A tale of two communities: Fanatics Fest and FlameCon 2024

This is a tale of two conventions: the first Fanatics Fest NYC and the 10 year anniversary Flame Con. One cost $10 million to put on. One cost much less. They served completely opposite fandoms (ultra normcore sports fans vs queer comics kids) but thanks to the wonder of living in New York City I was able to experience both on successive days. And while the people they served might have had a slim overlap in a Venn diagram, as events, they had more in common than you might think. 

FANATICS FEST NYC

I’ve been pretty obsessed with this event ever since it was announced as “Comic-Con for Sports” a few years ago, with former ReedPOP head Lance Fensterman as show runner. Fanatics, if you don’t know, is the biggest company in sports merchandising. Owner Michael Rubin has a net worth of $11.5 billion or so, and Fanatics has become ubiquitous in sports collecting (they own Topps) and team merchandise. They have a reputation for questionable quality – a reputation that was not helped when they took over manufacturing uniforms for MLB and the pants were see-through. Although this led to baseball players having to wear more underwear, it also created controversy. 

According to all the PR, Rubin went to New York Comic Con a few years ago and looked around and thought “Why can’t we do this for sports?”

“[The National] is an incredible show but it hasn’t changed much, it hasn’t evolved. Then I went to Comic Con and said, ‘This is spectacular, why aren’t we having this for sports?’ I said, ‘Find out who runs Comic Con,’ and I met that guy, Lance Festerman, and said, ‘Hey, great news, you’re going to come to Fanatics and you’re going to start Fanatics Fest.’ That was really the origin of it.”

My interest in the launch of a sports comic con grew from my lifelong fascination with comic cons, and my observation (stated here at the Beat many times over the years) that comics-based events tend to spread out and embrace many different fandoms and cultures….but other events don’t. This history of the San Diego Comic-Con is the ultimate proof of the former theory: an eclectic bunch of folks sitting around a hotel pool is now the ultimate test of Hollywood’s star power, and everything else in between. 

As for the lack of growth among other shows….just look around you. Autograph shows stay autograph shows. The National, a huge show devoted to sports cards, is still a huge show devoted to sports cards. Romance conventions, horror conventions, even SF shows – they all stay focused on the area of their origin. But a comic con….that is everything! Cartoonists, animators, authors, wrestlers, stars of beloved old SF shows, cosplay, manga, giant mugs of root beer…you name it. 

The most common complaint amongst comics folks is that comic cons aren’t even about comics any more. Indeed, I can look at a website for several “comic cons” and see only former sitcom stars and anime voices listed as guests….nary a cartoonist among them. The rise of the “nerdlebrity fan fest” was huge before the pandemic, with competing circuits of shows, and reported garbage bags full of money from photo ops and autographs. 

But there is one third rail for comic-cons and that is…sports. Sure, comics loving sports stars often show up at cons to hang out – I had a particularly embarrassing encounter with then Celtic Grant Williams at one SDCC – or to promote their own comics ventures. But they attend as fans or comics pros. Sports stars very very rarely show up to sign at larger comic shows. 

Of course, there is a huge culture of sports autograph shows, but they tend to be one day hotel ballroom affairs. There are also “Fan Fests,” however, for most major sports events, like the Super Bowl and Wrestlemania, somewhat evolved from the comic con model but still tightly aligned with their host event. 

Why so little overlap? Well, let’s face it, jocks and nerds are historic enemies, or at least separate factions. Sports is the biggest passtime on the planet – the World Cup is the biggest event for a majority of earth dwellers – but comics folks tend to be interested in sports a lot less than the average person. I think I know every other die hard Mets fan in comics, and we frequently go to ballgames together! 

Anyway, back to Fanatics Fest. The backers clearly had the money to make the Comic-Con of Sports a reality, and invited the biggest names possible: Tom Brady! Gronk! Derek Jeter! Kareem Abdul-Jabbar! Kevin Durant! Jalen Brunson! As things developed, two new groups were added to the mix, music stars like Jay-Z and Travis Scott, and, of course, wrestlers, because Fanatics also has a huge deal with the WWE and their parent company, Endeavor. 

Still, I wondered how this would work out. Wrestlers do appearances at comic cons all the time, but Tom Brady and Jay-Z travel in the highest world of celebrity, a world pretty remote from the average con-goer. How would Fanatics Fest bridge this gap?

To me the question really was, could a show this big with this level of star power create the kind of intimacy that a Comic-Con brings? One of my OTHER theories about comic cons is that they somehow bring people into the same level and create a community. You might not be able to meet the guy who plays Superman, but you can meet the people who write and draw Superman – you can stand at their table an uncomfortably long time, even. 

