Wizard Entertainment announced that attendance at the recently completed (July 5-7) Wizard World: Chicago was over 40,000.  The total for 2002 represents a slight but significant increase over 2001, something that the folks at Wizard Entertainment did not think they would be able to achieve, since they felt that competition from Fourth of July weekend activities would cut into attendance this year.  When questioned by ICv2, a spokesperson for Wizard Entertainment stated that each attendee who bought a ticket, whether it was for one day or for three days, was counted as one attendee.

Certainly the excitement generated this summer by the $400 million dollar-grossing Spider-Man film has helped fuel attendance at summer comic conventions, but that staple item of comic conventions throughout the ages -- vintage comic -- also played an important role in the success of this year's edition of Wizard World.  The Heritage Comics Auction at Wizard World: Chicago was a major hit with record-breaking sales of over $4.8 million.

Wizard World: Chicago's attendance still lags behind that of the San Diego Comic-Con International, which tallied some 53,000 attendees last summer, but WWC is firmly entrenched as this country's second largest comic book and pop culture convention.