The 2015 comic convention season is upon us—if it ever truly ends. WonderCon kicked off Friday, and runs through Easter Sunday. While it’s certainly the younger brother to San Diego Comic-Con in terms of age, visitors and publicity, WonderCon is a big event in its own right, with almost 60,000 attendees making it out to the Anaheim Convention Center last year. Considering the snowballing popularity of these types of pop culture centric events, it’s a solid bet to beat those numbers this weekend.

This year, WonderCon is sponsored by NBC, DC Entertainment, San Diego Comic-Con and BBC. In terms of sheer presence and ubiquity, NBC’s American Odyssey is the dominant show in terms of advertisements, with massive banners emblazoned upon the convention center itself, and key art banners strewn upon streetlights across the thoroughfare. The show premieres Sunday, April 5.

Comic-Cons are known for their swag, and this one is no different. This year, attendees received exclusive Orphan Black WonderCon bags upon arrival to store their plunder. The hit BBC show returns April 18 at 9/8c. And with that, the panels begin…

Wayward Pines (FOX)

In Attendance: moderator Sandra Gonzalez (Mashable); Executive Producer Donald De Line; stars Reed Diamond and Tim Griffin.

After screening the pilot of FOX’s Wayward Pines, the forthcoming mystery event series from M. Night Shyamalan, De Line gave the lowdown on the project’s “birth story.” Based on a trilogy of books by Blake Crouch, Wayward Pines was originally pitched as a feature, but instead it became De Line’s first job producing TV, and the first show that M. Night Shyamalan had ever directed. According to De Line, Night took the job because he wasn’t able to guess the twist.

Wayward Pines is clearly influenced by Twin Peaks and Lost, but unlike the latter, it’s not keeping secrets.

Reed Diamond excitably explains: “Very early on we find out what’s going on. Instead of taking the air out of the story, it explodes, like a rocket to the moon. And I could never see it coming…it blew my mind.” Tim Griffin added, “This is one of those shows where they’re very generous in exposing secrets early on. You don’t have to wait 7 seasons. We’re not referencing anyone…J.J. Abrams, are you here?” Answers “come fast and furiously,” De Line joked.

This willingness to uncover mysteries doesn’t come by accident. The miniseries was designed for 10 hours, with a beginning, middle and end that De Line hopes viewers find satisfying.

“It was almost like a limited run of a play. We were going to create something special and it was for this 10 episode ride,” De Line explains. The show’s limited run played a large part in assembling such a star-studded cast that includes Matt Dillon, Melissa Leo, Shannyn Sossamon, Toby Jones, Hope Davis, Juliette Lewis, Carla Gugino and Empire‘s Terrence Howard, in addition to Diamond and Griffin.

But the show isn’t necessarily finished after its 10 episode series. We “could absolutely continue on, if there were people that wanted to. That’s a possibility,” De Line teased.

We’ll start to find out if the people want more when Wayward Pines (#waywardpines) premieres May 14 at 9/8c.

Last Man on Earth (FOX)

In Attendance: moderator Jarett Wieselman (BuzzFeed); creators/Executive Producers Chris Miller and Phil Lord; star/creator Will Forte.

Before screening an advanced cut of the apocalyptic comedy’s ninth episode, airing April 19, the last man himself Will Forte addressed the crowd.

“There are things in this episode we don’t want to get out, so we’re trusting you,” Forte warns.

Afterwards, the possibility of a season 2 was brought up.

“You never know until you get the call to say we’re doing it. We’re very hopeful. It seems good, but you never know. Hopefully we’ll know soon. We have to know by May,” Forte says. Throughout the panel, Phil Lord suggests not only mailing volleyballs to the FOX offices to show support, but shaved beard hair. Overall, Chris Miller was “cautiously optimistic” about their chances.

Directors Lord and Miller were asked about some of their other projects, including a possible return to Clone High. “We talk about it a lot. We periodically call Bill Lawrence about it. It seems like it’d be easier to do it as a movie than a TV series with everybody being tied up in different places,” Miller explains. Unfortunately, “there hasn’t been any forward movement in the past few months,” he continues. But Miller makes it clear that they’re “still excited about it.” After all, they still know the guy who plays Abraham Lincoln (that would be their literal right hand man Forte).

A crestfallen fan wondered about Lord and Miller’s decision not to direct Lego Movie 2. There are “a lot of reasons. They take a long time, which means we wouldn’t be able to make anything else for two and a half to three years. We found a guy that we love, who’s a friend of ours, Rob Schrab, who’s a very talented guy,” Miller says, referencing his Community resume. It’s clear they feel the franchise is in the right hands, and Lord believes it’s for the best. The three Lego sequels having different voices is “inspiring to us. We wanted to expand on what can be done in the medium of Lego movies.” Lord doesn’t think that’s possible if they were the only ones making the movies.

Miller and Lord insist they aren’t going to be “deadbeat Dad’s” with the entity, that they’ll be more like “super involved” soccer Dad’s. In fact, “we’re going to be writing Lego Movie 2 as soon as we’re done with this panel,” Lord mentions.

In the meantime, fans can take solace in new episodes of Last Man on Earth every Sunday on FOX at 9/8c.

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