How to Prepare for the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con: What to Expect

On my last post, I briefly went over my own experience and history with the San Diego Comic-Con.This installment will be...

What Can You Expect at the San Diego Comic-Con.

As previously noted by this May 2013 article by Film School Rejects, the San Diego Comic-Con has about 130,000 attendees at a convention center with a square footage of 615,700 (an area larger than 10 football fields). What does that all mean? It means you can expect that there will be a lot of people, there will be a lot of walking, there will be a lot of waiting in line to get into places to check things out, and it will be hella crowded. But you are going to have a lot of fun while you’re there.

Oh, and you can expect to see some cosplay.



Lots of cosplay:



Make sure you have your camera ready. Lots of people cosplay, and everyone wants to show off. Just be polite and ask if you can take their picture. Unless the cosplayers need to get somewhere, they are always willing to oblige for a picture or three.

Besides, you never know who might be under that Spider-Man mask.

The Days Of Comic Con

Comic-Con takes place over the course of 5 days.: Wednesday night to Sunday.

Wednesday night is Preview Night.

Not everyone can go to Preview Night. It used to be that there was no price difference between a 4-day pass and a 4-day pass with Preview Night. With the growing popularity of the show, Preview Night costs a little extra. Preview Night was meant to be where you could check out the Exhibit Hall the night before the show opens. It was never too hectic or too crowded and you could get freebies from many booths as well as having the opportunity to buy some Exclusives from places like Mattel or Hasbro. Those days are now a thing of the past. Preview Night is now all about getting Exclusives and watching Screenings, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Despite Preview Night turning into a day all on its own, Thursday is still considered the first day of Comic-Con.

You can expect lighter programming on Thursday than the other days, but when the Twilight movies were a thing, Thursdays at Comic-Con became as busy and as hectic as Saturday Hall H programming.

Friday is Star Wars Day!

Friday is considered Star Wars day at Comic-Con because of the bevy of Star Wars related programming that day. Also, the first slides of the first Star Wars was shown in Comic-Con, so there will always be a deep connection between the film franchise and the show. With Star Wars: The Force Awakens coming out later this year, it is almost a sure bet that there will be a Star Wars panel in 2015.

In the last few years, Friday has also hosted panels for AMC’s The Walking Dead and HBO’s Game of Thrones in Hall H, a room that fits 6500 people. Having been to those panels, I can tell you that you have to line up early and no one leaves until at least those two panels are over.

The Will Eisner Awards are also held on Friday. The Eisners are the comic book equivalent of the Oscars. They are held at Indigo Ballroom of the Hilton Bayfront and they are open to anyone with a four-day badge or a Friday badge.

 

Saturday is the big "Hollywood" day!

Saturday is what I like to call "movie panel day" as Hall H typically hosts the Warner Bros panel to start the day with Marvel Studios ending the day. With Marvel Studios potentially not coming to Comic-Con this year, there’ll be a Hulk-sized programming hole that will need to be filled. There will be plenty of studios that will be clamoring for just that spot in the programming schedule. When people say that Hollywood has taken over Comic-Con, they are typically talking about the stuff that happens in Hall H on Saturday.

On other programming news, the second biggest room in the San Diego Convention Center is Ballroom 20 which seats about 2000 people. That room on Saturday hosts the Comic-Con Masquerade Ball. The Masquerade Ball is arguably the biggest event of Comic-Con. Morgan Spurlock’s documentary, Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope, dedicated a huge portion to the Masquerade Ball and what people have to go through to make that magic happen.

Sunday is Kids Day!

You can expect a lot of family friendly programming on Sunday. Sunday is not as hectic as the other days, but I wouldn’t recommend trying to stay in the Exhibit Hall to the very end. The rush to get out of the convention center rivals any mass crowd scene I’ve experienced.

