Lower Decks

The thing is, I got past all that, throughout the whole year. This will be my second annual QB 50 (the reason most of the titles will have a previous ranking number), the third time I’ve ranked my ten favorite comics of the year, and now more than ever it feels relevant, the achievements worth honoring, the creators worth lauding. It’s a tall order, calling my own awards, transporting them from one website to another, but one I feel is necessary. Sit back. This is going to be a long one. This is what 2008 was like for me.

(I was going to wait until Friday to post this, but being impatient and thinking of giving my readers this particular column as a Christmas gift, here we go.)

To start off this particular column, a little context is required. To make a list of 50 comics, you probably need to be reassured that I read a number of comics throughout the year. Two weeks ago, I put together a list of 25 that didn’t, for a variety of reasons, make the list. That makes 75 so far. Owing to the fact that I previously wrote a weekly column entirely devoted to my comics reading, this year I made a running tally of every new comic I read (those of you who frequent our Observation Lounge message board know that Lower Decks’ webmaster forst has a running tally of the television hours he logs during a given year, so if you really want to know something of dedication, you’ll have a look at that and then you won’t look at me quite so funny, I swear), so I have an exact number to give you now, and it’s 151, through the week of December 17th. I’ll admit now, before you even start reading the list, that a number of slots are double- and triple-stacked, so there’s some cheating and thus not necessarily strictly 50 titles, but hey, it’s my list so I can cheat as I see fit (as far as slot 19, everything is one-per-title, so you can expect my very favorite comics to have a certain distinction availed them).

As befitting DC’s second weekly series, which concluded in May, I considered counting down to the number one book, but then reconsidered it. I do a lot of these lists, actually (OL members recently sat through a countdown of my 300 favorite films, for example, over the course of four months). Following the QB 50 are specific awards for my favorite writer, artist, and single issue of the year, categories I’ve maintained since 2006 (I’ve since dropped favorite character, because it got to be that only Batman or Superman could win, simply because everyone wants to write them, and in recent years, write them well fairly consistently, over a number of books). A number of titles that concluded earlier in the year that ranked well in 2007 are represented perhaps better than some memories would allow (Academy Awards style) them this year as well (one exception: the delayed conclusion of Superman Confidential’s “Kryptonite” arc from Darwyn Cooke and Tim Sale, whose impact still lies mostly in last year’s issues). I’m a DC man through and through, but Marvel played a number of strong hands, and produced this year very easily some of the best stuff I’ve read from the company. But without further delay…

The QB 50

(As I said, this is not the first compilation of this list. In parentheses after the publisher of the given book is the rank it may have gotten on last year’s version. Readers of comics know that this is a medium of dedication.)

1. Batman (DC) (4) Grant Morrison. Over the past twenty years he has come to redefine what it is to write superhero comics. Alan Moore got all the credit, from Swamp Thing to Watchmen to League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, but it’s Morrison who revolutionized the concept of working in the mainstream. Almost stubbornly, he has consistently left his mark on every property he has handled, from Animal Man to JLA to Seven Soldiers of Victory. The only creator who even begins to rival him is the legendary Frank Miller, the only creator whose reputation rivals Moore’s. Morrison, however, has been consistently overlooked, even though virtually everyone has had nothing but glowing praise to bestow on him. Perhaps it’s because although he’s done consistently stellar work, he’s never done large-scale concepts in small-scope projects. The Invisibles is a commitment that overshadows a mere volume of Sin City or V for Vendetta to sit down and digest. Even when he does a finite project, it still consists of greater shear volume (Seven Soldiers) and complexity than even the fabled Watchmen, less concentrated a narrative. Yet for all that, Grant Morrison may have finally breached the subject this year. He took hold of writing Batman several years ago, and his storytelling has been consistently phenomenal. It is every bit on par with Miller’s Dark Knight sagas, Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale Long Halloweens and Dark Victories, but the thing Morrison has done is present it in the context of regular continuity. You can have a look at the trade collections “Batman & Son” and “The Black Glove” to get an idea, but his just-completed and heavily-hyped “R.I.P.” arc (with art from Tony Daniel, who has quickly joined the elite club of signature depicters of the character) is where you will best discover the extent to which his genius has eclipsed what virtually every other creative run with the character has managed to achieve. In many ways, every story for the past twenty-five years has dealt with the fall-out of the post-Crisis On Infinite Earths reboot, exemplified by Jason Todd’s murder in “A Death in the Family,” including the introduction of the third Robin, Tim Drake and the seminal “Knightfall” saga of last decade. Morrison doesn’t so much create a new mythology as reach beyond the post-Crisis rules, embrace a sense of the character as you’ll find him in Miller, in Loeb, in Christopher Nolan, but beyond even that. Morrison is a creator who seems to understand every possibility, and reach past even that, to see the man behind the icon but the icon as well. Even when you think he’s been given a gimmick that negates every decision he’s made, every conclusion he’s reached, Morrison has already included in his story every counterargument possible. If Mark Waid imagined the character Max Mercury as the Zen master of speed, then Grant Morrison is the Zen master of superhero comics. You will find a more kinetic version of his writing elsewhere on this list, but you won’t find any more of his passion. Here, he has indelibly added to the canon of Batman lore.

