie's and uh yeah, one of yours, and then we went up to the 13th floor and kind of hung out for a little while.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. What were your panels on Saturday?
SPEAKER_01Saturday I had the uh Hey I Liked It, which is basically another um I explained it as like to the audience of like let's say you're you know, like this weekend you're sitting around with a bunch of friends and people are talking about a movie and um everybody else is like, oh god, that was horrible. That was awful. What an abomination to cinema, and you're like, Hey, I like it.
SPEAKER_02AKA the conversation Heather and I have every fucking week. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03This is the conversation I have with everybody because I like garbage, and people are you know very strict on the card.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so that was fun, and then uh yeah, there was like uh four other panelists, and everybody had really wild um you know movies that they like, of course, and then the audience kind of chimed in with some movies too at the end. So that was like really, really a lot of fun. And then Willie and I after that were on the uh Frankenstein on film panel, which I thought went really, really well too.
SPEAKER_02Super, super fun. A little bit underattended. I think we were in competition with like a terrifier panel. And this this weekend, yeah. This weekend belonged to Art the Clown.
SPEAKER_03It was, it was dominated by that fucking clown.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, he was here. Uh what is it, David Thornton? Howard Thornton, Howard Thornton, and then a couple of other cast members from the series were there, and uh, I know his line in for the autographs and pictures were it was never less than a hundred people. Yeah, the ton of that, and a lot of the t-shirt t-shirts and uh um costumes I saw were all terrifier inspired, it seemed like.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03That's what all the kids like. I know. Oh my god. I mean they're they're fine movies, but I I don't the fandom around it's bizarre.
SPEAKER_02Um I I don't vibe with them at all, but but I you know, I sub I support the fandom. Sure. Y'all do, y'all. Yeah. I'm old. I'm too old for these movies, I think.
SPEAKER_03Um my panel, I think my first panel on Saturday was a panel that I created called Stay Scared, The Science of Fear, and so it was broken up into um different aspects of fear. So you've got the primal, primal fear, the lizard brain, um, and you know, the science of that and how that works in horror, and then going on to um political and socio uh sociological horrors um and how you know the current climate affects what we think is scary, and then um examining childhood fears and how those stick with us throughout the years and how that influences what we think is scary as adults, and then uh we didn't get to the filmmaking techniques, um, uh how filmmakers essentially try to bypass the lizard brain or bypass the um our conscious brain to our lizard brain so that the fear that scares and fear is more effective in filmmaking. Because we were running short on time, so we didn't get to that, and then just examining the um the the epigenetics, which is essentially um a a different expression of a gene that you have that basically changes how you perceive and experience. So the fact that like if you are so submersed in horror all the time that it actually can rewrite your genes so that you you become a horror fan or you become a fan of what you're doing and what you're immersed in. It was fascinating. Um so I read this book called Um Oh God, I forget.
SPEAKER_01You can we'll find it and you can look for it in the show notes.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Um it's been a long week. Uh anyways, I read this book um about the science of fear and horror, uh, which was really uh fascinating. And so yeah, that panel, it was just like me essentially like talking about all of this stuff that I read and talking to the panelists, and so it was less interactive with the audience than I would have liked, but I always felt like I was short on time.
SPEAKER_01And that was going on the exact same time that we were doing the hey, I liked it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and I feel like I uh we had about maybe 25 people in my panel, in that panel. Um, and when I went to go shut the doors to get started, it was like standing room only in your like there was like a line out your panel to like peep for people to get in. I was like, fuck, I can't compete with them. Because it it's just more fun, you know, and it's it's less like, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um yeah, and then the third panel I had um was Let's Talk Kaiju 2, which was you know Kaiju movies. Um and uh it was me and Gretchen Brooks was on the panel, and we had John uh Portanova and uh Justin, who was a new panelist. Um he was really good. Everybody was really good on the panel, but I noticed like I see the exact same faces every year, like the same people who were there last year who were there this year. Because I I know like kaiju movies is a very kind of niche.
SPEAKER_03You mean the audience?
SPEAKER_01Audience, yeah, yeah. I recognize like all the same people who were there last year.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So that's cool.
SPEAKER_02We all have our fetishes, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. What were you on? What was your panel on Saturday?
SPEAKER_02Uh let's see. Uh I kicked things off. God, memory it was so long ago. Um I think, yeah, uh around five, we did uh I uh for the last four years, I think I've done uh a lecture basically called uh psychological archetypes of the movie monster, which is uh a very, very short, compacted version of material that is uh also a book that I'm working on and that I also hope to turn into a college course uh pretty soon in the future here.
