What is the best Graphic Novel ever written?

[gigantes]

ah, good points.

maybe it's a little like the condescending attitudes that have prevailed in the literary industry against SF... it's taken decades to break them down and there's still a lot of work to be done.

[Nesacat]

We probably have Hollywood to thank for a lot of it. Sometimes it can be useful. The movies started being made and the cash registers in the minds of the people running the big stores here started ringing. It's only really been in the last year or so that stores have started having comic book sections.

And Hollywood has helped the Science Fiction & Fantasy sections as well. You can almost see the bulbs lighting up over people's heads. They've got a ways to go towards understanding how to order the books but at least it's moving in the right direction. Eventually everyone will figure out that when books are trilogies it means you need 1, 2 and 3. It's NOT okay to have 1 and 3 or just 2. Same problem with comics.

Have been looking at Maus online and would definitely like to read it. Will see what I can find this weekend, otherwise there's always Amazon.

[Timewalker]

I couldn't resist adding my own favorite: The Crow, by James O'Barr.

[Connavar]

When its comics. I would say Batman The Dark Knight Returns its the comic that made me a comic fan. The combo of the great art and the interesting story is hard to beat. Anothers that comes very close are Hellboy and Sin City.



The best manga is tied beteween Hajime No Ippo and Lone Wolf and Cub.

[daisybee]

The whole Preacher series is great, but Alamo is the best.

[HardScienceFan]

Originally Posted by Duchessprozac

Both of those you mentioned at first are two of the best. Others are Maus, V For Vendetta and one of my personal favourites Sandman:A Game of You

I'd go for Maus,also

[GOLLUM]

Originally Posted by HardScienceFan

I'd go for Maus,also

What's Maus about??

[Connavar]

Isnt it about Rats or something

[Bant Warick]

It's about the nazi treatment of the Jews and the holocaust in concetration camps during world war two. With mice representing the Jews and cats representing the nazis.
No rats though

[Connavar]

Heh i was so close

[swish]

-Nausicaä!
(Of the Valley of the Wind: That is the name of the manga
You other ecologists out there would also love?)

[iansales]

I'd vote for Watchmen. It's a seminal work. I'm also a big fan of Alexandro Jodorowsky's work, so The Incal would come a close second. Actually, I much prefer European sf graphic novels to US super hero ones - stuff like Gimenez's The Fourth Power, or Magnus's Milady 3000, or The Nikopol Trilogy by Enki Bilal.

Other favourites include The Sacred and the Profane by Ken Steacey, Ministry of Space by Warren Ellis, Empire by Howard Chaykin and Samuel R Delany. Oh, and Dan Dare. Some of the stories were a bit dodgy, but it looked fantastic when Frank Hampson was drawing it.

Also worthy of mention are Richard Morgan's two Black Widow mini-series - Homecoming and The Things They Say About Her. Both are excellent, although apparently they were not fan favourites...

[Connavar]

Richard Morgan as the SF writer? or another guy?

[iansales]

Yes, that Richard Morgan.

[APhilmon]

Well the DC Universe has a hero in Batman.

The Long Halloween written by Jeph Loeb and illustrated by Tim Sale is definitely one of my favorites. It has some interesting art and a good storyline. Definitely look to pick that one up. Also, Dark Victory, written by the same author is another good one. I am waiting for my copy of Haunted Knight to arrive, another by the same author and artist.

Along the same lines, I am awaiting my 9 volumes of Fables and Snowfall. Should be here within the next two weeks or so!