It’s time for another Top 10 list! And another break from ranking the important things, like ways to cook an egg or kinds of facial hair. I’ve been planning this one for a while now, and my good friend Owen MacDonald insisted I post it sooner than later, so here goes. For the bigger runs I won’t be including issue numbers, Marvel and DC characters have six or so comic book runs with several #1’s, but it won’t be hard to find which comics I speak of. To be clear these are my favorites, not the best to start with, I might do that at some point but a lot of my favorite stories are mired in continuity. I’m also going to play fast and loose with what constitutes “a comic book” though I’ve always argued there’s a massive difference between graphic novels and comics, so this can include single issues, runs spanning hundreds of issues, and six or twelve issue arcs. Or graphic novels. I didn’t end up including single issues, but know there are many I love. Let’s do it!

Honorable Mentions: This list was harder to come up with than the movie one and there aren’t nearly as many honorable mentions but I did want to call out some current/recent favorites that deserve their due. Including Ant-Man: Antiversary By Al Ewing & Tom Reilly, Avengers: Twilight By Chip Zdarsky & Daniel Acuna, Batman/Superman: World’s Finest By Mark Waid & Dan Mora, Eight Billion Genies By Charles Soule & Ryan Browne, Fantastic Four By Ryan North & Others, Friday By Ed Brubaker & Marcos Martin, Green Lantern By Jeremy Adams & Others, Human Target By Tom King & Greg Smallwood, Love Everlasting By Tom King & Elsa Charretier, Public Domain By Chip Zdarsky, Shazam! By Mark Waid & Dan Mora, Ultimate Spider-Man By Jonathan Hickman & Marco Checchetto, Wesley Dodds: The Sandman By Robert Venditti & Riley Rossmo.
UPDATE: I lied, this was hard, here are some other honorable mentions from my shelf –
Batman: Dark Victory By Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale, 52 By Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka, Mark Waid & Keith Giffen, Invincible By Robert Kirkman, Cory Walker & Ryan Ottley, JLA Year One By Mark Waid, Brian Augustyn, & Barry Kitson, Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen By Matt Fraction & Steve Lieber.

10. Black Panther: Complete Collection Book One By Christopher Priest & Mark Texeira.
This is the only run on this list I still haven’t actually finished reading, which is why I only included the first of the four collections. Christopher Priest’s writing is dense and witty and this run gets weirder and weirder as it goes, while also jumping around through the chronology of its own storyline. I believe this was his first major writing job, so I think it is also when he debuted his unique writing style. All of his comic books are separated somewhat into chapters by what I like to call Frasier title cards: Black background, white font, witty title.
This particular run of Black Panther is unique and memorable for many reasons. For one, Christopher Priest didn’t want to be known as the “Black” writer and initially turned down this run because he knew it was because of his race. Which is why, and this was his non-negotiable idea, the comic book is narrated from the perspective of a white man. A weird, affable, goofy white man. The very first page of Black Panther #1 is a full page spread of a white guy named Everett K Ross crouching on top of a toilet in a tenement building wearing no pants and pointing a gun at a rat. The last thing he says is “I still had no pants.” By the end of this arc he would sell his soul to the devil for a pair of pants. It should also be noted that Ross, the Dora Milaje, and the White Wolf were all created for this run of the character, for his mature revamp as part of the Marvel Knights imprint. The movie Black Panther, which I love, would not exist in the form it does without Christopher Priest. Martin Freeman wouldn’t be in Marvel movies without this comic.
This is a comic book about the sovereign leader of the African kingdom of Wakanda. Who is, despite the introduction, featured quite heavily. It turns out if you want to have a man in a cat suit look badass and unknowable, you write the whole comic from the perspective of a befuddled dude who isn’t, and it makes the character even more interesting and enigmatic. It’s a terrific comic. It’s a political thriller in a wacky superhero world. There’s twists and turns. The devil is in it, who Black Panther punches. It’s badass and fucking awesome. I’m gonna go finish it.