SPEAKER_03Um that would be amazing.
SPEAKER_02I would love, love, love to have.
SPEAKER_03Can I take that course? Do I have to go to school?
SPEAKER_02Um I would love to have you. Thanks. Um yeah. Um so this year I got I got paired up with uh a panelist named Lily Munn and uh found out that she's um a horror nerd after my own heart. She's also very into Jungian archetypes and uh the Jungian approach to horror. Um and I will admit that when I first heard about that, I I got a little bit territorial. I was like, hey, is someone bucking for my job here? What's going on? Um, but we did kind of reach out and communicate what we wanted to talk about ahead of time, and we spent a little bit of time with um kind of a model of of uh character archetypes that she had, and then I kind of presented the model that I'm working on, and it was really great back and forth. I think we both kind of inspired each other and pointed out, you know, where we could both explore and improve our own models a little bit. So I think this is gonna be the start of a beautiful creative friendship.
SPEAKER_03That's awesome. Totally. That's really awesome.
SPEAKER_02That's the kind of thing that happens all the time here at CryptoCon. It's why I think Jeff and I have been coming since 2010, you know. It is comparatively a very small convention, but that really allows for a lot more intimacy and interaction between everybody. Yeah. And yeah, it just gets more magical every year. I think not to be too much of a hippie about it, but yeah, there's kind of a hippie vibe here. I don't know.
SPEAKER_01It's it's very warm and fuzzy.
SPEAKER_02It's true.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's not like there's so many cons um that are kind of they just feel super corporate. It's like, you know, they just want to shuffle people in and out like cattle for pictures and autographs and this and that. And there are panels, but uh not nearly. I mean, CryptoCon has so many panels.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think it it feels panel forward in a way, you know.
SPEAKER_01Um and I think like the celebrity experience here um is totally different than like the other cons because they're like edit table in a room. There's not a lot of handlers, like, oh, don't take a picture, don't do this, don't do that. Um, and especially if you come like on a Friday night or a Sunday, which are not the busiest day, like Saturday, um, you can go up and have a conversation like like last year you did um with Rye Barrett, right?
SPEAKER_03Oh my god, yeah. I just like walked up to Johnny from In a Violent Nature and I was like, Hey, you're cool. And we had a really awesome conversation about the movie and kind of behind the scenes look at his experience, and we talked about horror trivia, and um yeah, I was just like, Can we be friends?
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And he said yes.
SPEAKER_01Um Yeah, I would say anybody who's in the Pacific Northwest and you've been thinking about coming to Crypticon, do it. It's it's fun.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um, so yeah, uh, where was I? Uh I think after Archetypes, we did um a horror trivia, which we can talk about later. Uh, and then closed out the night with another uh super deep, super nerdy Dan Gildark special, uh O'Neyric, the power of dream state in horror films, which we did with Brian Callahan. And that was super fucking fun. Uh going through you know all the obvious ones uh from uh uh Un Shin and Delou to uh Murnau and uh Carl Dyer's uh Vampire, and then moving into Maya Darren, David Lynch, Gaspar Noe. Um super super fun, and that stuff is totally my jam.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Was that pretty well attended and like uh pretty good? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, probably uh again to uh to your to your point, we probably should have those kind of panels a little earlier in the day.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, because that was like eight or nine. Yes.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. But the people who were there were very into it, so I'll take I'll take quality over quantity, I suppose.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. One of my panels um after the Stay Scared panel, I did a low budget panel, which was um again, pretty easy research. Uh and we just talked about low budget horror films um and what makes horror fans love them and what makes the genre really susceptible um to embrace low budget movies when you know that kind of thing isn't really acceptable in any other genre really. Um and then the I think the panel that I prepped most for was the the um witches in feminism um panel. That fucking beast took up like three weeks of my life in April. Um I wish to God I could have been there for that one.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I thought you you did a great job on that.
SPEAKER_03Thank you. Yeah, it was essentially um, and again, I I referenced heavily um a book that I I kind of stumbled upon um before I started my research, uh, that was perfect, and it was literally um, which is uh the phases of feminism in horror movies, and I was like, what the fuck? This move this book is amazing. And again, I forget the title, I can um update the notes with that. But uh yeah, so essentially the panel is um examining each wave of feminism, um, how the image of the witch uh was portrayed during that phase of feminism um in culture and and in movie horror movies, and how that evolved with each phase of feminism um to where we are now, which you know you go from kind of like the fabled hag to um the sexy, dangerous um, you know, coven witch, and then the rebellious um you know, normal is not the way kind of witch, and then now the rage witch. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01The book is that very witch, fear, feminism, and the American witch.
