Comic books/graphic novels

[African_Love]

Do you read them? Besides Archie, I'm getting into the Angel : After the Fall series (I've only read the first 5 issues) and I want to get into the Buffy comics as well.

[Silas Thorne]

Started reading the Sandman epic, and wowed out tremendous after The Dolls House, so still reading now.

Read a lot of Judge Dredd and Slaine when I was a young lad, that stuff was pretty good too. :)

[toni]

Started reading the Sandman epic, and wowed out tremendous after The Dolls House, so still reading now.


I think Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean's Sandman is the best of all the graphic novels.

[OrphanPip]

I think Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean's Sandman is the best of all the graphic novels.

I don't read a lot of graphic novels, but the best I've read have been Spiegelman's Maus and Craig Thomson's Blankets.

[The Comedian]

I read quite a few comics and graphic novels. I've done so for many years now, though I never read them as a young child.

Recently, I've been reading anything and everything by the Canadian creator Jeff Lemire: The Essex County Trilogy & The Nobody are graphic novels. And his series "Sweet Tooth" from Vertigo is outstanding as well.

Regarding Superheroes: I also try to keep up with world of the Green Lantern. And as much of the stuff that Geoff Johns does. Oh yeah, Mike Mignola's Hellboy is great too. ;)

I also greatly enjoy Indie comics/graphic novels as well: Blankets & American Born Chinese are two of the very best recent works in this area. And anything by Chris Ware is worth your time. His Jimmy Corrigan: Smartest Kid on Earth has complexities of character and plot that rival if not surpass some of the classic prose fiction that I've read.

[toni]

I don't read a lot of graphic novels, but the best I've read have been Spiegelman's Maus

I was browsing through Art Spiegelman's Maus recently. Really interesting
http://www.stuartngbooks.com/spiegelman_maus_II_cvr.jpg


Apart from Sandman, I also find Arkham Asylum by Grant Morisson and Dave Mckean mind-blowing. I wonder if anyone is familiar with The Arrival by Shaun Tan? The book has no text, just really powerful visual storytelling.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v47/acid42/arrival-01.jpg

[rimbaud]

right now I'm reading Superman & Batman and loving it! (huge batman fan)
I've started from the first and working my way up :)

[African_Love]

right now I'm reading Superman & Batman and loving it! (huge batman fan)
I've started from the first and working my way up :)

I'd like to get into Superman, Spiderman, Black Panther etc. I just don't know where to begin. I recommend Angel : After the Fall to anyone who loved the show.

[dfloyd]

But I don't know how anybody over 14 could be interested in these. I read Classics Illustrated until I was about 14. The did provide a basis for reading classic novels as I got older. Many of these books were an introduction to the novels. For example, these were my first introduction to A Connecticut Yankee, The Cloister and the Hearth, The Gold Bug, Ivanhoe, and more.

[The Comedian]

But I don't know how anybody over 14 could be interested in these.

Aside from these abridged and illustrated readers for adolescences that you mention, have you ever read a graphic novel? Or are you judging all all graphic novels and comics based on these adaptations? If you are making such judgments, then you might want to review some of the titles mentioned here.

Comics and graphic novels are simply a medium of story telling. You can make that medium tell any sort of story that you like.

I know that in my early teens, I loved reading Dragon Lance fantasy novels. I read them almost exclusively. If you said "books" to me back then, these are what instantly came to mind. Thank Heaven that I allowed the concept of "book" grow and expand.

Of course, if you want to think of comics as tripe, well then, that's just fine. I have often thought that comics' "trashy" reputation gives them an edge and an appeal that almost no other literary medium can lay claim.

[OrphanPip]

I wish I could find the image online, but there was this one page from Maus where Spiegelman depicts himself as the artist seated at his desk and the bodies of the emaciated mice are strewn around his feet. That image sticks with me as a profound expression of Spiegelman's conflicting feelings over him profiting from representations of the holocaust.

If you're willing to consider Japanese comics as well, Tezuka's retelling of the life of Gautama Buddha was a really enjoyable read for me. It was one of Tezuka's last projects and he is generally considered to have been the godfather of Japanese comics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha_%28manga%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osamu_Tezuka

[African_Love]

Aside from these abridged and illustrated readers for adolescences that you mention, have you ever read a graphic novel? Or are you judging all all graphic novels and comics based on these adaptations? If you are making such judgments, then you might want to review some of the titles mentioned here.

Comics and graphic novels are simply a medium of story telling. You can make that medium tell any sort of story that you like.
I know that in my early teens, I loved reading Dragon Lance fantasy novels. I read them almost exclusively. If you said "books" to me back then, these are what instantly came to mind. Thank Heaven that I allowed the concept of "book" grow and expand.

Of course, if you want to think of comics as tripe, well then, that's just fine. I have often thought that comics' "trashy" reputation gives them an edge and an appeal that almost no other literary medium can lay claim.

I agree, a story is a story no matter how it is told. I hate elitism. Reading is not "intellectual" for me, it's entertaining.

[mtpspur]

African Love in regard to Black Panther I strongly recommend his series featured in Jungle Action 6-24 etc. by Don MacGregor from the 70s--why Marvel doesn't reprint this run is a sin --it was ahead of its time I assure oyu.--then the Chris Priest series from the late 80s early 90s---he really made the character a contender.

[keilj]

I'm a comic book geek. Some of my favorites are Winter Men, Scalped (which is currently ongoing), 100 Bullets, Preacher, Uncle Sam by Alex Ross....

[eric.bell]

I have cherished both the Sandman series and The Last Man series. Maus is great and so is Kingdom Come.

[sweetdisorder]

I'm ashamed to say I havent being reading much graphic novels lately. The last I did read was "Absolute Watchmen" and "The Runnaways" series! I've started " The umbrella academy" but I have yet to finish.

[keilj]

I recommend Omega the Unknown by Lethem to anyone who hasn't read it