9. Gotham Central By Ed Brubaker & Greg Rucka.
This is another one I need to reread. Gotham Central focuses on the Gotham Police Department, through the day shift and the night shift, and follows a litany of different cases involving police corruption, various supervillains, occasional run-ins with Batman, and one of my favorite DC characters, Detective Renee Montoya. I had to grill myself for a while to determine if this or 52 should go on the list, they both have great Renee stories. Side note: If this were a Top 10 Favorite Comic Characters list, it would be Superman, Captain America, Renee Montoya, She-Hulk, Tintin, Multiple Man, Plastic Man, Wallace Wells, Daredevil, and Wally West. Anyway.
What I love about shared universes in comics, DC and Marvel in particular, is that a writer can use multiple comics if they leave one and start another to give usually side(Ish) characters great arcs. Greg Rucka loves writing Renee Montoya, and in an era where these two comics titans ruled the Batman world, Greg gave her some incredible stories. I don’t have much more to say. I love a mystery and a gritty detective story and I love Batman stories that focus on the extended characters in Gotham, who are usually a bit more narratively interesting to read about than Childhood Trauma Man. See Batman: Caped Crusader, the new Batman show proving my point, which heavily features Renee and, surprise surprise, includes episodes written by Brubaker and Rucka. Oh and to be clear Black Panther and this had a few different artists throughout the run but they all work. Everyone understood the assignment. This one has a lot of beautiful Michael Lark art.

8. Chew By John Layman & Rob Guillory.
There are some stories that are so weird and fucked up and fascinating that they only work in comics. This one… Oh boy. So, a large amount of people just suddenly died one day because they were eating chicken and now chicken is a banned, illegal substance. We meet our hero, Tony Chu, undercover at a black market chicken restaurant. We quickly learn that he, and others on this planet, has food-based psychic abilities. He is known as a cybopath. When he eats say a leaf of lettuce, he knows where the lettuce was grown, the pesticides sprayed on it, the people who bagged it up and sold it, etcetera. If he eats a steak, he feels the cow’s pain. The only food that doesn’t affect him is radishes, so he eats radish soup mostly. His partner convinces him to eat the chicken soup, at which point he realizes the cook has been killing and cooking people and serving them as chicken, and it escalates from there.
He soon is recruited by the most powerful federal agency in the world, the FDA, to solve crimes, often through some light cannibalism. Throughout the 60 issues he falls in love, a conspiracy unravels, and I don’t know what to tell you, I love it. It’s a very gross comic book, it takes an acquired taste to enjoy this kind of book, you have to love very dark humor like I do. Once you get past that it’s a really fun and weird detective comic, and I would love to see an animated series, but Warner Brothers were going to make it and now won’t because they ruin all good things.

7. Superman: Secret Identity By Kurt Busiek & Stuart Immonen.
This is a weird one to explain. Essentially it takes place in our world, or a version of it, and a man born in a small town, I think in Kansas, is named Clark Kent and given Superman merch his entire life. One day, when he’s a teenager and a shooting star or asteroid flies by (I think) he finds that suddenly all the teasing and jokes are now much more real and he has the powers of Superman. What follows is a story about a man trying to do good and find his place in the world while having the powers of a fictional character. But also he wants to do this without being captured by the government and dissected, preferably.
I love Superman, and there are many Superman stories I could have included instead of this, but this one always stuck with me. It’s got a cozy vibe, it’s a well-written story, and the art is beautiful. It’s also not about Superman. It’s about a man learning to use awesome power that cannot exist in real life with the way our fucked-up world works, while still managing to be a good man. Years later, Kurt Busiek also did a Batman comic with the same premise, presumably in this world, and that one’s about an insane kid with dissociative identity disorder who imagines a giant black bat beats the shit out of his enemies. That one’s less hopeful.

6. Captain America: Two Americas By Ed Brubaker & Jackson Guice.
Ed Brubaker wrote on Captain America for many years and it’s one of the first runs I read all the way through. I could have included the whole run or highlighted The Winter Soldier or Reborn, but I didn’t. The whole run is fantastic. It’s an espionage story that takes place before and after Civil War, and was for many years, a Captain America comic without Steve Rogers. It should be noted that it was Ed Brubaker’s idea to finally bring Bucky back and make him a Russian spy. It should also be noted Marvel has given him fuck-all, and when the premiere for the incredible adaptation of his work, Captain America: The Winter Soldier occurred, they would not let him in and he had to text Sebastian Stan and ask him to come out and get him. Boooo. Anyway.
I picked this one because it’s the one I read the most as a kid. At this point in time, Bucky Barnes has become the main Captain America, and he wears his beautiful shiny suit that I always loved. I like Anthony Mackie, I’m looking forward to Brave New World, but I wanted Bucky Cap for the suit alone. Oh, I should mention. Marvel introduced an idea a while back to explain a plot hole. In the 50’s before Marvel fully became Marvel, Captain America had been running around still. In the 60’s the iceberg was introduced and suddenly he’d been frozen for decades. The explanation was that the government hired actors to play the new Captain America and Bucky when Steve and Buck died. This comic is about a man that looks like Steve Rogers who’s gone crazy and evil.
From memory that’s not the 50’s guy, he’s just a nutcase who got plastic surgery, but I thought my other fact was cool.
Anyway, Stevil has this big plan to blow up the dam or throw rednecks at the world or something, it’s been a while. I don’t know why it stuck with me, it’s just my favorite comic of the whole run. I like the concept.

