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It’s 2010 (that’s 20-10 folks!) and I can’t believe that this is the third ever best of edition I have done for TPL.
Last year I picked up 1203 books. This year I was down slightly to 1166, but that is a figure I am sure will be down for this next year since there were massive cuts to the pull list due to both financial reasons and just being too busy reasons. So 1166 books averaged out to about 22 and a half books a month. There were 6 months of 100 titles or more (down from 7 last year). The month with the most amount of comics was January with 138 titles. Boy that’s the way to start the year off! The most books I ever hauled home in one week was 37 and that happened twice: June 24th and August 26th. The month with the least amount of books I picked up was November with 79 and the slowest weeks (besides 12/30, where no books were released) were January 14th, February 11th, and March 11th, all with 15 titles. Well, enough stats, let’s just get to the best of 2009! (Note for regular readers of this column – you may notice there is no Worst of this year. I just want to focus on the positive!).
-Best Single Issues- Captain America – Theater of War or Brother in Arms by Paul Jenkins. Pick any of Jenkins’ issue of Cap: ToW and you will have your winner. This is a man who just knows how to channel the feeling of those in World War II and look back on it not through rose-colored glasses but with a certain fondness of how brave these men and women were who defended our freedom in what many call the Greatest Generation. Maybe it’s because my grandfather was one of those guys in the war that I get so sentimental reading these but I also credit Jenkins writing. I’ve read other WWII books and none are as good as Jenkins’.
Runners-Up: Amazing Spider-Man #600, Captain America #600, Daredevil #500, and X-Factor #200 – All four were great mash issues of all-time great talent on these milestone issues.
-Best Writer- Geoff Johns has really proven how good he can be with his writing on the Blackest Night. While writing the main mini-series and the Green Lantern title he has crafted a really amazing story of the undead rising to battle the heroes of the DC Universe. Everytime I pick up a title from Geoff I know that it is going to be good. He, more than anyone else this year, has shown he has what it takes to move these high-profile books and keep the sometimes jaded comic book online community in his grip and really avoid a lot of the negative energy out on the web.
Runners-Up: Peter David (for his awesome work on X-Factor) and Abnett & Lanning (for Nova, Guardians of the Galaxy and the War of Kings titles).
-Best Artist- This was a tough one for me to hand out. There are some great artists but how many of them are really able to get a book going by himself? This isn’t the 90’s where the artist makes the book. There is one guy who has done a tremendous job and that is JH Williams III. His work on Detective Comics is just an amazing visual treat. His panel layout and use of design elements almost remind me of the great Steranko. I don’t really like Detective Comics or Batwoman but his art kept bringing me back to the book. He’s at the top of his game right now.
Runner-Up: John Romita Jr (Kick-Ass, Spider-Man)
-Best Ongoing Title- This was one that had a little bit of competition. There are some fantastic titles on the stands right now but which one was the one that was the best of 2009? X-Factor to me was the single best book on the stands. Month after month it has been delivering just fantastic stories that have managed to stay linear (thanks to being contained in one book) and stay fresh in a time of seemingly rehashed stories. We started the year with Madrox absorbing the baby he and Terry produced. See it was just a dupe and he takes those back in. This leads to an interesting faction within the group that is still being paid off right now. We had a really groovy time travel story that brought Layla Miller back into things and this time travel story managed to merge both Madrox (in the future) and X-Factor in the present. When we finished that we had the awesome X-Factor #200 and the team starting a new leaf in New York City. Peter David has created possibly one of the best books on the stands right now and it’s one I always look forward to month in and month out.
Runners-Up: Batman, Amazing Spider-Man and Incredible Hercules.
-Best Mini-Series- Universal War One: The Flood was a mini-series I almost forgot about when looking over the books I’ve read this year. When you read over 1100 books that can happen. However poor my memory is as soon as I saw the title I knew this would be the winner. This was just an amazing mini-series that followed the great first mini-series and if you’ve been looking for a smart time-travel/space-faring epic then this is the book for you. It is just so well-written and so intelligent that I highly recommend this to anyone. There are enough twists and turns to keep you riveted and this is one that belongs in anyone’s comic book collections.
Runners-Up: DarkTower: Fall of Gilead, The Stand: American Nightmares
-Best Event- This came down to the cosmic events. I didn’t care for Dark Reign since it was just too large and the Batman stuff didn’t do much for me in the long run with the minor titles. In the end I had to choose between War of Kings and Blackest Night. I’m giving the edge here to War of Kings for two reasons. The first, it is completed and I think Blackest Night has many tales left to tell. Second, War of Kings was pretty much contained to only 3-4 titles while Blackest Night has a bunch of tie-ins of varying quality and way too many repeat themes. War of Kings had a great ending that spun out into Realm of Kings which has been very interesting so far. I’ve always been a fan of Abnett and Lanning and they definitely deserve their just credit here for their work on the cosmic Marvel realm.
-Most Promising Title heading into 2010- Fantastic Four was a title that never really reclaimed its identity after Waid and Weiringo left the title. It’s been crappy story after crappy story and delays has really hurt the title the last few months. Then, Hickman took over writing and Eaglesham took over the art and we finally have the FF back. It’s the family dynamic that’s always been the cornerstone of the book that Hickman is bringing out and with the first five issues so far he’s made the title on that is one to watch out for in 2010.
I finished off last year talking about keeping prices down for comics and it looks like DC is keeping with the $2.99 price tag while Marvel has bumped up a lot of books to $3.99 (all mini-series, including most tie-ins) and there don’t seem to be many $2.99 books anymore. That’s caused a big drop in books I pick up but that’s actually made me more energetic about TPL because now I am only buying books that I really want. It’s helped out my wallet, too. I was definitely getting a bit worn down by September doing the columns and I even got rid of the awards but since dropping books I’ve been better off since I’ve had less to read. Well, it’s another New Year and another edition of Best of TPL is done. See you back here next year!
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Questions? Comments? Shoot me an email.
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