The first two celebrities booked for the newly renamed Salt Lake Comic Convention have been announced: a teen star of “Stranger Things” and a former Power Ranger.
Gaten Matarazzo and Amy Jo Johnson will make appearances at the sixth annual convention, set for Sept. 6-8 in the Salt Palace Convention Center, organizers announced to fans on Christmas.
Matarazzo plays Dustin Henderson, one of the four friends sucked into the mystery in their Indiana town in “Stranger Things.” Dustin’s the one who wears a trucker hat. Matarazzo, 15, is also an advocate for people (like himself) with cleidocranial dysostosis, a congenital condition that affects bones and teeth.
Johnson applied her childhood gymnastics training to her first screen role, that of Kimberly Hart, the acrobatic pink Power Ranger, in the original “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” TV series, from 1993 to 1995, and in two subsequent movies. She also has starred on life-in-college TV series “Felicity” (1998-2000) and the police dramas “The Division” (2004) and “Flashpoint” (2008-12).
The Salt Lake Comic Convention was known as Salt Lake Comic Con before a California jury found earlier this month that the Salt Lake City event was violating the trademark of Comic-Con International, which runs the popular San Diego Comic-Con. Owners of the Salt Lake City event announced plans to appeal immediately after the verdict, but the event also has edited the event’s logo and social-media pages to eliminate the words “Comic Con.”
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