Will the writers strike affect the San Diego Comic-Con?

by Glenn Hauman on January 15th, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Posted In: News

My Magic 8-Ball says "ALL SIGNS SAY YES". Valerie D’Orazio links to this piece in Wired‘s blog (which links to Marc Bernadin, which links back to Heidi MacDonald and Peter Sanderson):

Comic-Con is a ways off, but people are already talking about the effects the Writers Guild (and possible Directors and Actors Guild) strike will have on the geek event of the summer.

The second half of the TV season is already a doozy, and if production doesn’t start soon next season may never start. Since TV shows like Heroes, Battlestar Galactica, and Lost draw in a large part of the crowd at Comic-Con, can we expect a way smaller audience this July? … To make matters worse, if the Directors and Actors Guilds follow-suit with their own strikes, will movies that are expected to promote themselves in San Diego, like Harry Potter & the Half-Blood Prince, Watchmen, Star Trek, The Day the Earth Stood Still, and G.I. Joe, show up without their stars? If a movie promotes itself and no one is around does anyone see it?

The real question will be the ripple effects outwards. Will we have Kristen Bell and Hayden Pantierre doing even more conventions? Will the autograph tables at WizardWorld start having actors from Grey’s Anatomy? And most importantly: will I be able to get a hotel closer to the San Diego Convention Center than National City?

On the other hand, we could get great shows like this one: Murder, Unscripted: