If I’m going to read comics it’s Archie all the way.
Not all the ones I read, or even all my favourites:
[ul]
[li]Elfquest - This hasn’t been mentioned yet?[/li][li]Adam Warren’s Dirty Pair - Hillarious SF cum slapstick comedy cum manga/anime homage/parody[/li][li]You’re Under Arrest - Neat little comedy set in a Tokyo police station…not enough of it around for my taste. Features the gooniest ‘Super-hero’ in comicdom - the Strikeman! Beware the Black Ball, Home-run Girl! ::Giggle::[/li][li]Oh! My Goddess - Same author as YUA, geeky guy and beautiful goddess fall in love (but are both too shy to make a move), her sisters interfere, chaos (and, at one point, the end of the world!) ensues.[/li][li]Futabakun Change! - Teenaged guy finds out he turns into a girl when he gets excited (ANY excitement…yes, even that)…his sister tries to seduce him…things just get weirder from there…[/li][/ul]
Yeah, that’s a high proportion of Japanese stuff.
I think Chester Brown is alarmingly inventive.
He put out a comic called YUMMY FUR during the 1980s. His book collections (actually, the middle two are novel-length single stories) are entitled
ED THE HAPPY CLOWN
THE PLAYBOY
I NEVER LIKED YOU
THE LITTLE MAN
Only the last one seems to still be available.
Oh, yeah…Alison Bechdel’s DYKES TO WATCH OUT FOR. It’s a comic strip about a group of women (and a few men, too) that runs in alternative papers.
It’s difficult to write a soap-opera style continuation strip where you come to love and admire the characters, that’s FUNNY EVERY TIME (Al Capp did it…I can’t think of too many others).
All of Bechdel’s stuff is in print in book form. Try her out.
but I still read them occasionally. My all-time favorites are:
[ul]
[li]Sandman[/li][li]early Hellblazer[/li][li]Yummy Fur[/li][li]Eightball[/li][li]Hate[/li][li]V for Vendetta[/li][li]Watchmen[/li][li]Big Numbers (damn shame that this never went anywhere, although there are rumors of a movie!)[/li][li]A Small Killing (What can I say? I love Alan Moore. Oh, and while we’re at it,)[/li][li]Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing stories[/li][li]Mage (but NOT Mage 2][/li][li]Black Orchid[/li][li]Virtually anything by R. Crumb. The man is a bona fide genius. See the movie “Crumb” TONIGHT if you haven’t already.[/li][li]As gross and nasty and kitschy as they are, I also have a soft spot for “Bedlam” by Veitch and Bissette.[/li][/ul]
I’d like to add to my list:
The work of R. Crumb (thanks for the reminder, Ogre)
Sam & Max, Freelance Police (VERY funny. These have been collected into a paperback)
I’v got one nobody’s mentioned:
Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer. Ben Katchor.
In fact, there was a review in the nov. 26 New York Times book review of four new graphic novel: Julius Knipl, The! Greatest! Of! Marleys! by Lynn Barry. Jimmy Corrigan, the Smarest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware and David Boring by Dan Clowes. So maybe they’re making it out of the ghetto!
I’d recommend all of them, particularly Julius Knipl and anything by Dan Clowes. Before his did Davis Boring he did Eightball (Lloyd Llewelan (sp?), Ghost World, Like a Velvet Glove Cased in Iron. He’s amazing.)
And I’ll second Sandman, Preacher, Hate, V for Vendette (you mean V WASN’T a superhero?)Stray Bullets. Oh, and Hellblazer.
Oh, and anybody read From Hell (by Alan Moore who did Watchmand and V for Vendette) about Jack the Ripper?
And of course there’s Maus.
Alright I think that’s all for now.
Left out “Peep Show,” by Joe Matt. It’s very heavily influenced by Crumb (no problem, Soup,) but it’s even more of an unblinking autobiography. Uncomfortable sometimes, but always entertaining.
betenoir, you humble me. You reminded me of all those great comics I should have remembered. I love Clowes. “Eightball” was genius, but he’s done some other really good stuff. Good call on “Julius Knipl,” too. I heard the author doing readings from it on NPR one evening, and it was great.
I’ve read “From Hell.” Alan Moore is one of my idols. There are also movie rumors about it floating around.
And how, HOW, HOW, HOW could we have gone all this time without mentioning Spiegelman’s “Maus?” Incredible. Another good call, bet.
Thought of another!
underworld by Kaz
The fourth collection of these strips will be coming out soon.
Pretty much off american comics completly, cept for Gold Digger. Books of Magic held me a long time on the strength of the early issues, but the last two years have been nothing but everyone in the series blaming the hero for things that arn’t his fault, including himself.
Am pissed I missed Rising Stars, though. Hope they come out with a graphic novel eventually. And will pick up Grendel if they ever come out with some new ones. Anyone know if the last issue of Mage 2 ever came out?
Non-superhero americom are pretty much their own worst enemy, though. Vertigo lost me due to it’s own unbelivable pretention, considering that three out of every four of their series were considerably worse than you’re average sh comic. Then Sandman ended and Hellblazer got crappy again . . .
Pretty much straight manga these days. They’re finally redoing Lone Wolf and Cub, though the new translation is very stilted sounding, and I’d be willing to pay twice as much for pages that were big enough to read. Normal, half sized “manga collection” size would be fine. Pulp has some good sections, though they seem to be changing directions. Blade of the Immortal is, I guess, technically superhero, but it’s so much fun that I kinda have to mention it. Sanctuary was unbelivable. Gunsmith Cats is fun. And, of course, the load of SF and comedy stuff that’s come out over the last few years.
