Comic Book Thread

[Surf314]

Here is a place where we can post recommendations of good series to others.  Try to keep the super hero stuff to a minimum unless it's something original, we all pretty much know who's who by now.

[Budr]

In before Watchmen

[fyre]

....we all pretty much know who's who by now.

I don't. I'm a failure at comics. I've read V for Vendetta, Watchmen, and The Dark Knight Returns. That's it. :-[

[Surf314]

Lucifer by Mike Carey
This is a spin off series from the sandman focusing on the devil.  It stands extremely well on its own.  It is also incredible.  It focuses a lot on religion and mythology as well as the role of storytelling in our lives in beliefs.  One of my favorite moments is when this character who was made the god of hedgehogs (it makes sense in the story) is complaining about how they take advantage of her and take unnecessary risks.  Pretty much sums up my thoughts on religion.  Anyways expect great storytelling, good continuations of popular mythologies, a good dose of humor and lots of gore.

Also you will not be disappointed by Lucifer's character.  He is exactly who he should be.  I won't ruin it for you, but trust me I was impressed because I'm sure the author was tempted to try to do all sorts of stuff with the character but he didn't.  He stays true to what a Lucifer character should be to the end.

The Sandman
Of course this one needs a mention.  It starts of slow and chugs a bit.  By the end it will make you rethink a lot of things, especially what you thought of comic books.  Basically it is about one of the endless, beings who represent basic human attributes and exist beyond gods and creators.  It has a lot of just wonderful stories in it.  Some of them that stick out are a story about an underground cat movement, a completely made up middle eastern fable and one featuring Shakespeare.  The overall arc is also a great story.

DMZ
This is series takes the problems in the middle east and adapts them into american problems.  Basically it's about a second civil war, but it's really just a way of understanding the global conflict by putting it in american terms.  It shows you just how fucked up things are but also does a good job of making you feel hopeful for the human spirit.  The last trade absolutely floored me.  It is one of the few stories to have a truly emotional impact on me.  I don't want to give too much away but it was about a really bad military mistake and then it presents each side and the people involved.  The moral is that in some situations there really isn't a right and a wrong, there's just people.

Ex Machina
This is a clever take on the super hero genre.  It's about the only super hero in the world, who after being only somewhat successful making the world better in costume decides to run for office where he thinks he can do more good.  It is an interesting political story as well as being a more realistic take on the difficulties of trying to use your special talents to help humanity.  One of the big things driving the main character is his anger at himself for only being able to save one of the twin towers, so that should give you a big clue on what to expect.

Fables
Probably one of the greatest current running series.  This follows the premise that what if every fable ever told had it's own world, and what if those worlds had a huge war.  The story is of a group of Fables that have sought sanctuary in our world from the conflict plaguing theirs.  It really is an interesting story with lots of great characters.  My favorite's are B.B. Wolf, Snow White, Prince Charming (who is a complete womanizer) and Jack (who is the Jack of all Fables and a con artist).

V for Vendetta
This book is far better than the movie.  Chances are you know the story by now.  The movie dumbed the story down greatly and changed a lot of the characters in ways they probably thought were small but if you understand the book are huge.  Reading this made me hate the movie for that reason.  It is one of the extremely few books I have read twice and will probably read more.  It is far deeper than you think and even if you saw the movie will have plenty of surprises for you.

The Watchmen
I think this is the only graphic novel to make it on Time's list of 100 best novels of the last century (personally I think V is better).  This is a must read however.  It is very creatively written with almost a mixed media technique combining "Top Secret" reports, articles to fictional magazines, news articles and traditional story telling.  There is also a story within the story.  The basic plot is taking a hyper-realistic take on super heroes.  These are strange people that for one reason or another want to fight bad guys.  Each character is unique and gives you an interesting look at what a super heroes' psychology would be like.  Also the ending twist is crazy.

A lot has been stolen from this so don't be surprised if some of the story looks familiar.

[Surf314]

[quote author=Surf314 link=topic=805.msg20597#msg20597 date=1215786138]
....we all pretty much know who's who by now.

I don't. I'm a failure at comics. I've read V for Vendetta, Watchmen, and The Dark Knight Returns. That's it. :-[
[/quote]

You are doing better than most, those are all some of the best ones.

