I was reading through some trade paperbacks of mine, and I hit upon some fine reads, but a friend asked me what the best one was, and I had a lot of trouble deciding between a few of them. I narrowed it down to the choices, but was curious as to what the dopers thought.
These are my pics:
Claremont and Byrne’s **“X-Men - The Dark Phoenix Saga” **
Frank Miller’s "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns"
Alan Moores’s "The Watchmen"
Waid and Ross’ "Kingdom Come"
Busiek and Ross’ "Marvels"
and the truly excellent and underread :
Greg Rucka’s "Whiteout"
Bendis and Oeming’s "Powers: Who Killed Retro Girl?"
There are mountain’s of argument to be made for all of these stories, and I’m sure I left out some that you loved (I’m sorry I didn’t list the Youngblood mini-series, it wasn’t personnal.), But I was curios what your thoughts were on these books, and what story, listed or not, would you consider the best in comcs history.
I would nominate Moore & Gibbon’s The Watchmen as the best of all time.
However, I think these other extended story lines are very good.
Thor 337-382. The Walt Simonson Thors told an extended story line that really extended Norse mythology. A fabulous arc even if the art was shaky at times.
Swamp Thing 28-31 & Annual Thing: It’s never been published as a graphic novel to my knowledge, but it’s genuine horror. Swampie sends Arcane to Hell and brings out Abigail
Swamp Thing 67-78: I may be off a bit on the exact issues, but it’s the story arc where Swamp Thing is trying to avoid destroying the Sprout while finding a worth successor. Wonderful job by Rick Vietch.
Sandman Novels: Brief Lives, A Season of Mists, A Doll’s House, The Kindly Ones.
The Pertwillaby Papers: Vertigo by Keno Don Rosa.
Strange Tales, the half with Dr. Strange, 132-147: Again, I may be off on exact issues, but it’s the sequence where Dormammu furnishes Baron Mordo with unlimited power, Mordo chases Strange all over the Earth and even into another dimension, Strange learns the secret of Infinity, finds a way to beat Mordo and Dormammu, then beats Mordo’s henchmen after his return to Earth. Stan Lee’s finest moment and a constant inspiration to me as a DM.
I think that everyone will write Watchmen in their top ten, but is it really the best book ever written? It’s firmly grounded in the eighties, with a political situation that doesn’t always ring true today, much like DK Returns.
I think that gives an edge to books like Kingdom Come, which have a free floating timeframe, set in “the future” is vague enough to stay modern.
The Coyote Gospel, and now that I think of it The Death of the Red Mask from Animal Man were both one issue stories.
My favorite multiple issue storyline is The Invisibles vol. 1, which was incredibly tightly plotted as well as dealing with some intriguing concepts.
Frank Miller’s Daredevil and Elektra stories. Daredevil: The Man Without Fear by Miller is a good 5 issue mini-series. I just saw the preview for the Daredevil movie at a showing of ST: Nemesis and it actually looks like it could be really good! Wasn’t sure when I first heard about it, but now I’m excited.
But what makes one stand out above the rest? Watchmen get held back a little because it’s a limited series, and the characters do not ever appear again, and DK returns and Kingdom Come are elseworlds, and thus out of continuity. Continuity is what tarnishes The Dark Phoenix Saga, as it loses so much punch once you realise they brought her back a few years later.
There’s a couple that I re-read. Kingdom Come was good, but as it didn’t really fit into immediate continuity (I think it’s branded Elseworlds) I’ll dismiss it for the time being.
The original Dark Knight Returns. I’ve heard rumours from “Frank Miller’s lost it” to “DC forced him to do it”, but DK2 was a steaming pile and a waste of ink.
For greatest underread stories, I’ll have to second the notice on Powers: Who Killed Retro Girl. It’s got that casual realism that I just love in my books.
For brownie points, I have to say Kindred only because I worked at the comic shop where Brett Booth visited.
But my absolute favorite that I read on an almost weekly basis has to be Crisis on Infinite Earths. That story was absolutely amazing and I’ve yet to see anything compare to it. Too bad it’s been watered down by sequels and garbage like Zero Hour.
The Death of Speedy Ortiz was a classic tragedy, it also perfectly captured mid 80s barrio life and punk rock attitude. Love & Rockets wasn’t really a superhero comic, although there were elements of that in it, but it did have a complex continuity.
This was a book that told a hell of a story, pushed the medium to its limits, and carried a strong message. It also crossed over out of the geek borders of comics to the mainstream and made non-geeks view comics as capable of serious art. Although I have a great deal of respect for most of everyone elses choices I think Maus wins hands down as the greatest comic story of all time. Even Watchmen doesn’t compare in my opinion.
