It is that time of year again when all fellow comic con enthusiasts descend down to the Jacob Javits Center to enjoy their yearly festivities for all things pop culture related. Except this year was different due to the multiple strikes on going by Hollywood, which I felt had a huge impact on this year’s attendance and things to see and do. New York Comic Con had to get more creative with its exhibitors to make it seem more exciting to fill the void the Hollywood studios would usually do.
You’d usually get tailored NYCC limited released trailers, celebrity interviews about the current projects they are working on, and stronger project based advertising by the studios while the celebrities still were in attendance all they could talk about was random things not project related. It was just extremely dull. It felt more like a shopping comic con than an experience con this year which was unfortunate if you didn’t want to spend to enjoy the convention.
As for the exhibitors hall there were numerous vendors with interesting activations especially ones regarding online manga reading subscriptions. Those really did stand out brightly as many people in the US love reading manga and also learning to know there are resources out there to get them straight to the source in English. Other exhibitors booths had their usual gotchas with as long as you provide them with your basic info you can participate in their swag giveaways.
The cosplay scene luckily was solid even with the lack of studio presence, it was fun seeing a variety of cosplayers doing popular tv shows, movies, anime, and video games.
The biggest issue with New York Comic Con every year though is the complete lack of mobile phone service which means lack of internet to participate in booth activations in the convention center. Which means the booth people will not let you get the free swag or enter contests due to lack of entering, exhibitors not being able to quickly do credit card transactions for points of sale, press not being able to live report smoothly, and special guests not being able to update their social media to promote NYCC.
Overall, New York Comic Con is still the best comic con I personally feel in the US, because of its location and the content they bring every year.
Were you at NYCC 2023? What were your thoughts? Feel free to leave a comment below or chat with us on Twitter/X at @TheConCollectve, Threads at @theconventioncollective, or Bluesky at @theconcollective.bsky.social
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