Everything I’ve already mentioned does not even scratch the surface of all of the events at Comic-Con. There are off-site events like Nerd HQ, the the Nerdist, Walker Stalker Fan Fest and The Walking Dead Escape just to name a few.

As you can see, there is a lot to do at Comic-Con. This post was my attempt at showing what one can expect at the Comic-Con. On my next post, I will actually go over what you need to do to prepare for the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con. There is a lot to do with so little time. You will need to prepare and plan accordingly so that you can get the most out of your Comic-Con experience.

How to Prepare for the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con: My History and Introduction

The San Diego Comic-Con has been called many things: nerd prom, a gigantic pop-culture event, a celebration of the popular arts. Comic-Con is all of that and more. Comic-Con is one of the biggest pop-culture events in the world. Because of the scale of the show, preparing for Comic-Con requires a lot of planning and homework. Yes, something like Comic-Con should be fun, but planning and preparing for Comic-Con is the best way to get the most out of your experience.

Before I start with the “how to prepare for Comic-Con” advice, I would like to share my own history with the show, and particularly what going to Comic-Con unprepared is like. I have been going to Comic-Con since 2001. My first Comic-Con experience was as a day trip on a Saturday. My girlfriend and I had only heard of Comic-Con. Neither of us had ever been, and neither of us knew what was in store for us. We had decided that week to check out the world famous San Diego Comic-Con. Even back then, Comic-Con was already pretty well known. We just did not know the scope of the show.

We jumped in my car and drove to San Diego on a Saturday morning. We fought through typical Southern California Saturday traffic, we navigated our way through a crowded downtown San Diego to one of the Comic-Con parking lots, and we eventually made our way to the San Diego Convention Center through one of the free Comic-Con shuttles. Once we arrived at the convention center, we had to wait in a hella long line to get a registration pass for the day. Yes, there used to be a time when you could get passes to Comic-Con on the day of the show. After the 2+ hour traffic from Van Nuys to San Diego, plus what seemed to be at least an hour wait in line just to register, we were finally able to get into Comic-Con. We weren’t prepared for what we saw and experienced.

We saw a crowded Exhibit Hall with maybe 50-60,000 people all checking out the same booths. We saw a lot of people dressed as their favorite comic book character. We did not know about cosplaying back then. When we tried to go to a quiet part of the convention center, we just saw more people crowding around. When we tried to check out some programming, we saw more lines to get into some of these rooms. We thought the show was already huge and overcrowded and overwhelming. We did not prepare for Comic-Con. We did not know where to get food. We did not have any water with us. We didn’t even have any bags to help us carry around the free stuff we got or any of the cool and geeky things we bought. And then after the show, we fought our way through San Diego and Southern California traffic to make our way back home that same day.

However, when all was said and done, we didn’t know how good we had it back then. That first day seems like a nice quiet Comic-Con day now. To paraphrase Game of Thrones, we were sweet summer children.

The San Diego Comic-Con has only grown since then . I have witnessed first hand the incredible growth and popularity of Comic-Con.

What used to be a show where you can get tickets the same day is now a show that sells out in one hour.

Comic-Con used to cost around $50 for a 4 day pass with Preview Night. That same ticket costs about $200 now.

I was there before Hall H was ever a thing. Now for many people, Hall H is the only thing that matters.



I remember when Preview Night wasn’t a madhouse like it is now, and you could actually walk through the Exhibit Hall without getting having to fight your way through the crowds.



This is not to say that Comic-Con has gotten worse. This is only to say that Comic-Con has changed and evolved over the years. I have been to the last 14 Comic-Cons. My experience ranges from the one day trip to staying at a hotel near Sea World to staying in the downtown San Diego Gaslamp District.

With my history and experience, I can help some of the newer Con goers to prepare for Comic-Con. In the next few weeks, I will show you what you can expect at Comic-Con, what you need to prepare for Comic-Con, and how to successfully navigate Comic-Con’s programming schedule so that you can make the most out of your Con experience.