Around TownParties/Events

Awesome Con Returns For its 10th Anniversary

Awesome Con 2022. Image courtesy Awesome Con.

Over 50,000 fans of comic books, television and film, science and tech, and over-the-top cosplay will gather to kick off the milestone 10th-anniversary celebration of geek culture at  Awesome Con June 16 – 18, 2023. And to get it all started, Mayor Muriel Bowser will officially proclamation June 16th, 2023 as “Awesome Con Day.”

To celebrate this year’s 10th edition, Awesome Con is excited to announce a lineup of top-tier celebrity guests including: Amy Jo Johnson (Mighty Morphin Power Rangers), Ashley Eckstein, James Arnold Taylor, and Matt Lanter (Star Wars: The Clone Wars), Billy Dee Williams (Star Wars) Danny Trejo (Spy Kids, Breaking Bad), Diane Guerrero (Encanto, Orange is the New Black), Elijah Wood and Sean Astin (The Lord of the Rings), Felicia Day (The Guild, Supernatural), Jodie Whittaker, Mandip Gill, Christopher Eccleston, and Billie Piper (Doctor Who), Karen Gillan (Doctor Who, Guardians of the Galaxy), LeVar Burton (Star Trek), Phil LaMarr (Justice League, Samurai Jack), and many more.

And anime fans are in for a special treat as Awesome Con welcomes 12 of the voice actors from My Hero Academia including: Austin Tindle, Caitlin Glass, Christopher Sabat, Clifford Chapin, Colleen Clickenbeard, David Matranga, Elizabeth Maxwell, Jason Liebrecht, Justin Briner, Leah Clark, Lindsay Seidel, and Monica Rial.

In celebration of Pride Month, the fan-favorite Pride Alley—presented in partnership with Geeks OUT and Metro Weekly—returns once again to celebrate LGBTQ+ artists and creators.

Awesome Con 2022. Image courtesy Awesome Con.

The popular Science Fair will also include a brand new Science Demo Stage presented by the National Science Foundation that will allow fans to get up close and personal with mind-boggling live science experiments and demonstrations. Other science programming tracks feature content related to NASA’s Roman Space Telescope, the wonder women of NASA, and the exploration of the Moon.

Family-friendly programs take over Awesome Con Jr., which returns with playful events planned to educate and entertain both the young and the young at heart.

The Awesome Con Short Film Festival, which debuted eight years ago by local filmmaker Joe Carabeo will showcase indie short films from around the world.

And The Awesome Con Book Fair is also back with exciting new bookseller partners, Loyalty Bookstores and Lost City Books. 23-time New York Times bestselling author Terry Brooks will headline the feature along with fellow accomplished authors TJ Klune, Mia Tsai, Emily Whitten, E.K. Johnston, and more.

How AWESOME is all of that?!