With the year drawing to a close, I thought I'd reflect on my favorite books that came out this year.

Monthlies (series debuts)
Astro City: I'll start out by cheating (sort of). Astro City has been around for well over a decade, but 2013 was the year of its triumphant return after a too-long hiatus due to writer Kurt Busiek's health. This was definitely a solid return to form.

East of West: Jonathan Hickman is always good for trippy high concepts, and East of West is no exception. In this case, the concept is "post-apocalyptic western." Nick Dragotta is doing a great job on the art.

Lazarus: Ed Burbaker is a beast, and Michael Lark can draw circles around just about anyone. This book is awesome. In the future, the corporations have taken over and most of the rest of us are serfs. The focus is on Forever Carlyle, her family's Lazarus, i.e., an engineered superhuman who carries out missions on behalf of the family corporation. Great stuff.

Mysterious Strangers: Written by Chris Roberson and illustrated by Scott Kowalchuk. It's like the Mod Squad meets Ditko-era Dr. Strange. Fantastic stuff.

Sex: The concept behind this Joe Casy/Piotr Kowalski book is simple: Batman decides to retire. What's he going to fill his days with? What's going to happen to Gotham? Of course, since this isn't published by DC, the names have been changed, but if you've ever wondered what Bruce Wayne would do if he ever hung up the cowl, check this book out.

Sex Criminals: Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky have come up with an amazingly funny book. The concept behind this is simple: whenever Suzie has an orgasm, time freezes for everyone but her. She meets John, who has the same ability. They decide to use their powers to become robbers. Hijinks ensue.

Superior Foes of Spider-Man: Nick Spencer and Steve Lieber give us a hilarious take on Spider-Man's enemies. My favorite new book of the year from the Big Two.

Trillium: Jeff Lemire's art takes some getting used to, but there's no denying that he's a creative genius. This is a sci-fi romance involving two explorers: one from the early 20th century and another from the distant future. I can't wait to find out where Lemire is going with this.

Uber: Kieron Gillen and Canaan White give us this alternate history tale of World War II. It's 1945, and just as Hitler is about to blow his own brains out, he gets the news that the German program to create superhumans has succeeded. The war is turned on its head as we follow an arms race that makes the Manhattan Project look like kid stuff.

Umbral: I've only read the first issue of this Antony Johnston/Christopher Mitten fantasy series, but it's been amazing so far. If you like those doorstop fantasy novels of the 80s and 90s like "Wheel of Time" or "Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn," check this out.

Velvet: Another Brubaker series, this time with Steve Epting on the art. The basic concept is that Miss Moneypenny from the Bond movies was actually a bad-ass spy in her own right. Another one where I've only read the first issue, but so far it's been great.

The Wake: Scott Snyder and Sean Murphy are cranking out some scary stuff in this horror story about a sinister creature that lurks in the oceans off the coast of Alaska.

Honorable mention to Infinity. I only read the first issue and then decided to wait for the trade, but from everything I've heard this is the best Big Two event in years.

In terms of continuing stuff I enjoyed, it's got to be Archer & Armstrong, Daredevil, Deadpool, Hawkeye, Manhattan Projects, and Superior Spider-Man.

Collections and OGNs

There were lots of good collections this year -- Marvel and DC have been consistently putting out solid collections of their Marvel Now/New 52 stuff, and I'm not going to go through every Green Lantern or Thor collection that caught my eye this year. Instead, I'll hit some highlights of original stuff and older stuff.

The Fifth Beatle: Writer Vivek Tiwary and artist Andrew Robinson give us an amazing biography of Brian Epstein, the man who discovered the Beatles playing in a Liverpool club and guided their careers until his untimely death in 1967. This book is gorgeous, well-written, and absolutely engrossing.

March: The first volume in Congressman John Lewis's comics autobiography. A must-read look at the Jim Crow-era south.

Marvel Epic: I'm going to throw the whole line in a single entry. This year, Marvel started putting out huge trades collecting massive chunks of Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four and Avengers runs. There's some real gems in there (I'm partial to the first Iron Man volume released, which collects Denny O'Neil and Luke McDonnel's "Tony Stark sinks into alcoholism and hands the armor over to Rhodey" story) and some not-so-great runs (no comment). But the format is a real bargain if you're looking to read stuff from the first two or three decades of Marvel in color in a format that won't break the bank.

