San Diego Comic-Con: Special Edition convention to be held on Thanksgiving weekend

San Diego Comic-Con is officially planning to hold an in-person convention this year. But with the exciting news comes some controversy already about when the popular convention will be taking place.

Earlier, San Diego Comic-Con announced that they will hold both a summer convention online and an in-person convention in November — which will be called Comic-Con Special Edition. And now, they have revealed that those November dates will be held from Friday, Nov. 26 to Sunday, Nov. 28. That means the convention will essentially be held on Thanksgiving weekend, though there will be no days of activity actually held on Thanksgiving Day itself.

The announcement of Comic-Con’s first-ever in-person convention since 2019 was met with mixed reactions. While some are excited for the convention to come back regardless of the dates, others have expressed that choosing a holiday weekend is just bad timing. And among those expressing concern about the Thanksgiving weekend dates is Star Wars author Charles Soule, who said he would be skipping the short convention and waiting until next year.

As Soule mentioned, this is also a very unique holiday situation. Due to COVID-19 last year, many people may finally get the chance to spend the holidays with their families this year. And so, placing a convention during this special Thanksgiving weekend means it may leave out the people who want to go, but would have to skip it so they can spend time with their families.

It must be noted that this is not the official SDCC that takes place in July. With Comic-Con Special Edition, the convention creators were simply wishing to create a smaller convention to give the community a chance to meet up in-person, and in no way was it intended to be compared to the summer convention. Over on Twitter, the SDCC Unofficial Blog tweeted out the  difference between the two conventions:

Additionally, as Entertainment Weekly reports, San Diego Comic-Con defended their choice of dates for the convention, releasing a statement that details their commitment to this date:

"Our decision to hold an in-person event in 2021 was driven by a number of factors. Our primary hope was to be able to gather in-person as a community, something we have not been able to do since early last year. Another was to try to determine how best to effectively and safely produce events in light of current health concerns with the least negative impact on attendees.Of the dates presented with the fewest restrictions, Friday through Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend seemed to be the best balance of available space and our envisioned event. As longtime fans ourselves, we have attended many conventions over that holiday weekend, opting to spend Thanksgiving day with family and the rest of the weekend with friends and our families of choice. While this is not unusual in the convention trade, we understand this choice is not optimal for everyone."

So, the good news is that this convention will likely work out in everyone’s favor. If you are really missing in-person cons and have nothing to lose this November, this comic con will be for you. But if you don’t want to trade family for conventions, you won’t be missing out on much anyway. And by then, the real Comic-Con should be back with an in-person convention in 2022.

Will you be going to Comic-Con Special Edition in November, or will you wait to attend SDCC in summer 2022? Let us know in the comments!