Sean & Team StarKid: How it came about

Excerpted from http://caitlinmarie55.tumblr.com/post/21154506954/nerdparadise

Now, I am a huge LOTR fan and I love Sean Astin. So when I found out he was there giving autographs I was psyched…until I found out he wanted $40 for an autograph, then I was just crushed. But luck and the awesomeness of Sean Astin was in my favor. The line for Starkid autographs was right next to Sean Astin’s line and he had all but finished up signing so he came over to our line and talked to us and told us to come get his autograph. One girl in line explained that while she was a huge fan she just simply could not afford the $40 and pretty much all the other Starkid fans, including me, expressed the same. He is such an amazing guy that he spent the next 20 minutes walking up and down the Starkid line shaking hands, giving hugs and talking to everyone. We explained to him who Starkid and gushed about them. I noticed that after he left the fan line he headed over to the Starkids who were equally geeking out about him as their fans were. Here was someone who really appreciated his fans. This isn’t even the awesome part yet. 

I finally got up to the front of the Starkid line got group hugged by Dennise Donovan and Brian Rosenthal (ahhhhh!!!), talked to a bunch of the Starkids and got all of their autographs. Needless to say I was in nerd heaven. But I realized that Dylan Saunders was not at C2E2. I made my way upstairs to wait in line for the Starkid panel were I met other fans and participated in a singalong (lines at C2E2 are awesome!). I was able to get a second row seat for the panel. Here is where all the awesomeness happened. The Starkids ran into the room in their full Holy Musical B@man costumes (LOTS of spandex). In the middle of introducing themselves, Dylan Saunders comes running into the room barefoot and in his Scarecrow costume…..it was NOT Dylan. SEAN ASTIN had dressed up in the missing Dylan’s costume and came to join their panel!! Cue me dying from excitement! He said he was blown away by everyone’s enthusiasm and passion for the Starkids and after meeting them he couldn’t resist. He spent the whole panel pretending to be Dylan Saunders and fielding questions about Starkid’s musical which he clearly had never seen.  

What made this experience truly great was seeing how geeked out Team Starkid was at having Sean Astin on their panel. At one point Meredith Stepien stopped mid answer to gush, “I’m sorry, but Samwise Gamgee is sitting right there.” We were all fans in that panel. I give credit to the fans for keeping the panel about Starkid even though Sean Astin was there.

The cherry on top of the most geektastic day was that I got to take a picture with Sean Astin.

I will end my ramblings and declare my first Comic Con experience a resounding success. C2E2 was a true nerd paradise and made me think of this John Green quote:

“Nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff…Nerds are allowed to love stuff, like jump-up-and-down-in-in-the-chair-can’t-control-yourself love it. When people call people nerds, mostly what they are saying is ‘you like stuff.’ Which is not a good insult at all. Like ‘you are too enthusiatic about the miracle of human consciousness.’”  

Never have I been so proud to be a nerd.

Thanks to Caitlin Marie for posting this!
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