There are a LOT of box subscription services. There are so many that (according to Wikipedia) critics of subscription boxes have attempted to study their impact on the environment. But, those people suck and don’t like seeing other people happy as far as we can tell. The Whiskey & Waffles team, on the other hand, are huge supporters of subscription boxes. And the latest they got a hold of is the Stan Lee Box.

Powered by Stan Lee’s Pow Entertainment, JC got to check out one of the coveted first boxes of the new subscription service. Coming in at $49.99 for a single box (or $44.99 per box for a year long bi-monthly subscription), the Stan Lee box is on the upper tier when it comes to box cost. It is actually about $5 more per box than Loot Crate DX if you go off the standard plan so this means expectations are pretty high.

The MCU has a lot of mysteries in it. Some have been revealed and become major plot points for the whole universe, like the ultimate fate of Tony Stark’s parents. Others have been hinted at and probably won’t get full explanations. Two of these minor mysteries have become questions for the fan community and revolve around the non-powered Avengers, the Black Widow and Hawkeye. 

The first is “What happened in Budapest?” Stemming from a seemingly throwaway line, this question has made the Avengers community speculate as to whether this was a battle the two took part in during their S.H.I.E.L.D. days or if it was something more personal.

The other question is how the two met. In The Avengers, Black Widow recalls, “I got on S.H.I.E.L.D.’s radar in a bad way. Agent Barton was sent to kill me, he made a different call.” And that was it. Needless to say, it leaves a lot to the imagination as to what could make a top agent like Hawkeye defy orders from the top brass.

Going to Comic-Con in San Diego is a commitment. It’s not just the travel, the hotels, the Lyfts and Ubers, the food, and the drinks (…oh so many drinks), it’s much more. The floor of SDCC is the ultimate test of maintaining your composure and measuring your self-restraint.

And many, if not all of us, fail. New vinyl collectibles, classic non-sports trading cards, prints, sketches, autographed memorabilia, comics, nostalgia filled unpackaged toys, trades, meet & greets are just the start of the ways that your wallet can bottom out within just a few hours if you aren’t careful.

I, like many, try to go down with a plan on what I will be purchasing. As a Comic-Con veteran of nine SDCC’s (eight of them being consecutive), what I look for in advance is the list of the exclusives. This gives a good baseline for what will most likely be purchased.

This is the first of three (possibly four) recap videos from San Diego Comic-Con International 2016 from my trip this year. As it is my eighth year going as a part of The Flickcast, it has been an honor covering the convention in a variety of ways such as photo galleries, interviews, visual tours and unboxings. This year will be no different. Later this week, our Comic Con shopping haul video will release followed by our Field Trip video where we take you down to the Con floor and even some of the VIP parties.

Our first video kicks off with the Loot Crate Gallery of Heroes Convention Exclusive Crate. Founders of the monthly geek in a box phenomenon, Loot Crate has maintained the top spot in the subscription box community.

In just a few hours, almost 200,000 people will meet in San Diego, CA at the annual gathering of all things geek and pop culture. The Flickcast has gone every year since the site began in 2009 (with many of us having attended before that). To help jog our memories and get things started, WallE and I kicked things off at Golden Apple Comics in Los Angeles last week and talked about some of our favorite convention moments.

With the first story happening to Joe back in 1989 and featuring Stan Lee to WallE’s Hall H line nightmare to my encounter with Raptor Jesus (Yes, that’s a thing, watch the video), this trip down memory lane got everyone ready to experience the “grand daddy of them all” again.

Comic-Con comes and goes but the memories never leave… because we take video… and add music to it… and post it to YouTube. This was the 7th year The Flickcast has been at SDCC, and though the whole crew couldn’t make it down this time, those of us who did made sure to fully represent. As always, way more happened than we could fully capture on camera but we did our best to catch as much of it as possible as we could.

Some of the highlights for this year:

The Con Season has officially begun! E3 is already in the bag and this past weekend JC ventured to the halls of Anime Expo all by himself. Not being the biggest anime fan, outside of Attack on Titan or Neon Genesis: Evangelion, JC doesn’t know much about what lies within the walls of AX 2015.

Luckily for JC, he isn’t alone as he found his friends from Mega64 to help him on his journey. Rocco, a man of few words, lets pictures explain his feelings of the event and Garrett explains the majesty of fur suiters. In addition, Spry Cooper of OGeeku shows up too but adds even more confusion.

With WonderCon, the Con season of 2015 has begun. Starting with WonderCon it rolls into the Star Wars Celebration, E3, Comic Con in San Diego, VidCon, RTX and wraps up around New York Comic Con… so basically the next six months of our lives. In celebration, JC and Wally went to Anaheim with camera in hand and only one pass. If Wally didn’t get in, he’d head to Disneyland. But if he did, he was going to “press” as hard as he could.

This may be the last year for WonderCon to grace the Disney neighborhood as it may be heading to Los Angeles next year. When we were there this year, we did see an influx of Disney / Star Wars hybrids. If they get further from the happiest place on earth, will that still happen?

Most likely. Mashup cosplays have taken over. JC though wasn’t having any of that and decided to rock the SoCal Hal look, the douchebag alternate universe version of the Green Lantern from DC’s Infinite Crisis MOBA game.

Scarily enough, Comic-Con in San Diego is already on its way. Pre-registration is done. Media credentials are due soon. And the mad rush for tickets and hotel rooms will soon be upon us all.

But unfortunately, there are some people who have not gotten to experience San Diego Comic-Con for themselves. So to help let you know what it’s like, we’ve put this together.

Last month right before Comic-Con, Loot Crate released one of their best crates with a phenomenal Villains crate that included a totally original and exclusive Joki shirt alongside, amongst other things, a pair of Deadpool socks. It was going to be pretty hard to follow that up. But who better to show up the Villains than… the Heroes.

This month WallE and JC put their physical prowess to the test in an effort to capture a bunch of items based off of some of their favorite childhood heroes along with an exclusive Pop made just for Loot Crate. As some of you have seen in past crates, WallE and JC have an addiction for the little guys and battling over an exclusive one could possibly end their friendship and Whiskey & Waffles as we know it.

Hot on the heels of Comic-Con comes the next unboxing in the Loot Crate Wars series. For July and August, the guys at Loot Crate have created a two part crate. First, July kicked things off with Villains as its theme which started with an awesome super foe themed trailer on Loot Crate’s own YouTube channel. In it is some of the baddest of the bad as you’ll see in the unboxing video below.

Most notable of the Crate (while still trying to keep the article spoiler-free-ish) is a special variant comic for a number one that just came out from Marvel. Loot Crate’s subscriber base has gotten so big that just by putting it in the July crate, they literally doubled the preorders of the book.

LEGOs are a slippery slope. You see a cool Star Wars pack by the checkout at Target. It only costs five bucks. You tell yourself it would look cool on your desk. Then next time you see the Daily Bugle and think it’ll look great on your shelf. Six months later you have a replica of the Death Star and Batman’s Bat Cave taking up a quarter of your living room. And then, the sick bastards decide this isn’t enough and make something you’ve been waiting for since you were 5… the Simpsons in LEGO form.

Luckily I have the self control (lack of funds) to spend $270 on the Simpsons house even though it is pretty epic to say the least. Because of that, it’ll be easier to hold back purchasing Moe’s Tavern or the Quik-E Mart when they are inevitably released. But LEGO still knows how to stick it to you. They make a set of 16 blind bag minifigures of all of the top Simpsons characters and charge a “mere” $4 each. So just to get the entire set with no duplicates, it’s going to take $64 bucks, plus tax.