The Aquabats! at Comic Con! Panel-Interview-Concert

This year at San Diego Comic Con has been life changing for many of us at Geekscape. I myself gained new friends and lost old livers. The height of the convention for me was the presence The Aquabats! had was next level. As a devout die hard Aquacadet (card carrying member) getting the opportunity to go to their first SDCC panel, let alone INTEVIEW them was life changing.

The Aquabats! were there alongside The HUB to promote their new show, The Aquabats Supershow! Being together for almost 20 years, and having a few pilots made and fall short, It is finally time for them to get what they’ve earned and deserve.

The panel was full of super-radness and awesome forces. The room was full of cadets and new fans alike. Questions were asked, tickets to their show were given out, everyone was very happy. In usual Aquabats! fashion, evil forces showed up at the panel to foil the plans of our heroes to make kids everywhere happy. A small fight broke out, with the ‘bats! emerging victorious.

You can expect to see The Aquabats Supershow! this fall. The rumor going around was sometime in October, but nothing is set in stone yet, and that is the official word from The Hub.

Interview

After the panel, I was lead into an interview room. I could hear my heroes on the other side of the divider. I became very nervous and started to forget some of the questions I wanted to ask. After settling down and regaining my composure we all sat down at the table and began. I shared the table with 2 other media outlets, and we all began asking questions. The full interview was about 20-minutes long but I will cover some of the more important questions here right now.

Aquabats!: This is our first comic con offically as The Aquabats, we’ve been here as our alter egos before and we are very excited to be here.

Interviewers: How did the relationship happen with The Hub?

A!: You want the true story or the interesting one? Haha, we’ll leave the VH1 story out. The Hub is a new channel, they’re risk takers and the people at the top there are super creative producers. When we pitched Yo Gabba Gabba to another network, Ted Viaselli was the person who brought it to that network. When we got turned down everyone was really bummed. We all kept in contact and when Ted landed at The Hub it was great. All things worked out at the right time and the right place. Where we are right now is the best possible way for the show to happen. Its because the Hub is not afraid and are looking at new programming that other networks aren’t able to look at and bring funky ideas like The Aquabats to the network.

Shane: Are you guys going to be using your recent pilot as apart of this new series and are you going to keep the same format 50% Live action and 50% Animation?

A!: Well the last pilot will probably be going in the vault. We were able to figure out what worked and what didn’t work. It’s not gone but it has its own place. It will resurface somewhere else. The Hub wanted to see more of our shining faces. The animation will still be there but it will be slimmed down into little segments. We wanted to have a live action cartoon, make it feel like the Power Rangers but a little more wacky.

Shane: Are you guys going to have a format where each episode is it’s own story where you have a problem and fix it at the end or is it going to be full of small adventures in it like Yo Gabba Gabba. Will you guys have an over arching story line spanning an entire season or will each episode be self contained.

A!: Whoa…uhhh…Some from column A and some from Column B. You will just have to tune in each week to find out! Collect all 8 cups!

I really believe that we are about to see some amazing stuff from this joining of forces with The Hub and The Aquabats! The ‘bats want to bring joy and music and radness to kids of all ages. 

Now if the powers that be you will be able to see the full 20 minute interview here at the end of this article.

Concert

The interview felt surreal the next day. Being able to sit and talk to my heroes and finally seeing them get their awesome show was amazing. The very generous people at the Hub offered me and another tickets to the concert at the house of blues. Me and the great Ben Dunn ventured out to the show. We were greeted by Julia from the Hub. She gave us our tickets and led us into the the VIP area. Once inside we did what only what great fans would do. We got moustaches.

Once I got my bearings inside, and a drink in my hand I was able to marvel at the setup. Ice sculptures of the Aquabat and Hub logo. Giant banners of each member of the band circled the balcony. I finally realized how much the producers at the Hub really loved the ‘bats. I got a tad teary eyed seeing the great purveyors of awesome hoisted up high. Finally they have an organization behind them that fully believed in them. We found the food and sat down to watch the opening band. 

Koo Koo Kangaroo. Odd name great guys. Think the wackiness of the Aquabats coupled with great techno beats and you got these two guys. Their crowd interaction was next level. Jumping into the audience and doing dances with the pit. It was great. Then it was time, for the super hero teenaged wonderments to get on the stage. We finished out food, drinks and rushed down to join the crowd.

After a bit the ‘bats flew up on stage. I had a flash back from the first time I saw them, in that very venue a few years prior. Their first song Shark Fighter was amazing. Hearing it live and in person felt right. We danced and moshed and I lost Ben, for the first time that night, but that is for another story. New songs, old songs, strange songs and normal songs. We held up children who were riding in pool toys on the sea of people, and raced them around the room. Everything climaxed with the greatest singalong song ever, Pool Party. Koo Koo Kangaroo joined the stage as well as DJ Lance from Yo Gabba Gabba. Everything was perfect. The band exited and I found Ben upstairs. More drinks were consumed and we chatted with the band. Greatest concert ever. I had to break up a fight though…

SO! I can check off a stack of things from my bucket list. Met the greatest band ever. Was VIP at a concert. Watched Ben Dunn get punched by Crash McLarson. So…set your Tivo for the Hub and The Aquabats Supershow!