Thousands attend Comic Con Africa on Heritage Day

Thousands of South Africans descended on the Nasrec expo centre, south of Johannesburg on Heritage Day for the Comic Con Africa.

The third day of the pop culture festival which kicked off on Thursday, and saw massive traffic congestion and long queues with a continuous stream of visitors coming through the gates.

Tickets sold out ahead of the Comic Con Africa show, and organisers said over 20,000 visitors engaged with exhibitors, cosplayers and gamers at Nasrec.

Highlights

On the Comic Con Africa show floor Marvel fans could step into Disney Plus’ mirror dimension inspired by Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.

The Netflix Stranger Things activation continued to pump, and cosplayers filled the aisles. SpongeBob Squarepants paid a visit to fans in the Link.

Celebrities

Internationally acclaimed Cosplay artist, Taryn Cosplay joined fans for the first time in the Pop Culture Hall for a Q&A session.

The Cosplay artist engaged with the audience and answered questions about how he rose to fame while US actor Ross Butler attracted hundreds of fans as he appeared at the festival for the first time.

The star chatted about his latest project Shazam 2, and his past projects with Netflix and Disney Channel.

Gaming

Unplug Yourself hosted the tabletop gaming section of the festival, teaching fans to play board games, miniature games, trading card games, and much more.

Fan favorites Pokémon, Magic The Gathering, and Yu-Gi-Oh! were on the tables.

Attractions

At StreetCon, urban influencers appeared on stage with Bathu SA to chat about how street culture influences on pop culture, followed by the highly anticipated finale of Barber Wars.

The Røde Microphones’ StreamerCon stage in Hall 7 hosted panel discussions, content creation sessions and workshops on how fans can elevate their content.

Brand Manager Cameron Nyce said Røde’s major focus is to bring studio quality equipment on the market at an affordable price.

“Being at Comic Con Africa has been a great opportunity for us to connect with content creators of all forms, and we’ve had an amazing time meeting like-minded individuals.”

KidsCon

At KidsCon, the Board of Little Experts, who helped plan the festival for the past few months along with the team, made their way to the KidsCon main stage to share what they’ve enjoyed the most at the Con so far, and give away tons of prizes to the kiddies and their parents in the audience, awarded by Bela Bela’s Warmbaths Forever Resort.

Venue

Show Director Carla Massmann said ComicCon moved to the Johannesburg Expo Centre because the event needed a bigger home.

“The show offers over 256 hours of content across three halls and seven stages – there is so much to learn and experience at Comic Con Africa. It’s the coming together of so many diverse yet intersected communities and it is our goal to showcase these awesome fandoms that are the very heart of pop culture.”

Comic Con Africa ends on Sunday 25 September.