Comic-Con a celebration of pop culture

Calling all superheroes, zombies, space aliens, comic-book lovers and kids of all ages: Comic-Conbegins Thursday in San Diego.

The pop-culture convention annually draws thousands of costumed fans to the San Diego Convention Center for a peek at what Hollywood has in store and a celebration of comics themselves.

'Movies, TV and video games all spin out of the creativity of telling stories with words and pictures' Comic store owner Joe Field

The line for badges to access the festival was already wrapped around the San Diego Convention Center by Wednesday afternoon. More than 130,000 guests are expected over the next four days.

Conventioneers perused a 192-page event guide to the hundreds ofexhibitors.

"The people who go through those doors, most of them are film fans and fans of pop culture, be it video games or movies or television shows, T-shirts or comic books, it's all part of this big cultural stew," says filmmaker Jon Favreau, who will premiere his latest flick, Cowboys & Aliens, at Comic-Con.

"These are people who normally interact with one another through the Internet ... Then when you finally open it up to meeting in person, it just concentrates that experience."

Hollywood continues to command a headlining presence at Comic-Con, and Tinseltown offerings are some of the most anticipated, among them:

• Captain America will play in San Diego for a full day before its nationwide opening Friday and star Chris Evans is set to introduce the earliest screening.
• Cowboys & Aliens will hold its world premiere at Comic-Con on Saturday a festival first.
• Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson are coming to the convention to talk about The Adventures of Tin-Tin.
• Sony is offering a peek at The Amazing Spider-Man.
• Twilight trioKristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner and Robert Pattinson will greet fans.

TV-wise, True Blood, Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead are big draws, while new shows such as Person of Interest, Grimm and Terra Nova will present preview footage and introduce their casts to attract viewers before their fall premieres.

"Comic-Con is this incredible celebration of the arts, and the arts spans movies, television, video games - which are incredibly artistic now," says documentarian Morgan Spurlock, who made a movie about Comic-Con.

"It's toys, it's collectibles, it is straight comics and graphic novels. It is this cornerstone of pop culture that has so much influence now."

New video games are also expected to scorewith players able to get bigan early look at sci-fi shooters Halo and Gears of War 3 and the latest Batman and Spider-Mangames. The comic books that started it all 40 years ago are still there championing the heroes.

Determined not to be eclipsed by Hollywood, hundreds of the industry's artists, writers and creators are attending Comic-Con this year, along with publishers ranging from DC Comics and Marvel to Image, BOOM! Studios, IDW Publishing and Oni Press.

"The comics are what I like to call the gooey centre of all pop culture," said Joe Field, who owns a comic book store in Concord, Calif., and has gone to the convention annually for the past 25 years.

"Movies, TV and video games all spin out of the creativity of telling stories with words and pictures," said Field, who founded the industry's annual Free Comic Book Day. "That's why the SanDiego Con has become this sort of beehive of pop culture activity, because comics are really the genesis of visual entertainment."

Running through Sunday, the convention provides a one-million-square-foot playground where comic creators, consumers, collectors or just the curious can interact with each other many in costume.

"The thing I love about Comic-Con is people are allowed to become superheroes; the streets are thronged with all kinds of people dressed up as their favourite comic characters," said Grant Morrison, a longtime writer of comics who is helming the upcoming relaunch of DC's Action Comics in September.

"I've always loved that nonjudgmental thing. The world becomes this weird Fellini-esque reality for a few days," he said.