The Cupid of Nerds: Ryan Glitch’s Comic-Con Speed-Dating Empire

For an 18-year-old dressed as a Pok

é

mon figure hitting on an older lady, the kid is actually surprisingly suave. «this really is my personal 3rd Comic-Con, but it’s 1st 12 months I became of sufficient age to achieve this,» Ash Ketchum claims, gesturing into 82 people seated in sets in a conference room inside the cellar regarding the Javits Center. Lamenting the tyranny of soccer at his twelfth grade, he proposes to show-me his Pok

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all, but a Jedi knight with spiked tresses yells, «opportunity’s up!» Our three-minute rate go out has ended.

Sunday Jedi warrior Ryan Glitch could be the 27-year-old holder of
Sci-Fi Speed Dating
, which in three years has actually prepared countless speed-dating events at a lot of super-fan events. Glitch’s periods have actually contributed to five marriages, two babies, nineteen involvements, «and over one hundred such as couples dating,» he informs me at certainly one of ny Comic-Con’s eight Sci-Fi increase Dating sessions. «that is certainly just what we understand from people telling united states on our fb page!»

A «big old geek» from a household of NASCAR lovers in upstate ny, Glitch is actually a gleeful one-man show of flick rates, absurd sounds, and fart laughs. The guy 1st experimented with speed matchmaking five years before, at Atlanta’s Dragon Con. «It was like twenty dudes and five ladies,» he recalls. He left before the period finished.

Afterwards that season, the guy emailed the organizers of

Performers Wars

Party V to
advise they take to performance internet dating
. «I got an e-mail straight back inquiring, ‘How really does speed matchmaking work?’ Therefore I described it in their mind. They questioned easily’d work one. I told all of them I experienced. But I had not.» Every treatment sold out.

«after that it really blew right up,» Glitch goes on. «We got fortunate, we hit on a good option, therefore went with-it.» Ever since then, he and a rotating staff members of pals have actually organized speed-dating events at about twenty downsides annually;
Sci-Fi Speed-Dating reality tv show

Geek Love



aired
shortly on TLC
,
then moved
to video gaming site IGN. «the coming year i will try to press it to 35 [conventions],» Glitch states. «I at this time make sufficient to stay off it. Well, stay meagerly, i ought to say.»

Between cons, Glitch operates from inside the straight back place of an area Walmart, assembling flooring design shows. The guy estimates they are the next or 4th quickest assembler of bicycles during the Walmart enterprise. According to him their buddy and speed-dating collaborator Jeff Hubbard is the better assembler on the planet. «You know, aces inside their locations,» Glitch states.

Hubbard has become assisting Sci-Fi Speed-Dating setup and pass product sales because start. A single day we met him, he was sporting an Indiana Jones costume rigged to try out the film theme song when he strolled. The guy doesn’t believe he’s the quickest Walmart assembler worldwide, but admits that in twenty five years he’s gotten very good. «i enjoy assist my arms,» Hubbard clarifies. For the art economic climate of

Superstar Wars

costuming, their specialty is actually fabricating armour. His Darth Vader costume is definitely worth around $10,000.

Glitch’s a lot of valuable outfit is actually an

Episode III

Anakin Skywalker worth $4,000, but putting on weight at this time prevents him from using it. The guy recently devoted their fb page to documenting their journey to shed weight for the following

Star Wars

Celebration. «62 times soda and fast-food free. 13 times consecutively of jogging. 556 times till party. Beginning fat, 367, present body weight 346.2,» he blogged last week.

Glitch’s speed big date web hosting style is part stand-up comedy, component soups Nazi. He packs as much rate daters into his sessions as well as physically feasible; to avoid 82-person pile-ups, performance big date rotations needs to be organized and rapid. For heterosexual sessions, the guy pre-registers more females than men, next just admits as numerous guys since there are available females. (LGBT rate online dating typically happens in different classes.) He is strict about outlines. «In Denver we’d larger lines than their particular A-listers. In Salt Lake City, we’d bigger traces than A-listers.» The guy talks of a Sci-Fi Speed-Dating range that when overshadowed a William Shatner panel.

My speed times feature a Peruvian motion picture enthusiast, a Wall Street financier in Final Fantasy armour, and a cosplay professional photographer from Hong Kong. Some men are seeking girlfriends, but most say they’d be delighted despite the dreadful friend zone. «merely a person who takes me,» an electric Ranger with an extended Island feature states, gesturing to his spandex-clad human anatomy. «Because people just who fulfill me here, they see every thing.»

3 years ago, Keri Brugge ended up being clothed as a Jedi knight when she sat down facing husband to be Matt Brugge at Glitch’s basic

Superstar Wars

Party V speed-dating treatment. Four months later, they were marching down a wedding section into

Celebrity Wars

motif tune. Matt suggested by organizing his

Celebrity Wars

figurines in a diorama version of a Sci-Fi Speed-Dating place. Keri’s engagement ring was hidden underneath Padmé Amidala of Naboo.

The pair live in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, with Matt’s 7-year-old daughter, whom Keri is assisting create a Princess Leia costume outfit for Halloween. Stopping by the Sci-Fi Speed-Dating room at Chicago Comic Con this year, «I was similar,

awww

,» Keri recalls. «right after which I became like, everybody do this! It struggled to obtain you!»

«discover a couple people from the first program exactly who I’ve already viewed walking around keeping arms,» Glitch informs me following the treatment. «It’s sort of an unwordable experience. Whenever Keri and Matt called to state, hey, we’re marriage, I became like—» He drops his jaw and pantomimes speechless pleasure, fingers flapping in the wrist. «In My Own contracts for some time, underneath in which you signal, it could state ‘Ryan Glitch, Geek Pimp.’ They use it the state agreements! I imagined it absolutely was entertaining. It’s a cool sensation and that I want it.»

The technical pimp himself, but is actually single. Glitch’s latest union began at their first-ever

Celebrity Wars

speed-dating treatment; he was merely internet hosting, but she found him on fb in addition they dated for quite some time. «i simply desire a wife and children. That is my sole aim in daily life. If speed relationship don’t happen once again, when we never ever filmed once again, i mightn’t care basically had a wife and young ones.» But he’sn’t certain whether he’ll mix business with pleasure once more.

«i’d love to satisfy somebody,» Glitch sighs, «but i do believe it’s dishonest to use my personal powers for evil or self-gain.»