2. Action Comics (DC) (3) Geoff Johns is the DC writer who is the yang to Morrison’s yin, the only other person the company can turn to and entrust unquestionably the hands of its future. Where Morrison is unpredictable, Johns is predictably reliable in discovering the path ahead in what has come before. In the past, it has been easy to try and forge new directions by blasting away at what has come before, but Johns has demonstrated an uncanny knack at integrating new concepts with old ideas, some the company has used in the recent past, some which hasn’t been since the first Crisis and earlier. This is the guy, after all, who wrote the sequel (Infinite Crisis) just a few years ago. Like Morrison’s run on Batman, Johns took over Action Comics a few years ago, and while he has certainly seen a rare amount of success previously his work in 2008 took things to a new and higher level. It didn’t hurt that his “Last Son” arc was finally concluded in Action Comics Annual #11, or that he helped the whole Superman team revisit its significance late in the year with the sprawling “New Krypton,” but in two more storylines, he set a new standard in what it means to honor old mythology while pushing it forward. An adult version of Superman’s old friends, the Legion of Super-Heroes from the 31^st century, involves him in a plot to isolate Earth from alien “contamination,” only for the Man of Steel to return home and finally confront the one, true Brainiac, which not only allows him a reunion with the bottle city of Kandor, but the seeds of the “New Krypton” arc and a death that has been a famous element of Superman lore but has long been avoided in the modern era (even during the last decade’s most famous arc, Superman’s own death and eventual return, it was used only as a teaser and segue, as soon after the “Reign of the Supermen” began, in Adventures of Superman #500). Throughout much of the year, Johns has had the good fortune of collaborating with artist Gary Frank, who has in very simple, realistic fashion given the Man of Steel an epic feel that every bit matches the writing.

3. The Twelve (Marvel) Finally we reach a title readers of the column may not already be familiar with but by all rights should be. Inspired, perhaps it may best be acknowledged from the start, from the tradition begun with Watchmen, the fact that it has all but been ignored since launching at the start of the year may be understood, because it is understated in every way. The product of creator J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5, Rising Stars), it’s the second of two projects launched during the year to take existing Golden Age, forgotten heroes and put them in a single narrative (released last December and over the summer are reprint issues that attest to the vintage of the characters). On the surface, The Twelve (appropriately, a mini-series of twelve issues) is indeed a knock-off of Watchmen, involving a generational saga that includes the murder-mystery of a main character, or even a rehash of Captain America’s famed backstory (a WWII hero revived in the modern era). Beyond that, it’s anything but. The characters, the heroes have been thrust on a singular path, a familiar notion of attempting to adjust to a time that is not their own, but in such a way that embraces every nuance Straczynski can bring to the story. Even the point of the narrator, one of the Twelve known as the Phantom Reporter, can be said to have been lifted from Kurt Busiek’s Marvels, but it’s the unifying, last element that helps shape the whole of the saga into its own, distinct identity. The story moves at a leisurely pace, as the heroes discover new ways in which this blessing of new life is only an extension of a curse they brought upon themselves or was thrust on them. Where Moore’s Watchmen was concerned with the ways history warps an individual, The Twelve meditates on the ways an individual is warped by history, nothing as specific as a Cold War or Richard Nixon, but by the passage of time, whether it has passed someone by (the Blue Blade, a cross between Green Arrow and Errol Flynn and easily the most flamboyant character) or redefined the choices someone has made in one context which no longer exist in another. Each character discovers or has lived with their own pain, and while artist Chris Weston has etched each face in his distinctive unsympathetic style, Straczynski consistently guides the reader toward new definitions of sympathy, even for the seemingly least redeemable characters. I have never cared much for Straczynski, but here he seems to have finally discovered the ability to achieve what he has always tried to do, which is mold a world that seems familiar but which opens into a phantasmagoria of existential exploration in the heightened reality of superheroes who exist within a Marvel context, who are aware of and constrained by developments within that mold (the post-Civil War Registration Act, the fact of Captain America’s similar journey) but are never defined by it. If Watchmen was always known as the comic that couldn’t be made into a film but somehow is going to be, The Twelve is a comic that could be made into a film, but few people would want to. It is not an easy story, but it is an important one, and its significance and place in comics history is only going to increase.

