BotCon 1997

BotCon 1997 was held on July 18-20, 1997 in Rochester, New York. It was the first convention organized by 3H Productions.

Preceded by: BotCon 1996

Followed by: BotCon 1998

Merchandise

Convention exclusive toys

• Predacon Geochemist Fractyl in Energon Armor - A redeco of "basic" Terrorsaur.

• Maximal Thief Packrat in Energon Armor - A redeco of "basic" Rattrap.

The two were only sold as a set, although numbers released for the figures confusingly state that there were 600 Packrats and 570 Fractyls produced.

Comics and art

• Ground Zero - standalone comic story included with Fractyl/Packrat.

• BotCon 1997 Mural Print - a print featuring Fractyl and Packrat's back-of-package mural art. Possibly also included with Fractyl/Packrat.

Miscellaneous

• 'Til All Are One 2-disk CD set.
• Convention T-shirt.
• Namebadge.
• Program guide.

Additionally, most attendees who paid for the pre-convention dinner was given a Decoy hand-painted by Dave Van Domelen and a laminated copy of a storyboard panel from The Transformers: The Movie. However, 3H continued to take seating reservations after announcing that there were no more dinner exclusives left.

Guests

Voice actors

• Peter Cullen
• David Kaye
• Venus Terzo

Hasbro employees

• Dawn Berryman, marketing
• George Boznos, designer
• Jerry Palmer, engineer

Beast Wars Story Editor

• Bob Forward

Marvel Comics

• Simon Furman
• Andrew Wildman

Music

• Stan Bush
• Vince DiCola

Events

Friday

• Dinner/Opening Ceremonies

Saturday

• Peter Cullen panel

• Bob Forward panel

• Simon Furman/Andrew Wildman panel

• Stan Bush/Vince DiCola concert (evening event)

Sunday

• Beast Wars Video Game Presentation

• Beast Wars Voice Actor Panel

• Stan Bush/Vince DiCola Panel

• Hasbro Presentation

• MSTF

• Quiz show

• Charity auction

• Convention Organizers' Panel/closing ceremonies

Trivia

• According to a magazine advertisement for the convention, story editor Larry DiTillio, Hasbro representatives Vinnie D'Alleva and Todd Wise, and voice actors Susan Blu, Garry Chalk, Frank Welker were originally scheduled to attend. None of them ended up making the convention, but Welker sent an audiotaped message to the attending fans.

• The same advertisement put the convention in Kendallville, Indiana rather than Rochester, New York.

• Until he was invited to BotCon 1997, Simon Furman was unaware there was a Transformers fandom! As a result, he allowed himself to forget everything he'd done and was unprepared for an in-depth Q&A session: "I was floundering, and often had to resort to a lame ‘sorry, I don’t remember.’ It was a nightmare... I made damn sure that by the time the 1998 Botcon rolled around I’d re-read/revisited practically everything I’d ever written."[1]

External links

BotCon 1997 in the BotCon archives

See also

BotCon