ArtisticallyChill

I left some feedback on Chicago Comic-Con’s Facebook page last week leaving a few suggestions for next year’s show. It got a lot of ‘Likes’ and when I went to look for it this morning, it seems to have been deleted. All this tells me is that management only cares about non-criticizing comments that show the convention in a positive light when they know they need to work on how this convention is being handled if they ever want to be considered a top tier comic-con like SDCC or c2e2.

That said, I will try and recall the suggestions I made that Wizard World needs to pay attention to in order for Chicago Comic to go back to its roots and actually maybe it will retain some of its former glory and once again be the premiere comic-con of Chicago.

1. I don’t know what Wizard World did to piss off Marvel and DC Comics to vow never to come back to Chicago Comic-con but management needs to fix this. One they do and Marvel and DC come back, the other publishers will follow.
2. Timing. Wizard World scheduled Chicago Comic-con 3 weeks after SDCC. No wonder attendance by publishers and creators was lacking. Having the convention after SDCC forces publishers, creators and vendors to second-guess attending because publishers have deadlines to meet, as do creators, and vendors have trouble selling because fans spent all their money at San Diego. Schedule it before SDCC like you did 2 years ago. Everyone, publishers, creators, and even vendors will benefit from this.
3. Layout of the show was horrible! You had the autograph section immediately on entering the show floor. All this does is cause a bottleneck of fans wanting to get in line and fans wanting to walk through. The convention center has a lot of room. Stick autographs in a separate ballroom.
4. Celebrities are fine but do we need all those old wrestlers? And compensating for the lack of publishers by adding more celebrities (old ones at that) only makes Comic-con less of a comic book industry oriented convention.
5. Where are the indie publishers, small press, and webcomic creators? You should definitely invite them to the show instead of wrestlers and older celebrities. (see SDCC and c2e2)
6. Panels! Where the frell were they? Screening movie trailers doesn’t count as a panel by the way. You’ve got so much space to play with and you can’t setup some decent panels for fans to sit back, take a breather from all the waiting in line for overpriced celebrity autographs, and enjoy an interesting panel? C’mon! (see SDCC and c2e2)
7. Have tournaments and give away prizes! Heroclix, Magic the Gathering, and Monsterpocalypse tournaments should be held in another ballroom and invite vendors to sell the game pieces there as well.
8. Convention cafeteria food sucks. Invite local Chicago favorites i.e. ROBINSON’S to the show to sell food. This also shows that you support the community by having Chicago only restaurants feeding the fans. (see c2e2)
9. Seriously, BLAGO?! WTF?! You want to promote political corruption at one of the highest seat of state government at a show where fans and families worship superheroes? Way to stay classy! What you should have done was have the fans dressed up as superheroes kick that piece of shit in the groin and have the fans and families watch and cheer for Justice!
10. Better upkeep in the restrooms. Is it really that hard to have a clean restroom to walk into?

And there you have it. Despite Serena’s successful appearance in Artist Alley this year, this will most likely be our last trip to Chicago Comic-Con. Next year, we’ll be looking forward to attending c2e2, CHICAGO’S PREMIERE COMIC-CON! And we will be attempting to attend other comic-cons in neighboring states i.e. Mid-Ohio Con, Motor City, Spring Con, Fall Con etc.

Get your act together, Wizard World!

~ LoneWolf