On the Ropes: 25 years ago, Jim Vance and Dan Burr released Kings in Disguise, an Eisner/Harvey-award winning look at the early years of the Great Depression. This is the long-awaited sequel, picking up five years after the first one left off and allowing us to catch up with Fred Bloch. We hear a lot about the "greatest generation," but the narratives tend to start on December 7, 1941. This is an amazing look at the crucible in which that generation was forged in the years prior to World War II.

Sleeper Omnibus: I'm throwing Brubaker a ton of love this year, but that's only because he's so damned good. This is the collection of the various Sleeper comics he and Sean Phillips did for Wildstorm. They focus on Holden Carver, a superhuman who is undercover in a criminal organization. It's Donnie Brasco for the superhero set, and this collection does it proud.

Solo: About 10 years ago, DC started a series called "Solo" in which they would give various artists 48 pages each to do whatever they wanted to do. 12 issues were published with work from Brendan McCarthy, Sergio Aragones, Darwyn Cooke, and Mike Allred, among others. This year, those 12 issues were collected. They are absolutely amazing and well worth revisiting.

OK, so that's what stands out for 2013 as far as I'm concerned. What did everyone else love this year?

good idea jason! here's my ranking if anyone cares...


2013's best new graphic novels



01 THOR God Of Thunder Jason Aaron and Esad Ribic



02 SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN Dan Slott



03 TALON James Tynion



04 SHAZAM Geoff Johns and Gary Frank



05 PUNK ROCK JESUS Sean Murphy



06 INVINCIBLE Death Of Everyone Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley



07 STAR WARS In The Shadow Of Yavin Brian Wood



08 ALL-NEW X-MEN Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen



09 THE WALKING DEAD Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard



10 BEFORE WATCHMEN Brian Azzarello, J. Michael Straczynski, Darwyn Cooke, Adam Hughes, Amanda Conner, Jae Lee, J.G. Jones and Lee Bermejo



11 NEW AVENGERS Everything Dies Jonathan Hickman and Steve Epting



12 SWEET TOOTH Wild Game Jeff Lemire



13 BATMAN & ROBIN Death Of The Family Peter Tomasi and Patrick Gleason



14 GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY Cosmic Avengers Brian Michael Bendis and Steve Mcniven



15 JUDGE DREDD Day Of Chaos John Wagner



16 JUSTICE LEAGUE Throne Of Atlantis Geoff Johns



17 NOVA Origin Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness



18 LAZARUS Family Greg Rucka and Michael Lark



19 SUPERMAN H'El On Earth Scott Lobdell



20 SAVAGE WOLVERINE Kill Island Frank Cho



21 INCREDIBLE HULK Vol 2 Jason Aaron



22 NEW52 Villains DC Comics



23 GREEN ARROW Harrow Ann Nocenti



24 STAR TREK New Universe Mike Johnson



25 THUNDERBOLTS No Quarter Daniel Way and Steve Dillon



Honorable Mention DANGER GIRL / G.I. JOE Andy Hartnel




Bonus shoutout --


Digital only:

THE PRIVATE EYE Brian K Vaughan and Marcos Martin

I continue to enjoy All Star Western, and while everyone crows about Batman (which I do enjoy), Peter Tomasi and Patrick Gleason have really done a great job on Batman & Robin (or whomever they include on any given month).

io9 says this was an absurdly great year for comics. I'm inclined to agree.

http://io9.com/the-very-very-best-co...013-1486689177

(Except I'm pretty sure that Helen Keller book -- which is incredible -- came out last year. I'm 99% sure I learned of it by seeing it on a "Best of 2012" list).

It seems like every year there is more and more standout creator owned work. And Image seems to be publishing much of it. I'd wager you could probably take any Image book from 2013 and someone could make a convincing argument on why it belongs on a "best of" list.

Agreed. Image really blossomed once it expanded beyond just doing Marvel/DC style superhero books and began publishing creator-owned works of different genres.

Its great to see East Of West & Lazarus on some lists.

No love for Revival or Harbinger?

