OCEANFRONT — This intrepid reporter was undecided about attending the rebirth of Tidewater Comicon this year at the Virginia Beach Convention Center following the days of Covid restrictions, but this multiverse’s Perry White called. Since it’s an assignment, I must go.
Not that my editor had to twist my arm.
I, a comic book fan, took on the mission to seek out what Tidewater Comicon had in terms of comic book illustrators, inkers, writers and fans who might hail from Virginia Beach.
It was as if I was the Dark Knight detective.
Short for comic book convention, a comicon is like a comic book store where characters jump off the page and come to life. You get a chance to interact with your favorite – as I would argue – literary characters. You can even take a picture with them.
There were vendors and artists aplenty mixing with fans and families. Serious cosplay artists – meaning the folks who dress up like characters from games, comics or films – vied for your attention.
There were Supermen and superpeople. There were queen mothers with little princesses in full regalia. Daredevil and Moon Knight were there straight out of the online streaming shows and, of course, the books that inspired modern digital entertainments.
But fans could also discover the creativity of artists who live right here.
“I’m here because I love comics,” Perry Ilvento, a Virginia Beach native and collector, told me. “I have had a love for comics since I was six years old. One of the first comics I got was from a vendor here in 2005. I just had them signed today. Many of the comics are from Charlie Kirchoff, who did the coloring.”
Kirschoff, a professional comic book colorist from Virginia Beach, was at the convention.
Some people want signed work to sell it, but Ilvento told me he has no plans to sell off his purchases.
They are not merely signed. They are personalized.
“I’m trying to expand my collection,” Ilvento said. “I like my collection. The writer’s signatures, colorist, or inker is important to me. … You don’t find that many people from Virginia in the comic book field unless you count the guy who plays the Hulk in the Marvel movies.”
That’s Mark Ruffalo, who went to First Colonial High School.
Elbonie Kirchoff worked on commissioned anime pencil illustrations and signed ones she already had drawn. She displays her cosplays under the title AtomicFerret Cosplay. A Bayside graduate, Elbonie met Charlie while they were attending the Savannah College of Art and Design.
What brought Charlie Kirchoff, a professional comic book colorist, to Virginia Beach?
“She did, actually,” he said.
“My favorite character is Batman, I guess,” Elbonie Kirchoff said. “I have more of his comic books than anyone else’s. Then Tales from the Crypt. I was an avid reader as a child. So when I saw my first comic, I liked the art and the story. I’ve always been attracted to art, and, with words together, I said to myself, this is perfect.”
Her husband said he got into comics through his father.
“As a kid, I got into Superman, Batman, Legion of Super-Heroes and stuff he liked,” Charlie Kirchoff said. “Then, when I got older, I wanted to get newer comics.”
That translates to Marvel, Heavy Metal and the “new” DC stylized by writers Dick Giordano, John Byrne, George Perez, Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams.
Growing up in Minnesota, Charlie Kirchoff went from “drawing and copying comic book heroes” to taking drawing seriously in junior high school.
“When I got to high school,” he told me, “I knew what I wanted to do. When I finished college, I started getting assignments from IDW, Image and Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy. I did Star Trek covers for DC. Humanoids were one of the comics that DC was buying American rights (for) from Europe.”
The Kirchoffs don’t have any plans to attend other conventions over the summer.
The beauty of Tidewater Comicon, for many of us, is that it is close to home – a great, colorful way to bring fans, collectors, creators and stars together.
And it’s a chance to discover some of the talent we have right here in Virginia Beach.
The author is a writer and documentary filmmaker who grew up in Norfolk and lived in Virginia Beach for much of his life. He ran a production company, worked in college athletics and was curator at an art gallery in Virginia Beach for years.
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