Lehigh Valley Comic Convention turns 25 with busy pop culture weekend at Agri-Plex

ALLENTOWN, Pa. — The Agri-Plex has seen a lot over the years.

Livestock. Trade shows. Home shows. Farm equipment. Fair crowds.

Over the weekend, it had superheroes, voice actors, comic book artists, fighting games, cosplay, collectibles, Funko Pops, a fan-made “Stranger Things” pizza van, and enough long boxes of comics to make a collector disappear for hours.

Lehigh Valley Comic Convention turned 25 with a two-day event Saturday and Sunday, and by the time I walked into the Allentown Fairgrounds Agri-Plex early Saturday afternoon, the place was already moving.

Families were making their way through vendor aisles. Cosplayers stopped for photos. Artists signed prints. Dealers talked comics across folding tables. Kids pointed at toys. Adults pointed at toys, too.

For a weekend, a 59,000-square-foot expo hall in the West End of Allentown felt less like a fairgrounds building and more like the Lehigh Valley’s own little pop culture universe.

Karen Rollo, who co-operates the convention with her husband, Joe, had set aside VIP passes for me. A week earlier, when I spoke with her for a preview story on the anniversary, she was humble about what the show had become.

Seeing it in person, she undersold it.

Immediately inside, the floor opened into rows of vendors, artists, featured guests, and fans moving through it all. The convention advertised more than 500 tables and more than 60 featured guests for the two-day anniversary celebration, held at the Agri-Plex, 302 N. 17th St.

It felt full without feeling impossible to navigate. Every corner had something going on.

There were comic books from different eras, toys, anime items, art prints, collectibles, gaming setups, cosplay groups, and tables where people weren’t just buying things but talking about what they loved with someone else who got it too.

That is not always easy to find locally.

A few minutes in, I kept coming back to the same thought: There is clearly room in the Lehigh Valley for more of this.

Not everything has to be in Philadelphia, New Jersey, or New York. There is clearly an audience here for events that are a little nerdy, a little nostalgic, a little weird, and a lot of fun.

Lehigh Valley Comic Convention gave that audience a room.

Near the center of the convention on Saturday, Fight Your Rival had set up part of the floor as an arcade-style fighting game, with players facing off side by side instead of hiding behind online usernames.

Taylor Beasley, one of the owners, described Fight Your Rival as “the premier Lehigh Valley fighting game tournament series.”

The group runs tournaments around the region, including events at Nazareth Brew Company and pop-ups in Allentown. At the convention, their section felt less like a formal tournament and more like an open invitation: sit down, pick a game, play somebody.

The games include current fighting titles such as “Street Fighter 6,” “Tekken 8,” and “Guilty Gear Strive,” Beasley said.

“The biggest thing is bringing in a community,” she said.

Beasley said she grew up playing fighting games, but did not realize there was a larger competitive community around them until she got older. Playing online, she said, could be intimidating. Playing in person was different.

“As a woman, playing online is scary,” Beasley said. “But playing offline is where I started to thrive and actually find friends.”

That was the energy Fight Your Rival brought to the show: competitive, but welcoming.

Deven Baker, who runs Fight Your Rival with Beasley, said the idea came from a simple local problem. If players in the Lehigh Valley wanted larger fighting game events, they usually had to leave the area.

“We realized if we wanted to go into bigger tournaments or anything like that, we would have to go out to Philly and Jersey,” Baker said.

And, as he put it, there is nothing worse than driving all the way to New Jersey, going 0-2 in a tournament, then having to make the long ride home.

Feeling salty.

So they started building something here.

Fight Your Rival began before the pandemic, first renting space at the South Mall in Allentown, Baker said. Since then, the group has moved through different venues as a traveling tournament series.

“We just try to bring them to the people,” Baker said.

For him, fighting games are meant to be played in person.

“You gotta play old school, face-to-face, side by side,” he said.

“It’s a real community,” Baker said. “People want that third space that we don’t have anymore. The malls are dying, arcades aren’t around, so we got to remake that.”

In a way, that was a lot of the convention.

People were not just shopping. They were meeting, playing, talking, taking photos, showing off costumes, finding artists, and reconnecting with the kinds of spaces that no longer exist everywhere.

There were no food trucks inside, but the Agri-Plex cafeteria was open and busy on both sides.

Later in the visit, I made my way toward the artist tables.

That is where I met comics artist Paris Cullins, whose DC credits include “Blue Beetle,” “Wonder Woman,” and “Green Lantern.” His table sign spelled “Parris.”

His wife was watching the table when I first walked up. Cullins was nearby, talking and networking, but she helped wave him back over while fans and media waited.

He jumped right into the story behind the name.

Cullins said he was born in front of a travel agency. His mother, he said, wanted to go to Paris, saw a poster, and gave him the name.

He described himself as someone who has loved comics from the beginning.

“I’m here ’cause I love comic books and I love conventions,” Cullins said. “I’ve been a fanboy from the day I was born.”

He said his mother introduced him to Captain America, which later helped inspire him to join the Marines.

“Long story of success and dreams shattered,” Cullins said, “but pulled together by love and dedication.”

Before I left the area, Cullins’ wife pointed me to the table next to them and told me I should talk to Joe Staton.

She described him as a heavy hitter.

I will be honest: I am not a comic book expert. I walked into this story more as someone trying to experience the event, meet the people in the room, and understand what makes this community show up.

So I introduced myself.

Staton was sitting at his table with his wife, selling commissions and talking with fans. His career includes co-creating E-Man, Michael Mauser, The Huntress, and several Green Lantern characters, as well as a 10-year run drawing the “Dick Tracy” newspaper strip.

When I asked him to tell me about himself, he started with the big number.

He has been drawing comics for about 55 years.

Staton said he is supposed to be “semi-retired,” mostly because he is not currently doing a regular book. But over his career, he said, he has worked on “all kinds of superheroes,” including “Green Lantern,” “Dick Tracy,” and “Scooby-Doo.”

So what brings him back?

“It’s just fun,” Staton said.

He said he still occasionally gets calls for work and turns down many of them these days, but if something sounds interesting enough, he signs on.

Then he is working again.

Staton said he has been coming to the Lehigh Valley show since its early years, when it was much smaller and held in a firehouse.

“I don’t know if I came to the first one of these, but it was very early,” he said.

Now, 25 years in, he has watched the convention grow into something much larger.

For younger artists or writers, Staton said a show like this is a chance to see what people are making and meet people already working in the industry.

“This kind of show is really good to see what’s being done,” Staton said. “If you’re a new artist or a writer, this is a good time to make connections, to be around people who are in the business and talk to them.”

Before I left, Staton asked for a photo with me.

Usually, I’m the one asking for photos.

But there we were, standing in the aisle while our wives took a few quick shots before we exchanged contact information and went our separate ways.

On the way out, we passed more featured guests, including voice actors and creators with credits tied to shows and franchises familiar to generations of fans. There were also vehicles on display, including a fan-made “Stranger Things”-inspired Surfer Boy Pizza van.

By then, we had seen a lot.

And still probably missed a lot.

Lehigh Valley Comic Convention is not trying to be San Diego Comic-Con. It does not need to be. Its charm lies in its local, approachable nature, yet it’s still big enough to make the room feel alive.

The 25th anniversary show brought the comics, artists, games, cosplay, collectors, and fans together in one place.

For one weekend at the Agri-Plex, the Lehigh Valley had its own little world of weird, colorful, geeky fun.

Here’s to another 25 years.