Creatives at Stratford Comicon happy to share work with attendees

Left to right Lila Stanic and Aimee Aitken cosplaying at Stratford Comicon.

By: Emily Stewart

Artisans and pop culture enthusiasts of all kinds gathered at the Best Western Arden Park hotel for Stratford Comicon on Aug. 22.

Stratford Comicon, hosted by Pop Culture Canada, featured a variety of vendors offering prints, stickers, bookmarks, plush toys, trading cards, collectibles and books. WWE Hall of Famer Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake was also at the event for a meet-and-greet.

Regan W.H. MacAuley and Tamara Botting, authors with Pandamonium Publishing House, were there with lots of their books.

"We ourselves are into nerdy stuff so we write about some nerdy stuff too and genre. In particular for me, I have some horror-comedy novels for adult readers so I thought Comicon would be a particularly good fit for those but wanted to bring other books for the full age range from zero to 100 basically, so that everybody has a little something here,” said MacAuley.

"I think also with Comicon, so much of what brings people here is their love of the stories and their love of the characters, the different issues that are touched on and just how personal it is,” Botting added. “For us as authors, we really love to share the stories that we've come up with as well, so it's just another opportunity for us to share our voices." 

Jason Neal of ArtRed Shop, selling handmade and hand-painted items like keychains and rubber ducks of characters from Hazbin Hotel, K-Pop Demon Hunters, and the Disney universe, among others, has been part of Stratford Comic Con for nearly six years.

"What makes me come back is meeting all the awesome people, all the cosplayers that are committed to the bit,” Neal said. “Also, just the little light that I see on people's faces when they get so excited, like seeing your favourite fandom and seeing that someone takes the time and the passion to recreate it in a way that you could physically have it instead of just seeing it on your favourite show or in your favourite book all the time."

Guests also dropped off food bank donations at the event.