Influential and/or Favorite Comics/Graphic Novels

["Outlaw" Patrick Kidd]

I recently have been given the chance to start working with a new publishing company starting in the new year. One of their big focuses is going to be comics and I'll most likely be one of the writers. I've been getting back into reading comics again i prefer graphic novels or trade paerbacks with complete arcs. I know a lot about writing especially from e-fed experience and other stuff, and I've been reading some books on the style of writing for comics and stuff like that. I just wanted to know what some of your favorites were, or some that you think are must reads if your going to be doing that line of work. I have multiple stories in mind, but not sure which they are going to let me run with first. If all goes well I'll post more about that in the new year.

I'm currently reading some books by Will Eisner, And have recently read Dark Knight Returns, Killing Joke, and Batman: Year One, I'm a big Batman fan so i've downlaoded a bunch of the major batman stories and I'm reading those. I've also read the entire Preacher series and have read The Watchmen, and the first volume of LXG. Some titles I haven't read yet, but really want to are the Sandman colelctions, and the other LXG volumes.

So let me know some of your favorites and why?

[Chris Casino]

you pretty much nailed all of the "must read" graphic novels. I will add that I like to read the Ultimates collections. I think that they're a great re-imaging of the marvel heroes

[Ryan Ro [NAPW]]

Spider-Man Ultimate is pretty darn good, although it loses focus later on... I really disliked the Carnage take even though I thought the Venom re-imagining was great.

One of my favorite series is Bone. What's not to like about it? Fantastic art, comedy, humour, high adventure, magic, and above all great characters to draw you into the story. Fantastic.

Batman: "The Long Halloween" and it's sequel "Dark Victory" are probably my two favorite Batman stories. Jeph Loeb is hit and miss in modern continuity, but his script in the "Year One" timeframe is awesome. Tim Sale's art owns.

You can't forget DC's "Kingdom Come" and Marvels, um, "Marvels" by Waid/Ross and Busiek/Ross respectively. Gorgeous painted art by Alex Ross and two distinct but equally captivating stories, one about the end of a comic universe (Kingdom) and one about the beginning (Marvels.)

"SHAZAM! SHAZAM! SHAZAM! SHAZAM!" Boom.

Identity Crisis was a very good story in recent years. I disliked a couple of the killings, feeling they were unecessary with how much bad crap had already gone on... but a really great story.

And for pure mark-out value, I dug Green Lantern: Rebirth. I'm a big fan of Kyle Rayner as GL, and I was damn glad they didn't just off him to bring Hal back as the main GL. Go Kyle Go!

[KRENSHOV]

I second Ryan's opinion on "Marvels". The art alone is worth the purchase, but the story makes it even better. It's pretty much based in the 1930's-40's in NYC, and it's all from the view of one reporter who ages over the time of the novel. The entire work is brilliantly done, showing how the world falls in love and fears those that are super human.

"New Avengers" is another I would throw into the hat, it's a pretty addicting read.

["Outlaw" Patrick Kidd]

long halloween and dark victory i ahv eon my puter jsut need to get around to reading them, Kingdom OCme and Marvels ar eon my to get lsit.

[Static]

craig thompson and alan moore fan here.

[Celtic Assassins]

Batman: The Killing Joke
Box Office Poison
Kingdom Come
Marvels
Sin City (pick any of them)
Spiderman: Blue
Long Halloween
Dr. Strange/Dr. Doom: Triumph and Torment
X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills

[Ryan Ro [NAPW]]

Man, how can you read these things on a compy, especially the long ones? Yipes.

Just uh, the ones you really like, try to buy for your bookshelf.

["Outlaw" Patrick Kidd]

i have started buying them, i'm just a huge batman fan and i found a palce that had all of the batman story arcs in one spot so i grabbed it. I still plan on buying most of them. I jsut bought Death in the Family

[Ryan Ro [NAPW]]

I also own some MadMan comics. MadMan is great. Mike Allred is great. which reminds me, check out his RED ROCKET 7 trade. Unbelievable stuff, wish my copy hadn't gotten trashed.

[Lex Vain]

I'm very odd cause I read Wizard almost monthly, but I don't own much comics.

[Bruce "The Beast" Richards]

A quick list of "essential" trades from my bookshelf (duplicates from previous entries included for emphasizing the classics):

• The Adventures Of Barry Ween, Boy Genius (Judd Winnick) - whole series, particularly Volumes 3 & 4
  
• Animal Man Volumes 1-3 (Grant Morrison)
  
• Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (Frank Miller)
  
• Crisis on Infinite Earths (Marv Wolfman & George Perez)
  
• Daredevil: The Man Without Fear (Frank Miller)
  
• DC: The New Frontier 1 & 2
  
• Hellboy: The Seed of Destruction (Mike Mignola & John Byrne)
  
• Lone Wolf & Cub (Kazuo Koike)
  
• Preacher (Garth Ennis) - whole series, particularly Volumes 2, 4, 8
  
• Swamp Thing (Alan Moore) - whole series
  
• The Authority Volume 1 (Warren Ellis & Bryan Hitch)
  
• The Sandman (Neil Gaiman) - whole series, particularly Volumes 2, 5, 6
  
• Transmetropolitan (Warren Ellis)
  
• Watchmen (Alan Moore)
  
• X-Force / X-Statix (Peter Milligan & Mike Allred) - whole series
  
• A Contract With God - Will Eisner
  

Looks like a lot, but that's not even 50% of my shelf.

[Ryan Ro [NAPW]]

Man oh man, I loves me some Milligan/Allred X-Force.

For some reason it lost me when it became X-static. Anyways. Still good.

[Stylin' Kyle Roberts [REBEL]]

Seconded on Barry Ween. Granted, I might have been the one to turn Dev onto that, since I'm a huge Judd Winick mark. "Pedro and Me" is also good.

Cerebus: The early stuff is super-awesome. Before Dave Sim went batshit insane. I highly recommend the Church and State arcs, because it's INSANE in its awesomeness.

["Outlaw" Patrick Kidd]

Preacher is awesome and has been picked up by HBO as a series so woot woot. I also have eisner's contrct with god on order.