4. Final Crisis (DC) Here’s Grant Morrison again, in a book that’s still issues away from completion, classically telling one of his all-but impenetrable tales. It’s a book that like The Twelve I can understand if readers aren’t as enamored of it as, say, Secret Invasion, because it’s not easy reading, it’s anything but straightforward, its twists aren’t there to obscure plot points that, once revealed, reveal nothing more than what the reader might have expected anyway, but are rather the product of a storyteller at the height of his powers. Final Crisis is the third of three Crises, and as its title suggests something of a closing act, but it can’t be said to have much to Infinite Crisis as, say, Crisis on Infinite Earths. In fact, it has far more to do with what Morrison himself has been doing in DC over the past decade, whether in JLA or Seven Soldiers of Victory. It handles Jack Kirby’s Fourth World as reverently as no other creator before, not even John Byrne and his Genesis event that is itself about a decade old at this point. The allure of Darkseid is certainly long and prevalent in epics past, but nowhere has he and his context been as significant as it has been here. While perhaps only Morrison, J.G. Jones (the artist of Mark Millar’s Wanted, but perhaps better known for his covers for every issue of 52), and their editors may know just what makes this story any different in its most basic sense than any other battle DC heroes have undertaken to save Earth or even what makes it, specifically, a Crisis, it’s difficult to deny the craftsmanship that has already gone, in five of seven issues, on display, flashy and sometimes easy to dismiss because of it, because with Morrison, meter isn’t just a poetic term. It’s a ballet and it’s not simple and it’s not just another battle. I will actually, to spoil another part of this special column, be writing more about it later on, so I’ll leave my thoughts to this, but suffice to say, as part of a tradition of easily-derided “event” books, Final Crisis stands apart.

5. Justice Society of America (DC) (22) And because I just wrote about Morrison, Johns has no choice but to follow, correct? In the second year of his relaunch, Geoff has only turned things up a notch, building as only he can on plans he set about from the start (back when he first came to DC, he worked on the then-titled JSA with James Robinson, and didn’t present this level of concentration except when handling the matters of a certain Black Adam, and I hadn’t felt compelled to read, but am now anxiously awaiting an opportunity to do so). As the list continues, I will only further remind you that Geoff Johns possesses an exceptional mind for planning and plotting significant events and continuations of famous works, but with this title, he undertook the impossible in crafting a response to Mark Waid and Alex Ross’ seminal Kingdom Come, first by introducing Gog, who for all intents might as well have swapped the last “g” for a “d,” and then Magog, who has swiftly become the most significant creation of the modern DC era. Not content with just the regular series (or his numerous other commitments), Johns expanded on the story first with Justice Society of America Annual #1, then with a series of one-shots, one that saw Alex Ross revisit his Superman, another with Peter Tomasi handling Magog, and finally another stab at a issue simply entitled The Kingdom (even Waid couldn’t sustain interest when he and a fleet of creators attempted it in launching Hypertime, a proposed alternative to the Multiverse where the interest in reached its zenith with the overlooked Superboy arc “Hyper-Tension”). While Johns has kept this particular series as his most leisurely, he has developed it into one of his best, simply by handling it as the cornerstone it should be.

