Talk about an extremely eventful weekend and a lot to talk about with the experience from Fan Expo Dallas this year!

As an frequent convention attendee I was able to see some huge improvements, minor issues, and more based on other convention experiences and in particular, previous Fan expo visits.

Fan expo Dallas is one of the very few conventions I usually go for the whole experience (3 days) and that’s because of how much there is to do there, see, meet, and overall do.

Space:

My first visit was in 2017 to Dallas Fan Expo and it was very reminiscent this year in how the floor layout was! Which I can say, is not a bad thing because of how they mapped out the celebrities in a lower pit area and all the booths were in the higher area. It’s a nice separation of the different crowds from those looking to get autographs and pictures vs those that are shopping for art, meeting artists, or buying awesome goods.

The booths were much more spaced out for celebrities, so it wasn’t like waiting in line for a concert festival merch. I hardly had to wait in line longer than about 30 minutes tops and that’s because how they were able to make it flow quickly. I noticed bigger lines like the Stranger Things kept more order to prevent long lines spewing in the crowd flow area by handing out tickets for those to come back later.

The spacing for vendors was much better as well since it had a nice flow all around with the unique artists that I personally got to meet quite a few new ones. With that, I didn’t have to worry about running into people with my cosplays and overall breaking through the crowd.

Guests:

Any attendees main goal for conventions is usually to bring back awesome memories with some of their favorite actors, cosplayers, voice actors, or artists. And being the theme was Back to the Future it was kind of a letdown. Mostly in part by the new actors to Dallas like Michael J and Lea Thompson cancelled days before and even on the day of the Con. Don’t get me wrong I love Christopher Lloyd and Thomas Wilson but with the cancellation it turned more into a less themed con. But with last minute A-list announcement of Ben Affleck as replacement, it saved the con more so and shocked lots of fans that usually anticipate cancellations without replacement.

And most notably Mr. Goldblum, Mamoa, C3P0, and my personal favorite Mrs. Baccarin just made the waiting in line so much more like a breeze than compared to previous years, their friendliness was amazing and everyone from what I saw got some great stories on their interaction rather than a 10 second hello.

(Sam De La Rosa – Artist)

Cosplay:

After having time to reflect on seeing and being in cosplay all three days, it was a bit of a mixed review.

Being in Venom on Friday was amazing, almost no crowd, lots of space, plenty of vision and ventilation, and a great response. It was more pact with cosplay more so than I’ve seen in the past which is awesome. I would say it was about a 1/10 ratio of cosplay vs casual, comparable to the 1/25 ratio.

I was able to get almost all my shopping done Friday and was able to meet the cosplay guests such as Nigri and Vamp without having to wait long and getting some chat time to catch up and talk cosplay.

Saturday was uncomfortable for any big or hot cosplays (props to Reinhardt there) due to the crowds that had a peak of around 2pm that looked like ants in a colony from above the stairs before entering the guest pit. I know I lost about 5 pounds in water weight that day from sweating but walking around wasn’t as bad as previous years where it was body against body (risking chances of something breaking). Overall not too bad but it would mean certain areas would take longer to get through and being hot was an issue with many.

Sunday was super casual for many so walking in Deadpool was easy as pie. So much more room, visibility, and of course ventilation in the room. Overall not bad for cosplayers who know how crowded a Fan Expo Dallas can get. I think so long as they can carefully continue to create mapped out areas for crowd flow and lower the A/C Saturday, I don’t see many issues going forward.

If you haven’t checked out Fan Expo Dallas or their Fan days I highly recommend checking it out since they know how to bring awesome guests and take feedback to improve on each year, creating a unforgettable experience for us fans.

(210ultimatespiderman vs sirnickjustice)

4/16/18

Sir Nick Justice

Facebook.com/sirnickjustice