We donated a Total of $10,143 in 2017!
Dr. Horrible at FanX – March 18, 2017
Browncoats worldwide mourned when our beloved Shepherd Book passed away. We wanted to honor his memory, and as a result, chose the Al Wooten Jr. Heritage Center in Los Angeles as the selected charity for our FanX fundraising effort. Ron Glass was a cherished supporter and board member of the Wooten Center for 24 years. The Center exists to support children academically by helping them to prepare for a college education.
In addition to our usual fundraising activities during this event, prior to the movie screening, we held a moment of light and silence in honor of the passing of Ron Glass, who embodied so many roles and was a delight and an inspiration to his fans, his family, and his friends.
Although our 2017 event was not as tightly packed as previous years, due to the incredible generosity of all the attendees, we are very pleased to announce our highest FanX donation total ever! Bit by bit, and in $2, $5 and $10 increments, we raised a total of $2.600!
Thank you again to SLCC for donating the space and allowing us to put on the screening! We also want to thank the many vendors and artists who have supported these events by donating a seemingly endless array of items and artwork from many different fandoms. Finally, we are so very grateful for both the SLCC volunteer staff and our own hard-working volunteers without which we could not be so very successful.
“Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog” screened by permission from Time Science Blood Club, LLC. © Time Science Blood Club, LLC. All rights reserved.
CSTS Salt Lake City – June 9 & 12th, 2017
June 9th – Pre-event
This year, we were able to kick off the weekend again with a special Friday night Cosplay Karaoke at the very popular fandom-friendly bar – The Union (Formerly Scofy’s) – with a fun night of “Space Western” cosplay and Browncoat singalongs of “The Hero of Canton” and “The Ballad of Serenity”. The Utah Browncoats are famous for our lavish prize drawings, and the night was no exception, with over 40 unique fandom and Firefly items given away.
We are also very fortunate that famed local cosplay photographer Mark Loertscher was on hand to capture all the night’s shenanigans, this time in front of our custom “Firefly Ship Works” backdrop. Check out all the beautiful photos on the Mark Loertscher Photography Facebook page.
We greatly appreciate Bill and Neff and everyone at The Union for their sponsorship and support of our Can’t Stop The Serenity event.
June 14th – CSTS Main Event
On Saturday, we were once again splitting our main event between two locations, with a screening at Brewvies at 1:30 pm, followed by the very lively auction and prize drawing at Legends next door at 3:30.
We had some special extras this time around, with Utah Browncoat Mark Woodring of the My Own Little Shadow blog bringing his custom car “Mal the Mini” to the event screening for photo ops and admiration. Mark has put a great deal of work and thought into making his machine the Browncoat mascot to be seen with in Utah, and our attendees reported many fun selfies and photos with Mal.
Another fun bit of interactivity came after the attendees had checked in, they were then able to be “sorted” into our Guilds of the ‘Verse and received a themed swag bag and button matching their Guild assignments. And by “sorted” we mean that in the most fandom-mash-up way, as our talented co-organizer Anastasia had created a “Sorting Hat of Jayne” that everyone wore to be inducted into their Guild.
Once the Guild inductions were completed and everyone had gotten their food and drink, we filled the theater and enjoyed the event pre-show, starting with our sponsor slideshow, and our esteemed William in his traditional role as emcee.
We also had the video singalongs of “The Hero of Canton” and the “The Ballad of Serenity” created by the very talented Maggie. Right before the Big Damn Movie, we showed the introduction videos showcasing Browncoats from around the world.
Following the movie, we continued the festivities next door at Legends, an option which we first tried out with last year’s event, and which continues to be a popular way of extending the celebration.
We had prepared a special Big Damn Heroes tribute to our loyal Captain William Pace, that unfortunately had to to be rushed at the beginning of our after-party as he was called in to work. We presented him with a customized wooden plaque which had a carving of his very fine hat, and the famous lines from Firefly:
- If you can’t run, you crawl
and when you can’t crawl –
when you can’t do that,
you find someone to carry you
Several of the Board members then spoke about why we were presenting it and what it meant to them to pay tribute to our Captain.
Following the tribute, the auction and prize drawings got underway, and more than a few ferocious battles ensued. The most coveted items included the beautiful wooden items created by Rebel Rousing Props and some Cargo Crate items generously donated by Geoff Mandel. We also gave away signed items and so much more.
At the conclusion of the event, we awarded the Guild Master medal to Keegan Briggs, who won the Guild Conclave contest we ran during the 2017 Salt Lake Comic Con FanX.
We greatly appreciate all of our sponsors who helped make this year’s event so very special. Please take a moment and help us thank them for their contributions.
Alamexo Mexican Grill
Brewvies Cinema Pub
Geoff Mandel / Firefly Cargo Crate
Karen Hallion Illustration
Legends Sports Bar & Grill
Rebel Rousing Props
The Union / Scofy’s
Watchtower Cafe
Dr. Horrible at FanX (SLCC) – September 30, 2017
Have you heard of Equality Now? We are very proud to support this critical work, which helps women and girls worldwide. Every time we hold a Can’t Stop the Serenity event like our Dr. Horrible screenings, we help them to advocate to #endchildmarriage, to outlaw #FGM and much more. This event raised $2,600!
This ongoing tradition of screening Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog as one of the last events of Salt Lake Comic Con has become a huge fan favorite over the four years that we have done it, and once again, we gratefully thank everyone who attended and supported it, and thank our volunteers who do so much work both behind the scenes and at the screening.
Immense gratitude goes out to Salt Lake Comic Con for donating the space, which allows us to put on the event, and to their volunteer staff who help everything run smoothly.
We also want to thank the many vendors and artists who have supported these events by donating a seemingly endless array of items and artwork from many different fandoms.
“Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog” screened by permission from Time Science Blood Club, LLC. © Time Science Blood Club, LLC. All rights reserved.
