London Comic Con: the best bits

Outsize zombies, Stan Winston knockoffs, reincarnations of  Sauron from ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and obscure fourth-generation Pokémon descend on London for the convention’s dramatic climax. The show quite literally provides a platform for costumed punters to strut their stuff, swing their scythes and sing their hearts out to a soundtrack of J-pop and cartoon theme tunes. Each European country submits a contender, though for some reason The Netherlands and Poland always seem to come up trumps.

Do you like cartoons? Is sci-fi your kinda thing? Are you a fan of Charles Babbage’s mechanical polynomial calculator engines? If so, you’re probably into steampunk already. And if not, this regular Comic Con feature is a great place to start. Steampunk is essentially sci-fi for Industrial Revolution nostalgics, merging Victorian machinery and fashions with fantasy elements. The genre is responsible for some top-drawer art, as demonstrated in the range of talks, exhibitions and stalls in this quirky corner of the convention.

Probably the only person in the world who can claim to be a ‘Welsh-Indonesian filmmaker’, Gareth Evans is one of the least likely martial arts film directors in the world – and one of the best. His blistering Jakarta-set action flick ‘The Raid’ yanked him out of cult obscurity and into the limelight, while last year’s sequel upped the body count to genocidal levels. Priority ticket holders on Sunday can hear him talk about why he left the Cynon Valley for the slums of Java and what he’s working on next.

Like the volatile doctor of the title, Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel has resurfaced over the centuries in a variety of guises – some of them good, some decidedly bad. With luck this spin-off series, which reimagines Jekyll as a baddie-busting superhero in 1930s London, will fall into the former camp. The show’s writer Charlie Higson (the posh one from ‘The Fast Show’) will be speaking about his work in advance of the show’s ITV premiere.

Six years on from its launch, American adult animated TV series ‘Archer’ is going from strength to strength (via the arguable weakness of last year’s weird ‘Miami Vice’ spoof episodes). Starting from the observation that James Bond is basically a prick, Adam Reed’s animated spy satire about an egotistical secret agent has unfolded into one of the funniest, savviest things on the box. Reed will appear on stage to discuss the three films that have most influenced him.