Love, Dragon Con style: Relationships blossom at the legendary Atlanta con

Tyra gets an (emerald) rose

In 1989, Tyra Mitchell attended Dragon Con as a bright-eyed 19-year-old well-versed in the worlds of “Star Trek” and “Star Wars.”

For years, she joked that she’d eventually meet the man she’d marry at Dragon Con. “You put a bunch of nerdy people together, and we eventually find each other,” she said.

In 2009, Tyra’s meet nerdy finally happened. She was watching Emerald Rose, a quirky Celtic folk-rock group known for songs like “Santa Claus is Pagan Too” and “Fairies Stole My Keys.” The now-defunct band had become a popular draw at Dragon Con.

Shane Burton volunteered to do security for the concert in a Hilton Atlanta ballroom. While off duty, he sat to watch the band but couldn’t see because of a woman wearing a massive Marge Simpson beehive in front of him.

He got up and found an open seat next to Tyra.

They chatted, then parted ways without exchanging numbers. Tyra, aware this might be a lost opportunity, found him on what was then a new social network called Facebook and “friended” him.

They began talking later that month and decided to hang at a post-Dragon Con volunteers party in Acworth dubbed “the Dead Dog party” because everyone was “dog tired,” said Tyra, by then a Kennesaw State University professor.

Tyra and Shane met for lunch, attended the party, then strolled the KSU campus. “We clicked,” Tyra said. “We could talk forever.”

Four months later, they were engaged. Nine months later, they were married.

“It just felt right,” said Shane, a client services manager for cruise lines at a financial technology company.

Tyra and Shane book a hotel room every year at Dragon Con, both admitting they blow their planned budget every year.

“The art show is amazing,” Tyra said.

“We have way too much art,” Shane admitted.

“It’s worth it because I’m surrounded by my people,” Tyra said. “This is home. And it’s even better with Shane because he still makes my heart pitter patter.”

Credit: Courtesy of Niki Rece

Credit: Courtesy of Niki Rece

‘Our brains kind of melded’

On opening night of Dragon Con in 2006, steelworker Ken O’Dell was in a gaggle of “Firefly” fans, many in Browncoat outfits, at the Marriott Marquis. They decided to go to the Vortex in Midtown for dinner.

“It was like herding cats,” O’Dell recalled. “I was assigned in the rear to grab stragglers. That’s when I first met Niki.”

Niki Rece had heard about Ken through a mutual Florida friend and immediately felt the connection.

“Our brains kind of melded,” Rece said. “We were both that kind of weird. He looked like a ZZ Top roadie. Hot!”

“She was an attractive redhead,” O’Dell said, “like Bette Midler.”

They didn’t get physical that first weekend. O’Dell was dating a woman who “didn’t approve” of Dragon Con (red flag alert!). But he soon dumped her and began dating Rece.

Two years later, the couple married on the 10th floor of the Marriott Marquis with 60 of their closest Dragon Con friends. The hotel didn’t allow outside food, so they sneaked in Marietta’s Williamson Brothers Bar-B-Q barbecue and chicken in Rubbermaid containers.

“Everyone was in costume,” O’Dell recalled. “Her parents came down from Canton and looked confused.”

They return every year to Dragon Con. “We consider Thursday of Dragon Con as our wedding anniversary,” Rece said.

Credit: Courtesy of Chris Cummins

Credit: Courtesy of Chris Cummins

‘Come join the cult of Dragon Con!’

Before meeting for the first time at Dragon Con, Derek Gayle and Chris Cummins began corresponding on Instagram in 2020.

Cummins, a writer for Archie Comics and creator of the live events Sci-Fi Explosion and Music Video Book Club, invited Gayle, a writer and podcaster, to come to Dragon Con in 2021.

“If this had been any other year,” Gayle said, “I would have said, ‘I’m too busy.’ But after COVID lockdown, I said, ‘Why not?’ I thought it would be cool for someone to walk me through what this convention is about.”

“I’m, like, ‘Come join the cult of Dragon Con!’ “ Cummins said.

Cummins flew into Atlanta from Philadelphia, Gayle from Richmond, Virginia. Although they had never met, they shared a room at the Omni.

As the first mass gathering both had attended since the pandemic started, Gayle felt “there was less pressure on us to make a good first impression, and we were instantly more vulnerable and open with each other.”