Could Fanatics Fest bring the egalitarian spirit of a comic con to sports world? 

Kinda. 

So, on to my Fanatics Fest journey. The show took up the main floor of the Javits, and included large areas devoted to the major sports. As I walked around, I saw that this was a family affair, with areas for kids to kick soccer balls, or shoot pucks. Exhibits included some pretty impressive stuff, like a showcase of all the Super Bowl Championship rings. A Sports Illustrated sports memorabilia area brought a tear to my eye with a Miracle on Ice display that included Herb Brooks’ toque. 

Other areas included lots of sports card dealers. I collected baseball cards as a kid, but I’ve long since left that part of my life behind. I understand there were some very valuable card sets being sold and blah blah. Not my scene. I have my 1956 Topps Rance Pless card and that’s all I need. (I wish I’d bought a Hank Aaron card when it was $5 though.) CGC and HotFlips were on hand, as were a few slabbers. I have to admit, these areas didn’t interest me much. I saw some dealers had markdowns at the end of the day so I’m not sure how sales went. 

There were also some artists on hand, because sports art is a thing. The Art Zone was a fairly small zone and not too many people were there when I walked through. The Raygun display was great though, although I feel a bit guilty adding to the pile on. 

So there was an interactive level to the show as far as testing your sports skills went. But how to bridge the gap between the godlike heroes of our sports dreams and the people who paid $80 to walk around? Fanatics Fest had a huge social media presence, and they rather cleverly rolled out a lot of clips of Tom Brady tossing a football with some kids, and Rhea Ripley talking to some fans. Although it was all manufactured, these did give the impression that there could be those serendipitous moments of interaction that make it one big happy family. 

But not too serendipitous: every time I saw a star on the floor they were surrounded by presidential levels of security. 

The weirdest thing about Fanatics Fest was Jay-Z recreating the 40/40 Club, an exclusive nightclub decorated with sports memorabilia that used to be on 25th St. (although there are other franchises around the country) The 40/40 club was resurrected at Fanatics Fest as a second level lounge surrounded by velvet ropes and heavy security, but yes, I spotted Jay-Z up there. No idea how you got in, just like the original. This pop-up supposedly cost $3 million and even included the original menu, which is kind of touching to me because even a superstar can have a yen for a certain kind of chicken fingers that are no longer served, I guess. 

The sports stars and the music stars seemed to be fairly remote from the hurly burly, at least to someone walking around, like me. There was one segment of the guest list that seemed to bridge the divide though, and that was (surprise!) wrestling! Numerous news stories proclaimed the WWE the biggest hit at the show, and all of the wrestling photo ops and autograph sessions sold out long before the other areas. Currently feuding C.M. Punk and Drew McIntyre used their panel times to further their dispute, and created more headlines. 

Upon a little reflection, this is not that surprising. Think about it. Even I, as a die hard Mets fan, don’t know too much about my current favorite Met, Francisco Lindor (although he’s absolutely awesome.) He’s a snappy dresser, loves his family, is a team leader, but when interviewed, he’s mostly all about “I’m really seeing the ball well,,” or “Sevvy was really great on the mound today.” Sportsters are trained to give pretty anodyne answers to questions, and displays of individuality are confined to very rare Instagram posts. 

Now compare that to WRESTLERS! Every week we hear their hopes and dreams, their feuds and factions. We see them beaten down, and rising up again, sometimes with new allies. It’s storytelling, baby! 

It’s no surprise that wrestling has been a part of comic cons for decades, from sad Virgil to wrestling rings set up at smaller shows (where you might have caught the entire Anoa’i family hanging out if you went to Long Beach Comic Con before the pandemic.) It’s also no surprise that the wrestlers carried over the “community” vibe to Fanatics Fest a lot more than the sports stars did (even if they had just as many bodyguards.)

In fact, my one goal at Fanatics Fest was to get my “WWE Entrance.” This is an attraction where you are able to come out of the tunnel to your favorite wrestler’s entrance music, and they send you a video of it afterwards. GREAT DEAL. I wanted to do this when I went to the Wrestlemania WWE Fest, but the line was 90 minutes long! The line at Fanatics Fest was just about half an hour, the same time that you might spend waiting for a smoothie at NYCC. 

A word about this: it was kind of like karaoke except theater, I think. As I stood in line, I had a lot of time to think about what I was going to do because…you can’t really practice it at home, or at least not in a small NYC apartment. Most people did either Cody Rhodes’ theme or Roman Reigns, with probably the DX theme #3. (A few Joe Hendry’s in there, too, take note.) Surprisingly, only one other person picked my choice: Seth Rollins’ “The Visionary” theme with its punk rockish “BURN IT DOWWWWWWWWN!!!!!” intro. Just as in a real wrestling entrance, they had the area behind the curtain labeled “gorilla” and I gotta tell ya….when the music hit, my adrenaline surged and I have no idea what actually happened. Except I have a video of it, a video no one will ever, ever see. Except the first six seconds are pretty damn cool! How often do you get to burst through a wall of flames? 

