gap between US Celebrations and EU Celebrations

I'm wondering why it feels like the Europe Celebrations are the cheap / lite version of the US ones.
Seeing all the guests announced for next month Celebration, the line-up of guests at London last year is totally ridiculous.
is there any possible reason(s) why there's such a gap between US and EU Célébrations ?

 

The Disney parks play a part in sure. Cheaper for vendors and sponsors to come to the US ones could also be a reason.

I'd like to think it is actually more accessible for the average person too.


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Disney also, in all likelihood, pays for the big guests airfare and hotel. Domestic flights and hotels (especially when you own several resort areas near the venue) is a lot cheaper than international.

 

jeykey

You mention the guests as the big difference, but for the past many Celebrations US and Europe a like, the headliners has been pretty much the same. There has been the occasional new minor actor, but headliners was always the same. Only now with Topps running it, do we have new headliners.

 

i think the guest lineup is really dependent on the guests themselves - since most of the main actors that they call on are US-based, it's easier for them. but seriously, how can you say that Celebration Europe in London was light on guests? The entire main cast of Rogue One was there. Gwendolyn Christie was there. All the usual mainstays of the past few Celebrations (Mark, Carrie, Tony, Warwick, Ray, Ian and Peter) were there. Sure, there were only a few Rebels cast members there, but it's a long way from where most of the voice actors are based (California). The only guest that feels like a total big name new addition for Orlando is Hayden, and he hasn't done a Celebration in person since 2002. also a lot of it is star availability - other than those who are in the new movies and disney has their marketing appearances as part of their deal, the rest might just have other jobs scheduled.

as for it being more accessible for the average person -- that really depends on where 'average person' lives. For those in America, yeah, a con in the US is more accessible, but there's a lot of fans in Europe for whom a trip to the states is not in their budget, and vice versa. Celebration Europe and Celebration Japan are meant primarily for the fans in those areas, and not for american fans. same with exhibitors and vendors.

 

sorry, i meant the line-up of guests available for autograph/photo ops session
even Alden Ehrenreich & John Boyega were there at London to go your way

 

Mr_Mundi
jawajames

well i wasn't the only one who noticed that London's lineup wasn't great
http://boards.theforce.net/threads/anyone-else-disappointed-with-guest-list.50041426/

there's even european brand like Lego doing a lot more in US than in EU...

 

jeykey

I wasn't saying the lineup was great. I was saying it was not much different from many previous Celebrations US and Europe alike. Meaning none of them are great once the same batch are brought in for the fifth time.

 

Depends on how often you go as well. I've only been to the London ones.

 

Eh. TFA made something like 900 million bucks in the domestic box office in the US compared to 163 million in the UK (and prob more if you count the rest of Europe but obviously not as much as in the US).

Celebration, on the basis of capitalism, is going to cater where the largest market is, which is unfortunately for the rest of us, is the US of A.

 

Im very dissapointed with the difference. I went to celebration london and wasnt impressed at all. Instead of hyping the london event two weeks before or even loger before they announced the next celebration in orlando, the guests were no where near what they are for orlando either. Alot of people said it was rushed, not very thought about and that they pay more attention to the american cons instead

 

I will write more later BUT can I say that I was a LOT more impressed by the effort that went into EU celebration than the one I am attending? I don't think that I would've returned for another con if this one had been my first...

 

Really?! I just think that alot more focus seems to be made in the american one. As i said at the europe one last year they focused on this years orlando, the guests lacked massively, all info was released with like 2weeks to go. They just seem to make a bigger deal eith the us celebration

 

From what I've read in other threads it sounds like London was a bit more organized. I've only been to the UK ones, not the US ones.

 

As for the poor guest lineup in London last year I think that is in large part because there wasn't a proper license in play. Official Pix was done and Topps hadn't started. Now with Topps got a lot of great guests (albeit expensive) for Orlando and I honestly think they can keep that up for a European one too. Granted there are restrictions as to guests willingness to fly abroad/health, but there are lots of them in England already (that weren't autograph guests last year) including noticeably, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega... As well as people like Ewan McGregor and Liam Neeson whom might not live in the UK anymore, but it is their home country! And of course all the filming being done there

As for the other reasons why the European one is definitely a "light" edition is probably, as already mentioned in this thread, US vendors being unwilling to spend the resources.

 

I found it a much better experience (London) - so yeah - other than the 40th and TLJ panels, I didn't really enjoy myself anywhere near as much as last year.

For a comparison - in London, we had the unveiling of the "Rogue One' costumes. For this, we had to do with the (albeit cool, but replica) costumes from the OT put on display by a collector.

In London, we had ILM VFX debuting their immersive VR star wars "Trials on Tattooine" thing. Here, we had Nissan do a Oculus Rift car commercial (cool but I spent most of my brief time trying to peer OUT of the bleeding cars windows to see the the cool stuff happening outside.

I could go on..