5. Hawkeye By Matt Fraction & David Aja.
This comic was so good it very loosely inspired a mediocre TV show. Imagine Hawkeye, right? No, not the boring, bland, brings nothing to the character, seems like he’s asleep Jeremy Renner, (Sorry about the snowplow and the deletion of the Jeremy Renner app, buddy, glad you’re alive) I mean the fun pop art comic book version that buys an apartment building and saves Lucky the one-eyed dog. And it takes place during the post Avengers supergroup tower era, which I like.
I’m a massive fan of Matt Fraction’s writing. He’s got a very sardonic style of writing characters while also nailing the characterization of each individual character. I easily could have swapped this for Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen, which is one of the funniest comic books I’ve ever read. But this run also has beautiful art from comic genius David Aja. If you watched the show and thought “I wish Kate Bishop wasn’t just a fangirl and Clint was funny and hapless and slightly unlikeable but also that there would be an entire story told from Lucky’s point of view”, this is very much for you.
This era of Marvel comics had some great gems. #3 is another one of those. Also there’s one issue where everyone is a dog in a cartoon show and it’s illustrated by the legendary Chris Eliopoulos, who wrote and drew Franklin Richards, Boy Genius, the Calvin & Hobbes-esque comic for kids that delighted me as a child. That would’ve made the cut if I didn’t love Black Panther.

4. Amazing Spider-Man By J. Michael Straczynski & John Romita Jr.
This run of Spider-Man is somewhat controversial for a few reasons. It introduced Morlun, the energy vampire that would later become the catalyst for the Spider-Verse event. It introduced the idea that Peter was a totem, and this led a fairly grounded character to have more mystical battles. Straczynski is currently doing the same in his Captain America run, which I’d argue is a much less successful transition, as Rick Remender proved when he did his Iron Nail run (Hey, Dad! Remember that comic we both hated? Love you!) and that weird bubble guy.
Anyway, I never minded it here, especially because there’s more to this run than that. The other controversial thing is three particularly hated storylines that all happened after Romita Jr. left the title. Sins Past, The Other, and One More Day. I will point out that all three stories have massive elements Straczynski didn’t want to write, but editorial forced him and he’s become a scapegoat for some terrible ideas that still affect modern comics.
But this run is just good fun. Straczynski knows how to write Peter and his quips and he brings a lot of good things to the title: A tailor for heroes and villains, a tenuous friendship/ongoing teamup between Peter and Strange, the infamous 9/11 issue, Aunt May finally finding out her Nephew is Spider-Man, and my personal favorite job for the perennially down on his luck Peter Parker, (Marvel editorial refuses to let him grow up. At the end of this run his marriage with MJ and Aunt May’s memories are erased by the devil and he was forced back into a spiral of childishness Marvel won’t fix. There have been bright spots (Dan Slott and Nick Spencer’s runs) and attempts to undo the bullshit, but they won’t let him and Mary Jane be together.) teaching science at his old high school. This run also has some of the funniest Spider-Man bits.
The other reason this run is on here is John Romita Jr. His art style has gotten blockier and rougher as the years go on and I don’t always love how it looks, but this run is JRJR at the peak of his abilities. It’s very clean and pretty. His father was one of the most iconic Spider-Man artists, and he does him proud. I have a deep emotional connection to each of these comics. I could tell you where and when I read these issues for the first time.

