Recap: @Animate! Miami

Contrary to most conventions of today, Animate! Miami's main focus is not pop culture, but, rather, it is anime, animation, comics, cosplay, and video games. I felt that this year's Animate! Miami was more successful in drawing the focus more onto those things than last year by having mainly voice actors from popular animes and cartoon series, as well as having a massive room with tons of video game stations and having a costume contest on each one of the nights. All of that plus with many beloved voice actors having not only panels, but meet and greets and autograph sessions throughout the weekend and the amazing merchandize on display, surely made this weekend a hit!

 We were so excited to be at Animate! Miami

Can't you tell?



We saw some great cosplays during this weekend. I loved seeing how creative some of the cosplays were, as well as unique.

 The Fourth Doctor and a Gothicy Sailor Moon character

  One of the ringwraiths from The Lord of the Rings

 We got to make a new friend who was dressed as Rufio from the movie "Hook", and he was the sensation of the con! Wherever we went he got chanted at and was constantly asked to take a picture with them. It was such a great cosplay, and he made it himself! Now, that's dedication!

 I got to meet a Sith Lord

 I absolutely loved this mashup!

 From one of my favorite movies: Princess Mononoke

 This has got to be one of the best cosplays I've ever seen! Sorceress of Grayskull (He-Man)

I love gender-bending cosplays -but I may be biased since I do it all the time 

Doesn't he look like an older RDJ?

I've always wanted to do a group cosplay but, until now, I have not been able to do so (it's hard to get a whole group of friends to do this), so I absolutely loved seeing so many group cosplays. It made me want to start planning costumes and recruiting friends to do it with me for the next con (Magic City Comic Con)!

 How cute is THIS version of Catwoman?

I don't have any kids of my own, but if I do ever have any, I plan to introduce them into the wonderful world of geeks and start dressing them up since early on. So, of course it was so amazing to see how many geeky kids there were at Animate! Miami and how excited and proud they were of their cosplays.

 The girliest and cutest Darth Vader you will ever see!

This little Princess Leia was actually saying "Obi-Wan Kenobi, you are our only hope" into the ting R2D2 and made all of our hearts melt.

We were able to attend the panel with Christopher Daniel Barnes, who did the voice of one of our favorite princes ever: Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid (and Kingdom Hearts II), as well as of Spider-Man in the animated series.

 He was so nice and incredibly charming

 Answered every fan's question with a smile

And even gave some good advice for those who want to become voice actors some day

And we perused all the merchandise and saw some amazing art, and my bank account saw a rapid decrease in its balance. I spent way more than I thought I would, but there were so many amazing things that I just couldn't say no to them. Including a mash-up tank top of Poison Ivy watering a piranha plant (from the Super Mario Bros video games), a gorgeous drawing of the TARDIS, a Doctor Who charm bracelet, and a purse that looks like its a cartoon drawing...among other things.

 The top right drawing of the TARDIS is the one I got and I am in love with it

But my all time favorite moment of the con was when a group of guys dressed as the characters from Steven Universe surprised none other than Zach Callison himself, the voice the show's namesake character. He was such a cool guy to hang out with (we saw him every day of the con and got to talk to him a little every day, and he even said we are cool peeps! *cue fingerling moment*), and he got so excited to see these guys and even sang the show's theme song with them. That was by far the coolest and most fun moment of the entire weekend! Here are the pics:

And, of course we couldn't miss the opportunity to be able to take a pic with the main celebrity of the con who, by the way, I loved even more when he made whacky faces in the pics -I don't really like normal smiling pics!

Thanks Zach for being so cool and fun!

Lastly, here are our cosplays for the weekend:

Rixi was a Demon Girl while I was a crossbending Riddler on Saturday

 For Sunday I was a grownup version of one of my most favorite characters of all time: Wednesday Addams (I even had my bottle of arsenic poison with me)

And Rixi was Castiel from Supernatural

We can't wait to be able to go back next year to Animate! Miami and see what awesome cosplays they'll have as well as the guests (although none can be as cool as Zach!). Check back on their website for updates on the dates for next year's con!