Countdown to Dragon*Con: What’s New For 2012

With only seven weeks left until Dragon*Con, there are only two things left to do: Finish your costume and start planning your schedule. (Last-minute efforts to increase your alcohol tolerance are optional.) Here’s a bit of what’s new so far on this year’s agenda and a few things to look forward to:

• The Puppetry track is new this year, with track director Beau Brown. Guests so far include Peter Linz, an original Broadway cast member of the Tony Award winning musical Avenue Q, and Leslie Carrara-Rudolph, best known for her Emmy-nominated work as Abby Cadabby on Sesame Street.
• The Dark Fantasy track has become Horror and Dark Fantasy.
• The American Sci-Fi Classics track has a new director, Joe Crowe, and appears to be working on a bit of a track makeover. Their schedule for this year includes “8 Bits of Awesome,” a look back at the “golden age” of video games, and “Manimal & Friends: Quickly Canceled Sci-Fi TV,” a session about one-season wonders.
• The Kaleidoscope track is in its second year, and it’s where you can see a panel of GeekMoms in a session called “Are you a Geek Parent?”
• There is also a new Video Gaming track, directed by Mike Capps, the president of Epic Games.
• On the guest list, there are, of course, the perennial favorites to look forward to, as well as a few first-timers. With Eureka ending I’m excited to see Colin Ferguson, who just did a great AMA on Reddit a few days ago, along with Saul Rubinek from same-universe show Warehouse 13. But as much as I love those shows, the #1 guest on my list (and I’m sure the lists of many others!) this year is John Barrowman.
• The MMO track’s sponsor, Guild Launch, is hosting a new awards show called Dragon Slayer. The awards will be determined by voting.
• Strange Frame will be one of the films screened in this year’s Dragon*Con Independent Film Festival. It describes itself as “the first lesbian science fiction rock ‘n roll animated film” and has quite a cast, including Claudia Black, Tara Strong, Ron Glass, Cree Summer, Tim Curry, Alan Tudyk, Michael Dorn, Claudia Christian, and George Takei.
• The mobile app has been updated and improved, including with push updates for Android. In addition to iPhone and Android versions, there will be tablet versions for iPad and Kindle Fire this year. New features include tapping a location to see what’s happening there and guest bios built-in.