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Jasper Ramirez

This year the anticipation in fans for the Salt Lake Comic Con was high and the event seemed to uphold its expectations and reward its participants with thrilling experiences. However, many fans were disappointed when they were forced to wait in a patience-testing line. Comic Con started out rough on Thursday when attendees sacrificed many hours just to be admitted into the building and find the line continued.  With the line wrapping around the Salt Palace the hours people waited were between two to four.

“I wasn’t sure why it was so bad, for the last one I pre-registered and  I didn’t get a chance to this year, but I thought ‘Oh you know it wouldn’t be so bad’ and I didn’t even get in on the first day and was just amazed they didn’t handle it better,” said teacher Rob Eberly.

This didn’t seem to waver fans too much though. With all the tickets sold out, they broke their own record from last year on Saturday with twice as many people compared to last time. About 125,000 attended the event this year and with only 72,000 last fall there seemed to be a huge difference in experience for fans that went the year before. Although there were people who attended Thursday and didn’t get in or get to spend much time due to the line and demanded a refund, which the Comic Con founders are willing to pay back.

Salt Lake City’s convention is making history being the third biggest, with New York coming in second and San Diego taking first. But with this new popularity come the increased crowds.  While some people expected large crowds for others it may have come as a bit of a surprise just how large they were.

Junior Anna Benavidez said, “They could have put it into a bigger place so more people could enjoy it without it being too crowded.”

The event hosted many activities like contests, panels, and booths.  Some of the contests included those of cosplay and wrestling. There were many panels and celebrity meetings such as those with Stan Lee, Simon Helberg, and Eliza Dushku, who seemed to be popular ones.  There were hundreds of vendors with their booths focusing on movies, books, and some even dressing up people who came as themselves but decided they wanted to be a part of the other cosplayers. A popular area of the vendors was Art Alley where artists created pieces depicting heroes of all sorts in their own unique ways for all kinds of fans.

Eberly said, “I always love looking at the artists. I just love looking at the difference, and a lot of it gets repetitive, but I enjoy it, seeing what people can do and what they are willing to put out there.”

Although some may have been disappointed, conflicts aside, this year’s Salt Lake Comic Con seemed to be quite a hit with attendees. ”I loved it.”, said Benavidez. Although they aren’t sure about another FanX, plans are already in the making for a 2015 event.