Adventures at South Carolina Comicon

We have been here before, in this familiar place, in this familiar space – no, I’m not talking about The Observer, I’m talking about South Carolina Comicon!

While the passage of time will always bring change, some of life will always stay the same. Staying the same, for me, means going to cons. April brought about the 10th Annual South Carolina Comicon – some of you may remember I had the privilege of going for the first-time last year with Kasie Strickland (the now publisher of The Newberry Observer).

Cons have steadily become more and more of a tradition for me, and it appears I am now going to them once or twice a year. South Carolina Comicon was the first this year (hopefully the first of many) and quite frankly, as a kick-off con, this was a doozy!

This year’s con was bigger than I’ve ever seen in South Carolina – not to say that there have not been bigger ones before, but for me, this was. The guest list was packed and while I cannot list everyone, I’ll present the highlights for Kasie and me – Jim Lee (comic book creator), Jae Lee (comic book creator) William Shatner (Star Trek), Nakia Burrise (Power Rangers), Jason Faunt (Power Rangers). There were tons more guests, but these were the guests we had the opportunity to interact with.

I’ve written in the past about my love of these fandoms and being able to get autographs (especially autographs on comic books) is an incredible opportunity! I must also highlight seeing Kasie literally fan-girling over meeting the legendary William Shatner was worth the price of admission!

However, going to S.C. Comicon (or rather any con) is not solely about the guests. While that is a big part of the experience, one of my favorite parts is seeing who is dressed up and the common themes. Superheroes are always a given, as are characters from Star Wars or Star Trek, but a lot of times you find creative, out of this world characters!

This year, I got into a show called Hazbin Hotel and I’m clearly not the only one, seeing as the pilot has been out since 2019. I saw plenty of people dressed as characters from the show – some of which were handmade. Kasie and I also spotted characters from childhood shows that unlocked core memories. Two examples of this were Muriel from Courage the Cowardly Dog and Loonette from a show my sister liked called the Big Comfy Couch.

On a side note, and in a fun small world way, it turns out the person I snapped a picture of during the con dressed as Loonette is my aunt’s cousin.

As when I’ve written columns such as these in the past (or even when I wrote my goodbye column and quoted Doctor Who), I’ve always found these types of events or fandoms bring people together. For example, before I left The Observer, I literally lost count of how many Whovians approached me about loving the show!

Looking toward the future, I’m looking forward to a few more cons, one of which will be Soda City Comic Con where I’m looking forward to Rose Marie Favors experiencing her very first con!

I’ll of course attend more cons with my camera, ready to snap a few pictures!