Hi, all. Could anyone recommend some graphic novels? I liked Watchmen and V for Vendetta - what else might I be likely to enjoy?
Thanks!
If you’d like to continue with books written by Alan Moore, I can recommend his “Top 10” books. These are described as follows (copying from the back of the paperback of the first volume): “Imagine a city where every citizen, from poorest slum-dweller to corporate honcho, has unusual powers powers and abilities - not to mention an alter ego and costume. How would you police such a city?”
These volumes are stories of that city’s cops. The stories are fun and very engaging.
As per normal I previewed, but somehow managed to miss that double “powers”.
sigh
If you’re looking for something unusual and thought-provoking, I’ve been very impressed with The Exterminators, and the first paperback came out a few months back, as I recall.
I’ve also liked some of the old Frank Miller stories - Daredevil: Born Again, Batman: Year One, and of course, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware is more than worth a look. Much of the story is set in the late 19th century during Chicago’s Columbian Expostion. It is lovingly detailed and I had to read through it several times before I spotted all of the minute details. I don’t know what else to say about it because words fail me. You have to read it for yourself, I think. Maybe someone else will come by and expound its virtues.
Clyde Fans: Book 1 by Seth is also great. If there is a Book 2 I’m not aware of it, but I believe the first book is actually a collection of a serialized strip so maybe it is being continued in the same way. I don’t know. It follows the story of a family who’s business was in the manufacture and sale of . . . fans. This story, like Ware’s graphic novel, has a scattered timeline jumping from the somewhat recent past to sometime in the 1930’s. My memory is murky on this point, but I think it is set in Canada.
If you liked Watchmen and V for Vendetta, invest in Alan Moore’s League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (there’s the original and The Black Dossier) and Saga of the Swamp Thing–well worth it. Also worth checking out are Promethea and the new Lost Girls.
In the same vein, Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series is seriously excellent.
Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller are considered pretty seminal if you’re a DC fan, and there’s The Absolute Authority by Warren Ellis and Absolute Batman: Hush by Joseph Loeb…
Marvel 1602 is a great read. It’s jsut as it sounds, all the classic Marvel characters in the early 17th Century.
Powers, by Bendis and Oeming, is another very good superhero series that’s been collected into books. So far, there’s Who Killed Retro Girl?, Role Play, Little Deaths, Supergroup, Anarchy, The Sellouts, Forever, Legends, and Psychotic.
Preacher and Transmetropolitan are two of my favorites.
Is “Battle Hymn” any good?
Astro City is a great series. It’s a little like Watchmen in the way it treats superheroes, except it takes a much less negative view.
FWIW, I just read - and hated - Jimmy Corrigan. It came across as pretentious and being bleak simply for the sake of being bleak. But a lot of people I know loved it, so YMMV. The author, Were, has been compared to Dave Eggers, who wrote A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Which I also hated, for the same reasons.
I did like Maus, but it’s about the Holocaust, so it’s not exactly light reading. Very interesting, though, and made me cry at some points.
Sorry, the author is Ware, not Were. :smack:
Also Alan Moore,From Hell is rather good. Since the OP isn’t asking after graphic novels sensu strictu, but rather collections, I’d also like to recommend some more Brit stuff - Slaine, the Horned God collection by Bisley.
mmm, which Hellblazer collection to recommned…
How about Maus? It’s about a serious topic (the Halocaust, based on true events). Very, very good book. It’s about as graphic novel as you could get.
Second Neil Gaiman’s Sandman and add his Black Orchid.
And if you’re up for more (ahem) Moore there’s The Ballad of Halo Jones which starts quite light but gets darker further in.
Another nod for Brian Michael Bendis’ Powers series. Everyday cops dealing with crime in a world of superheroes. I love how he writes his dialogue.
I also enjoyed Millar’s run in The Authority, as well as his treatment of The Ultimates (Marvel’s Avengers.) Like Bendis, he excels in showing superheroes as real people with real-world issues.
The original Aliens vs. Predator was good. You can probably safely ignore anything that follows the franchise, but the first one is very well done.
Also, virtually any Groo collection is good, as are collections of The Tick while Bed Edlund was writing. (Sean Wang was a good Tick writer too.)
Since I’m getting all old-school on y’all, I might as well suggest the first four or so collections of Elfquest.
If you can find an old copy, the one-volume compilation of CAMELOT 3000 is pretty good. I’ve got the individual issues (about 13, I think)- insectoid aliens are attacking Earth, the leaders of Earth’s defense are unaware they are reincarnations of Guenevire & the Knights of the Round Table, while their leader, the UN Sec-Gen in actually in league with the attacking aliens as he is none other than Mordred, in thrall to Morgan LaFey.
Meanwhile, a teenage boy flees attacking aliens by going down into a cavern in an archaeoligical dig on Glastonbury Tor. He collides with an ancient crypt & awakens its inhabitant, that moment also awakens the memories of the reborn lords & ladies of Camelot.
Who could that inhabitant be? A once and future…
I recommend the Usagi Yojimbo series.
Contrary to appearances, it is not a childrens’ series, but has a dammed good plot, & intresting art. Do not dismiss it as a “furry” series, either. Is is very, very good, & some of the best names in comics agree with me.
What Bosda said. I can’t believe I left out Usagi. Very compelling characters and plots.