Even with attendance capped at 130,000 by the fire marshal, the San Diego Comic-Con International remains the granddaddy of all comics conventions. It’s the biggest pop culture event in North America—comics are the core of an event that also showcases movies, toys, video games, science fiction, fantasy, and animation—and even with the cap, the show still seems to get bigger and better every year.
Despite complaints that the movies completely overwhelm news about publishing, this show continues to be a great platform to launch new print comics—and now digital comics too. Robert Kirkman’s Walking Dead periodical series marked its 100th issue with a near 400,000 first printing; Neil Gaiman is working on a new Sandman series; and Yen Press announced a comics adaptation of Zoo, a new adult graphic novel forthcoming from James Patterson in the fall simultaneously with the hardcover prose edition. There were announcements of a new digital imprint at indie comics publisher MonkeyBrain, the first e-books to be released from Abrams ComicArts and First Second, and Fantagraphics had it both ways, celebrating the 30-year print anniversary of the Hernandez brothers’ acclaimed Love & Rockets series by releasing their graphic novels as e-books for the first time. Here are a few photographs from this year’s show and another collection focused on kids' comics.
