COMIC CON INTERNATIONAL: Booth Babes and the Ultraverse

And here we go with the final installment of Old Comic Book Convention Photos week. I think everyone knows what a “Booth Babe” is – she’s the model-like girl at a convention who usually works in an exhibitor’s display area or prowls around in front of it, chatting with potential customers and repeating all the talking points she’s been given for the day. She might even be handing out product literature or free samples and you willingly take it because “Hey, a pretty girl is giving me stuff.” You could always find booth babes at car shows, boat shows, and consumer electronics shows like CES. The same types of places where Adam West might show up to lean against one of the original Batmobiles.

Back in the 1990s, there was an explosion of booth babes at comic book conventions, usually at a publisher’s booth. Sometimes they were actually on staff at the publishing company, sometimes not. Thanks to the explosion of Image Comics in the early 1990s, there was a tremendous increase in costumed characters as well – not the fans dressed in costume, but professional models, male and female, hired by the publisher to wear custom-made costumes based on characters in their books. They would hang around the booth or stroll around on the floor, mingling with the fans, driving traffic back to their booth and posing for “Hey! Look at me with a pretty girl at the convention!” photos with tubby fans in too-small X-Men t-shirts. Image had them, Harris Publications trotted out a couple of different Vampirellas, and other publishers jumped in.

Malibu Comics, always able to identify and then exploit a trend, had their own costumed characters with the launch of the Ultraverse in 1993.

Click to continue reading COMIC CON INTERNATIONAL: Booth Babes and the Ultraverse