After 2 and half years, I finally found my way back to Comic Con. Since I started going in 2015, I haven’t gone so long not attending Comic Con. A friend and I used to go every year, twice a year. Then we cut down to once a year, and then in 2019 I went on my own, and then BOOM. COVID-19 pandemic.
October 2021 felt like a triumphant return. But at the same time it felt different for a lot of reasons. Because COVID rates are so high in the UK at the moment, I was nervous about 1) Travelling to and through London to get there, and 2) Spending a whole day in a room full of hundreds of other people.
Comic Con had put in extra entry requirements. All attendees over the age of 3 had to show their COVID status – that either they had a negative COVID result or that they had been double vaccinated. We had to show our COVID status to security and get a blue wristband before we went into the ticket hall to get our tickets.
We also had the option this year to get our tickets posted to us before the day, so we didn’t have to queue up in the hall. I didn’t get mine posted to me because I didn’t want to pay the postage for then to have wasted it if con got cancelled! (I know, I’m awful, but a huge part of me felt it wasn’t going to happen). They also had bag checks this year, which they haven’t had since the Manchester bombings. There were also a lot of police patrolling the hall this year, which was…strange. But it was nice to feel that the organisers cared out our safety.
Once thing I didn’t like that they did was hold people back in the ticket hall. If you get priority entry tickets, then you get to go into con earlier than the general ticket holders. But in past years they have let general people into the strip between the two sides of the exhibition space and then stopped people going into the exhibition spaces with security, but this year they held everyone in the ticket hall and then did a countdown thing to 12pm. Which I thought was pretty poor as everyone was forced together in a confined space and then it created a crowd/bottle neck when everyone went into the strip.
COVID hadn’t made the organisers change their entry requirements. It also changed con as a whole. I felt something was different the moment I walked into Pop Asia – which is one of the areas within con.
Usually, the floors are covered with carpet, and there are banners hanging from the ceiling advertising upcoming films. But as you can see from the below picture, everything was very bare this year. There was no carpet on the floor, and barely any banners.
When my friend and I started going to comic con in 2015, con was so small that it was held on just one side of the ExCel centre. One year they had the stalls on one side, and a couple of food trucks on the other. Then, over the years, con got bigger and bigger. In 2019, both sides were filled with stalls. There were was so much to see and do.
Going to con in 2021, felt like going to con in 2015.
In some ways, it was good that they had done a reduced capacity, because it gave more people space to move around, and quiet areas you could sit without people around. Good for social distancing away from the hustle and bustle of the stall areas which were busy. But it felt like it had regressed 6 years.
There were also a lot of stalls missing. After going to con for so many years, there are some stalls I’ve started to expect to be there: the bubble tea stall, the steampunk stall, the gay stall, the art tech stalls, and the gaming section. But none of them were there is year. And there was no manga stall! Forbidden Planet were selling manga (at full price) and there was one stall selling second hand books, but Viz Media who usually have a stall weren’t there and Travelling Man Comics weren’t there either.
But there was still plenty going on and plenty of cosplayers to see. I think if I had gone to con this year for the first time, I would have loved it, but going this year after having been so many times and seeing it built itself up into an amazing event, it was so disappointing to see it regress. But, as my mum said, they likely had to run the event on a reduced budget this year, which is why there was less. Hopefully one day it will return to its full glory.
As I said, even after all that complaining, there was still plenty to see and do. The moment I got into the hall, I headed to the Japanese foodstall for takoyaki (which I then burnt my mouth on!) I also bought (and ate) a coffee cakejar that had some excellent ACNH reference branding.
There were plenty of stalls to look at. Lots of t-shirts, nerdy stickers and art, Geeky Clean were there again this year, as was the Japanese pottery stall, and the apothecary stall, and strangely Lush had a massive set up this year, with glowing cherry blossom trees.
And what did I buy, I hear you ask?
Well, aside from the cake and takoyaki, I bought a A3 digital print. It’s rolled up and sealed at the moment, but below is an Insta post of the print from the artist’s account. I can’t wait to get it framed and put on my living room wall.
For ages, I’ve also wanted to start collecting enamel pins. Because they’re just so nice, but I don’t want to pin them on my bags because I know they would fall off, get lost and then I would be sad. So I thought that a pin display flag thing would be the best thing to do, and much to my joy they had some at Comic Con. I fell in love with this one from inpages and bought it along with one of her enamel pins.
I also bought my first Funko Pop! I’ve been umming and ahhing about buying one. I was afraid of starting because I had a feeling that once I started I wouldn’t stop! But a couple of years ago they released a Hiei one…and I felt that I needed it! Lucky for me, I found one at con and snapped it up. Just got to hold myself back from going mad and buying many more…!
In terms of cosplayers, there was a LOT of Demon Slayer cosplayers, which was only to be expected. But I was so surprised not to see any Jujutsu Kaisen cosplayers. Considering how popular the anime and manga have been, I would have thought that there would have been dozens of people cosplaying as the characters, but I didn’t see a single Jujutsu Kaisen cosplayer. NOT ONE!
As ever, there were the usual Naruto, One Piece, Sailor Moon, Star Wars, and Marvel cosplayers. But the strangest cosplay I saw had to be the skeleton dinosaur going around with a boombox on his shoulder… That, or the two people dressed up as Bananas in Pyjamas….
Will I got to Comic Con next year, I hear you ask? The answer is maybe. It depends on two factors, one being COVID, because I don’t think I want to go again if con is at the sort of toned down state it was this year, and the second is that I have BIG PLANS for next year, which are exciting but they are going to affect general plans. So we’ll see…
Bookworm Scribe 