Fan Xpo draws crowd
It’s really grown in leaps and bounds. Organizer Bonnie Gratz
The Okanagan Sunday
Characters and creatures from every movie, TV show and comic book imaginable filled the streets of Kelowna on Saturday during the fourth annual Kelowna Fan Xpo.
“The Kelowna Fan Xpo is a big celebration of pop culture,” said Bonnie Gratz, organizer of the event.
“We’ve got everything from films to animation to tabletop gaming, a Harry Potter area, lots of cool stuff for kids with Disney interactive, (virtual reality) gaming in the big theatre, it’s all here.”
Activities took place in multiple locations downtown Kelowna, including the Kelowna Community Theatre, the Rotary Centre for the Arts and the Okanagan Regional Library.
Organizers were expecting upwards of 3,000 people to attend the expo.
“It’s really grown in leaps and bounds,” said Gratz. “We’re finding lots of people are coming and planning in advance with their costumes.”
People came from all over B.C., Alberta, the U.S. and as far as Toronto this year, she said.
“People are putting it on their calendars to make sure they can be here, which is really exciting, because we never had anything like this in Kelowna until we got together and started to do it.”
People dressed in all sort of elaborate costumes dressed as characters from their favourite movies and TV shows were seen walking all over downtown on Saturday as part of the event.
“It’s really fun to see everybody enjoying things and I love how vibrant it is and how colourful everything is here,” said Gratz.
Inside the Rotary Centre for the Arts, dozens of artists set up booths selling their drawings and various artwork.
“The amount of time people spend planning wonderful booths and creating things is amazing,” said Gratz.
“There’s a huge arts community here in Kelowna, and it’s so neat that so many people have jumped on board.”
Elle Sherwood and her sisters Marie and Kat were some of the many participants dressed up for the occasion.
“I’m here today because I felt like dressing up like my favourite character from Alice in Wonderland, and I’m Alice,” said Sherwood. “We’ve never been to such an event, and we decided to go full out for the first year.”
Sherwood said one of her favourite parts was seeing everyone else dressed up in their costumes.
“I think it’s wonderful,” she said. “It’s a great community thing, and it’s a lot of fun.”
A highlight of this year’s Fan Xpo was the premiere of The Recall, a science fiction film shot in the North Okanagan last year starring Wesley Snipes, said Gratz.
“We’ve always had Indie films, but this is a big budget movie, which is really really exciting,” she said. “It’s not even being released for another two months.”
The film premiere marked the end of the two-day expo.