A day at Michigan's weekend-long premier pop culture convention

This weekend, heroes, villains, aliens, wizards, monsters, mythical creatures, cartoon and cult classic characters walked among one another at the only place that they can: Motor City Comic Con.

Michigan’s largest and longest running comic book and pop culture convention returned to the Suburban Collection Showplace in Novi, bringing together celebrities, creators, cosplayers and fans for the second time this year.

This weekend’s convention presented dozens of comic and celebrity guests, featuring some famous faces like Peter Weller of the original “RoboCop”; Ralph Macchio, William Zabka and Martin Kove of ”Karate Kid” and the sequel TV series “Cobra Kai”; James and Oliver Phelps of the “Harry Potter” franchise; David Harbour of “Stranger Things”; Lorraine Bracco of “The Sopranos”; Scott Patterson of “Gilmore Girls”; Veronica Taylor of “Pokémon”; Mae Whitman of “The DUFF” and many others.

When not waiting in line for celebrity autographs and photo ops, superfans strolled through a sea of more than 150 vendors and exhibitors, browsing through comic book collections, crafty knickknacks and action figures, fantasy weapons, nostalgic technology such as VHS tapes and Gameboy, and a plethora of magnets, keychains and geeky jewelry — the typical pop culture galore.

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The convention also boasted an impressive Artist Alley, where 108 artists, writers and illustrators came to display and sell their work, and sometimes participate in a sketch duel to put audiences’ concepts to paper in their various styles.

But like any good Comic Con, its cosplayers are what brought the convention to life. Some fans played it safe with a repurposed Halloween costume, but others obviously poured extensive time, effort and creativity into their cosplay.

For instance, on Saturday, Sarah Eyk of Grand Rapids showed off with her own take on the Mandalorian, which she called the “Disco-lorian”: bedazzled armor, a hot pink cape, glimmering high heel boots and a Baby Yoda doll sat in a cross body purse rocking sunglasses.

“It took about three months of consistent work … or all of ‘New Girl,’” Eyk said. “Honestly, I’m just a casual Star Wars fan … I just like costuming and crafting. Casual fans are always welcome.”

On the other hand, a cosplay of Fluffy the Crate Beast from “Creepshow” could be spotted rolling across the convention floor all Saturday afternoon. The costume, worn by Michael Cude from Ann Arbor, was ordered from an SFX studio and its crate-on-wheels was crafted by Cude out of XPS board.

“I know the studio took a couple of months to make the costume itself, and then I worked on the crate for basically all of September and October on the weekends when I had free time,” Cude said. “All the paint got done on the last day, I was really happy it actually came out nice.”

Several other cosplayers — like Sara de la Fuente as Daniel LaRusso’s shower costume during the Halloween party scene of “Karate Kid”; Mario Porco as Flash Gordon Flying in Hawkmen's Rocket cycle; Frank, Luigi and Dominic Porco as the Hawkmen and Brent Meyers as General Klytus, all in Vultan costumes; and Rene Williams as the iconic man-eating plant, Audrey II, from “Little Shop of Horrors” — also garnered jaw-drops and photo requests from other attendees.

And what would Motor City Comic Con be without at least one fictional car?

Of the three grand displays by the 501st Legion, Ghostbusters Detroit and Motor City Reel Rides, two brought in famous film vehicles: the “Robocop” police car — in honor of celeb guest Peter Weller — and the Ectomobile from “Ghostbusters.”

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In fact, Ghostbusters Detroit’s display went above and beyond with an inflatable Stay Puft Marshmallow Man that loomed high above the crowd, as well as life-sized replicas of Slimer and Zuul, a dozen realistic proton packs, a Ghostbusters arcade machine straight from the 1980s and nine volunteers in full ghost-busting gear.

Ghostbusters Detroit normally operates as a not-for-profit organization, participating in walks and events for different charities like the MS Foundation, the Epilepsy Foundation, Make-A-Wish and others. But for the past three conventions, Motor City Comic Con has asked Ghostbusters Detroit to show up with their specialty “Ghostbusters” items, host “Slime Time” — a slime-making children’s activity — on Saturday and Sunday and help other attendees get the best free photo op they could ask for.

“We do the work together. No one’s getting paid to be here. We’re all here volunteering our time, taking off work, away from family and friends… We come out here because, look, the kids love it. It makes the kids feel good, it makes people feel good to make other people feel good,” said Eric Lindow, the founder of Ghostbusters Detroit. “It’s nice to come here and separate yourself from what’s going on everywhere else and just have a good weekend.”

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Motor City Comic Con returns to Novi