Our time at Dublin Comic Con: Spring Edition 2025
Once upon a time, we had a thing called “Convention Season” in Ireland. Now it’s sort of an all-year-round affair that really kicks off for comics at Dublin Comic Con: Spring Edition. The first official Spring Edition was in 2019 (a year after they tried an Anime Edition and possibly realised the audience was largely the same), and it as there that we launched Meouch #1. In 2022, Spring Edition was when we returned to conventions after Covid-19 with five new books to launch. And now, in 2025, a lot has changed.
Tables at Dublin Comic Con: Spring Edition 2025
We won’t focus on the logistics of organising a convention. It takes a lot of work – Paul should know. How it affected us is the main thing. We used to get two tables beside each other, but recently that’s been reduced to one. This year, Spring Edition provided an opportunity for Limit Break to pop up all over the convention, with Paul, Mari and John all tabling separately.
One thing we love about being a collective is the variety of approaches to art and storytelling that everyone offers. With the newer additions to the collective this past year, we’ve been able to show off some amazing work by some of the hardest working people we know.
Book Launches
Spring Edition saw the launch of two new books by Paul Carroll: The Ties That Bind (with John McGuinness) and The Dark House, Volume One (including art by Mari Rolin and James Killian from the LB Team).
The books pair together as the first stories in the wider universe of The Dark House to be published by Limit Break Comics. The Ties That Bind leans into psychological horror in a rural Irish setting. The Dark House, Volume One takes a Monster of the Week format for storytelling. Interspersed letters add to the worldbuilding and connect the stories together in a longer narrative.
Panels at DCC: Spring Edition
We’re big on our panels, here at Limit Break Comics. Paul and Seamus can’t help themselves when it comes to running or appearing on panels at Dublin Comic Con in particular. For Spring Edition 2025, our schedule was as follows:
- Saturday, 12pm: The State of Comics Anthologies (speaker: Paul Carroll)
- Saturday, 1pm: Can Comic Book Skills Pay the Bills? (moderator: Seamus Kavanagh, speakers: Debbie Jenkinson, Alice Coleman, Ken Mahon)
- Sunday, 1pm: Octocon Presents: What Do You Do When the Fandom You Love Was Created By Someone Who’s Caused Harm? (speakers: Paul Carroll, MaryBrigid Turner, Colm Dodd, Kat Dodd)
It was busy, especially with portfolio reviews on-going with the guests.
The panels serve as a good way of gathering our thoughts, though we’re undecided about the approach for August thus far. Still, this convention marked ten panels for Seamus at Dublin Comic Con, which is quite the achievement!
While Paul is technically no longer an official member of Octocon‘s team, you never really escape. Hugo the Octo found us at our table over the weekend.
Final Thoughts from DCC Spring Edition
We love getting to attend Dublin Comic Con. Conventions like this are where we found each other, and where we continue to get to introduce new readers to our books. It isn’t always easy – print sales were way down, but book sales were up, which is the whole point – but we’ll keep returning as long as they’ll have us.
And hopefully next time we’ll get to have all of us at an event together.
