Think of this as a Force Push of a different kind!
Gareb Shamus announced today that due to the Star Wars Celebration being held in Orlando in August, the Chicago Comic Con will be pushed back a week to August 19-22, 2010.
“We respect our 20 year relationship with LucasFilms and everything Star Wars has meant to the fan community. In deference to our attendees, guests and friends at Lucas, we are changing dates. We are all fans of the Star Wars films, and this slight change enables us to bring the type of presence the fans would expect at our annual Comic Con,” Shamus said in a release.
Now, this is interesting in a couple of ways, namely due to the Great Con Wars. A lot of people are certainly going to scoff at Wizard taking a step back for a competitor, especially given all the controversy of their pitting their Big Apple Con against Reed Exhibitions’ New York Comic Con. There may be a lot of people who feel slighted that Shamus would “respect” George Lucas, but seemingly not them.
Yet if you read between the lines, there’s another interesting tidbit: This Star Wars Celebration is also run by Reed. Could this be the first thawing of the Comics Cold War? Are there any benefits from Lucas and company that Wizard could get out of this gesture? Could Wizard get flat-tired by the Star Wars Empire, even as they are half a country away? As we asked earlier this week, is this industry big enough for two conventions? Let us know what you think, and sound off!
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:26 am
Wouldn’t that be nice if the ice was thawing? But, he knows the fans will choose Star wars over him. The same will come to pass with NYCC.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:30 am
Shamus is a shmuck. The Chicago comic-con used to be great. But Wizard has destroyed the show so badly, that they even had to remove their own name from it. Notice that they’re not calling it Wizard World Chicago anymore? Brand re-imaging is only necessary when the brand is so damaged that nothing can salvage it.
2008 show had a dozen empty vendor booths
2009 didn’t have DC/Marvel/Dark Horse
2010 won’t have me
BTW – The only reason I’ve gone the past couple of years was because I got free tix.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:57 am
He’s blinking for Star Wars/Lucas, not for Reed.
But ironically, I think it’s one show they COULD “compete” against, as I think the crossover between die-hard Star Wars fans and comics fans is not a big as people think. The kind of SW fan that would go to the Celebration surely reads comics, but more likely ONLY reads Star Wars comics, or perhaps other Sci-Fi adaptation books.
More likely there are a few publishers (Dark Horse leaps to mind) who do the Star Wars books who will go to the celebration and skip Wizard entirely.
Of course, moving the Wizard show also places it only one week away from the Blatimore Comic-Con. hopefully that won’t affect its ability to draw guests who may hesitate about two shows two weekends in a row.
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:31 pm
He’s backing out because half of his “Special Guests” are fringe characters who have had 5 second cameos in the Star Wars films! They will be going to the Lucas event and blowing him off, so he’d be stuck with old wrestlers and Lou Ferrigno. Wizard’s show is a ridiculous sprawl of D-List celebrities and strippers mixed fewer and fewer comic creators and retailers every year. I just wish they would go away.
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Hey Chuck, Lou Ferrigno is awesome. If he had his own convention I’d go to it.
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:11 pm
now if only they’d do this with NYCC and big apple Gareb Shamus please just change the dates so that yours is a little before or after the show.
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:31 pm
hey Chuck, speak for yourself buddy, the virgin fanboys NEED those strippers, its as close to a real women most of them will ever get to!!!
December 3rd, 2009 at 6:37 pm
This year’s “celebrity” autographs was outta hand! Taylor Dayne? Jake Busey!?! Please! And if you wanted an autograph by Rhona Mitra you had to pay an arm and a leg and then some. Forget it! The entire convention has lost any luster. Like someone else said here, I only went cuz I got in for free and even then….I was bored! The best part has and always will be Artist Alley.
December 3rd, 2009 at 8:06 pm
notice that Gareb has the word SHAM in his name.
Go away Wizard, you’ve destroyed the comic book hobby enough
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:53 pm
Well, the only alternative I can offer is, if anyone is willing to make the trip, there’s always I-CON 29 at SUNY Stony Brook, (Long Island) NY. The website is http://www.iconsf.org.
December 4th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Whatever. I just want that sleazy dork Shamus to fail for his purposeful screwing with NYCC.
December 7th, 2009 at 11:23 am
“The best part has and always will be Artist Alley.”
And that has been steadily going downhill. Wizard just doesn’t get the draw (pardon the pun) of big time artists. Sure, Howard Chaykin, Mike and Laura Allred and Matt Wagner were there in 2009, but that’s it. (And I want to thank each of them for showing up!)
Baltimore, meanwhile, had 20 big name creators.
Shoot, I know comic fans that fly from Chicago to Baltimore to attend a decent con.