Comic-Con International 2022 is scheduled for July 21-24 (with a Preview Night on 7/20) at the San Diego Convention Center. I passed on their "Special Edition" last Thanksgiving, on WonderCon 2022 in Anaheim a few weeks ago and on the smaller, more intimate San Diego Comic Fest this past weekend. While folks who attended these seem to have had a great time, I feel like I made the correct choices for me. Barring an unexpected surge of something contagious, I plan to be at the Comic-Con in San Diego in July. And assuming I can corral the right personnel to be on them, I intend to host Cartoon Voices Panels and Quick Draw! and most of the usual events I host there. I hope.
Some of you may be thinking, "Well, Mark's been to every one of the big San Diego Comic Cons…he doesn't want to break his streak." That matters to me less than you might imagine. Not coming down with a disease that has actually killed people I know…or caused some to go through the agony of having it…that matters more.
The first of the annual gatherings we now know as Comic-Con International was a one-day "test" con held at the U.S. Grant Hotel on March 21, 1970. An estimated 75 people turned out for it but it was considered a success and led to more. I was not among that estimated 75.
The first "Golden State Comic Con" (that's what they called it) was August 1–3 of that year. My friends Steve Sherman, Gary Sherman, Bruce Simon and I went down there for Saturday. Steve drove. We had a great time…and not the slightest inkling of what that event would turn into. No one did except for one of that year's Guests of Honor, a man named Jack Kirby. Boy, did he call it.
Thereafter, I attended every year — and for a time, every day of the con. It grew, it changed locations and it changed names. In '72, it was San Diego's West Coast Comic Convention and in '73, it became the San Diego Comic-Con. Since 1995, it has been Comic-Con International, though I still see people abbreviate that as "S.D.C.C." That includes people who weren't there (or alive) when those really were its initials.
At some point in the eighties, I began to lose enough interest in the event that I began skipping the first day and/or most of the last. There are many reasons why people love being at that event and I found that fewer and fewer were applying to me. For instance, a lot of people go to find and acquire copies of old comic books they love. Around '85, I more or less decided that any old comic book I loved but didn't have wasn't worth the amount of money I would have had to pay for it.
Some people go to buy new books and merchandise. I wasn't buying a lot of that stuff there…and even when I did, I didn't need to be there four days to buy what I was going to buy.
Some people love to see previews of upcoming TV shows and movies. No interest. If I want to see something, I'd rather see it all at once instead of in preview increments.
Some people go seeking employment or business contacts. I had enough of them then. In fact, I found that I enjoyed the con more when I didn't go to it to conduct business.
Some people go to meet people whose work they love. That was a big thing for me at one point. At San Diego Cons, I got to spend time with — just to name a few — Harvey Kurtzman, Will Elder, John Buscema, Gene Colan, James F. Davis (The "Fox and Crow" guy), Charles Schulz, Al Williamson, Marie Severin, John Severin, Mort Drucker and many others. And of course, the problem with that motive is that I ran out of people I wanted to meet.
Among those of us who work in comics, there are folks who make money at the con selling their work. I hope some day if/when I need the dough, I can get comfortable doing that but I'm just not. No criticism is implied of those who do. I kind of envy them in a way.
I always enjoyed myself at the con but as I'm trying to explain here, there was this period when I was starting to have moments of boredom and I began paring back the number of days I spent at one, especially when I was attending stag because whatever lady I then had in my life wasn't interested in being at a comic book convention. Then three things changed that…
One was that I had companions who did want to be there. Another was that the convention was asking me to host more and more panels. I think I got up to sixteen one year and those were almost all fun.
And the third one, and this may have been the most important to me, was that I began to view the convention in a different light. I began to feel it wasn't about helping my career or satisfying old nostalgic needs or enlarging my collection. I decided that it was worth going to for me just to spend 4+ days being among so many happy and/or creative people. At a time when I often feel surrounded by people who complain-complain-complain, it's invigorating to be around human beings — even if some of them are dressed like monsters — having the time of their lives.
I will write more about this in the coming weeks. For now, I'll make it simple: I love being at Comic-Con because I love being at Comic-Con. I'm really looking forward to being back at it again.