3. Daredevil By Mark Waid & Chris Samnee.
I’ve made it known that Daredevil is one of my favorite comic book characters. He’s a blind lawyer who can fight bad guys with radar sense! That’s kick ass! The thing is though that many writers tend to lean into the dark tortured Catholic guilt side of the character, which has led to a lot of darker grittier crime comics starring DD himself. Ed Brubaker did one! It was great! I would marry Ed Brubaker and Mark Waid if I could. Their writing is incredible! Anyway.
When Mark Waid took over, Shadowland had just happened, which was a big dark Daredevil comic where he took over the Hand, the demon ninja death cult he’d fought for so many years, put on a black costume, and got possessed by a demon. It was a bad comic written by a man named Andy Diggle (Also known for writing Green Arrow: Year One, and the character in Arrow named Diggle who was named after him. Good for him. I’m not a fan of his writing.) who is probably a nice guy, I don’t know. So Mark Waid, the genius that he is, knew a change had to be made. First of all he worked with artists with a brighter, quirkier style, like Paolo Rivera, Marcos Martin, Javier Rodriguez, and Chris Samnee. He had Matt Murdock go down on a dangerous path of refusing to not be happy. When you have a character that dark refuse the darkness they’ve lived with and try to be a brighter, quippier character, it could be out of character. This was an incredible character study.
The brilliant bastard realized he could have his sad Catholic guilt cake and eat it too. The entire run, which consists of a relaunch, two number ones, and a move to San Francisco, delves deep into the mechanics of his radar sense better than any other writer ever has (Waid has always had a great sense of a character’s powers.) and delicately balances the vibe and tone of the bombastic swashbuckling ridiculous comic booky adventures Stan Lee had written when he created the character, with the darker sensibilities of Frank Miller, Kevin Smith, Brian Michael Bendis and Ed Brubaker. He managed to tell really fun, weird, and often intense body horror stories without betraying anything that came before. It’s a masterclass in writing. It won many Eisner Awards. And, as I’ve said before, it’s one of the big comic runs that made me the huge fan I am today.

2. Scott Pilgrim By Bryan Lee O’Malley (All Six Volumes).
That poster hangs next to my bed. The premise is simple but brilliant. In Toronto, Canada, an unemployed slacker who sleeps in his gay friend’s bed, plays bass, is dating a 17 year old girl because he’s still getting over a terrible breakup. One day he meets a woman named Ramona who uses the empty superhighway that runs through his head to deliver packages quicker, and he immediately falls in love. He quickly learns that to be with her, he’ll have to defeat her seven evil exes in a series of ridiculous video game style battles.
Her seven exes are a Theater nerd with demon chicks, a pompous skater and actor, a bassist with Vegan superpowers who’s dating Scott’s ex, a ninja girl who went to college with Ramona, two jaded Japanese twins/roboticists, and a jaded asshole named Gideon. On this journey, Scott finds self-respect, reconciles with his ex, apologizes to Knives, gets a job, learns how to be less of a dick, defeats his darker tendencies, dies temporarily, and gets the girl. It’s a lot like Jesus, if you think about it. This comic has gone from a cult hit to a massive property over the years. In that time accusations have been leveled that Ramona is too aloof and unlikeable in early volumes, and the movie didn’t fix that, particularly because the sixth volume hadn’t come out yet and they stumble a bit at the ending. I never thought it was too egregious, and it’s since been fixed.
But it’s a great comic for a reason. It’s weird and funny, it captures the internal hell of being in your 20’s, and it introduced the world to the sassy icon that is Wallace Wells. And each iteration of this story (We’ve gotten four in twenty years, which is insane. Comics, Edgar Wright movie, video game, and Netflix anime series.) is excellent for various reasons. There’s also a great ongoing joke in the original black and white versions that they changed and made even funnier when they released the color editions. I think my dumb ass might have sold my original copies, currently I own the three color versions (Two volumes per book) with weird binding but I have now decided one of my goals in life is to become rich and buy the six individual color deluxe editions. Or I’ll become even richer and spend $250 on the 20th Anniversary box set. Only time will tell how rich I get.

