#NerdsUnite: The Ramblings of a Raconteuse (My First Comic Con!)

<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Helenna. We met on twitter not too long ao, and she's totes mcgotes one rad chiquita banana with a flare for all things flair! That's right, Helenna here is what we call an artsy fartsy nerd. She's a poet, into all things dramatic arts, and she's going to come on board to write each week about her love of said drama. Well not like actual drama drama, like some cat fight shit - but you get the idea. I only have one thing left to say ... HIT IT HELENNA!!! </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @Helslevy

Well, this week I’ll be going to Comic Con for the first time ever.  To say I’m excited is a gigantic understatement.  

I’m ecstatic, elated, freaking joyously jumping up and down feeling like I should run around in circles excited.  I’m Christmas morning when you are 4 years old excited, a zombie seeing brains excited, my cat getting pet by two people at once excited.  So excited I can barely type the word ex-ccccc—iiii—ttteeeddddd!!  

So why I am so crazed you ask?  

I have never been to Comic Con and for me it has always kind of been the holy grail or mystical emerald city.  I’ve been on the yellow brick road headed there for awhile, but never took the final steps to see the wizard.  And in this version, the wizard is AWESOME.  I’m not quite sure why I’ve never made it there before.  Part of it was always finances, or other obligations, and then I had this silly pact with myself that I wasn’t going to attend until I was on a panel there.  Who knows why I made that dumb rule.  But this year when Geek Girls Create wasn’t an accepted panel I was like, “hellzzz yes, I’m still going!”  

Now ironically, I have a family wedding to go to this weekend so I’ll only be there for preview night and then the full day on Thursday.

(NOTE: next year no one is allowed to get married, have a baby, even the apocalypse will not keep me from attending Comic Con for the entire length of the festivities. Actually, apocalypse during Comic Con might be the best way to ensure survival.  After all, aside from a army base where else would you find so many people with knowledge about how to survive the end of the world?)  But I digress….

So I’ll be there on Weds and Thursday!  Tweet me if you are there, and maybe in the midst of the madness we’ll run into each other, or come and visit myself and the other Geek Girls Create ladies at the Geekscape booth! Here are the deets! 

GEEK GIRLS CREATE - appearance/signing

Thursday, July 12th (11am – 12pm) The Geek Girls Create Meet Up!

 The Geekscape SDCC Booth #3919

 in attendance: Kristen Nedopak (Skyrim Parodies), Stephanie Thorpe (ElfQuest), Helenna Santos Levy (American Reunion), Crix Lee (COO GirlGamer.com), Leah Cevoli (Robot Chicken), 

And we’ll be signing copies of these, so please drop by and say “hi!”

#xoxo hels

tweet me at: @helslevy

browse me at: helennasantoslevy.com

email me at: contacthelenna@gmail.com

#NerdsUnite: The Ramblings of a Raconteuse (It's Good to Be a Geek Girl)

<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Helenna. We met on twitter not too long ao, and she's totes mcgotes one rad chiquita banana with a flare for all things flair! That's right, Helenna here is what we call an artsy fartsy nerd. She's a poet, into all things dramatic arts, and she's going to come on board to write each week about her love of said drama. Well not like actual drama drama, like some cat fight shit - but you get the idea. I only have one thing left to say ... HIT IT HELENNA!!! </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @Helslevy

y whole life I’ve been intensely passionate about a lot of things, many, many, many things.  I’ve never hid it.  Instead I’ve always shared my love for whatever I was jonesing on with anyone that I thought would care to listen.  Little did I know that the whole time I was a closet geek, or at least, I hadn’t as yet labeled myself as a geek. 

All I have to say is thank god for the Geek Girls Create panel that I was so lucky to be a part of at both Comikazee and Wondercon w/ Kristen Nedopak, Stephanie Thorpe, Leah Cevoli, Jessica Mills, and Crix Lee.  (see photo below)

When I was asked to be on the panel because I was an actor who was actively creating their own work, I was super worried about being “geeky enough.”  Would people boo me off stage because I didn’t have enough geek cred?  Was I an impostor?  But the opposite happened.  All of the things that I had an intense love for and somewhat obsessive knowledge of, including Joss Whedon’s works and what I assumed was probably a troubling love for zombies, was actually applauded and celebrated!  I had found my tribe, the place where I truly belong.  

Fast forward about 9 months later and I am flying my geek flag high for the whole world to see and have never ever been happier.  In fact, I am kicking myself that I wasn’t able to find this amazing community sooner! 

I wake up every day super excited and I can’t wait to see what awesome things you all have to do and say and share.  I used to passionately love things all by myself, in a Helenna bubble, and now I feel like I’m part of a cool stealth army that has superhero costumes under their clothes and is saving the world one tweet or blog post at a time. 