Huh? Do you mean normal people avoid comics because of comic book people, (possible, but not really the fault of the readers) or that comic book fans bitch about non-SH comics? Which is completly counter to my experience, as CB fans give non-SH comics a huge amount of slack, considering that, judged on their own merits, most are no better than they’re power-equiped compitition.
–
“It’s not a comic book, it’s a GRAPHIC NOVEL!”
I’ll go immediately over to MPSIMS after this and start a thread in which I post “I will not deliberately pad my post count” 500 times. 
As far as I’m concerned, the jewel of all the “alterna-comics” is “Cerebus.” Dave Sim and Gerhard have turned a cute animal parody comic into a complex storyline with levels upon levels of characterization, world development, plot, and theme. Sim has taken on everything from the papacy to feminism, and done it brilliantly. Also, the artwork is amazing. Gerhard is an architect, and the city backgrounds he draws are breathtaking. See the first issue of “High Society,” when Cerebus is walking up the steps to the Regency Hotel, and the whole place is laid out before him like a palace. Stunning.
BotI Superhero? Historical-Action-Fantasy seems more accurate. Manji and his enemies are exceptionally (Well, impossibly) skilled swordsmen but the only thing really superhuman about any of them is Manji’s immortality, and none (well, few) of them dress funny. It’s a little formulaic (Baddie-of-the-arc shows up, Manji slices him to bits in a really neat swordfight, mark up one (or two, or a dozen) more body on his way to his goal.), but in a general action formula, not strictly Superhero. If BotI is Superhero, so’s Gunsmith Cats, IMO. (So Rally’s not technically supposed to be immortal…she’s close enough! And it’s every bit as unrealistic with the fighting (and driving) as BotI is.)
Reads to me like he’s saying that since Superhero comics have been all there’s been up 'till now (factually incorrect, but we can bypass this, I agree with the conclusion, if not this part of the premise), that no one - Comics readers and non-comics readers, save for a small group can see that comics can do anything else.
Sort of true - few non comics fans realise there’s anything but SH, the Sunday Funnies and Archie to comics, and the majority of comics readers seem to be into them (though not quite to the exclusion of all else), so it looks like nothing else exists.
Cerebus. It’s like some sick addiction.
Books of Magic got cancelled in April (?), but is coming out in a mini-series in December that holds much more promise.
The first Rising Stars collection, #1-8, came out on Wednesday the 29th. Definite pick-up.
It’s better agin, now that a Chicagoan is writing it (Brian Azarello, who also writes 100 Bullets (his wife, Jill Thompson, writes the giggly-funny Scary Grandmother)). No, this isn’t a slam against British writers. Azarello is just…bringing a new perspective.
Cave Dwellers
Due to some oddity of my childhood, I’ve never read Superman or any of that genre of graphic novels. I remember reading some of the Star Trek ones, but they were my brother’s.
I’ve read and liked Sandman (I’ll buy anything with Gaiman’s name on it, I’m a sucker), Cerebus (especially the ones with Oscar Wilde, I was ROTF), V for Vendetta, Watchman, and there’s a porn series I really liked, but I can’t think of the name right now. I loved The Crow. I still think the first ones were the most romantic thing I’ve ever read.
Lets see, non superhero comics that I read…
Bone Like the guy earlier said, would replace many stories we read as children.
Usagi Yojimbo S. Saki is a master.
Sandman Was excellent.
Albedo One of the two comic series that defined the B&W comics explosion back in the 80’s…TMNT was the other one.
Fusion Was one of the great B&W’s, sad to see it end.
Xanadu V.Wyman’s series was very enjoyable.
Buck Godot - Zap Gun for hire Phil Foglio is hilarious, pure and simple.
XXXenophile Yes it is adult, it is also very funny and well done, in my mind without a doubt the best ‘adult’ comic series ever done.
What’s New! [sub]with phil and dixie[/sub] Hey, I’m a gamer, so of course I include this one.
Appleseed Shirow’s masterpiece, now he needs to finish it.
I still favor Archie and Jughead with Betty and Veronica, which my daughter gets.
Well, when I was a wee lad, I always favored the DC horror comics:[list][li]House of Mystery[/li][li]House of Secrets[/li][li]The Witching Hour[/li][li]Ghosts[/li]
(Are there any similar horror series out there now?)
I was also a big fan of Sgt. Rock comics, as well as DC’s Tarzan series.
When I was still younger, I started my comic book habit with such titles as Casper, Hot Stuff, Richie Rich and Spooky.
In answer to the OP, I have tried to get my niece and nephews into comics with mixed success. It didn’t take with the nephews, but my niece really loves them. I buy her old back issues of Hot Stuff, Richie Rich, Archie, et al., and I sometimes take her to comic book shops to let her pick out her own.
I liked Richie Rich and Little Lotto as a kid.
Little Lotto’s Dad: Well! It took me years to save it up, but I finally have enough cash to buy the sailboat I always wanted!
Little Lotto’s Mom: That’s wonderful, dear. Why not leave the money here on the table while we go into the other room for a while?
(Little Lotto walks in, sees the sack with the $ sign on the table, grabs it and runs out and purchases $90,000 worth of Lotto tickets)
Little Lotto’s Dad: OH NO! LITTLE LOTTO!!!