Comic-Con's history

1976
Attendees are shown slides from a movie called Star Wars, a year before the film’s release. Slides!

1981
Blade Runner screens one of the first ”behind-the-scenes” featurettes.

1998
The Buffy riots! Fans swarm the Buffy the Vampire Slayer autograph table.

2000
X-Men writer-director Bryan Singer draws heat for cutting Beast from the script.

2001
Hollywood smells money and descends. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Spider-Man, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, and Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones all make appearances.

2004
Alias creator J.J. Abrams screens Lost pilot, incites swooning.

2006
TV invades. Heroes, Jericho, and Battlestar Galactica show off their wares.

2006
Footage from 300, Zack Snyder’s bloody symphony of man-flesh, hurls it into buzz stratosphere.

2007
Jon Favreau debuts Iron Man featurette. It’s met with such raves that he screens it again two days later.

And the Crowds Go Wild

1998
42,000 attendees

1999
45,000

2000
48,500

2001
53,000

2003
70,000

2005
104,000

2007
125,000