San Diego Comic-Con Joins The Trend Of At Home Events With SDCC@Home

Geeks rejoice! San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC), the biggest geek culture event of the year, has announced that they’ll be joining in on the trend of hosting at-home events, according to Deadline. On Friday, the convention announced San Diego Comic-Con@Home — a virtual version of their annual event.

In a video released on the official SDCC Twitter account, the convention organizers teased the event saying, “Coming soon… Free parking, comfy chairs, personalized snacks, no lines, pets welcome, badges for all, and a front-row seat to… Comic-Con at Home.”

See you this summer! #ComicConAtHome pic.twitter.com/Sf5UbJkXtE

— San Diego Comic-Con (@Comic_Con) May 8, 2020

The date for the virtual version of the convention hasn’t been released yet, according to Deadline. 2020’s convention was supposed to take place on the weekend of July 23-25, so Deadline posited that the virtual convention will take place on the same weekend.

According to CBR, Comic-Con — the organization behind SDCC and some other comic book conventions — was forced to postpone Wondercon in March due to the coronavirus pandemic. Back then, the organization was hopeful that they would be able to hold SDCC as scheduled and find a new date for Wondercon. But as coronavirus continued to spread, the organization made the difficult decision to cancel both Wondercon and San Diego Comic-Con for 2020.

The convention organizers released a statement in April announcing their decision, per Deadline.

“Recognizing that countless attendees save and plan for its conventions each year, and how many exhibitors and stakeholders rely upon its events for a major portion of their livelihood, they had hoped to delay this decision in anticipation that COVID-19 concerns might lessen by summer. Continuous monitoring of health advisories and recent statements by the Governor of California have made it clear that it would not be safe to move forward with plans for this year.”

The convention organizers promised convention-goers all over the world that both Wondercon and SDCC would be back in the spring and summer of 2021 respectively.

So far, no information has been released about what kinds of events the virtual convention will include or how much the virtual convention will cost, according to CBR. When SDCC was officially canceled, the event organizers posted information about how convention-goers who had purchased advanced tickets could get their purchase refunded, so it’s likely they will be requiring people to purchase tickets to the virtual event.

San Diego Comic-Con is hardly the only event to move online in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. According to Billboard, several concerts and music festivals have opted to stream their events online so that people can watch from the safety of their own homes.