2015)

Star Wars Celebration 2015 was held in Anaheim at the Convention Center from April 16-19. This four day event was the first Star Wars Celebration held in the city and the follow-up to the one held back in 2012 in Germany.

With the new Star Wars movie due out later this year and the past event two years ago in Europe, you bet that the event was crowded and packed to the gills. Parking at the convention was made worse with the front parking lot off Katella Ave. roped off due to construction with many attendees being directed to the Anaheim Angels baseball stadium for parking.

On Thursday the beginning of the Celebration kicked off with a panel of the director and major stars of the movie along with the reveal of the second trailer for the movie which caused many a fans to camp out overnight to be able to attend the main hall event with the stars.

Those of us that were not able to fit into the main hall were moved into other meeting rooms to watch both the panel and trailer on the screens. After the trailer was shown, it was replayed one more time and then attendees were given a limited edition Force Awakens poster.

The exhibit hall was packed with mainly vendors and a small artist alley. There were many backdrops from the Star Wars universe attendants could take pictures with as well as a good amount of cosplayers at the event.

Actors from the film were not available in the exhibit hall and could only be met via purchase of photo op or signing tickets, which of course caused people at the event to mainly line up for exclusives or the booths that had interactivity attached to them; which of course caused major lines for every booth there.

If you did not want to mainly walk the floor, you could also attend panels for which got filled up fast and if you did not make it to the panel by the time the doors closed you would not be admitted in.

With the lack of guests to interact with and booths at the event mainly relegated to selling Star Wars trinkets that you could buy online or at your local store, the lines for freebies or booths such as the Battlefront, Star Wars XD sections and booths selling exclusives such as Funko, Hot Wheels, were hours long.

There were some odd choices for the event such as an alley just for onsite tattoos. The artist alley was very small with no more than 20 artists inside a closed off area.

I was able to walk the main floor and see a majority of the vendors all within a few hours. With the lack of novelty freebies or the lines for them so long, I was dissuaded from staying any longer than necessary.

Passes to the event sold out for the 4-day pass as well as Saturday’s event. Tickets were not cheap, with Saturday being $85 and other days around $65.

Overall it was an amusing event, but the long lines and lack of significant items and people to meet from the Star Wars universe hampered the fun of the event.

Comic Convention Report: WonderCon 2015 Review (Los Angeles, CA, (4/3-4/5/2015)

WonderCon Anaheim 2015

WonderCon returned to Anaheim for 2015, again during the Easter weekend which probably impacted the number of attendees and guests that could bypass events and work holidays to participate in the fourth WonderCon at the Anaheim Convention Center.

Attendance for 2015 was decent and comparable to previous years though the amount of “wow” factor special guest, exhibitors and events decreased significantly. At the very first WonderCon held in Anaheim back in 2012 exhibitors such as Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, and movie studios appeared. But for 2015, Marvel, DC, Dark Horse were missing and only Boom Studios, Lion Forge and Image had a publisher presence on the floor.

Statue displays

The set-up of the floorplan was changed significantly with the artist alley space moved to the Hall A section instead of the previous year’s Hall D and the badge pick-up also kept next to Hall A instead of the bottom basement hall for pick-up. Publisher booths were kept near the doors and the special guest signing table was moved to the mid-hall location. Some of the bigger tier artists were placed near each other causing some major line congestion and blockages that caused some exhibitors to pitch a fit and request some artists or signing lines to be moved.

Jae Lee sketching

Artists such as Babs Tarr (Batgirl), Phil Noto (Black Widow), Jae Lee (Batman/Superman), and Darwyn Cooke (New Frontier) had significant lines throughout the con with Babs’ line being the longest all 3-days of the event.

Phil Noto sketching

Other guests such as Dan Jurgens, Kevin McGuire, Ken Lashley, Steve Epting, Ron Lim had more manageable lines and commissions could still be acquired on the second day of the convention. It always eludes me when convention organizers do not place big name talent at table corners where lines can be more controlled instead of placing them smack dab in the middle of artist alley where lines just clog up the walk way and block other exhibitors.

Rob Van Dam

Tempo and excitement for WonderCon 2015 was lower in expectation and turnout when I asked other attendees of the event. The lack of many more higher-profile guests, media guests and the Big 2 publishers significantly loosened the “wow” factor in this event and SDCC-lite it was.

With the 2016 event for WonderCon moving to the Los Angeles Convention Center the change in venue will either make or break the event. The LACC significantly lacks the foot-traffic and restaurant and Disney location of the Anaheim Convention Center but hopefully the closer star power location will bring in more guests and “wow” missing this year.

Comic Book Event: WonderCon-Anaheim 2014

WonderCon 2014 has passed, now referred to as WonderCon-Anaheim as WonderCon-San Francisco should be back in effect one day according to the WonderCon program book. So it looks like the success and packed 2013/2014 season has led to Orange County now getting their very own San Diego Comic Con-lite convention as an annual event instead of just a hold-over until Comic Con Intl. was able to secure a location in San Francisco again.

Compared to the 2013 WonderCon in the same Anaheim Convention Center location, this year it was able to secure halls A & B as well as the arena for larger events which was nice but also meant that this year they had a lot more attendees and traffic compared to last year.

Last year had some artist and creators that appeared from multiple national locations but were noticeably absent this year with a good portion of artists and creators being more LA/OC/San Diego locals that usually show up for the smaller regional events. Marvel Entertainment also was absent with nary a booth set-up this year compared to last year leading DC Comics and IDW, Aspen as having the larger booths for comic publishers.

Navigating the aisles was a lot harder this year with a good amount of people on Saturday and Sunday and clogging up the aisles especially in Hall B where the comic book booths were at.

Many artists in artists alley were busy and jammed if you were a B or A-lister!

See you next year WonderCon.

WonderCon-Anaheim 2014 Photos

WonderCon-Anaheim registration hall
Writer, Scott Snyder (Batman, Swamp Thing)
Writer, Len Wein (Wolverine, Swamp Thing, Batman)
Artist, Russ Heath (The Haunted Tank, Out Army at War)
Writer, Richard Starkings (Elephant Men)
Artist, Frank Cho (Liberty Meadows, Avengers, Savage Wolverine)
Witchblade cos-player
Dr. Who cos-players
Artist, Marc Silvestri (Witchblade, Hulk, X-Men)
Witchblade creator, Marc Silvestri, with Witchblade cos-player

Enjoy!