Anyone talking about WonderCon almost always seems to compare it to its big brother in the world of comic book conventions, the San Diego Comic-Con International. This year the comparison is that while San Diego in the summertime generally has great weather, this past rainy San Francisco weekend (February 22-24) was hardly ideal for drawing a crowd to the Moscone Center for the 22nd annual WonderCon. Nevertheless, this year’s show still attracted thousands of fans hoping for a chance to get close to both cartoonists and movie stars.

“We had 20,000 people last year,” said David Glanzer, director of marketing and public relations for Comic-Con International, which owns and manages WonderCon. “I think it’s safe to say that when the numbers are counted [for this year] we’ll see an increase.” Glanzer noted that the crowd was large, but there were no complications in circulating fans through the convention hall. Glanzer attributed this to the opening of more panel discussion rooms, including the massive 4,500-seat Hall A, which featured most of the movie and television panels. Glanzer said he didn’t expect the poor weather to affect crowd size. “The people in the Bay Area and Northern California are very resilient,” Glanzer said.

DC's Mike Carlin and artist Mike Mignola. (Photo by Scott Dunbier.)

While the movie and television studios have a presence at WonderCon—the reunion of X Files stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson for the film continuation of the sci-fi TV show was a big hit—comic book publishers still demand much of the attention at the show. DC Comics remained the biggest publisher there and came to San Francisco with a few major events and announcements.

The Vertigo imprint will now publish a collection of the 12-issue series Demo by Brian Wood and artist Becky Cloonan. The original periodical series about superpowered teens was originally published by independent publisher AiT/Planet Lar. At the show, Wood and Cloonan announced the start of a new series of Demo stories by the same creative team. A six-issue miniseries is expected to be published sometime late this year, and Wood said more Demo comics after that are a possibility. Also forthcoming from Vertigo is a coffee-table book collecting renowned artist James Jean’s cover art for the continuing series Fables. Bill Willingham, creator and writer of Fables, a special guest of WonderCon, said he will be providing an introduction to the book. Willingham revealed that there will be another Fables graphic novel like 2006’s Fables: 1,001 Nights of Snowfall.

WonderCon attendees got to hear from both the writer and the artist of Trinity, DC’s forthcoming weekly superhero title that will follow the exploits of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Writer Kurt Busiek and artist Mark Bagley both appeared at the convention, signing books at DC’s booth on the convention floor and appearing on the DCU Countdown panel Saturday. While the book will feature the biggest names in DC superheroes, it will not be connected to larger events in DC’s current continuity. While Marvel Comics again had no exhibitor presence at the show, Marvel Studios’s film Iron Man was a sponsor of WonderCon, and J. Michael Straczynski, writer of Amazing Spider-Man and Thor, met with his fans at the convention. His appearance made even more news for DC. Now that Straczynski’s exclusive deal with Marvel is over, the creator of the sci-fi TV show Babylon showed up at the DCU Countdown panel to reveal he’s about to start writing for DC, although he would not reveal the title or titles he will be working on. Along with former Ultimate Spider-Man artist Bagley, that makes two names long associated with Marvel teaming up to work for DC Comics.

Without a doubt, one of the biggest crowd magnets was the world premier of DC’s new animated film, Justice League: The New Frontier. The film is part of several animated direct-to-DVD films from Warner Bros. animation based on DC characters. This particular film is based on New Frontier, Darwyn Cooke’s story of DC’s Silver Age characters gathered together against the backdrop of actual events from the late 1950s to the early 1960s. Cooke was also a special guest at the convention, and he, along with the film’s director and executive producer Bruce Timm, were there to speak to the crowd after the film was screened. The festivities continued when the San Francisco comic book store the Isotope threw Cooke a celebratory bash at its glitzy Hayes Valley location.

DC v-p of sales Bob Wayne appreciated the sizable but not overwhelming crowd WonderCon attracts. “I look at the San Diego Comic-Con as an enormous comic book convention dropped into the middle of something else,” he said. “This feels like what San Diego was 10 years ago.”

Dark Horse’s announcements added even more variety to an already wide-ranging line of books. The company will start producing collections of Web comics Achewood and Perry Bible Fellowship. The publisher is also teaming up with Bay Area cartoonist Keith Knight to publish The Complete K Chronicles, Knight’s series of political cartoons. Dark Horse is preparing for the much-anticipated release of Hellboy II: The Golden Army by releasing a plethora of Hellboy and BPRD trade book collections and serials. Hellboy creator Mike Mignola was at the convention signing books at Dark Horse’s booth.

Dark Horse director of publicity Jeremy Atkins said that Dark Horse’s titles are attracting people who aren’t necessarily comics fans. “Two of our books brought new fans into the stores,” he said, pointing out Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 8 and The Umbrella Academy, “and have been very successful in the direct market.” Buffy Season 8 is, of course, the continuation of Joss Whedon’s cult hit TV show that formerly aired on the WB and UPN. The second book is a story of a family of strange superheroes written by My Chemical Romance singer Gerard Way. Atkins praised the show and said, “At WonderCon, you see a variety of fans. It’s a mix between Comic-Con and SPX. It’s a little mellower, and you can talk to such a variety of people.”

Small publishers do get more notice at WonderCon, where everything else is at a smaller scale. After eight years attending WonderCon, Mark Masterson, writer of the photocomic Dorothy, finally got his due when two attendees decided to “cosplay” as characters from his book. “Masquerades are not my thing, but it was an honor,” he said.

If there was a hot book at the convention, it was Mark Evanier’s Kirby: King of Comics. Published by Harry N. Abrams, the book hasn’t been officially released yet, but comics retailer Rory Root of Berkeley’s Comic Relief ordered 80 advance copies for the show. By 3 p.m. Saturday, they were sold out. Evanier was at the show signing books and moderating panels, including the Jack Kirby tribute panel that occurred only a few hours before the book was cleaned out from Comic Relief’s shelves. The book is a large hardcover featuring page after page of carefully reproduced Kirby artwork, from published comic book pages to penciled originals. Between the artwork is Evanier’s biography of the man who was both a professional mentor—Evanier first worked for Kirby over 30 years ago—and a friend. “Mark is the expert and also one of the fans,” Root said. “When he talks about Kirby, it’s a relationship of respect that’s palpable.”

Despite the impact of movies and TV, WonderCon 2008 still managed to be about the joy of finding and reading a big stack of funny books. On Sunday, DC Comics executive editor Dan DiDio and his DC colleagues hosted a panel entitled “For the Love of Comics.” DiDio didn’t hype any new books from DC, but spent the hour talking to fans about their first comics and what they did and didn’t like about comic books today. It was a refreshing break from the talk of what’s new and what’s hot. The panel was really all about fans connecting with other fans—some of whom just happened to have jobs in the comics business. It’s one of the reasons why people turn out for shows like WonderCon in the first place.

Fans line up to get in on Friday of the show.




















Fables writer Bill Willingham at his spotlight panel.


Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny promote the upcoming X-Files movie.

Above three photos courtesy WonderCon.