As San Diego Comic-Con gets underway for another year, it’s worth asking — what if the show never ended? That’s the hook behind The Long Con, a new Oni Press miniseries debuting at the convention ahead of its July 25 wide release in comic book stores.
Written by Dylan Meconis and Ben Coleman with art by EA Denich, colors by M. Victoria Robado and letters by Aditya Bidikar, The Long Con is the dystopian fantasy (or, perhaps, nightmare scenario) of anyone who’s made it through all four-and-a-half days of the annual San Diego saturnalia: Five years before the series begins, a cataclysmic event destroyed everything inside a 50-mile radius of the Los Spinoza Convention Center in the middle of the world’s biggest comic book convention. What few realized was that the con-goers survived, and the show went on…and on…and on.
When the truth emerges, one reporter is sent to investigate because of his personal connection to the story. After all, five years earlier, he had been covering the show, and had only escaped thanks to dumb luck. But whatever happened to the friend he left behind…?
Denich, who will be signing at the Oni Booth (#1833) on Saturday and Sunday during Comic-Con, calls The Long Con “a love letter to all the pop culture we hold near and dear in our dorky little hearts — it’s a book about nerds, by nerds, for nerds.” The Comic-Con exclusive edition of the first issue features a cover by My Little Pony artist Sara Richard, who will be signing alongside Denich on Sunday at 12 p.m.