I don't have a formal list, but if you haven't been reading Saga and Rachel Rising in the past year, correct that immediately. I will have to check out some of these other series.

Great thread--thanks.

Birthday present for Beatles-loving, comic-reading brother-in-law purchased! After the birthday has passed, I'll add it to my own wishlist.

I was just looking at a couple of these in a LCBS--I love these kinds of collections, though the Avengers one covered an era a little past when I was reading them regularly. I have many of those stories in a couple different formats, though, so it'd be nice to get something new (new to me, that is).

Nice--I just blindbought vol. 1 for five bucks on clearance without knowing they had been mentioned twice in this thread.

Honestly I haven't been loving a lot of the comics that have come out. Books like sex criminals or saga, I really don't get the hype.
But there were a few books i liked:
Favorite Series:

The Wake.
It's like someone combined Alien with Creature from the Black Lagoon.
Really loved it.



Afterlife with Archie.
Just a fun book. It actually has a story it isn't just sight gags and Archie references.

Favorite Single Issue:
Hellboy In Hell #5

Self contained story that reminded me of old school hellboy where it was just a mignola version of a fable.

Still need to read Mind MGMT, have it, just haven't gotten around to reading it.
Want to read Boxers and Saints, and need to re-read 47 Ronin by Stan Sakai.

For 2014 I am also excited about Stray Bullets and Twilight Zone.

Thanks for the suggestions. Now that I've dropped all but a few DC titles off my list, I have money now to try out new stuff, and some of these titles sound interesting. While I hate playing catch-up via TPBs (still love the first printings of the floppies), it's time to move on from that bit of OCD and just enjoy the content between the covers.

Yeah, thanks for the suggestions everyone.

Dammit, I guess I can't quite quit floppies so easily. A cursory look on ebay netted 4 sets of comics (floppies) coming my way. Now... to find a deal on Sex Criminals 1-3...

This was one of my facebook status updates:

Cross that off my bucket list: Bought and received "Sex" off of eBay...

Mwahahahahaha.

Picked up the first eight issues of Sex. It's okay, but I felt it was a little slow. I get the guy is retired, but there was very little action in eight issues.

Very little "action" in a book called "sex"...that just sounds like a cruel joke.

Oh great! I feel so not jerked around!

So, last year i didn't read much between my final year of grad school and my daughter aging from 1-2...but since school ended in December, I have been trying to figure out what i wanted to pick up. Thanks for the list!

I will add Boxers & Saints, which came out last year but I just read this week. It's by Gene Luen Yang, author of American Born Chinese. It's actually two books (one called Boxers and one called Saints) that tells a fictionalized version of the Boxer rebellion -- the former from the perspective of a member of the Boxers and the latter from the perspective of a Chinese convert to Christianity. Really good stuff -- simple cartooning (I would put Yang in the same tradition as Jeff Smith), but very well done and the characters and plot are really compelling.

Hey Jason, thanks for recommending The Wake. I blew through the current issues on my lunch break and I loved it.

Picked up Lazarus Vol 1. Man, that was fantastic.

Some of my faves from the last year that I haven't seen listed yet...



If you are a Planet Of The Apes fan, like me, Corrina Bechko and Gabriel Hardman have been a godsend to you. For the past few years they have been doing great mini-series stories set before the first Apes franchise begins. Their latest story has also been their longest, and best.







Paul Jenkins and Carlos Magno present a 12 part story in which a group of superheroes and villains are abducted and forced to fight in a "Deathmatch" arena, until there is only one survivor. Only no one knows how they got there, or what the ultimate purpose is. Finding out is half the fun. Magno is a talent that I'm surprised hasn't been snapped up by DC or Marvel, as he does great superhero art.







Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo continue to deliver the best book in the entire DC New 52 universe.







Grant Morrisson and Chris Burnham delivered one of the best Batman stories I've ever enjoyed. A shame it's done now.







James Robinson, Nicola Scott and alternating artist Yildiray Cinar have been crafting one of the only other New 52 books I'm still reading.





This book was absolute shite until Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino took it over, and actually made it into something worth reading. If you like the ARROW TV series, this book is just about as good now.

I'm concerned with that price tag on Batman #24. Double sized issue?

Yes, although it is normally a $3.99 book.