Despite not reading a lot of novels and books in 2015, I
read over 150 graphic novels from the mainstream companies of Marvel and DC to
the more independent Image, Dark Horse and Boom! Studios. What may surprise many of you is that I didn’t
read a single superhero comic in all of 2015.
I don’t really like superhero comics and haven’t really read one in
almost twenty years (no lie) and even though most of what I was reading in the
‘00s was manga I read very little of that this year as well. Most of tastes in reading material was more
serious or avant garde or surreal.
First I’ll break down just what I was reading in 2015 by
company and then get into the real interest of what you probably want to know
which is just what I was reading.
Dark
Horse was the clear winner this year with a whopping 47 graphic novels read,
almost twice as many as any other company.
A lot of this you can thank Mike Mignola for as I read all of his work
from Hellboy, B.P.R.D., Abe Sapien , Lobster Johnson, Baltimore, and Sir Edward
Grey: Witchfinder, which all had several new graphic novels published last
year.
Another huge contributor is the
Aliens franchise which had the 4-part “Fire & Stone” saga with Aliens/Predator/Alien
V. Predator/Prometheus all with parts.
Going to some order titles that I missed I read the entire 3-volume saga
of “Mail” as well as several volumes of Astro Boy (Volumes 12-14) and two
massive Omnibus collections of Ghost (Vol. 4-5), which is the closest to a
superhero comic that I’ll get.
Another
huge oldie-but-goodie is Sergio Aragones’ Groo of which I read seven volumes; I
was really interested in reading something I hadn’t read since I was a kid and
none of these volumes I had ever read before including the most recent release
of “Groo Vs. Conan.”
I caught up with
Bryan Talbot’s Sherlock Holmes homage Grandville (with 3 volumes I hadn’t read
before) as well as a surprise to me, three volumes of the video game adaptation
Halo (which took over the property from Marvel). I’ve never played the game nor
seen the animated film so this was a complete gamble on my part that I actually
really enjoyed.
Dark Horse also finished
up one of my all-time favorite series “The Massive” (2-volumes read), which I
highly recommend to everyone.
There are
some other stand alone titles that I read but as you can see, I really enjoy
the vast variety that this company has to offer.
IDW is up next with twenty-six graphic novels that I
read. The big winner here is Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles since I read twelve volumes from this series. I’m a huge fan of the turtles and IDW has
done an amazing job with reprinting the old comics as well as the new ones; 80%
of these included reprints of the classics while the rest was made up of the
new series and spin-offs. The other
major contributor was Godzilla with the “Cataclysm” and “Rulers of the Earth”
series (4-volumes in all). I tried out a
couple new titles with Sam Kieth & Chris Ryall’s “The Hollows” and the
first volume of “Edward Scissorhands”
but most of what I also read had me catching up with various volumes of
“The Crow” and “Deadworld.” IDW also
happens to have brought back new iterations of “Winterworld” and “The X-Files”
Season 10.”
Image has the luck of having most of the ongoing series that
I read (with 18 volumes overall). Here
is where I read the latest from “Black Science” (2-volumes), “Hack/Slash” (“Son
of Samhain” story), “Intersect” (1-volume), “Low” (2-volumes), “The Manhattan
Projects” (2-volumes), “Outcasts” (2-volumes), “Pretty Deadly” (1-volume),
“Revival” (1-volume), “Trees” (1-volume), “Chew” (1-volume, “Wytches”
(1-volume), and everyone’s favorite “The Walking Dead” (2-volumes). The only Image volume I picked up not
associated with an ongoing series was the third volume of Joseph Michal
Linsner’s “Dawn” (the story “Three Tiers”), which I original had in single
issue form but now have it on my shelf with the others (plus it gave me a
chance to reread the story all at once).
Boom! Studios doesn’t have many series that I continuously
read but they do produce a lot of great one-offs (10 volumes read).
Of the series that I do read “John
Carpenter’s Big Trouble in Little China” (1-volume), “Clive Barker’s Hellraiser:
The Death Watch” (1-volume), “Clive Barker’s Nightbreed” (1-volume), “The
Woods” (1-volume), and “Planet of the Apes: Cataclysm” (3-volumes).
The special one-offs I read (that are note
worthy) are “Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials – Official Graphic Novel Prelude”,
“The Calling: Cthulhu Chronicles”, and “Tag: Deluxe Edition.”
