DRAGON CON EXPECTING 65,000 FANS TO GEEK OUT IN DOWNTOWN ATLANTA 

Cosplayers, Gamers, and Pop Culture Enthusiasts Come from Across the Country for 

Annual Celebration of Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Gaming 

ATLANTA – August 23, 2023 – Dragon Con, the internationally known science fiction, fantasy, and gaming convention, returns to downtown Atlanta for Labor Day weekend, bringing with it some 65,000 pop culture fans.

Dragon Con attracts fans from all 50 states and several foreign countries who come to Dragon Con to meet their favorite actors, artists, authors, creators, and experts, show off their latest cosplay, make new friends, and revel in the joy that is Dragon Con.

Dragon Con 2023 runs from Thursday, Aug. 31 to Monday, Sept. 4 with events and activities across five host hotels – Hyatt Regency Atlanta, Marriott Marquis, Hilton Atlanta, Westin Peachtree, and Courtland Grand (formerly Sheraton Atlanta) – and AmericasMart Buildings Two and Three.

Guests – Cultural icon George Takei, fan favorites Elijah Wood and Sean Astin, and Andy Serkis, the performance capture specialist known for bringing monsters to life are among the most recognizable stars and celebrity guests headed to Dragon Con this year, leading a legion of actors who are well known to fans for their work in television, animation, and movies.  

They will be joined by Paul Bettany, Gina Torres, Bruce Boxleitner, Adrianne Palicki, Anson Mount, D.B. Woodside, Ian Anderson, Tom Cavanagh, Tested.com’s Adam Savage, and 1970s action tv stars Lee Majors and Lindsay Wagner. In all, there will be more than 100 actors on site leading panels, signing autographs and taking photos. 

Marty Krofft, of Sid & Marty Krofft Pictures, will also be in attendance. Often referred to as the Kings of Saturday Mornings, they dominated children’s television with programs including H.R. Pufnstuf, Lidsville, Sigmund & The Sea Monsters, Land of the Lost, and Mutt & Stuff – a run that started in 1969 and ran through 2015 – plus primetime variety shows including Donny & Marie, the Brady Bunch Variety Hour, and Barbara Mandrell and the Mandrell Sisters. 

In addition, Dragon Con will host some 300 authors, artists, game designers, puppeteers, scientists, engineers, and other experts to lead panels and talk with fans across 38 tracks of programming, from high fantasy to hard science. 

Cosplay – Dragon Con is well known for the quality of its cosplay and that tradition will certainly continue. The nation’s top cosplayers will show off their best work during the show, participating in costume contests every night of the convention and promenading throughout the five host hotels and the streets of downtown Atlanta.

Cosplay competitions remain a mainstay of Dragon Con, including the queen of competitions, Dragon Con Masquerade, the oldest continuously-run competition in fandom, the craftsmanship-focused Friday Night Costume Contest, and the low-key and fan-voted Hallway Costume Contest.

Gaming – Dragon Con, one of the largest gaming conventions in the nation, offers more than three acres of gaming in AmericasMart Building Three, plus additional gaming and game-related programming in the nearby Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel. 

This year, gamers headed to Dragon Con will get a chance to experience Magic The Gathering’s newest new edition, Wilds of Eldraine, before it hits store shelves this fall.  The convention will have special Magic The Gathering tournaments featuring the new Wilds of Eldraine edition as well as the recently released Lord of the Rings edition, which garnered worldwide attention when it was released in June. Fans will have exclusive access to purchase starter and expansion packs for Wilds of Eldraine, as well as tournament packs for Lord of the Rings. A full slate of Commander League, Convention League, Drafts, and Sealed Commander events will also be available.

The popular Artemis Bridge Game, in which eight players man the bridge of a USS Enterprise-like starship through its galactic adventures, is returning with two bridges, allowing cooperation or head-to-head competition.  

From the latest video games to the most popular tabletop games, plus Japanese and classic American arcade games, ‘round the clock gaming is free to Dragon Con members starting Thursday, Aug. 31 at 4 pm.

Parade – The always popular Dragon Con Parade steps off on Saturday, Sept. 2 at 10 am. The parade is free and open to the public. 

The parade route remains the same as in past years. Beginning at the intersection of Peachtree Street and Linden Avenue, the parade will head south on Peachtree, east (left) on Andrew Young International Boulevard and north (left) on Peachtree Center Avenue. It will end on Peachtree Center Avenue between John Portman Boulevard and Baker Street, in front of the Atlanta Marriott Marquis.

The route is convenient to three MARTA stations – North Avenue, Civic Center, and Peachtree Center. Parking downtown is expected to be tight. Dragon Con encourages parade spectators to ride MARTA.

The 2023 parade will once again be televised live on Atlanta 69. Live coverage will begin at 10 am and will remain on air through the entire parade, with a time-edited rebroadcast on Sunday, Sept. 3 at 10 p.m.  

There are a number of live streaming options. DCTV will broadcast the parade live on a closed circuit to the convention’s host hotels, with rebroadcasts throughout the weekend. Parade coverage will also be available through Dragon Con’s streaming membership available at dragoncon.tv. 

Official Charity – CURE Childhood Cancer is Dragon Con’s official charity for 2023. Through auctions, merchandise sales and other charity events, plus a dollar-for-dollar match up to $100,000 from Dragon Con, the convention will raise money to support this important organization.

Since 2013, the convention has consistently raised more than $125,000 for each of its annual official charities. In 2022, Dragon raised more than $206,000 for official partner Open Hand Atlanta. 

Since CURE’s founding in 1975, it has raised millions of dollars to advance promising research, lobbied for important legislation, and provided tangible support to thousands of childhood cancer patients and their families in the Atlanta metro area and across Georgia. Over the last 12 years, the organization has invested more than $38 million in innovative research.  Callaway’s law, which requires insurance companies operating in Georgia to pay for experimental therapies to treat childhood cancers is CURE’s signature legislative achievement. 

In addition to fundraising, Dragon Con conducts the largest convention-based blood drive in the nation. In 2022, some 3,000 fans donated more than 6,000 units of blood and blood products in the annual Robert A. Heinlein “Pay It Forward” blood drive, benefiting LifeSouth, which serves more than 40 hospitals in the Atlanta area and 110 hospitals in the Southeast.

About Dragon Con:

Dragon Con is the internationally known pop culture convention held each Labor Day Weekend (Aug. 31 -Sept. 4, 2023) in Atlanta. Organized for fans, Dragon Con features more than 3,500 hours of comics, film, television, costuming, art, music, and gaming over four days. For more information, please visit www.dragoncon.org and follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.