Comics and graphic novels

M

Malky

Lived Through the Heat Death
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For the past year or so, I've become totally consumed by comics and graphic novels. I was never into comic books when I was younger, even though all of my friends were, and I can't explain why. I guess I was just wrapped up in "real" books, and movies were kind of my forte growing up. While all of the other kids on the block were reading Spiderman and X-Men, I was watching The Godfather and The Evil Dead. I mean, I've always loved the characters, I would wake up early Saturday morning to watch the X-Men cartoon, or rush home from school to watch Batman: The Animated Series, but I could never get into the books. This past year, though, it's totally taken over my life as far as reading goes (well, that and non-fiction history).

So, since I'm sure many of you guys are also into comics, I pose a few questions:

Favorite books?
Favorite characters?
Favorite authors?


My favorite graphic novel is probably either Watchmen (duh), or Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. Watchmen is the standard as far as graphic novels are concerned, I suppose, and it deserves every bit of praise it gets. The Dark Knight Returns is just awesome on every level. This is the book that brought Batman back to his original roots, and it's a thrilling read. When Batman has Superman on his knees, throat in hand, at the end of the book...man. So intense. Preacher is a favorite of mine (the limited story arc about the Saint of Killers is absolutely awesome). I'm also a big fan of David Boring, which was written by Daniel Clowes of Ghost World fame. Neil Gaiman's Sandman books are terrific, as well. I'm hoping to get into The Walking Dead (zombies!) and Transmetropolitan soon.

Recently, I've been reading The Ultimates, which is Marvel's Ultimate Universe version of The Avengers. It's a pretty dark and cynical book, plenty of violence and intensity (way above average for a mainstream comic). Marvel's New Avengers is probably the best mainstream book out right now. It's cool to see Spidey and Wolverine on the same team. Traditionally I'm not much of a DC fan, except for Batman.

As far as individual characters go, my favorite "superhero" is Batman. I'm also a big Punisher fan, Garth Ennis's work on The Punisher is absolutely brilliant. I guess technically neither of those are "super" at all, but I suppose I find it interesting that they're more or less ordinary men doing extraordinary things, surrounded by (and often surpassing) extraordinary people. The Ultimate Universe version of Thor is really cool, specifically because he's always spouting out political propaganda and rhetoric, and at one point only agrees to join The Ultimates because George W. Bush gives into his demands towards doubling the international aid budget. Oh, and how could I forget The Joker and Carnage.

As far as authors go, I'm a big fan of Garth Ennis (The Punisher, Preacher), Alan Moore (Watchmen, V for Vendetta, The League...), Mark Millar (Judge Dredd, The Authority, Ultimate X-Men, The Ultimates), and Brian Michael Bendis (Jinx, Torso, Sam and Twitch, Ultimates, Ultimate X-Men, Elektra, Daredevil, House of M, Secret War, Ultimate Fantastic Four, New Avengers). One can't forget Frank Miller, either. He really is a mixed bag, though.
 
It's hard to keep up with my comics since it's difficult to find a good comic store around here (it's been 6 months since I've been able to update :( ) but currently I'm of the mindset that anything Robert Kirkman touches turns into gold. The Walking Dead and Invincible are both two of my favorite original comics. Like Malkav, I was never big into the comics when I was a kid, so it's easier for me to attach myself to original properties (plus a lot of DC and Marvel writing has been absolute trash).

I also read Y: The Last Man, which does the lone man in a world full of women sub-genre of sci-fi the justice that made for tv movies and The Outer Limits have failed to do. I do think it could do with a lot less College Democrat, though.

Favorite character still remains the ever loveable Spider Jerusalem of Warren Ellis's Transmetropolitan. As off-the-wall as the character is, the comic honestly strengthened my interest in journalism.

Honorable mention also has to go out to Mark Waid and George Perez' Empire. It's a short series, but it's a grand Super Villain Wins drama that borders on the Shakespearian.
 
Bradylama said:
Like Malkav, I was never big into the comics when I was a kid, so it's easier for me to attach myself to original properties (plus a lot of DC and Marvel writing has been absolute trash).
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Yeah, I have a friend who has been a comic fan his entire life, but can't get into original books or standalone graphic novels at all. It's kind of weird.
 
I have a few favorites, mostly already mentioned, but I have also read back in the Golden Age, including many of these. They were able to get away with a lot instead of having to conform to the Candyland shit of later years.

One of my greatest pieces in my collection, merely because I like its style though I haven't seen the inside of it in about 20 years, is the 1977 comic print of War of the Worlds. My copy is in English, of course, I was only able to find a Norsk version of the same general print series. Mine has a slightly different cover, too.
 
