What does it say about this year's Comic-Con when, on preview night (the Wednesday sneak peek at the show floor held the evening before the show opens to the public at large), you can navigate the aisles which are already full of eager folks looking to get their nerd on? If you ask me, it means that Comic-Con is growing, which is startling, considering organizers are already expecting 130,000 people to make their way through the doors of the San Diego Convention Center.

　　I'm no stranger to comic conventions--I attend Wonder Con annually and used to be a regular at Dragon Con back in my Atlanta days--but five minutes wandering the aisles in San Diego will tell you that there's a reason Comic-Com is the big daddy of them all. There's more of everything, more booths, more fans, more cool, useless stuff to ogle. Case in point, a real-life stand in for Rose McGowan's character in Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror (the first half of Rodriguez's and Quentin Tarantino's brilliant Grindhouse).

　　Look closely folks, she's really missing part of her right leg, and that's really a gun (albeit a replica) plugged into the stump. One wonders if this is the role she's been waiting for all her life…

　　In terms of games, Comic-Con is becoming more important with each passing year. While many of the games on-hand are the same versions we saw at E3 a few weeks back, it's noteworthy to see Blizzard here with StarCraft II, or Capcom here with a huge chunk of games (including the hilarious-looking Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law), or local-San Diego-developers The Behemoth on hand showing off the always-charming Castle Crashers; and it all speaks to the show's rising prominence in the industry.

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　　Three important Comic-Con goals for me:

　　1) Meet Katee Sackhoff. I don't even know if she's here, but I'm keeping my finger's crossed.

　　2) Shake Greg Rucka's hand. I'm fairly certain he's here and there's a chance I might get to interview him. I don't get nervous for interviews, but I'll be sweating this one if it happens.

　　3) Leave San Diego with my bank account still intact. This is called wishful thinking.

　　NOTE: Thanks to Jan Heir for the fine photo of the Rose stand-in.