Streetalk: Why is Atlanta a good Dragon*Con host?

Weirdly, MARTA is a big factor.

Jennifer & Neil, Chicago: We’re Helga & Olav from Stupendgarden. We’re a beer girl and beer boy. We’re really impressed with the ambassadors and the greeters. We’ve never seen that before. It was very welcoming. We went to McDonald’s in Buckhead and people were very accepting of our differences. Chicago has three comic book conventions, but because it’s so large and there’s so many other conventions it’s too spread out. It doesn’t have that homey feel that it does here. You wouldn’t feel as welcoming in Chicago as you do here although we love Chicago. Go Cubs!

Raven & Treg: We love it. You guys have an amazing bus system. It’s clean, efficient. Cincinnati has nothing like it. And no one yells at you on your buses. In Cincinnati, law enforcement wouldn’t cooperate. They tried to have the Votcon Transformer Convention there and it was horrible. When the world comes to an end you’ll want to move to Cincinnati because everything there happens ten years later. The bus here runs every fifteen minutes. Awesome. With Cincinnati, half the time they don’t know what they’re doing. And your hospitals are awesome. We got in and out in less than two hours. The doctors were so efficient and so clean.

Sascha & Lance, Walnut Hill, Fla.: Atlanta is a pretty central location. It’s a major cit,y but it still has that Southern hospitality. That makes it appealing to people coming from out of town. MARTA is wonderful — although it is a little uncomfortable when you get on in full costume. They do look at us like we’re crazy, but they’re nice. Though we did scare a little girl this morning. The transportation in Orlando is awful. This is the biggest convention in the South and we enjoy being in Atlanta so much.

(Photos by Jeff Slate.)