It depends on how we define a “story.” For instance, the whole of Sandman is greater than the sum of its parts; although some of the constituent arcs were fabulous, it is the seires as a whole which must be evaluated.
On that basis, I’d probably pick:
The Invisibles – Wild and incomprehensible, but absolutely right about everything. (The story – not the characters. Which, of course, at least a few of the characters do ultimately figure out.) Also, I love the misdirection throughout.
Sandman – It’s a story of tremendous scope but at the same time, it’s also the story of one man who fails to deal with his knowledge of existential truth.
Watchmen – Not as good as the other two, but it wasn’t trying to be, either. However, it’s a technical masterpiece (every time you read it – every single time – you see more and more of it). And even though it was wedded to the Cold War, the ultimate questions it asks about means vs. ends (which, by the way, it doesn’t answer nearly as cleanly as it pretends to) are deeper than the setting.
Now, although all three of those are series unto themselves, they’re also each a single story. If we’re talking about particular series that are not themselves a single epic, I’d also nominate Barry Ween – it’s the funniest thing you’ll ever read.
“For the Man Who Has Everything” from Superman Annual #10 (I think).
In this Moore/Gibbons tale, Supes is trapped in a hallucinatory universe in which Krypton never exploded. An excellent work, but helped along immensely if you’re a pre-Crisis Krypton fan, as the references fly fast and furious.
Some good choices here. And some appalling ones that make me wonder if y’all are insane.
While I think ‘Watchmen’ is very good I think it’s not even Moore’s best work.
In not particular order…
V For Vendetta by Moore.
Cerebus: Church and State I & II by Dave Sim (I) and Dave Sim & Gerhard (II)
(On a side note I met Sim and Gerhard during the last stage sof C&S. Man, did they look tired.)
Love and Rockets: Human Diastrophism by Beta Hernandez. I agree that the Death of Speedy was great but HD was astounding.
Maison Ikkoku, by Rumiko Takahashi. A weekly romantic comedy that took seven years to complete. Possibly the greatest manga of all time.
Elfquest, by Wendy and Richard Pini. The original 20 issues (which I have someplace) are astounding. The first five should be a movie.
The Puma Blues by Steven Murphy and Michael Zulli. Killed by Dave Sim’s war with Diamond Distribution. Never completed. A great summary of a f*cked up guy.
Maus by Art Speigleman.
Ed the Happy Clown, by Chester Brown
It’s amazing how great comics were in the 80s. Just amazing.
I already listed my pick, but I think I’ll mention some other of my favs.
I’ve seen several people metion Cerebus, C&S, but I’ve always liked High Society better. Sim obviously doesn’t have a very high opinion of politicians.
I’ll second V for Vendetta, but better than the Watchmen? Although V had an interesting view towards politics and anarchy Watchmen took a stern look at the super-hero genre, easily the most dominant in comics, and raised a lot of questions concerning the assumptions made by creators and fans about what being a ‘hero’ means.
Since we’re on the Moore front I’ll add the Top Ten TPB, whenever that comes out and also the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, sort of a victorian era super-hero team featuring Capt. Nemo, Allan Quatermain and others. Not better than V or Watchmen, but both are fun larks.
A couple of other books deserving of mention, Stan Sakai’s Usagi Yojimbo: Grasscutter and its followup Grey Shadows. Sakai does a good job of mixing Japanese mythology and fiction to tell entertaining stories, all while using funny animals.
Red Star, by Christian Gossett and a slew of other people. Kind of a parallel universe to our own where magic exists. Follows the fall of the URRS (our USSR) and what subsequently happens to the country and people. The artwork is fantastic, using a combination of computer graphics and traditional comics artwork. It’s a mini-series which they haven’t finished yet so I’m reserving final judgement, but if they keep going the way they’re going it might wind up being a milestone.
Oh yeah, and the Simonson Thor story where Thor gets turned into a frog. Okay, not the greatest comic ever but a good surreal story involving a kingdom of frogs in Central Park, NY battling an invading army of rats. Good readin’.
I always thought V for Vendetta was better because it took itself outside the standard ‘super hero’ thing. God knows the whole ‘nature of heroism’ thing has been done to death.
This is probably influenced by my somewhat anarchical political leanings, I freely admit.
And this line…
“This isn’t anarchy, Evie…this is chaos.” gets me every time.
And if you want a single issue…
I’ll take that issue of the 1980s version of ‘The Question’ where he spends the entire episode buried up to his neck and doesn’t move a muscle. Just spends the entire time talking the villians around. That’s just cool.