Well. It should be no surprise that Wil Wheaton took the stage at Denver Comic Con looking like this:

Photo by: Alison “Boom” Baumgartner

There is a reason why Wheaton is a con favorite, and his showing at Denver Comic Con is proof of this. He had inspiring messages, thoughtful critiques, and funny stories, all packed into an hour.

Here are the highlights:

It Gets Better: Towards the end of the panel, a little girl asked if he was called a nerd when he was younger and how did he deal with it. One of the great things about Wheaton, as many will attest, is that he takes children’s questions as seriously as adults’, and he quickly changed from joking around about having hormones on the set of TNG to addressing an issue that clearly affected this girl.

Wheaton explained that he was called a nerd when he was growing up, then expounded upon why and how much it hurt. Really, it ultimately came down to a message that we should all take to heart.

Firstly, never apologize for being who you are. Secondly, and the crowd clearly appreciated how Wheaton didn’t beat around the bush here, there is not an easy way to deal with being bullied, because the truth is that it hurts. More importantly, he said earnestly:

“It has nothing to do with you. It’s not about what you said. It’s not about what you did. It’s not about what you love. It’s about them feeling bad about themselves.”

He ends the speech by saying it gets better, and notes that crowd of people around him are all nerds too; that none of us are alone.

How Gaming Saved His Family: It’s not a secret that Wheaton loves tabletop gaming. It’s hard to keep that sort of thing in the closet when you have a whole web series dedicated to doing it, not that I think Wheaton would ever keep anything like that in the closet. What you may not know, and he shared this quite candidly, is that it can bring a family together.

Wheaton told us a powerful story about his two children, who were from his wife’s first marriage, and how the ex-husband suddenly wanted to be in their lives again and was demanding custody. The court proceedings were arduous and hard on the family. Still, they played games together as a family, and it kept them together as a family. He then went on to tell us about other people he had met who also say that having family game nights helped keep their families as families instead of each member going off to do their own thing after dinner.

What’s New for Season 2.5 of TableTop: We will be seeing Wil Wheaton and Co. playing “Unspeakable Words” (a word game that slowly drives you insane), “Fortune and Glory” (Indiana Jonesque game), “Qwirkle” (great family game), “Ticket to Ride Europe” (which his wife will be joining in on!) and “Takenoko” (a game he thinks that has been flying under the radar, but will blow up).

If Wil Wheaton Created a Game: It would be based on John Scalzzi’s Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas, where there would be two groups playing one another: 1. The red shirts who play the game with the goal of surviving and 2. The writers who try to kill the characters. BUT! The two groups have to work together in some fashion in order to make sure the show isn’t cancelled. The idea has been put on the back burner since another game entitled “Redshirts” was released. However, he assured us, that he has a lot of ideas that he would like to work on.

Image Credit: Tiffany Arns

All in all, Wheaton was a huge hit at Denver Comic Con, and should be on everyone’s hit least to see at a convention.