Sharjah24 - AFP: Comic-Con finally returns to San Diego this week, where new "Lord of the Rings" and "Game of Thrones" TV series will compete before tens of thousands of cosplaying geeks and nerds at the world's most famous pop culture gathering.
Disney and its Marvel superheroes will also preview their upcoming films and shows to adoring fans at the sprawling convention, which has not taken place in full for three years due to the pandemic.
"I think it'll look like Comic-Con from 2019," said the event's communications chief David Glanzer, even if guests -- whether dressed as hobbits, dragons or princesses -- will be required to wear face masks.
"We weathered it. And now coming back, maybe we're gonna have tears of joy... it's very emotional," said .
In addition to 135,000 screaming fans, the comic book, science fiction and fantasy extravaganza draws Hollywood's biggest studios and their A-list stars to show off upcoming titles -- kicking off this year with Paramount's "Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves."
Marking the first time the world's most popular role-playing game has received a mega-budget silver-screen adaptation, the movie out next March stars Chris Pine, Hugh Grant and former "Bridgerton" heartthrob Rege-Jean Page.
But the week's headlines are set to be dominated by two huge fantasy series coming to television screens soon: Amazon Prime's "Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power" and HBO's "House of the Dragon."
"The Rings of Power" is Amazon's enormously ambitious saga taking place in the world of J.R.R. Tolkien's books, set long before the events of Peter Jackson's Oscar-winning trilogy of films.
The series -- playing out across five seasons, the first of which launches September 2 -- is reported to have cost Amazon well over $1 billion, and is said to be a personal obsession of founder Jeff Bezos.
Much of that cost went into buying the Tolkien universe rights and on lavish production values, with a healthy sum set aside for "activations," or immersive fan experiences, at Comic-Con.
Amazon on Friday will bring its cast of hobbits, elves and dwarves to the venue's cavernous Hall H, where fans who line up for hours or even days anticipate seeing the first detailed look at the series.
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