SPEAKER_03Yes. Phenomenal book.
SPEAKER_02Um I'm a hundred percent that witch. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Uh yeah, and then we did trivia, right? And that was great.
SPEAKER_01Well-oiled machine we are now.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, no doubt. We're like, everybody sit down and shut up.
SPEAKER_01Because we only have an hour to do it um up here, and uh there's only three rounds instead of four, but you know, we're getting teams in and settled and team names and all that stuff. Sometimes it takes 10-15 minutes before you even start ans asking your first question. But you know, I thought last night we were done, right? Like at 6 59. Yeah. Right before before they have something else going on up there. But yeah, it was fun. Seems like everybody enjoyed the hell out of it, you know.
SPEAKER_03So did you guys go into the celebrity area um and meet anybody?
SPEAKER_01Oh, in the VIP section?
SPEAKER_03No, not in the VIP section. Um down in the the hall. Like you know Adrian. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01I just I just stalked, you know, kind of Googled them. Yeah, but I did not um I did not get any any autographs, but yeah.
SPEAKER_03I really I want to just stand in front of Adrian Barbeau's table and just stare lovingly at her. I don't want to pay$90 to like, you know, meet her, but I I love her so much.
SPEAKER_01I remember like um was it last year or the year before, on a Sunday, Joe Dante was here and he didn't have anybody at his table. Yeah. So I'm just like, I'm just gonna go up and say how much I liked his movies and shake his hand and stuff. And he was like totally like that's the nice thing. You like they don't feel like, oh, you have to buy something.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I know, but they're here to get paid.
SPEAKER_01Well I think like okay if you're not in competition where somebody's waiting in line for something, but like at least with Joe Dante, it's like nobody was there. So I was like, I'm just gonna go up and talk to him for a minute.
SPEAKER_03I mean that's what I did with Rye Barrett, and I I didn't feel as bad because he was kind of new to the scene, you know, and everybody was at Joe Bob's table at that point and he looked all lonely and needed a friend. Which I would have if Josh Rubin had showed up, he uh Josh Rubin was uh supposed to be Josh Rubin was supposed to be at the convention and had to cancel um because of work and I it broke my little heart because I love him so much and I would have just sat at his feet and looked up at him lovingly. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Well but now you don't now you don't have to deal with the restraining order, so it probably worked out for the best.
SPEAKER_03It's true. No jail.
SPEAKER_02Which is why I didn't approach Emily Perkins' table.
SPEAKER_01I was like, Yeah, like other than like we had mentioned the uh terrifier uh cast is here, but like Adrian Barbo, like uh Heather mentioned, Tom Atkins is here, Emily Perkins. Um yeah, some good guests.
SPEAKER_03Some people from Freddie versus Jason.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. Some of the the stars of that. And uh Nathan Basil from Behind the Mask. Oh, yeah, yeah, because they just announced the uh um sequel. Finally, thank God. Yeah, to them 20 years later.
SPEAKER_02I guess I guess we're still in the crowdfunding phase, so I shouldn't I should fingers crossed.
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01But yeah, our friend uh Bob Foster, um, who's a panelist here and a part of the Ghostbusters uh group, he got uh one of the Halloween three, the skull mask, signed by Tom Atkins. That's so fucking cool. Yeah, it was like really he was sitting behind us at OnePale and he brought it in there. I was like, oh, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_03That's awesome. Um so speaking of celebrity um interactions, uh last night at the on the 13th floor, um, so the 13th floor, for those of you not in the know, um CryptoCon has kind of a an after our hours party floor that if you're if you have a ticket um to the con, you can get up to. Uh and it's just essentially people from the con, you know, drinking and getting weird. Um there's all these different rooms, uh themed rooms, there's karaoke. Uh it's pretty fun. So last night uh I went up there and we're hanging out, and I walked over and saw Matt Dinneman, uh, who is the author for the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. And I had met him before, before he was before he blew up in fame. I met him two years ago. Um, and he was at a little table with all of his books and nobody was around him, and he and I walked up to him and I was like, Hey, I work for Powell's, and like you people love you at Powell's and like, you know, whatever. And he's like, Oh, that's good. Because he the hardcovers hadn't been published yet. He still was like independently publishing his his soft covers. Um So yeah, he was kind of like a under the radar author, and now he's the biggest fucking thing ever.
