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This is the annual year-end tradition I started just last year, where I take a look at all the comic book action from the previous 12 months and condense it into one quickly-written and semi-rushed final article to sum up the year’s editions of TPL.
This year was quite a busy one, comic wise. I picked up an incredible amount of books over the 52 weeks, 1203 to be exact, which clocked in at about 23 comics a month! I picked up over 100 books in 7 out of 12 months, with June clocking in at 114 comics! November was the lightest month at 83 comics, but then again, I dropped a whole bunch of books during the summer for both financial reasons and entertainment reasons. If I didn’t like a book, it was gone. Anyway, what I want to do hear is give shout outs to what I consider the best of the best of 2008, as well as some of the lows. Let’s not delay one second more and see how 2008 fared.
-Best Single Issue- This was an easy pick for me, going way back to the 07/01 edition of TPL. Mythos: Captain America was just an awesome comic. From my original review: “I was a little bit disappointed with the other Mythos titles, but this one was just amazing. It is a retelling of Cap’s origin, how he became Cap, and the story we all knew, but it takes on a much more personal level when Cap starts thinking back on the ones he fought with, the ones who were lost, and even dining with the veterans. It gets to the point where there is only one veteran left and this was honestly one of the most touching stories I have ever read as a comic-book reader. Paul Jenkins wrote his ass off on this and it was just an amazing piece of art.” Even now I recall those original emotions and this was an easy choice.
Runners-Up: Amazing Spider-Man #574 (the Flash Thompson War Issue) and Kingdom Come: Superman
-Best Writer- Although some writers may have had more BOTW’s this year, I have to give the award to Grant Morrison, who really had a hand in all of the big events of DC this year. We start off with the awesome conclusion of All-Star Superman, the really unique spin he put on Batman during the RIP storyline, and of course the highly anticipated Final Crisis. Just the sheer amount of books he had his hands in this year makes him my most favorite writer for the year 2008.
Runners-Up: Abnett/Lanning, Ed Brubaker
-Best Artist- John Romita Jr, the elder statesmen of Marvel in terms of tenure as an artist, and he really was the go to guy with anything in Marvel. When there was a big event, he was there, as he was in World War Hulk last year. This year he had a big run on Amazing Spider-Man and his work on Kick-Ass, JRJR proved once again why he’s considered one of the best comic artist of our time.
Runner-Up: Mark Bagley
-Best Cover Artist- Alex Ross wins quite easily here, picking up a huge amount of cover of the week wins, 17 to be exact. His work was really marvelous, and was the runaway winner for 2008.
Runner-Up: Mike Deodato
-Best Ongoing Title- This may be a little controversial but I don’t care. One of the biggest things happening last year was One More Day and the Brand New Day that followed. Many people knee-jerked and dropped Amazing Spider-Man in protest of One More Day and panned Brand New Day, usually without reading it and just citing the fact that Peter wasn’t married anymore. But a strange thing happened. Amazing Spider-Man became a brand new title and it was actually fun again. Spider-Man and Peter Parker became the great carefree character we knew from the Steve Ditko/Stan Lee days. We actually got introduced to new characters, including Menace and Freak, and the now thrice-monthly title actually shipped on time. Throw in some classic storylines, including a JR JR plot and a great Flash Thompson story. I am actually enjoying Spider-Man for the first time since the Silver Age days.
Runner-Up: Captain America, Northlanders
-Best Mini-Series- Though it didn’t finish in the calendar year, The Twelve, by JMS was a great revival of 12 virtually unknown characters from the Golden Age that actually made me care about these characters. I eagerly anticipate the conclusion of this series, and how it is making new stars out of these 1940’s cast-offs. In fact, The Twelve won 5 Book of the Week awards in 2008. This was just a powerhouse title.