1. The Flash By Mark Waid, Brian Augustyn, Geoff Johns, Jeremy Adams.
This is the biggest of stretches I’ll ever make, but it’s for a good cause, my own. These are three separate runs of Flash comics by three different writers, spanning the 90’s, early 00’s, and then a big jump into 2021. These runs all focus on my favorite Flash, Wally West, in various stages of his life. Mark Waid (With assistance from Brian Augustyn) picked up the title after Wally had been the Flash for a year or two following Barry Allen sacrificing himself. He made Wally step fully out of Barry’s shadow and become a hero in his own right.
Mark Waid is one of my favorite comic book writers, as you’ve surely realized, and this is the run where he got his start. He had worked as an editor for other comics, which is part of why I’m pursuing a career as a copyeditor. During his tenure, Wally fought Eobard Thawne, discovered the Speed Force, became increasingly powerful, married his longtime girlfriend Linda Park, gained a sidekick in Impulse, his deceased uncle’s grand-child from the far future (See John Rants About The Flash (Comic Books) for a deeper explanation of this) and essentially defined the character going forward. Both Johns and Adams would not have written their runs had it not been for Waid and his trailblazing.
Johns took over soon after Waid fully left the title, having written 85 issues plus an Impulse ongoing and several Secret File issues. At the end of it, Johns wrote 61 issues. Adams had his run tragically cut short by misguided editorial edicts at a meager 36 issues. Each of these runs is wonderful because it focuses on one aspect of the Flash. Waid focused on Wally himself and his legacy. Adams focused on his family. Johns focused on the Rogues, and worked on developing the character of Captain Cold in particular. He introduced one of my favorite Flash villains, Eobard Thawne. He also gave Wally two kids, Irey and Jai. Geoff Johns is a very weird writer who’s made a lot of good comics and a lot of… a lot of comics. But I think his run with Wally as the Flash is my favorite.
Again, as mentioned in the previous Flash post, Barry was brought back to life after 23 years and Wally was swept out of continuity for at least five. A few years ago, Jeremy Adams, a writer of animated movies and first-time comic book writer, was brought in and brought Wally back as the main Flash with him. During a delightful but tragically short run, Jeremy emphasized the family, developed his children, gave everyone their own story arc, and wrote many great one-off issues that emphasized the Silver Age vibe, (My favorite comic books do) culminating in my favorite arc, the One Minute War. He also had Wally and Linda have another son, named Wade, in honor of Mark Waid obviously.
I said before it’s a massive copout, it’s three different runs over the course of three decades, but it’s a great story arc for Wally. As I’m writing this, Wally is still the main Flash, which is good, but I don’t love the current run. It’s very comic book sciencey and detached in a way that is narratively interesting, but very much not what I want from my Flash comics, especially after a run that was all about the family. Stupid editorial. Anyway. Flash!!!

Bonus Legitimate #1: This single page from Superior Spider-Man #31 By Dan Slott, Christos Gage, and Giuseppe Camuncoli.
I include this because I would be remiss if I didn’t credit Dan Slott’s run on Spider-Man, which I followed from the beginning of Superior Spider-Man to the very end. I could include the issue he wrote where they published an email I sent in to the letters column, but I don’t love that issue in itself. Though I had just become a big Spider-Man fan, I was very angry when they killed off Peter Parker (Doctor Octopus was dying so he swapped brains with Spider-Man and Peter died in his body while Octavius went on to become a better, Superior Spider-Man, but more accurately, a more totalitarian, scarier Spider-Man. He made himself a cool new suit and got an island base and goons and mechs and got Peter a doctorate.) but I got on board with the run after a while. Issue 31 was the final part of this run, completing Otto’s hero’s journey.
In the face of Green Goblin’s takeover and destruction of New York City that happened right under his nose, due to his arrogance, Octavius realizes that he can not defeat the Goblin because he’s not truly a hero. So he gives control of Peter’s body back to the fragment of Peter’s psyche that has been fighting him all this time, and Peter swings off to save Otto’s girlfriend and stop the Green Goblin’s evil machinations. All of this culminates in one beautiful moment that sums up everything Spider-Man is as a character, and, to this day, is one of my favorite moments in all of comics.
The Green Goblin flies in, thinking he’s on top of the situation, that he knows what’s going on, that he can defeat Octavius because he’s not really a hero. He makes a big, grand speech, cackling all the way. And in one moment, with one joke about the satchel that he keeps his bombs in, Peter lets him know he’s back. And you can see the fear and disgust in Osborn’s eyes. It’s hilarious. Truly special. “It’s you.” “The one and only.” Hee hee hee hee hee. Ah, comics.

I’ve been trying to write shorter, more concise posts lately, and this was not that. I’m very sorry. But if you stuck with me to the end I hope you learned a lot about comic books and got some ideas of what to read. I love comic books. I constantly have ideas for comic books I want to write. And this… this was a fun one. Anyway, thank you.