SPEAKER_01Well, I saw he had the second biggest line after Art the Clinton.
SPEAKER_03I know. He is so fucking famous right now. So I saw him up there and I was like, oh my god. And so I was introduced to him and we chatted for a little bit, and then um, and then uh a local author Clay said had told me earlier that Philip Farcasi was gonna be here, who is also a horror author that is huge. I mean, he when I was talking to Philip, he was like, I'm nobody, and I was like, that's crazy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I sat I had a beer with him yesterday in the bar.
SPEAKER_03Are you serious?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, Gretchen and Kelly know him. Okay, so he sat down and I was like, That's Philip Farkassi. And he's like, Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so I talked to him. Yeah, he was totally cool.
SPEAKER_03I talked to him for a while, and yeah, he had this like very uh humble complex of just like I I write books, but nobody knows who I am. And I was like, that's insane. People know who you are.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, he was uh telling us amusing stories. He was like he worked on uh the movie uh The Prophecy with Christopher Walken that came out. Like, yeah, he was like a something on the set, you know. I don't know what possession is, but he was telling us some Christopher Walken stories and stuff like that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I am totally ignorant about both of these people. I feel terrible.
SPEAKER_03No, I mean it's just like you know, author like geeking out about horror authors.
SPEAKER_02I did run into Gretchen in the lobby, and she was like, This is all cool. I got all of my books signed by Johnny. What's what did you say? What's his name? The first guy? Oh, Dinnerman. Dinner. Not Dinnaman, yeah. Not Dinniman. Where the fuck did that come from? Johnny. Johnny Marinera. Um uh yeah, she was super excited about that. And she also uh brought her ninth configuration poster for Tom Atkins to sign. I was like, wow, that's a deep cut, dude.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, she said like he was like, wow, or whatever. Because I'm sure you know, most of the things that Tom Atkins is having signed at a horror convention is either from Halloween 3 or Night of the Creeps. Or creep show. Right. Maybe Escape from New York, The Fog. But yeah, night configuration, that's a that's a deep cut.
SPEAKER_03I I have Matt Dinnerman's um first book, the the first Dungeon Carler Carl book, um, and it's the soft cover that he independently published that you know we would get like at Powell's, we would get two to three copies at a time. We were like ordering it from the publisher. It's like a short discount and impossible to get. It was like 18 bucks, and we would get, you know, one to three at a time. Um, and then so I bought one and um I never like opened it, you know, like it's it's fresh, it's a virgin. Um, and now that fucking book is like worth 400, 500. And I and I meant to bring it to get him to sign it because if he signs that particular copy, it's it's worth like a thousand dollars, and I completely forgot it at home because I was so manic with preparing to leave my house to for Seattle for a week.
SPEAKER_01Philip said yesterday that uh Matt had brought a bunch of kind of rare books and stuff, and he was sold out within two hours on all of all his rare stuff.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I wonder if uh I wonder how much he was selling it for.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, I have no idea. And it's funny because I have not read Matt Dinneman, and I'd only really honestly heard of him like maybe two months ago. Yeah. I guess like somebody had said, like, oh, and I saw like I guess his new books have been republished with these colorful covers. So I was like, oh yeah, I never heard of this. And then when they CryptoCon said I guess he's been like vending here for years or something like that.
SPEAKER_03So he was supposed to I think he was supposed to be here last year, but there was he didn't come for some reason. But I met him the year before. Yeah. So yeah, I mean he's uh he's like a local that people know, and now he's this huge name, and he's still like pretty like humble and cool.
SPEAKER_01I think that's why, you know, you have people like you know, the terrifier cast and Matt it brings people in the door to buy tickets, so that's why they gotta, you know, they can't have have all these old celebrities that like we like. You gotta have some young folks in there.
SPEAKER_03Uh any other highlights from from this weekend?
