Salute to Supernatural Vancouver Convention 2013 – Friday Panels
By Stacey Gillard
August 23rd marked the beginning of Creation Entertainment’s Salute to Supernatural Vancouver convention. Although not the biggest convention, “VanCon” has a very special atmosphere as it is the home of the show, so many crew members come and hang out on their days off.
Richard Speight Jr. was the host of the entire weekend and did a great job warming up the crowd before panels, introducing the guests and even jumping in when there was a lull in questions from the audience. First on stage was the adorable pairing of Emily Perkins (Becky Rosen) and Rob Benedict (Chuck Shurley/Carver Edlund). Right from the get-go they displayed the chemistry that made it obvious why the showrunners decided to have their characters develop a (albeit short-lived) relationship. Emily talked with candor about the fact that playing a crazed fan wasn’t hard to do as it’s not far from the truth, while Rob had an interesting insight into how the revelation that Chuck was God felt like a representation of Eric Kripke’s creation of the show.
Next up was Chad Lindberg (Ash). His passion for investigating the paranormal has led to an involvement with the show Ghost Adventures and he immediately set up a spirit box on the stage. While explaining about his interest he also introduced his parents who had made the trip up from Washington State to spend the weekend with him. He spoke of the life after his character’s death that Supernatural has offered him and how grateful that makes him. As Richard joined him on stage to wrap things up the spirit box started buzzing and the crowd gasped as it correctly identified “Richard” as the name of the man standing next to Chad. We all got chills!
DJ Qualls (Garth) took us into the early evening with a panel that demonstrated his quick wit and intelligence. Many fans were complimentary about his recent appearances on the show Legit and he seems to be a prime example of how fans of Supernatural will follow its actors to other shows and support them there, too.
Friday night at Supernatural conventions is traditionally Karaoke night, with a free event open to all, even those without tickets to the con. Richard Speight Jr. and Matt Cohen, the Karaoke Kings, are hosts and this year the theme was “Class of ’13”. Richard was dressed in the actual gym teacher costume worn by Jensen Ackles in the season 4 episode “After School Special”, while Matt donned a very revealing cheerleader outfit, complete with adorable bows in his hair! While the general public can sign up to sing, the night is mostly about getting a fun interaction with many of the stars of the show who are gradually brought out from backstage as “special guests”. As expected, the night was a resounding success and as we made our way back to our rooms, our ears ringing, it seemed like the perfect way to end the first day of a great weekend.
All photos: credit Stacey Gillard
