Cosplay, Comics, and Board Games: How FANCON Came to Be, and What to Expect From the 2025 Festival
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The history of the FANCON festival.
For two days, June 7-8, Kyiv will host FANCON — the largest Ukrainian festival of contemporary pop culture, which, as successor to Comic Con Ukraine, brings together fans of cosplay, anime, manga, video games, board games, comics, sci-fi, and other genres.
In 2024, the event drew almost 20,000 visitors across 15,000 square meters of Kyiv's International Exhibition Centre. But behind those numbers lies years of work by organizers, creators, and participants.
On the history of FANCON, organizing the event during wartime, and what makes this year's edition unique — read on in this DeTalks article.
The Beginning of Beginnings: What Is Comic Con?
Fans of unconventional art forms, like comics, sci-fi films, or cosplay, began gathering as far back as the 1930s. At first, these were solitary science fiction enthusiasts whose 'meetups' were mostly seen as eccentric. But as the fanbase grew, this enthusiasm poured into the first World Science Fiction Convention in 1939. The event, first held in New York, is now better known as WorldCon.
It was Jerry Bails who sparked pop culture's 'revolution' in the '60s, founding the Academy of Comic Book Fans and Collectors. The organization grew the ranks of comic book fans no longer afraid to express themselves. Bails, later nicknamed the 'father of comics fandom,' founded the Alley Awards — an award show that, much like the Oscars, honored the best comic art across various categories.
The first New York Comicon 64, which took place in July 1964, drew around 100 attendees. And although the event was mostly aimed at trading and selling comics, it was already attended by Marvel comic artist Steve Ditko, publisher Florence Steinberg, and artist Tom Gill, who was then working on The Lone Ranger.
Incidentally, the first ticket to Comicon 1964 was bought by 15-year-old George Martin, who later, at San Diego Comic-Con in 2014, called himself 'the first comic book fan.'
San Diego Comic-Con isn't mentioned by accident: founded by Shel Dorf in 1970, the annual festival most recently took place in July 2024, drawing more than 135,000 fans of anime, manga, collectible card and video games, and sci-fi films. And that's for an event originally conceived as a 'comic book expo' with an audience of up to 300 people.
Comic Con in Ukraine: From Ukrainian House to the Platforma Art Factory
The initiative started by Americans at San Diego Comic-Con International was eventually picked up by other countries, including Ukraine. Ukraine's first 'Comic-Con,' in particular, was Odesa Comic Con International in 2014, which was later renamed Fan Expo Odesa. Kyiv Comic Con later took up the mantle, first held in 2015 at the Ukrainian House exhibition center.
The Kyiv festival's program, in particular, covered eight themes, including comics, tabletop and video games, film, cosplay, literature, anime, and manga. The festival featured film premieres, presentations of Ukrainian and foreign games, comics, and books, as well as esports competitions across various disciplines.
In 2018, when Kyiv Comic Con drew a record 12,500 visitors, the world saw the first Ukrainian national festival — Comic Con Ukraine at the Platforma Art Factory. The arrival of a competitor for the capital's event even escalated into a lawsuit, when Kyiv Comic Con organizers Oleksandr and Mariia Shahuri claimed that using the name 'Comic Con Ukraine' violated their rights.
But securing one million hryvnias in damages proved unsuccessful: the court of first instance ruled that since the phrase 'Comic Con' refers to a format of event rather than a trademark, its use didn't violate any legal norms.
Comic Con Ukraine took place three times between 2018 and 2021, skipping only 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. Over that period, the festival's venue grew from 20,000 to 35,000 square meters, and its audience from 20,000 to 45,000 visitors, respectively.
Beyond the cosplay show, the festivals featured gaming fan zones and a music stage, hosted live quests and role-playing games, and showcased Ukrainian and international artists, comic publishers, and board game makers. Over the event's three years, it was visited by actors Christopher Lloyd (Back to the Future), Danny Trejo (The Flash), John Rhys-Davies (The Lord of the Rings), and other foreign guests.