SPEAKER_02Uh I mean, I always I always get such a fucking kick out of the 13th floor parties. Just that minute because of the the the vibe of it, I guess the fact that it's in a hotel room and the hallways are always super crowded. I think like last year or the year before, like we literally had like hotel staff constantly going down the hallway just trying to make space just to like cut a swath in the middle and get us all up against the walls because it was so fucking crowded. Wow. But that vibe just always reminds me of uh, I guess like spring break parties that I see in movies that I've always been too much of a scrawny nerd to ever be a part of. So I have a little bit of there's some catharsis in that. And there's just no shortage of conversation, you know. I'm I'm a very introverted person, and I'm not sure how much time I'm gonna need to recharge after this because I there's a difference between like just being in a crowd and then being in a crowd of people that you could have a fucking hour-long conversation with just about anybody in the room. And that's always such a high. Like I was just I couldn't sleep at all last night, and I don't think it was necessarily because I partied too hard. I don't think I drank that much. It was just kind of adrenaline and serotonin, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01It's uh yeah, I love going up to the 13th floor because you know, when you're at a con and you're on panels or you see people in the vending room, you don't really have time to you're just like, oh, nice to see you. But up there, you know, people go up there, a lot of the regulars, and you actually have time, nobody has anything to do but just hang out and talk. Yeah. So that's the you know, that's a blast to do that.
SPEAKER_03I'm gonna be uh a sentimental nerd and say one of my favorite um moments of the con was last night when we spent a half an hour in the hotel room watching VHS and drinking beer. That was lovely. We just like everybody had just gotten off all their panels, we had done trivia, um, we had eaten already, and we needed like a half an hour to just chill the fuck out before we went to the 13th floor. Yep, popped in VHS and was just like, yeah. I mean relaxing. You know, yeah. I mean, we always bring like our Chromecast here because I love watching horror in the hotel room, um, just in general, wherever I am. And so it, you know, it works out for CryptoCon really well. But I always want to have a movie night at CryptoCon. Yeah, but everybody's so busy partying that like nobody wants to do that. So it was nice to have a little bit of a sliver of that.
SPEAKER_01And I also enjoyed on Friday night, we had kind of the same experience, like, okay, let's chill in your room for 30 minutes. And what better way to to chill than to put on Texas Chainsaw Masker? Oh, that's right.
SPEAKER_03I put Texas Chainsaw Masker on.
SPEAKER_01Yes, well, yeah, this is it's just gonna, you know, horror horror nerds are gonna be they're gonna be calmed by that. It's like it's like uh you know meditation or something.
SPEAKER_02I'm sorry I missed that one. Oh, you were not You were on a panel. Oh, okay. Yeah stupid panel.
SPEAKER_03Uh yeah, so we uh we're about to do our last um round in the vendor hall to snag up any goodies that we we missed the first time and the second time and the third time. Yeah. Um I I wanna see. I think that I had my eye on um happy birthday, uh VHS of Happy Birthday to me. Um it was like fifty bucks. I think I'm gonna go back down and get it if it's still there. We'll see.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I have no I have no idea what I'm what I'm gonna get. I'm probably I mean, I I it's always my default to to blow most of my money on physical media. Yeah. So uh yeah, I'm gonna hit those because and and and there's always like there's a there's a handful of tables, but they're a couple of them are so crammed with product that there's always something that I miss. And they probably also are like replacing stuff that gets bought with something that isn't the same item.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's the land of beyond is the company that they have a lot of posters, a lot of movies, um, some books, rare stuff, but that table is always packed with people. So sometimes I'm just like, I'll come back later, come back later, come back later.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um and now's the time to go back later.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. You gotta love any vendor table that's got a section called movies to give you weird boners.
SPEAKER_03Our kind of people. Um yeah, so then we uh start our three-hour journey back to Portland.
SPEAKER_01I know in previous years on Sunday, uh when you and I leave, it's pretty quiet, right? We're just kind of like zoning out after three days of conning.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, just processing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, assimilating it all. And one of the fun things too is like starting tonight and then throughout the week, you'll be able to go on Instagram and see all the photos everybody and your friends have taken of CryptoCon.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think I've taken three photos this entire fucking weekend. So the funny thing is we spent Tuesday through um Friday in downtown Seattle um with friends and doing god knows what. Um I've took about a hundred and fifty photos during that time, and then I get here and I've taken three photos.
SPEAKER_01I I've taken it some, but yeah, you'll have to sh we'll have to share.
SPEAKER_02We'll make an album or something. Just living in the moment, man.
SPEAKER_03I because that's the thing is that like it's just so busy all the time. I'm always running from one panel to the next and looking at my notes and making sure I'm prepared that I just forget to have fun.
SPEAKER_01Willie got some good uh video of uh the Velociraptor.
