The first panel I knew I had to go to for my “kick off” experience at Salt Lake Comic Con Fan-X was one being moderated by our Editor-In-Chief Bryan Young AKA Swank-mo–tron. That and it was because the panel was about Batman’s faithful sidekick Robin. The History of Robin and Why Batman’s Sidekick is Great was amazing fun because of the panelists and the crowd interaction. Kerry Jackson of the Radio from Hell and Geekshow Podcast was accompanied by Dan Willis and Robert Easton. Dan is best known for “DragonLance: The New Adventure Series” and Robert Easton is best known for Hold 322. The panel led off with a spoiler from the crowd because they’d heard Kerry Jackson on the Radio from Hell say he was going to be the “turd in the punch bowl” of the panel. Kerry is mostly a Marvel Comics fan but he let everyone know that he could be open minded about Robin if the crowd had a reason to convince him Robin was cool.
First though, there was a general audience poll by Bryan Young to determine which Robin was the crowd favorite. Richard Grayson lead with Tim Drake, Damian Wayne, Jason Todd, Carrie Kelly, and Stephanie Brown took the least popular vote. Kerry Jackson, a Kerry Kelly fan, said the youngest Robin at the con was the best and cutest Robin he’d seen. She quickly became the crowds favorite too which was fun because the little blonde Robin was surely a Stephanie Brown Robin.
After a rousing history lesson and the mention of Dick Grayson soon to become a version of the Winter Soldier as DC’s super spy, Kerry admitted some awful truth. Kerry Jackson killed Jason Todd. When the Batman comic that asked fans to determine that Robin’s fate came out, Kerry called the .50 cents a call line to vote to have Robin die. Kerry admitted to spending $45 on votes and read some numbers from his Internet ally Atropos. The vote from the issue, Batman 427, were 5343 to die and 5271 to live. After much convincing from the crowd and the panel, Kerry tried to call the number again to take back his votes but was unable to. His phone will not dial 900 numbers. According to Kerry it was because of the last $45 phone bill his mom got way back in 1980.
