I’ve been going to Dragon Con for 18 years.
My first one was in 1997, right after I graduated from high school. My dad gave me a choice in graduation gifts. The first option was we could go see U2 live in concert. I was a huge U2 fan and had been begging for years to see the group play live. I was stoked with option number one.
But then dad made things complicated when he dropped choice number two.
Instead of going to see U2, he said we could instead buy two four-day passes to Atlanta’s Dragon Con and get a room at The Hyatt downtown, one of the convention’s host hotels.
Actually, the choice wasn’t really all that complicated now that I think about it.
Save for a really small (and kind of terrible) Star Trek convention held at the Macon Coliseum, I’d never been to a con before, and the idea of spending four days at one that prided itself on running around the clock held infinitely more appeal than a two hour U2 concert.
Dragon Con 2015 came to a close on Monday.
Tuesday morning, I got an email from the convention’s media relations team, proudly announcing that attendance for this year’s show managed to exceed 70,000. In 2014, the con saw roughly 65,000 attendees, a number that was up from 2013, which was up from 2012. When I first attended back in 1997, there were nowhere near 65,000 people.
To say that Dragon Con is a growing behemoth of a show is gross understatement.
But that’s by design. Dragon Con has never been about just one specific fandom.
It’s never been a comic book convention, or a Star Trek convention. It’s never been a Doctor Who convention or an anime convention.
Rather, it’s been all those things, and more. Video games, board games, space exploration, Buffy the Vampire Slayer; if there’s a fandom for it there’s a home for it at Dragon Con.
While conventions like San Diego’s Comic-Con International have caught flak in recent years for not holding true to their founding focuses, Dragon Con has managed to mostly sidestep that same criticism as there’s never been one founding focus.
It’s the party that everyone’s invited to and the guest list for that party keeps getting longer and longer.
People often make the mistake of thinking Dragon Con is just like every other con, but it isn’t.
Dragon Con often seems less like a con and more like the nerdiest fever dream ever. I got to the convention Friday night with the intention of picking up my badge and then heading back home.
But, things didn’t work out that way. Before the night was through I had played a game of Are You a Werewolf in the bowels of The Hyatt, watched some professional wrestling being held in a ballroom, ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in years near a Dragonlance fan group recruitment table, ran into a friend I had only ever interacted with online, got into an intense debate with a group of strangers as to the best Star Trek TV series to introduce newbies to (TNG—Duh), and hung out for a bit with a Furry cosplaying as Superman.
And that was just over the course of a few hours on the first night. Yet, the entire weekend, that kind of stuff never really stops happening.
My Saturday started with me moderating a panel on the state of the current crop of comics coming from publisher DC with creators like Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner, Van Jenson, and Babs Tarr and ended with me and my wife dancing (poorly) at an LGBTQ rave at 1 AM. In between, I had done everything from discussing the state of Ring of Honor with a professional wrestling journalist and playing a quick game of Dungeons & Dragons to learning about the intricacies of LARPing and hanging with a guy cosplaying as Wilford Brimley.
Let me say that again; I hung with a guy cosplaying as Wilford Brimley.
Take note, Deadpool cosplayers, as this guy won “Most Unexpected” by a long shot.
Sunday? Sunday was more of the same, only with a lingering hangover.
Finding a venue for 70,000 people all looking for what seems like a unique experience isn’t easy, especially when the goal of the convention is to keep things going 24 hours a day for the show’s duration.
Dragon Con manages this by not confining itself to just one space, but rather in five different hotels in downtown Atlanta– The Hyatt, The Marriott, The Hilton, The Westin and The Sheraton—and a trade center called the AmericasMart. All of these venues are easily accessible to one another and all of them, save the AmericasMart, have something going on no matter the time of day—or night.
There’s a hoppin’ bar at The Hyatt that stays busy and Marriott’s Pulse Bar is the place to see—and be seen— as far as cosplay goes. The Westin’s bar is where to go for quiet conversation or to spot a writer or two while The Hilton’s Trader Vic’s is still the best kept secret watering hole of the entire con.
However, make no mistake. If you’re looking to stay in full geek mode all through the night, you can do that, too. Live music, movie rooms, anime viewings, gaming—you name it, you’ll find it somewhere.
In fact, there’s so much to do, you can actually find yourself paralyzed by it all. Early Saturday evening, I spoke to one attendee who’d been staring at the pocket schedule for what she said had been hour.
“How do people choose what to do?” She asked her friend. “There’s like ten things in here I want to do but I have no idea how to just pick one.”
Just making a decision is a legitimate concern at a con that has something for everybody and every interest, especially when you’re attending the con with a group. I ran into several friends and acquaintances over the course of the weekend who had been in more than a few arguments as to what panels to see or what parties to attend.
“We don’t want to split up,” one friend said, “but we can’t get a damn consensus, either.”
All kidding aside, no one was legitimately angry at having so much to do.
Again, it’s what separates Dragon Con from every other show promising a one-of-a-kind experience. It’s because of everything to do that Dragon Con doesn’t just make that promise; it delivers on it.
I was lucky. I had my wife in tow but she had no agenda.
“Wherever,” she said as we got to the show Saturday morning, and I asked here where she wanted to go. “I’m fine just hanging out with you.”
Shortly after she said that, she abandoned me to go attend a few panels on the paranormal track.
That’s not to say Dragon Con is without issues.
We had our first one on Saturday when my wife waited in line for over an hour to see Doctor Who alum John Barrowman, only to be kicked out by several volunteers at the tail end when she said she wasn’t buying any merchandise. We were shocked, as we’d never been turned away from just saying hello to a talent we were fond of. We told the volunteers as much, but it fell on deaf ears.
“He’s not here to do a meet-and-greet,” the volunteer said. “If you’re not spending money, you can’t be in here.”
We’d been having fun up till that point, and being told to kick rocks if we weren’t going to drop $20 on an autograph and God knows how much more money on a photo op was a pretty dark stain on the show.
Meanwhile, the aisles of the vendor room were anxiety inducingly narrow.
I had heard horror stories on Saturday of the massive crowds making the room all but impossible to navigate, so I avoided it until early Sunday afternoon. It didn’t matter and after getting trapped in a mass of people all incapable of movement a second time, I called it quits on the vendor room. As much as I wanted to spend a little money, I ultimately decided that avoiding a massive panic attack was more important.
Dragon Con is proud that 70,000 people opted to come out this year, and they should be.
The con market is a crowded one, and more competition springs up every year. That this annual event is growing like it is should be touted. But sometimes, particularly on Saturday and Sunday, it seems like nothing’s being done to make that crowd manageable, that people are being packed tight in an effort to get that attendance number higher and higher with little regard for how that decision affects people’s con experience. Is there a remedy for that? To be honest, I don’t know. But I do know that with each passing year, it gets harder and harder to navigate through one hotel, let alone the entire convention.
A lot’s changed about Dragon Con since my dad first took me back in 1997. With the exception of an oddly small representation of comic book professionals, the show has grown in every way possible.
In 2015, there was more to do than ever, there were more people to meet than ever and there was more to experience than ever.
Yet despite all the choice, it remains an easily customizable convention and I think that’s why it’s growing like it is. If you want to spend the weekend surrounded by people who just want to discuss the paranormal, you can do that. If you want to play board games or have LAN parties for three days straight, you can do that, too.
Name your geek passion, and you can actually easily experience a convention base solely around that.
Or if you just want to party all weekend, you can do that, too.
Not many conventions let you make them whatever you want them to be, and even fewer offer an experience that runs for four seemingly endless days.
But Dragon Con?
Dragon Con does, and much, much more.
