WonderCon Wrap Up

A few weeks ago San Diego's Comic Con sister show WonderCon made its way to the Anaheim Convention Center for a year. Typically the show is held in San Fransisco but due to the facility being remodeled WonderCon needed a new venue for the show. It was great having such a well known show in my back yard (I am an Orange County resident) which was good because I didn't have to spend two (2) hours on the freeway to get there, nor spend almost $200 a night on a hotel room.



It was a fun show with plenty of costumed characters roaming the halls. Saturday was the busiest day which surprised me a bit. I had arrived late Friday afternoon as I had some free time open up and parked in the adjacent parking garage, got my badge, and headed on to the floor. I was figuring Saturday would be just as easy but nope, they rerouted everyone to nearby Angel Stadium to park and take a shuttle back to the convention floor. I was surprised once I got there on how crowded it was - almost like a Comic Con crowd, however, by Sunday the number of people had dwindled.

A word about the show. Being an OC native I have been excited every few years to hear that Comic Con may be coming to Anaheim as it would save me a whole bunch of time and money and maybe make the show a little bit less stressful. But for that to happen Anaheim will really need to figure out how to handle a show of this size. The Anaheim Convention Center is huge - much bigger than San Diego and they always have something going on there. For WonderCon they had a volleyball tournament going all weekend. The parking situation was a bit hectic as like I mentioned you had to park at Angel Stadium and take a shuttle. When we arrived Saturday morning there was a long line of people waiting for the shuttles to take us to the Con plus we were having a bit of rain that morning so there was a long line of people waiting in the rain for shuttles. On the return trip there was no organization as far as stops and which parking lot you parked in so the drivers just dropped you off wherever and you had to find your car.

A Brand New Bongo Comics
WonderCon 2012

The show is much smaller than Comic Con but still has many of the same amenities such as high profile programming, plenty of vendors, resellers, and comic book publishers such as all our favorites Bongo Comics. Bongo had a small booth at the show and it is the first time they have attended the show in many years. No doubt the proximity was much easier for them to make as opposed to Northern California. A small contingent manned the booth and I wonder if it was Terry Delegeanes idea to have a booth at the show this year as he seemed to be the only one at the booth whenever I went by. Still, it was good to see him and talk a bit since I didn't get a chance to at Comic Con last year.

They did have a spiffy comic to give away letting everyone know what is going on at the House of Bongo including the new logo design, the impending 20th anniversary, and what is coming up from their line of comics. Worth having if you are a Bongo fan.
All in all a fun show and one I wouldn't mind attending again in the future whether it be in Northern California or in SoCal like this year.