Currently i'm dug deep into the japanese specter of comics. Manga that is. I will again recomend Vagabond by Takehiko Inoue. The manga is a remake of a novel of the life of a japanese sword saint mushahshi. The story is great and exiting, the drawings are some of the best i have ever seen in my whole life of comicreading. extreme attention to detail and great great drawings make it extremly good. Too bad i'm poor and unable to buy it all.

Also hajime no ippo is a great sports manga. Ofcourse never forget the old ones: is allways worth reading. All donald duck by don rosa.
V for vendetta and sandman is also great.
I tend to not like superheroes, punisher by garth ennis an exception. I got the whole preacher collection(wich explains why i'm poor) and it is great.
I shall try to read watchmenn later on they got some down on my awesome public library. Lone wolf and cub is good too for whenever you want that random slaughter.

Favourite character miyamato mushashi.
 
Current favorite: Akira. After years and years of putting it off due to a morbid fear of anime/manga I finally started it and got so hooked that I read it all in one sitting. I've watched the movie about once a year since I was 16 so I thought I knew what I was getting into but it doesn't even scratch the surface of the comic, a 2000 page epic that puts almost everything else to shame. Any comic fan NEEDS to read this.

Some of my other favorites: V For Vendetta, The Watchmen, The Dark Knight Returns, Hard Boiled, Preacher, Transmetropolitan, Sleeper, Hellblazer, a lot more that don't immediately come to mind.

Current comics I'm following: The Walking Dead, Y The Last Man, Ex Machina, 100 Bullets, Lucifer. I gave up on following weekly comics a long time ago and would just occasionally buy a graphic novel, but I like all of these too much to wait for collected versions to come out.

Favorite characters is a hard one. I stopped following regular "superhero" comics in the early 90's because so many of them were so cheesy and the characters would change so much from writer to writer, in addition to nearly every issue being some retarded crossover with 5 different other books and each one having 10 different 'collectable' multi-colored foil covers. Superhero comics were so incredibly bad back then that it pretty much put me off them forever. If I had to pick though I guess I would say Batman and Spiderman. Guy Gardner too, since the last hero comic I followed was Justice League International (early 90's version) and I still think the first 50 or so issues are some of the funniest and best written hero comics ever.

Favorite writers: Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Garth Ennis. I'd give anything Neil Gaiman writes a chance though he's a little too over the top with the gay romance+goth+fairies+awful-teenage-poetry crap for my taste. Warren Ellis, Brian Vaughan, Brian Azzarello, and Ed Brubaker are writers that I like a lot as well but haven't read enough from to call favorites.
 
I used to get Tintin books from the library when I was younger, so I suppose that was my first taste of graphic novels.

The best graphic novel that I have read is Blankets by Craig Thompson. I can't describe it, just get it and thank me later.
 
Montez said:
100 Bullets
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It took me a while to get into this, but I'm glad I did. I only have the first trade paperback, though.

I'd give anything Neil Gaiman writes a chance though he's a little too over the top with the gay romance+goth+fairies+awful-teenage-poetry crap for my taste.
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Agreed. I dig Sandman, but he definitely goes overboard sometimes.
 
I've been trying to get my hands on Moebius' The Incal lately, but had no luck. I remember reading it when I was a kid and being blown away by it.
 
I was never really into comic books but i have read a few. Last one was the Sin City books which i read in anticipation of the movie.

I read a lot more comic books when i was a little boy growing up in Serbia. unfortunately i forgot most of them completely although i know that all of them were European comic books.

There's two italian ones that i remember well though. Alan Ford and Dylan Dog. Both enjoyed huge success in Italy and in former Yugoslavia but not much anywhere else. Dylan Dog, my favorite, was about a London private investigator who specializes in the paranormal. The stories were very similar to the X-files because of the theme, although Dylan Dog had a much darker atmosphere.

I was digging through the internets and found a site that displays the covers of every Dylan Dog. The only one that i remembered was this one:

dylandogdelirium3ok.jpg


This one definitely creeped me out when i was a kid, especially when you find out that that bald one-eyed freak was actually a woman.
 
The first graphic novel I ever read is an extremely old version of Tarzan. I can't remember the illustratror's name at the moment, and the book is in Mexico.