As you can see, the only books I read from
this company are properties licensed from films.
I’m not even sure if they publish that many
original properties.
Down further on the list we come to Viz Media (8 volumes
read). They had a big year (for me any
ways) with the release of the five-volume “Resident Evil: The Marhawa
Desire”. I love the Resident Evil
franchise and even though I thought this was only a mediocre series it kept me
entertained throughout the year. The
other monumental releases for the company (in my opinion) were Inio Asano’s
“Solanin” and the Battle Royale prequel “Battle Royale: Angels’ Border.” I also read the first volume in Kazuo Umezu’s
“Cat Eyed Boy.”
Now we get down to Marvel, which I only read eight volumes
for the whole year three of which belong to “George A. Romero’s Empire of the
Dead.”
I read more zombies with “Marvel
Zombies Christmas Carol” and had a great time Down Under with “Dexter Down
Under” based on the novels and television series.
I also read the last volume of “Halo: The
Fall of Reach – Invasion” (before that series moved to Dark Horse) and the
first volume in the “Kick-Ass” saga (so I will at least have to finish that
series in 2016) but the one volume I truly loved was reading Mark Millar &
Terry Dodson’s “Trouble,” which I recommend to everyone.
With DC/Vertigo I decided to catch up with everything I had
missed (6 volumes read) starting off with the original “Sandman” (1-volume) and
“American Vampire” (2-volumes). “American
Vampire” was suggested to me and I overlooked at first because I really don’t
care for vampire stories (hence why I wasn’t a big fan of Romero’s “Empire of
the Dead”), but I must say that this is an excellent series that I will
continue to read all the way through. I
also read both the “Prelude to the Blockbuster Film” and the “Inspired Artists”
graphic novels for Mad Max: Fury Road but the true stand-out was the adaptation
of Stieg Larsson’s “The Girl Who Played With Fire: A Graphic Novel.” This was truly an amazing read and overall
book and I can’t wait to read the final book in the trilogy.
There are twenty-six more graphic novels that I read from a
variety of companies but I’ll just highlight the major ones worth reading.
At the top of the list “March: Book Two” (Top
Shelf Publishing), which is one of my favorite graphic novels of the year.
This series should be at the top of
everyone’s reading list.
Another great read
is “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children: The Graphic Novel” (Yen Press),
Osamu Tezuka’s “Barbara” (Platnum Manga), “Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal:
Creation Myths Vol. III” (Archaia), “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath” (Self
Made Hero), Grant Calof’s “H20: Graphic Novel” (Liquid Comics), Max Brooks
& Caanan White’s “The Harlem Hellfighters” (Broadway Books), “Killing
Geronimo: The Hunt for Osama Bin Laden” (Gallery Books), Inio Asano’s
“Nuigahara Holograph” (Fantagraphics Books), “Trick ‘R Treat: Days of the Dead”
(Legendary), Jeff Lemire’s “The Underwater Welder” (Top Shelf Publishing) and
Anne Rice’s “The Wolf Gift: The Graphic Novel” (Yen Press).
As you can see, I was very busy reading a lot of graphic
novels in 2015 and I didn’t even mention all the ones I didn’t really care
for. The reason why the list is so
massive this year compared to previous years is the fact that I’m able to read
so many more on my Nook. I would say
that a good 60-70% of these books are on my Nook which I find makes it faster
for me to read and more often (I’ve managed to read all of Mike Mignola’s
series on my Nook). As for my favorites,
I will just list them below. These are
all titles I highly recommend to everyone:
*”Fire & Stone” Saga – Alien/Predator/AVP/Prometheus
*”Barbara” by Osamu Tezuka
*”The Dark Crystal: Creation Myths”
*”The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath”
*”The Harlem Hellfighters”
*”March” (Book One and Two)
*”The Massive”
*”Chew”
*”The Hollows” by Sam Kieth & Chris Ryall
*”Killing Geronimo: The Hunt for Osama Bin Laden”
*”Low”
*”Nuigahara Holograph” and “Solanin” by Inio Asano
*”Trees”
*”Wytches”
*”The Underwater Welder” by Jeff Lemire
*”Trouble” by Mark Millar & Terry Dodson
