Tickets for next year’s Comic Con Cape Town (30 April to 3 May 2026) and Comic Con Africa (24 to 27 September 2026) are officially on sale from today at 13:00 in their discounted Early Bird Phase.
If you’ve never been to a South African Comic Con, you may be wondering what to expect. If you are a veteran, well, you’ll know the organisers’ ability to not only bring absolute pop culture icons like William Shatner to our shores, but also the chance to engage with actors, comic creators and other celebrities who have big “one of us” geek energy.
Among the latter you can include D&D fanatic Joe Manganiello (a CCA guest in 2024), and, this year, Dan Fogler, whose character actor credits include the likes of The Walking Dead, Balls of Fury, A Complete Unknown, and, of course, the Fantastic Beasts films, set within the Harry Potter universe. However, Fogler is more than a performer. He’s also a fimmaker, comedian and comic creator – who actually has a connection to South Africa through his wife’s family.
Thanks to Comic Con Africa and their PR team, during this year’s show we received the opportunity to briefly chat to Fogler about his work, his comic recommendations and cosplay theoreticals (when he wasn’t entertaining us with Alien franchise trivia that is).
I think most South Africans know you for your more comedic work, but you’ve also appeared in dramatic and darker things like A Complete Unknown, Hannibal and The Walking Dead. And we’re not even talking about your voice acting, writing, directing and comics work. Did you seek out that professional diversity or has it just kind of happened naturally as opportunities arose?
Dan Fogler: I grew up in the 80s, so I love all things (George) Lucas and (Steven) Spielberg and, you know, action movies and Raiders of the Lost Ark, and sci-fi and everything. So I really just wanted that. I would watch these things and say that’s why I want to get into, I want to do that. I want to be running from a boulder, you know, I wanna be a Jedi.
I was a huge fan of The Walking Dead comic book. To be in that, for me, like the 10 year old me who grew up on comic books, it’s like, “Oh my God, Dan, you’re playing someone who is actually a character in a comic book.” That’s a dream fulfilled right there.
So yeah, I’m just a big kid; just trying to keep playing outside like I did when I was a kid, but instead I get paid for it.
Can you tell us more about your comics – The Foglerverse. How did that come about?
Dan Fogler: I still love collecting comic books and so I wanted to write my own comic book.
I was hugely influenced by Heavy Metal and the movie and Heavy Metal magazine, and so Moon Lake was my first book, which was a huge homage to that.
We’re developing that, actually developing all my stuff, for animation, film, whatever, but yeah, I’m creating a Foglerverse, because mostly because it’s hard to really rely on publishers in this world right now. And there’s too many middlemen.
I wanna just focus on my books and just keep expanding that universe. So the Foglerverse is coming, and it’s gonna consist of Moon Lake, Brooklyn Gladiator, which is my dystopian sci-fi, cautionary tale, and then Fishkill, which is the prequel to that. It’s like a modern noir with a little bit of sci-fi, which takes place now. And then I have another story called The Last Storm, which is like anti-diluvian, an Atlantean kind of tale. So I’m just expanding, just gonna keep on working on my books, creating sequels and trying to get everything franchise-able.
Where can people find your work? Is it available online?
Yeah, the best thing to do is exactly that. You could get it on the Heavy Metal website, but that might take a while. So if you go to where they sell comic books, that kind of bookseller, you’ll find it there.
Just type in “Dan Fogler Moon Lake, Dan Fogler Brooklyn Gladiator…” My books are out in the world.
I don’t think there is anyone who makes comics, especially indie comics, who doesn’t love the medium. So do you have any favourite series, graphic novels, or runs of an established title?
Dan Fogler: I’m a huge fan of Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso’s 100 Bullets. I don’t know why the hell that hasn’t… like if you’re listening, let’s make this into a series. It’s so freaky. How is it not a TV show? Then I also love East of West, which is so good.
Finally, you’re at a con, surrounded by cosplayers, so if you were dressing up, what would you do?
Dan Fogler: I think I would do something maybe elaborate, like an enormous Transformer or something with stilts. And I would just be like, “Move along!” Trying to get from point A to point B, I think people would move out of the way for giant robots.