The First FANCON: Amid War, With New Themes
In February 2022, Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. And although the September 3-4 date remained on the event's website for quite a while, the Comic Con Ukraine festival was postponed — first to 2023, then to 2024, and eventually canceled altogether. According to the organizers , this was due to the difficulty of ensuring the safety of tens of thousands of visitors gathered in one location, however large.
But in 2024, a team of organizers came together from Comic Con Ukraine, New Year on Sofiivska Square, Eurovision 2017, Otobe, Videozhary, K-POP UNITE FESTIVAL, and other public events to create FANCON 2024 — the first pop culture event since the start of the full-scale war.
The festival took place June 8-9 at the International Exhibition Centre. The venue was chosen for its shelter, large enough to hold all guests in case of an air raid alert.
Kseniia Dubniuk, the project's communications lead, told DeTalks that there were plenty of challenges, since the war raised a lot of additional questions — possible air raid alerts, power outages, shelter logistics, and so on, giving backup power as an example: producer Svitlana Rykhliuk had rented two generators in advance, each the size of a truck (and that's no joke), though luckily, they never had to use them.
She added that the team was ready for surprises at every turn, since the co-founders and coordinators had plenty of experience with various events, and that their main priority was making sure everyone who came to the festival felt the most positive emotions possible.
The festival's main events took place simultaneously across three stages, with the venue itself divided into ten sectors: from 'Games,' with video games, board games, and role-playing games (D&D), to 'Art & Books,' with books, manga, comics, and an artists' alley.
Organizers have described a lot going on behind the scenes of FANCON 2024, noting that starting in March 2024, they worked without a single day off, preparing about a dozen announcements a day, coordinating technical questions, and answering questions from the first FANCON's 1,500 participants, calling it three months of nonstop communication without a single hour's break, even at night.
Organizing FANCON 2024 itself took 7 months — from finding a name, concept, and design to opening applications, negotiating with partners, and sourcing content.
A separate area of the Exhibition Centre was the 'UA Heroes' sector, featuring booths from the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade of Ukraine's Armed Forces, the Patrol Police, the State Emergency Service, and the charitable foundation Skhid SOS. An additional goal of the festival, in fact, was raising money for charity, and over two days, FANCON and its participants raised, according to official figures, around 2.3 million hryvnias for the needs of Ukraine's Armed Forces.
Festival co-founder Arkadii Medvedev has explained that what motivated them was the sense that if they didn't do it, no one would, saying people needed a place to escape harsh reality, if only for a day, while their defenders needed donations, and that they found a way to combine both.
FANCON 2025: What's Known About This Year's Event
In 2025, marking the festival's second anniversary, organizers promise an expanded footprint — more than 20,000 square meters of space with themed zones and events. These include the following events and sectors.
- A Cosplay & K-Pop Cover Dance Show on the main stage, with a total prize pool of 160,000 hryvnias;
- More than 50 games from role-playing clubs, communities, and projects in the tabletop role-playing games area (D&D);
- Presentations of comics, manga, science fiction and fantasy literature, and art projects;
- Game presentations and tournaments;
- Meetings with fantasy, sci-fi, and horror authors;
- More than 2,000 square meters for board and tabletop role-playing games, tournaments, and workshops;
- 2,500 square meters for comic and manga publishers and an artists' alley;
- The UA Heroes sector.
For the first time, FANCON will also feature performances by Ukrainian bands on a Music Stage.
Organizers have said they're not focusing on any single hobby or interest, but instead reflecting the pop culture trends currently resonating in society, adding that they want to become a space for a wide range of communities, which will let the festival's guests and the content of individual fan sectors evolve along with those trends.
FANCON 2025 Tickets
Tickets for the festival are already available on concert.ua. The following admission options are available.
- 640 hryvnias — a ticket for any single day
- 590 hryvnias — a Saturday ticket
- 540 hryvnias — a Sunday ticket
- 890 hryvnias — a two-day ticket
Children up to and including age 7 can attend FANCON for free when accompanied by someone over 16. Combat veterans can purchase their own ticket at a 50% discount — a combat veteran's certificate is required as proof.
DeTalks is the official information partner of the FANCON 2025 festival — Ukraine's largest festival of contemporary pop culture, taking place at Kyiv's International Exhibition Centre on June 7 and 8. See you there!