So that was fun. 

That’s my impression of Fanatics Fest as a veteran of hundreds of cons, but I have no idea how regular folks felt about it. The one area where the event obviously had major problems was, shockingly, the one thing that every show has: photo ops and autograph lines. Most of the social media posts about the show are about how unorganized the lines were, and little kids crying because they didn’t get to meet Cody Rhodes. It sounds like scheduling was at fault with some (the WWE stars had a house show that night), but it’s also surprising given that autographs are a tried and true part of most shows. Knicks star Jalen Brunson reportedly left his signing early because the line was unorganized, although that’s from Reddit, so take it with a bit of salt. 

Regular folks also complained about prices: sports stars were as much as $400 for an autograph, although I’m sure that’s the going rate. Wrestlers were much cheaper: – a photo op with Drew McIntyre was only $80, a price so affordable I almost did it except it was sold out (and he left early, oops.) 

When all is said and done, I still think Fanatics Fest was kind of weird…it was definitely adapting one culture into another and not entirely a great fit. Will it return and how? I will definitely be watching!

After the show, I went with a pal to the extremely expen$ive Electric Lemon bar at the Equinox Hotel so I could behold the beautiful Jaume Plensa statues on the terrace. Worth every penny, and some prime people watching, even though it rained. 

After recovering from Fanatics Fest, the next day I went to Flame Con! Organized by Geeks Out, this is a show for queer comics nerds, with costume contests, panels, gaming lounges and everything else that builds community. If you want an example of how a show unites people around the idea of comics, this is it. The show is in its tenth year, although it wasn’t the 10th show (allowing for the Covid years), held at the Sheraton in midtown Manhattan. 

I wasn’t able to get to the show until about 2 o’clock, and as we all know, Sunday afternoon is when things at a con wind down, so it was pretty lowkey when I was there. I walked around and did a couple of stamp rallies, which introduced me to some talented new folks, and chatted with a few friends, then went to a nearby Indonesian food court, Urban Hawker, with Amy Chu and Joe Corallo for some Filipino food. You gotta love New York. 

Although I love Flame Con as an expression of the local scene and queer pride in general at a time when some places are actively oppressing it, the show has some quirks. 

First off, the exhibitors aren’t really juried, so it’s as much a craft fair as a comics show. There were more comics this time than last year, but not really all that many comics. 

I’ve watched over the years as exhibitors at shows put up bigger and bigger walls of stuff, and now it’s literally walls and walls of adorable stuff with the maker peeking out from a tiny window. I took many photos, but the name of the table isn’t all that visible in most of them. The stuff was super cute, though. Still, coming upon a cartoonist with a pile of books seemed a bit of a surprise amongst all the stuff. 

Also, this is just me, but there was also a tinge of Halloween in the air. This summer has been brutally hot and I spent all of June and July in a pre SDCC planning frenzy, so this weekend I crammed as many summer rooftop cocktails in as I could. Maybe it was just a Gothy or horror tinged display but the appearance of skulls and black cats suddenly reminded me that fall is coming, and man, where did the time go! 

There were a couple of larger publishers set up, Mad Cave and Yen Press. Also, weirdly, the upcoming anime adaptation of The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. YO, HELM HAMMERHEAD! I was excited to pick up a map of Rohan and some character pins, but it seemed a pretty random display. 

Also, Flame Con required every one to be masked, and at least one person I had a fairly lengthy conversation with posted the next morning that they had Covid, so THANK YOU FOR CARING ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE, FLAME CON. 

It sounded like panels went well, and folks had a good time, although sales on Sunday were pretty slow, I was told. Flame Con is probably the second or third biggest comics show in NYC and I kind of wish it had more comics stuff, but given its focus maybe that isn’t the right direction. 

But as a nexus for community, it’s a smash hit. 

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Oh one more thing….did I mention it’s August? One thing Augusts in the northeast are known for is afternoon thunderstorms.  A few years ago, walking out of the Sheraton attendees were greeted by a sudden, green sky tsunami that I put up on instagram. 

Well, this time I dallied a bit too long at Urban Hawker and one of the most violent downpours I’ve ever seen suddenly blasted the city. Flooded sidewalks and subways! Luckily, although I hadn’t had the common sense to check the weather, I did bring a waterproof bag and managed to wait it out and get home without being too horribly bedraggled. 

And that was my two con weekend! I’ll have more photos in another post.