Runner-Up: X-Men: Magneto Testament
-Best Event- There were a lot of events in 2008, including the two big ones, Secret Invasion and Final Crisis. While the former suffered from way too many tie-ins and the latter from delays, the winner I picked suffered from no delays, always shipped on time, and was just a breath of fresh air in the Marvel Universe and comics in general. Yes, it’s Spider-Man and Brand New Day. I don’t care what the haters say, Spider-Man was just really fun to read in the year 2008. Spider-Man shipped on time and had no delays (something that Final Crisis couldn’t do), and didn’t suffer from massive amounts of tie-ins (like Secret Invasion). While the event may have ended, it hooked me as a reader and you have to give it up for the guys who worked on this.
Runners-Up: Ultimatum, Kingdom Come
-Best Turnaround- New Warriors started off very poorly, and I hated the title. I was very close to dropping it, but only kept it since I wanted to have all the NW titles. Luckily, the title became good. Secret Invasion came and it restored the title to what it should be, and it became fun to read again. With the current story putting the New Warriors in an Iron future, this book has never shined brighter.
-Best New Character- Adam of Adam: Legend of the Blue Marvel was a character that debuted late in the year but immediately dragged me in. The fact that he was a “colored” character in the very turbulent 60’s made for a very interesting story and a character I hope stays for a while.
Runners-Up: Menace.
-Worst Single Issue- Countdown #01 was the culmination of a massive, epic failure on DC’s part. This was just a terrible series that ended badly and this issue capped off all the frustrations I had with this series. From my original review: “Countdown was coming hot off the heels of 52 and had huge shoes to fill. Unfortunately, it came nowhere near as close to the quality of 52, something that is even mentioned somewhat by Dan Didio in the weekly DC Nation columns. The story just grew too big for the title, with too many characters running around and since it wasn’t in real time like 52 was, it was missing an integral part of the storytelling that kept 52 in line. Anyway, this issue was a huge commercial for Final Crisis as we see what happened to all our heroes who were involved in the whole debacle. Piper (remember him?) returns from a long absence in the title and vows to fight for good. Olsen and Forager have a relationship and eventually meet up with Donna Troy, Hal Jordan, and a reluctant Atom and they become the Monitor’s monitor. Jason Todd is just there, the same as he was when this first started, Solomon makes a statue of Darkseid at the Source Wall, Mary Marvel meets with Black Adam and Mary acts out prompting Adam to leave. Mary has the line of the series (I’m Mary Damn Marvel!) which harkens back to the great Frank Miller All-Star Batman series, Kamandi’s grandfather becomes a vintage Kirby OMAC, and we end with Holly and Harley chatting on a roof. This was just a real letdown, as the story never lived up to the hype and really turned off a lot of fans on the whole weekly series. I really hope Trinity can redeem DC’s weekly series but based on this, I am not optimistic.” Luckily, my fears over Trinity never came to fruition, as it has been a solid the whole month.
-Most Disappointing Ongoing(s)- Mighty/New Avengers win the two-fer award this year, as both titles were incredibly bogged down with the Secret Invasion tie-ins. Neither title had any real flow to it, and was marred by just single issue stories that went nowhere and were utterly pointless unless you read Secret Invasion. Let’s hope 2009 will be better.
-Most Disappointing Mini-Series- Spider-Man: With Great Power was just terrible. It was Peter Parker at a time right after he got his powers and before his uncle was killed and was just totally out of character. Don’t even waste your time tracking this down.
-Most Disappointing Event- Countdown to Final Crisis was an easy choice. It just didn’t make sense. It had way too many tie-ins (something Secret Invasion suffers from) but when you tally it together and come up with something like 75 issues, and most of them being really hard to get through from an entertainment value, you have a series that really struggled, and it showed as it sputtered to the ending at the beginning of 2008. Trinity has redeemed the DC Weekly series, but they may have to retire that concept after Trinity, due to how hard these titles are to run.
I hope you enjoyed this look at 2008. God willing I will be here on the first Saturday in January for the best of 2009 edition. Let’s hope that 2009 can be even better for comics than 2008 was, and that the prices don’t start inflating due to the economy.
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Questions? Comments? Shoot me an email.
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