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Autograph seekers endure soul-crushing lines at Comic-Con

SAN DIEGO — Aside from Hall H, the longest lines Saturday were for the lottery for a chance to have a poster signed by the cast of a any number of movies and TV shows.

These signings take place throughout Comic-Con, but Saturday has the most of any day and, accordingly, the most soul-crushing lines.

Like almost everything else at Comic-Con, people slept out for the lottery, even though, since it’s a lottery, you could have been first in line and left with nothing.

I woke up at 3:45 a.m. and was in an Uber by 4:30 for drawings that were scheduled to begin at 6. On the way to the convention center, we drove past a couple of people miles from Comic-Con who were sleeping outside — not by choice — which really put things in perspective.

After following the line at least a mile around the convention center, I made it to the end at 4:58 a.m. Within five minutes, there were exactly 50 people behind me. Hordes more streamed by over the next few minutes. People were still arriving when I started moving at 6:25.

By 7:15, I’d made it all the way through the convention center and into a Warner Bros. line that was at least a couple of thousand people deep. By 8, I’d moved maybe a hundred feet.

Word started trickling in, through Twitter and other people in line, about which of the signings had run out of wristbands.

“Supergirl” and “Westworld” went first. The next update said “Arrow” and “The Flash” had been taken off the board. Then “Riverdale,” my ironic backup choice, was gone.

Steven Spielberg’s “Ready Player One” was hanging tough, though, presumably because people didn’t realize it was a Spielberg movie, and he was scheduled to sign.

Then, sadly, it was gone.

“Gotham,” my second pick after “Westworld,” fell soon after, as did “DC’s Legends of Tomorrow.”

That left Fox’s “Lucifer” and two shows that hadn’t yet debuted: Syfy’s “Krypton” and The CW’s “Black Lightning.”

“Black Lightning’s” cool, I told myself. I could appreciate a cast-signed “Black Lightning” poster.

At 9:20, a line monitor walked by, announced it was down to just “Krypton,” and there were only 25 wristbands left.

“How many people are ahead of us,” I asked. “About a hundred,” he said.

“So,” a voice far below me on the stairs responded, “you’re saying there’s a chance?”

At 9:30, security closed and locked the doors, four people ahead of me.

Contact Christopher Lawrence at clawrence@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4567. Follow @life_onthecouch on Twitter.

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