“We were impressed by each other’s mutual nerdity,” Cummins said.

But they chose to stay in the friend zone at first.

“I don’t think either of us were particularly looking for a relationship,” Cummins said.

This slow boil turned into more by early 2024.

“I was kind of dragging my feet a little bit because I’m nothing if not emotionally distant,” Cummins admitted.

They have been back to Dragon Con multiple times together and will attend again this year.

Gayle plans to cosplay as a 1970s Japanese superhero while Cummins will play Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode from the band’s “Enjoy the Silence” music video.

“It’s basically to entertain myself and four people,” Cummins said.

“Obscurity,” Gayle said, “is the point.”

Credit: Courtesy of Jason Marsden

Credit: Courtesy of Jason Marsden

Enter Pee-wee Herman on a red tricycle!

Character actor Jason Marsden (no relation to James) is a regular on the Walk of Fame at Dragon Con, signing autographs and taking selfies inside the Marriott Marquis.

As a child, Marsden appeared on shows like “Boy Meets World,” “Step by Step” and “Full House” and has done voice work in “A Goofy Movie,” “Hocus Pocus” and “Spirited Away.”

He was working the Dragon Con crowds in 2016 when he spied Remy Dee entering the Walk of Fame as Pee-wee Herman, an outfit she created for an earlier ‘80s-themed party.

“Remy was with her cousin Ember, who was cosplaying as Billy the Puppet from ‘Saw,’ and what made them unique was they were both riding around on red tricycles,” Marsden said. “They were having so much fun. I remember seeing Remy’s face, all lit up.”

He took a photo of them from a distance, then asked for more photos as they got closer. Marsden signed a photo of his cat character Binx from “Hocus Pocus.” Dee, a burlesque dancer and director, handed Marsden her business card with her photo on it. “This is what I actually look like in real life,” she told him.

The next day, Marsden DMed her on Instagram. “It turns out, he’s a fan of burlesque!” Dee said.

“Can you blame me?” Marsden said.

They hung out Sunday with his fellow voice actors in his Marriott Hotel room. He shared a cookie with her.

The bond was sealed. The couple spent several years in a long-distance relationship traveling between Nashville, Marsden’s home city, and New Orleans, where Dee resided. “We wrote a lot of letters,” Marsden said. “They’re all in a box.”

They moved in together in Nashville in 2022 and married this past spring. Over the years at Dragon Con, they have cosplayed characters from “Batman,” “Indiana Jones,” “X-Men” and “Jaws.”

“I still love the thick creative vibe there,” Marsden said.

Credit: Courtesy of

Credit: Courtesy of

Wedding proposal mildly gone awry

Suwanee resident Jake Calhoun quickly fell in love with Maryanne Henley while both were working at a Montana resort in 2022.

“I kept talking about this convention back home,” said Calhoun of Dragon Con.

“My little theater heart skipped a beat,” Henley said.

The pair were soon living together in Suwanee, but they were not in a rush to get married. In the meantime, they enjoyed their first Dragon Con together in 2023.

Calhoun, a planner, decided to propose to Henley during the Masquerade costume competition in 2024 at the Hyatt Centennial Ballroom. It airs on Dragon Con TV, which anyone can watch live, so he convinced friends and family to subscribe so they could watch the proposal in real time.

He even choreographed a scene where he, as Darth Vader, would fall to one knee during the lightsaber fight, and present Henley, as Ahsoka from “Star Wars: The Clone Wars,” with an engagement ring.

Henley had no idea what was about to happen: “I was having my own freak out because I have stage fright.”

But the director nixed Calhoun’s plan at the last minute, saying it would be unfair to the other competitors. He even threatened Calhoun with a lifetime ban from the contest if he did it anyway.

“I had to go to Plan B,” Calhoun said.

That meant proposing to her backstage after their performance. She was still tearfully surprised even if it wasn’t in front of a huge audience or Dragon Con TV.

“We didn’t win the contest,” Henley said, “but I got the best prize in Jake. I know. Cheesy!”

They are getting married in October this year and holding their bachelor and bachelorette parties at Dragon Con.

“Dragon Con is a big part of our relationship,” Henley said. “It also encompasses who we are outside of con. It means we get to be who we are unapologetically.”