In what is going to be a blow to Marvel fans attending the inaugural Comic Con Africa being held this weekend at the Kyalami Grand Prix Circuit and International Convention Centre — Marvel’s Falcon, Anthony Mackie, is unable to attend. We learned this information at a pre-event media briefing today at the Comic Con Africa venue, via a message from Mackie himself — seemingly filmed at the airport.

Mackie’s travel plans have been interrupted by Hurricane Florence, which has grounded large numbers of flights out of the States. He seemed genuinely bummed not to be able to make the trip and promised to attend the next event Comic Con event in this country, so we should be seeing him next year.

On the other side of things, besides the list of dos and don’ts the media hordes had explained to them at the pre-event briefing, we also learned that Comic Con Africa has completely sold out. Friday’s tickets were the last hold-outs… and those have all vanished, too. Long story short, there aren’t going to be any tickets at the door.

No ticket, no entry, no exceptions

The event organisers have explained that tickets are so non-existent they aren’t putting any infrastructure in place to handle ticket sales. To shorten further: If you have a ticket with you, you’re getting in. Eventually. We’re expecting a lot of traffic. And if you don’t, you’re unfortunately going to be turned away.

What this also means is that if you’re not attending Comic Con Africa in Kyalami, but your commute takes you anywhere near the area, you might want to alter your route tomorrow (14 September). If you normally head on or near Allandale Road or the R55 to Sandton, you’re probably going to run into a bit of a traffic nightmare tomorrow. Weekend traffic should prove less arduous, since there are far fewer folks heading into the office on Saturday and Sunday.

Stuff took a brief tour of the venue as it was being set up and it’s all looking very good so far. We’ll catch those of you who do have tickets at Comic Con Africa this weekend — if you spot us, come say hi.