Darth Daze and Dark Knights

Story and Photos by MICHAEL AUSHENKER | Pali Life Editor

Anyone attending San Diego Comic-Con International over the past 15 years realizes how the 45-year-old annual convention is more than just a gathering of comic book aficionados, it’s a “pop culture convention,” as Comic-Con now bills itself.

Since the Marvel movie “X-Men” hit Comic-Con before its 2000 release and certainly in 2007 when filmmaker Jon Favreau and Robert Downey, Jr. dropped by to promote the first “Iron Man,” Comic-Con has been supersized on steroids, prone to promoting not just the latest trends in comics but in cinema, television, video games and toys.

Held earlier this month, this year’s convention was no different, even with Marvel Entertainment, Paramount Studios and Sony Pictures foregoing their usual massive Hall H presence. With 130,000 attendees across four days and a preview night, SDCC maintained its robust energy. Arguably the splashiest, most memorable presentations this year involved Palisadians.

Promoting the upcoming Starz series “Ash vs. Evil Dead,” filmmaker and Riviera resident Sam Raimi, best known for the original “Spider-Man” trilogy and cult favorites such as “Darkman,” took part in a spirited panel alongside his Detroit-youth buddies, “Army of Darkness” star Bruce Campbell and producer Rob Tapert, with wife Lucy Lawless also onstage.

Decked out in red, “Ash vs. Evil Dead” star Campbell, operating in full-on “Ash” mode, called members of the packed Room 6A audience garbed in chainsaw-wielding Ash cosplay onstage and toyed with them as Raimi riffed off of Campbell’s antics.

Raimi’s Riviera neighbor Ben Affleck, who will portray Batman beginning in March’s “Batman Vs. Superman,” appeared courtesy of Warner Bros. (DC Comics’ parent company) alongside “Man of Steel” Superman Henry Cavill and cinema’s first-ever Wonder Woman, Gal Gadot. Affleck, it was announced, will also star in, direct and co-write a solo Batman feature.

The Force was strong indeed for yet another Riviera resident (and Palisades Charter High School grad), filmmaker J.J. Abrams, who has inherited the keys to George Lucas’ cosmic kingdom (and is also producing a “Westworld” reboot for HBO). Abrams not only hosted a panel for December’s highly anticipated “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” —featuring original “Star Wars” stars Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford—but he also invited all 6,000 eager “Star Wars” fans packing Hall H to a special treat. Rows of Imperial Stormtroopers led the crowd out to the harbor behind the San Diego Convention Center, where they were handed lightsaber-style glow sticks before the San Diego Symphony performed a concert of John Williams’ classic scores, topped with fireworks.

From the heart of the convention floor, here are some images capturing the color, the sound and the furry that is Comic-Con 2015!