Besides most of what's been mentioned, I'm a pretty big Enki Bilal fan. His cyberpunk/ancient egyptian world is awesome, just as the quality of the drawings.
I'm also a huge fan of old comics, the ones Rosh describes as the ones from the 'Golden Age'. Flash Gordon and so on. Unfortunatedly, no way to get those in Warsaw, so I stick to downloading megabytes and megabytes of itnernet-scavenged old comics and old comic covers. Mostly because some of them, especially the fifties' ones are priceless jewels by their unsurpassed absurdity level:

20050515mysticcomics2ndseriesn.jpg


Other than that, I love Vaughn Bode's work. A bit junkie and hippy, but nothing beats the Cheech Wizard.

Another genius of modern-day comics is Robert Crumb. Crumb comics are dark, sad and razor-sharp.

I once found a huge online archive of pre-1970 GIJOE comics. Damn, that was a hell of a find. I have the URL on another computer, unfortunatedly.

The scavenge for good old-school comics goes on.
 
My avatar is from Berlin: City of Stones, my current favorite. All time favorites are mostly Alan Moore works, From Hell and Watchmen namely, though I liked Sandman a lot when I was reading it. Pyongyang is also fun, as is most of Chris Wares' stuff.

Berlin: City of Stones is genius though.
 
Also see http://www.nma-fallout.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12445.

Funny that someone should mention Dylan Dog. A number of episodes were published in Sweden many years ago and I found them both funny and clever, somewhat to my surprise.

Apart from what's already been mentioned: many things by Grant Morrison, Thorgal, Bone, and Stray Bullets. Three greatest comics creators: Hergé, Barks and Moore.
 
I hate superhero comics. It wasn't always like that, though. When I was a teenager, I used to read X-Men and Spiderman, but then I discovered Robert Crumb and I started exploring the world of alternative comics and graphic novels, which are simply superior to all that Übermenschen stuff.

My favourite comic book artists include Chester Brown (I Never Liked You), Chris Ware (Jimmy Corrigan), Jeffrey Brown (Clumsy), Seth (It's a Good Life, if You Don't Weaken) and Joe Matt (Fair Weather). My all-time favourite is Charles Schulz, though. Peanuts is a work of true genius and one of the three things that I know of, that make life a little more bearable.

The third thing is sex.
 
Dylan Dog is awesome.
Every story is done by a different artist, diferent style.
Horror at its best, but some epizodes will have you laughing and some actualy cry. Whoever you might be.

Alan Ford is as good but wildly satiric and insane. Generations have been brought to adulthood here on these two and few other comics. Infact they are too good for you to read :)

It comes out again here :lol:

All the first true numbers done by original artists.

Read Sin City comics. Good.
Dark Knight returns and many others by a same author.

I loved Conan when i was younger, if you can find those old editions, they are supreme.
 
One comic that I haven't seen mentioned here yet is We3.

A 3-issue story by Grant Morrison about household pets that have been turned into cybernetic killing machines...and what happens when they escape from their creators.

It's great reading about how a tabby cat takes out 20+ armed soldiers and downs a chopper with little effort.
 
alec said:
I hate superhero comics. It wasn't always like that, though. When I was a teenager, I used to read X-Men and Spiderman,
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"Wah, novels suck! I used to read a few books though, like Bill and Ben Go to Texas and Arabella and Her Jolly Pony. Now I realize they were crap! Waah!"
 
Unkillable Cat said:
One comic that I haven't seen mentioned here yet is We3.

A 3-issue story by Grant Morrison about household pets that have been turned into cybernetic killing machines...and what happens when they escape from their creators.

It's great reading about how a tabby cat takes out 20+ armed soldiers and downs a chopper with little effort.
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I've thumbed through that but never read it. I believe it's being turned into a movie at the moment.
 
Malkavian said:
Unkillable Cat said:
One comic that I haven't seen mentioned here yet is We3.

A 3-issue story by Grant Morrison about household pets that have been turned into cybernetic killing machines...and what happens when they escape from their creators.

It's great reading about how a tabby cat takes out 20+ armed soldiers and downs a chopper with little effort.
Click to expand...

I've thumbed through that but never read it. I believe it's being turned into a movie at the moment.
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Furious animatronics of death!
 
Back when I was a kid I read mostly DC.I read the whole Doomsday,Funeral For a Friend,and Reign Of Superman sagas and then I quit for a long time.I started back up about a year ago-much to the dismay of my wife-and I picked up on New Avengers,Walking Dead,Spawn,and recently Spiderman.The new Sentry character is pretty awesome.Anyone who dismisses him as a Superman knockoff simply doesn't know much about the character.He has split-personalities,the power of a hundred exploding suns,and is a part of the New Avengers.Pretty cool character I think.Anyway..Brian Bendis is doing a great job with New Avengers and the Spiderman comics are starting to pick up again.A pretty good year for comics.
 
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