SpoutBlog is sitting out this year’s San Diego Comic-Con International, but that doesn’t mean we’re not paying attention to the geek mecca from afar. In a way, we get to have a more sane perspective without all the screaming and crowdedness (between Twilight and Johnny Depp, it’s apparently madness). Plus, we’re checking out all of the direct coverage, and I do believe we’re getting a more comprehensive experience this way.

I’ve selected some of my favorite coverage from the last 24 hours so that you may share in the appreciation as a fellow outsider (or maybe you’re there and want to see what others have seen/heard). Check out all the best comments, videos and links after the jump:

• Kevin Kelly at Cinematical introduces some photos of last night’s Preview Night with a quote that makes us feel alright about not being there:
  

  Crowds of people crammed everywhere, moving at near-cattle speeds. It’s almost enough to drive you nuts … until you remember it’ll be much worse when the show is actually in full swing.

• Kristopher Tapley at In Contention gives us a bird’s eye view of the Con crowd, to which John at The Movie Blog responds:
  

  …the line ups for things are just far too insane to even consider going to panels for (especially when I can just find out everything that gets revealed at the panels online 5 minutes after they’re done)…Uggg… no thanks.

• Rob Bricken at Topless Robot complains about a certain crowd in particular:
  

  Here’s the worst part at the moment — Twilight. I really don’t have any problem with SDCC having a Twilight panel, and it’d be cool if there was some way to harness all those screaming teen girls to get interested in the other aspects of Comic con, although I don’t think much of an effort has been made in that direction. But! At 6pm last night, several thousand peopls weree camped out to see the Twilight panel that will be shown this afternoon. The the Twilight fans have effectively taken over Hall H, meaning if I wanted to see the Disney panel with Tron 2 — and I really, really did — I would have had to get in line… yesterday at 6pm. This does not make me happy.

• Devin Faraci at CHUD.com thinks the anti-Twilight crap is stupid and counterproductive:
  

  I’ve heard people complain that these girls (eww) will keep ‘real’ fans from seeing Avatar footage. But these girls slept outside all night and will probably buy Avatar tickets in December… who are the ‘real’ fans anyway?

• Kyle Buchanan at Movieline gets the scoop on the reality of Twilight-Avatar synergy while interviewing the first person in line:
  

  “We’re here for New Moon, but I’ve got to be honest,” Ara told Movieline. “I’m excited for Disney 3D — we’re big Tim Burton fans, so Alice in Wonderland, I want to see that. And James Cameron’s Avatar, we’re looking forward to.”

  Did my ears deceive me? Was Comic-Con’s most devoted New Moon fan also excited for Avatar? This was like a fan of Seth Rogen also liking Entourage, or something!

• As for the actual panel, Steven Zeitchik at Risky Biz Blog addresses the lack of eloquent speech from the Twilight cast:
  

  Pattinson noted that this year’s Con would be different than last year — when “Twilight” came out of nowhere to become the talk of the show — because this year all the expectations meant “you actually have to have something to say.”

  The “Twilight” cast may not live up to that obligation. Then again, judging by the Team Edward and Team Jacob encampments outside the Convention Center, it may not matter.

• Jeff Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere should incite some fangirl attacks with this plastic surgery encouragement for a certain Twilight actor:
  

  If I was Lautner I would have the schnozzola re-shaped. I’m sorry but it’s an On The Waterfront longshoreman’s nose, or a nose belonging to a Russian wheat-farmer. If he’d come up through the ranks of old 1930s Hollywood studio system the moguls would have said “cute kid but fix the nose.”

• Kevin Coll at Fused Film shares his enjoyment of fangirls orgasming:
  

  The rest of the panel was somewhat underwhelming due to the fact the trailer we saw was the same that leaked yesterday. However many fans and screaming girls had a simultnaeous orgasm when Johnny Depp walked out on stage to greet everybody. Pretty cool when he entered the room.

• The Playlist celebrates some of the ridiculousness of Comic-Con coverage:
  

  A banner for “Jonah Hex,” starring among others Josh Brolin and Megan Fox has been spotted and photographed at Comic-Con. Last time this happened three or four nerds site got into an online tussle about who shot and posted the photo first and then therefore had the “exclusive.” Let’s hope this amusing bickering happens again.

• Alex Billington at First Showing made me very happy with purely speculative news regarding another Roger Rabbit movie:
  

  Today at the Disney panel, Zemeckis was asked if he would go 3D (or CGI) if he ever did make a Roger Rabbit sequel. “I will tell you this - if that ever does happen, the 2D animated characters will remain 2D. They will not be dimensionalized, but that doesn’t mean other parts won’t be in 3D,” he said at Comic-Con today. However, he also said “I can neither confirm nor deny” whether or not something like this (as in another Roger Rabbit movie) was even happening. This is great to hear from the man himself, because I’ve heard people express concern over the idea that he’d convert Roger Rabbit into a CGI character nowadays.

• Seth Abramovitch at Movieline also made me happy with a report of Daft Punk’s involvement with the newly titled Tron Legacy:
  

  Tron Legacy director Joseph Kosinski described his meeting with Daft Punk as being a “mysterious pancake breakfast in L.A.” And yes, they were wearing the helmets. Asked if they tour in support of the soundtrack, he said there would definitely be Daft Punk Tron-themed events on the horizon.

• Christopher Monfette at IGN also made me excited by interviewing Joe Dante about making his upcoming 3D horror flick The Hole:
  

  “I find that when it’s done well, it’s immersive. It makes you feel like you’re in the room with them, going through the experience with them. Of course, there are things that have to jump off the screen, because it’s expected and hard to avoid. You want to be able to get a sense of depth. So if you look at pictures like Up or Coraline — which are just as good in 2D – the 3D just gives them that little extra connection that you don’t get.”

• Dustin Rowles at Pajiba notes that you can almost experience the Con through Twitter:
  

  If you check Twitter at the moment, Comic-Con is the top trending item. But if you actually check the tweets, 85 percent of them come from people who are there, twittering about what they are doing (e.g., showing you their photo album, which right now mostly involves standing in long lines). The other 15 percent, of course, are twittering: “Shut the fuck up about Comic-Con already.”

• Finally, here’s the best thing I’ve seen from Comic-Con so far, courtesy of Kevin Kelly at Cinematical: a video of Michel Gondry rapping — with his son accompanying on beat box — about The Green Hornet: