Last weekend I had the chance to attend the second Manchester MCM Expo, held at Manchester Central. Manchester’s geek cred has been growing significantly of late as parts of Captain America: The First Avenger were shot in its indie culture heart, the Northern Quarter. I attended last year’s inaugural event which had a few teething troubles so I was keen to see how the event had grown and learned from its mistakes for 2012.
Any worries that the event’s popularity last year was a fluke were quickly dispelled on one look at the building. Early entrance tickets granted entry from 9.30am with standard entry beginning at 11am; my husband and I arrived a little after 12pm and were greeted by the sight of the entrance line stretching out of the building, winding down disabled access ramps, and continuing as far down the street as we could see. My husband took one look at the line and immediately announced he was going to the nearby mall instead as he wasn’t prepared to wait, and I do wonder how many others may have been put off by the line. The event attracted just over 11,000 visitors – almost double the 2011 figure – and the organisers have tweeted how they didn’t manage to admit everyone in the main queue until 3.15pm. While those numbers are great for encouraging the show’s return in 2013, I can’t imagine those people stuck outside in a queue until less than two hours before the show’s end must be too happy about that considering they had paid for entry four hours earlier. As I was forced to arrive late I didn’t see how the initial early entry queues were handled but from guest feedback there seems to have been a significant improvement on the queue fiasco of last year. The cosplayers were also out in force with no obvious repercussions from the Aurora tragedy twenty-four hours before the event began; the usual fully masked characters wandered around freely carrying all manner of (hopefully fake) weaponry and a stall I’ve seen many times before selling real swords was operating as usual.
One of the show’s biggest flaws in 2011 was that only half the convention floor was used, making it obscenely crowded to the point of it being impossible to move at times. This year the organisers had listened and the full building was in use. Other improvements had been made as well; the autograph tables had been clustered together and were positioned off to one side and not located on central walkways and the comics area had also been positioned more efficiently to allow better access. Sadly, although the convention floor space had doubled, so had the number of attendees, so the event was just as crowded as last year. I often found myself completely stuck and unable to move even an inch in any direction, so looking at stalls was completely impossible in many cases. The crowds were so bad in fact that after an initial (and slow) circuit of the room I gave up and left for two hours in the hope that the crowds would die off later in the afternoon as I was feeling claustrophobic and overheated despite having chosen not to attend in costume. The crowds were little better when I returned; in fact on one occasion we were shouted at that an entire aisle was closed because there were too many people down it, and this forced everyone on to the next aisle behind the video game demonstration zone and caused an enormous bottleneck. As with last year I felt bad for anyone attempting to move around the event with a disability or with children.
Another problem for parents regarding entry tickets has remained from 2011. Once again kids go free to the event but only with standard passes, not early entry. For parents who are die hard collectors and who want to be inside as early as possible this could make the difference from a ticket cost of £10 ($15) to £32 ($50) for a family of four just to arrive 90 minutes earlier – not an addition many would be happy to pay out. Despite the negatives, the attendees seem to have loved this year’s event if the comments I’ve seen on Twitter are anything to go by. The stallholders I know who attended also had a lot of praise and have commented on how well the event went for them. One stall I know personally had travelled almost five hours across the country to be there, yet they have already expressed how much they want to come back next year. Their only complaint (if you can call it that) was that they were constantly inundated with customers and struggled to handle the demand at the stall which never let up for a moment.
The organisers have announced their hopes for an even bigger hall next year, and if that becomes a reality then hopefully the overcrowding issue will finally be resolved as it is the one thing holding the event back from being truly great. In comparison, I was knocked over and whacked by other guests more in half an hour at Manchester than I was in two and a half full days at London Film and Comic Con earlier in the month. A second day might also be needed soon to try to spread the crowds out a little, especially if bigger guests are announced in the future – this year’s guest list included Warwick Davis, Vic Mignogna, Tom Hopper, and Rupert Young from Merlin, and six of the cast of Young Dracula. I really want to see Manchester’s MCM Expo succeed. This year the organisers have taken great steps in making the event better but once again the guest numbers have far exceeded what the venue was capable of handling. If improvements are continued as they have been, then I expect next year to be even better. But if I see that the convention will again be a one day event at the same venue then I’ll have to pass; there’s only so much pushing and shoving I’ll take to buy items for my collections and hang out with the northern geek crowd.
Entry to this event was provided free of charge by the organisers.