The best part of being a geek girl?  No matter what it is that I am freaking out about whether it’s Joss Whedon, zombies, steampunk, fantasy and Game of Thrones, sci-fi flicks, horror movies, becoming a superhero, getting in wicked shape so that I can be a master swordsman/archer/gun toting zombie slaying baddass…the list goes on and on and on…I know that there is someone else out there who loves whatever I love just as much as I do, and that I am not alone. 

I once had a boyfriend who said, “Helenna your life isn’t a movie,”  because often lines from whatever film or show I was obsessed with at the time would creep into my every day speech (ie. Buffy….).  Well, to that comment of his I say, “while it’s true that life isn’t actually a movie, I now have an army of people who live and love life so large that we’ve created our own passionate, gorgeous, vibrant practically cinematic world, and it’s beautiful. Come and join us if you want to play.”

#xoxo hels

tweet me at: @helslevy

browse me at: helennasantoslevy.com

email me at: contacthelenna@gmail.com

#NerdsUnite: The Ramblings of a Raconteuse (Wondercon here we come!)

<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Helenna. We met on twitter not too long ago, and she's totes mcgotes one rad chiquita banana with a flare for all things flair! That's right, Helenna here is what we call an artsy fartsy nerd. She's a poet, into all things dramatic arts, and she's going to come on board to write each week about her love of said drama. Well not like actual drama drama, like some cat fight shit - but you get the idea.

I only have one thing left to say ... HIT IT HELENNA!!! </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @Helslevy

Not gonna lie.  I’m pretty freaking excited!  But disclaimer….I’m taking off my nerd glasses for this post and putting on my geek cape! 

I was on a panel at the Comikaze Expo this past fall with a bunch of awesome geeky girls and we just found out that our panel is going to WonderCon!  

This is definitely a top life event for me.  

Yes, it’s true, I don’t have quite as much geek cred as the ladies I am on this panel with.  But, the little burgeoning geek in me is very very happy and jumping up and down like a freaking Oompa Loompa on crack. 

See I may not have a crazy amount of trivia in my brain about comics and characters, but I definitely have my fair share of geek out knowledge when it comes to anything Joss Whedon and also… zombies.  There are other things I geek out about too, but those are the 2 major fields of my geekdom.  And can I just say…. Cabin In The Woods?  Hellz YES!!!

Why is the fact that this panel is going to WonderCon so freaking exciting to me?  

Well…aside from the obvious “it’s WonderCon,” the words “speaking on a Comic-Con panel”are literally staring at me right now from my “vision board.”  And Comic-Con and WonderCon are put on by the same company.  Yes!  Manifest destiny baby!

Aside from the fact that I get to hang and talk with my favorite geeky ladies in the whole wide world, I’m really excited to be able to plug my latest animated online series that I produced with my husband and which will be released by the time we are on the panel.  It’s called “Girl and Boy”and I am super stoked to share it with the world.  

This is our teaser vid:

I’ve spent the last 4 years learning everything I could cram into my brain about the online web series world ever since recording my very first vlog in October of 2008.  Since then I have produced “The Day Player,”  “The Ex-Convict’s Guide,” “Songs From,” and 97 epsiodes of my vlog“Helenna’s Tinseltown Tuesdays”  all as a somewhat experimental foray into the web world.   I am a member of the IAWTV (International Academy of Web Television)  and absolutely LOVE the web series community. 

All this being said,  I am really stoked to be launching “Girl and Boy” with my husband Barry W. Levy.  It’s “high brow potty humor, for the low brow comedy lover,” and I’m excited that I’ll be able to talk about this project at WonderCon since it fits right in with the whole comic aspect of the convention! 

Aside from all of that, I’m so stoked to be on this panel is because these women are AMAZING!!!!  All of these ladies are super proactive go-getters who are completely taking their careers into their own hands and ROCKIN’ IT!  Mad props to Kristen Nedopak, Stephanie Thorpe, Jessica Mills,Cricket (Crix) Lee, and Leah Cevoli!  I am honored to be in your company!

If you want to “learn how each of these smart and sexy ladies built their unique, individual brands and gain insight into the struggles and success of creating your own work, from networking to production, to marketing…and staying sane along the way,” then come and join us atWonderCon on Saturday, March 17th, 2012 from 5:30 - 6:30 Room 207ABC!

#geekgirlscreate and #nerdsunite OH YEAH!!!
#xoxo hels

visit me at: http://www.helennasantoslevy.com

tweet me at: @helslevy

email me at: contacthelenna@gmail.com