SPEAKER_02Oh god, I love her so much. Yeah, yeah. Um, I wish I had gotten the video of her surprising you when you when you came out of the restroom, but I did get her ambushing somebody coming out of the elevator, yeah. And it was just that first that moment of pure terror, and then like she gives them a hug. So delightful.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And a lot of amazing cosplay this year, too.
SPEAKER_01Yep. Totally. Saw a couple of pearls, which are pretty nice. Um, I saw a Jimmy from 28. Yeah. Years later. Which is pretty fun.
SPEAKER_03Lots of art the clowns.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. Multiple. Somebody with uh there was like a duo who were like Baba Yaga and her hut. So somebody like wearing the hut with chicken feet. It was so fucking crazy.
SPEAKER_03I wonder who won the cost the costume contest. Maybe they'll put it.
SPEAKER_02Maybe maybe zombie Barbie. That was pretty impressive. I didn't see that either. She was like in a box in the Barbie box.
SPEAKER_03Oh. What the fuck?
SPEAKER_01I think I saw the box, or somebody had a box, but nothing was in it.
SPEAKER_03So but Zombie Barbie's on the loose. All right, any final thoughts before we wrap up here?
SPEAKER_02Um, if you are in Portland and you're uh you know a horror nerd, I mean we uh I think we had we've had like a couple of one-off horror conventions over the last 15 years. It's there's a little bit of a dearth, but I think you know, us in Seattle are we're kind of in a complimentary relationship. I've we found out last night that like so many um revival second-run theaters have closed down in Seattle.
SPEAKER_03Oh wow.
SPEAKER_02And yeah, there's like nothing left anymore. And you know, um Jason Weiss, one of the one of the people who run the con, was very envious of the Hollywood and all of the embarrassment of movie theater riches that we have in Portland. But then we're like, well, we don't have any cons, we have to come up here. So there is like a trade-off. But if you haven't been to CryptoCon, I cannot recommend it enough. It's um if you're an introvert, you will not be socially overwhelmed. Uh, and you will you I'm it's almost guaranteed you will make connections and find new friends and uh learn some stuff, be inspired and stimulated by by what people have to say. Um I I will I will keep coming until it doesn't exist anymore or I don't exist anymore.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, every year being on panels, I have a couple movies that I write down that like, okay, I gotta see this that either I haven't heard of or like reminds me, oh yeah, I need to watch that. So yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Uh and I guess just uh uh a plug for us, um, we're gonna be at the drive-in again this summer. Um 99 West drive-in in uh where is it? Newburgh Newburgh.
SPEAKER_01Newburgh, yeah. Yeah, 99 West. Last year we did um they had Thursday night terrors. Every other Thursday they would show horror movies, and we do trivia. Um, so you can sit in your car, you'll have answer sheets, and uh yeah, we ask questions before the movie. Um last year was a lot of fun. They screened like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Return of the Living Dead, Carrie. Um, and the first one this year is like May 21st, I believe, and they're showing Scream and Friday the 13th, part two.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And uh uh the trivia is just for fun. There are no winners or losers. Everybody's a winner. Everybody's a winner.
SPEAKER_02I mean, if you're if you're going in a caravan, you know, you and your the the the the cars that you're with, you can compete against each other and police yourselves and make sure you're not cheating. We don't quite have the capacity to to babysit everybody in a fucking car right now.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, there's sometimes there's like a hundred cars in the lot, so there's no way.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but it's a total blast. Um, and the drive-in experience, because the 99 drive-in really doesn't look like it's aged since like 1959. So uh but yeah, it's a fun communal experience, especially on you know a warm summer night. Everyone has their chairs out and it's just like a it's fun.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, last year we went we did twice a month for the summer. Um this year we'll be a little bit less, maybe only once a month. Um because it's just it's really far.
SPEAKER_02It's a bit of a commute, but yeah, there are so few drive-in theaters these days, and it seems so very counterintuitive to have one in the Pacific Northwest. And I I want to yeah, I want to, I I do not want to take it for granted. It's a beautiful experience.
SPEAKER_00All right. Let's see.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and we'll be back. Our next episode will be more we'll be talk more about some movies that we've seen, and we'll have a topic we're gonna discuss.
SPEAKER_03Totally. For now, we're just gonna go back to the vendor hall and spend spend more money. Spend more money on horror.
SPEAKER_01And uh Heather's gonna stare at Adrian Barbot.
SPEAKER_03It's true. Yeah, maybe that restraining order is uh not part of my future after all.
SPEAKER_01Thanks, guys.