[Surf314]

Some I forgot

Gotham Central
Take your favorite detective show and insert it into the world of Batman.  What makes this story so great is that it pits ordinary people against monsters while racing against the ego crushing work of Batman.  There is some great storytelling here.  One of the early arcs about a female detective and two face is one of the best stories I've read.  It's basically what would happen if two face kept flipping heads, then what would happen if he kept flipping scratched heads?  Also there is a pretty obvious twist about halfway through that makes it very topical.

any Frank Miller Batman story
Batman is one of the most iconic superheroes I think because we can identify with him.  It's a character so destroyed by rage and loss that he becomes something to be feared to fight it.  He struggles not only with the criminals but also himself to keep from going too far.  Take that and add Frank Miller and you have a good story.

[CaffeinePowered]

anything by Frank Miller Batman story

fix that for you

[Surf314]

[quote author=Surf314 link=topic=805.msg20614#msg20614 date=1215788625]

anything by Frank Miller Batman story

fix that for you
[/quote]

I've only read his Batman stories.  I hear a lot of people complain about how he writes female characters though.  In fact now that he's writing the rebooted Spirit comics my friend is terrified he's going to turn the lead female character into a prostitute.

[CaffeinePowered]

[quote author=CaffeinePowered link=topic=805.msg20619#msg20619 date=1215789575]
[quote author=Surf314 link=topic=805.msg20614#msg20614 date=1215788625]

anything by Frank Miller Batman story

fix that for you
[/quote]

I've only read his Batman stories.  I hear a lot of people complain about how he writes female characters though.  In fact now that he's writing the rebooted Spirit comics my friend is terrified he's going to turn the lead female character into a prostitute.
[/quote]

There were chicks in Sin City that weren't prostitutes, vastly outnumbered by the prostitutes, but they were there  :

[Budr]

There were chicks in Sin City that weren't prostitutes, vastly outnumbered by the prostitutes, but they were there  :

lol the pole-dancers and scantily-clad waitresses?

[Dave]

[quote author=CaffeinePowered link=topic=805.msg20628#msg20628 date=1215790317]
There were chicks in Sin City that weren't prostitutes, vastly outnumbered by the prostitutes, but they were there  :

lol the pole-dancers and scantily-clad waitresses?
[/quote]



stop complaining.

[Budr]

stop complaining.

Shut up you homo

[Geoff]

[quote author=Dave link=topic=805.msg20642#msg20642 date=1215792960]
stop complaining.

Shut up you homo
[/quote]

[shipero]

American Splendor is a fun read.

[Surf314]

Bumped from those that liked the Batman movie and are excited about The Watchmen and want to read some of this in the meantime.

[K2]

Y: The Last Man
Great series that just finished last January. Basically every male mammal on the planet suddenly dies except for one guy (Yorick) and his pet monkey (Ampersand). What follows is a surprisingly deep study on how people try to cope with huge disasters, how governments try to maintain control, not to mention all of the changes the main characters face over the course of their globetrottin' journey. Highly recommended.

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
If you've seen the movie, make sure to completely wipe that piece of shit from your memory before picking this up. It's written by Alan Moore, the same guy who wrote V for Vendetta and the The Watchmen (in fact, just go read everything he's ever written), and it follows a bunch of characters from 19th century adventure novels banded together to fight the enemies of Great Britain. Compared to Moore's other stuff, LEG is not particularly deep, and it's not supposed to be; it's a great adventure tale that's filled with references to Victorian-era literature.

Also, for those of you looking for Batman stuff, I suggest The Killing Joke (once again by Alan Moore), The Long Halloween (Jeph Loeb), The Man Who Laughs (Ed Brubaker), and Arkham Asylum (Grant Morrison), all of which inspired parts of The Dark Knight.

[Surf314]

Y: The Last Man
Great series that just finished last January. Basically every male mammal on the planet suddenly dies except for one guy (Yorick) and his pet monkey (Ampersand). What follows is a surprisingly deep study on how people try to cope with huge disasters, how governments try to maintain control, not to mention all of the changes the main characters face over the course of their globetrottin' journey. Highly recommended.

Fixed

[K2]

[quote author=K2 link=topic=805.msg24061#msg24061 date=1216841466]
Y: The Last Man
Great series that just finished last January. Basically every male mammal on the planet suddenly dies except for one guy (Yorick) and his pet monkey (Ampersand). What follows is a surprisingly deep study on how people try to cope with huge disasters, how governments try to maintain control, not to mention all of the changes the main characters face over the course of their globetrottin' journey. Highly recommended.

Fixed
[/quote]

Ah, yeah, that makes a little more sense now.

[rumsfald]

Groo

[HeK]

Deadpool?