6. Simon Dark (DC) (20) Here’s another series readers probably won’t be all that familiar with, but the writer, Steve Niles, they will be. Better known for 30 Days of Night, Niles has been working at DC on various projects for the past several years, but this is his first effort at adding something new to the table. Everyone knows how difficult it is to launch a new character with their own series. The company is littered with failed attempts (hey, even Morrison failed with Aztek, and that dude was being groomed as a member of the JLA), but few have been as unique or engrossing as Simon, a gothic hero placed in the suburbs of Gotham City. As much as I love Ragman, and as similar a setup as that sounds, Simon Dark is no Ragman. Under Niles’ direction and the art of Scott Hampton (imagine a more creepy version of the current Captain America style), Simon has been probing his origins while battling a conspiracy, who have eerie connections to his occult background. While he looks like a scarecrow version of TMNT’s Casey Jones, he’s anything but a knockoff. I don’t know how or when he’ll be integrated with the rest of DC or even Gotham proper, but Simon will be ready with something original to offer, a folk hero when everyone seems like they’re already famous, infamous, or simply obscure. It’s appropriate that he’s in Gotham, because he’s what an unself-conscious Dark Knight would be like. This is the same kind of assured writing James Robinson brought to Starman.

7. Captain America (Marvel) Since the relaunch in 2005, Ed Brubaker’s Captain America has been one of the most buzz-worthy comics around, so after Steve Rogers was assassinated last year, all the attention suddenly became a challenge, especially since the unlikely resurrection of Bucky Barnes in the first year had already presented a likely transition. I’ve held a testy relationship with the run, at times believing the hype, and others, suspecting Brubaker could never live up to it (I’ve tried following him on other titles, but have never been able to, with the closest being Daredevil as I indicated two weeks ago). With a purpose he can’t escape, Brubaker truly is unstoppable, and he started out strong this year with the inevitable, Bucky’s debut as the new Captain America. From there, he simply knocked down the dominoes he’d set up from the start, the long-awaited confrontation with the reconstituted Red Skull and his cabal, which perfectly showcased Bucky’s initiation and introduction to the world. I don’t know where exactly Brubaker goes from here, if he starts wobbling again or not, but it should be interesting.

8. Incredible Hercules (Marvel) Without a doubt, the biggest surprise of the year, Greg Pak following his “World War Hulk” and the announcement of Jeph Loeb’s Hulk by joining forces with Fred Van Lente and renaming his own series after one of the most unlikely breakthrough stars in comics, the formerly one-note Hercules, who transformed from the next-most-likely easy hero creation Marvel could find after Thor into an engaging and richly engrossing fountain of possibilities. From supporting player to star, Herc has managed to do what no Wonder Woman writer has ever done, which is make Greek myth into sport storytelling, with the equally unlikely-in-this-age support of a teenage know-it-all named Amadeus Cho and his dog Kirby (they actually made a contest out of naming the pooch). To top it off, the book was also one of two series Marvel managed to help redeem Secret Invasion for me by incorporating side-plots of actual interest, by cobbling together a God Squad of oddballs on a classic quest. For a full year of making it work, Incredible Hercules deserves all the praise in the world.

9. Tangent: Superman’s Reign (DC) Taking one of my favorite throwaway concepts from last decade and combining it with frequently overlooked talent Dan Jurgens, this is an event book in the tradition of Captain Atom: Armageddon that provides an alternative for fans looking to invest a few less bucks in something worth following month after month and still getting an epic in return. The Tangent universe itself is classic DC Multiverse fodder (and is, in fact, a bona fide 52 reality), begun as an effort to duplicate the Silver Age revision of classic names in new forms, best known for its Green Lantern and her Asian lamp, a world of heroes with origins that cover a Watchmen-style gamut of developments that mirror history where everyone’s human but some has complexes more akin to gods (that would be the Superman in the title). Though the gimmick of the book is that the namesake counterparts from our standard experiences have somehow become intertwined with Tangent events, Jurgens has proven all the potential that was originally there still exists. Whether this will be the official last word concerning the Tangent characters, it from now on exist as the final word that epics don’t need hype to exist.

10. Zorro (Dynamite) Though Zorro’s origin has been told many times, you don’t argue when a creator the caliber of Matt Wagner wants to tell it again. Interspersed with the origin is the equally intriguing tale of Zorro’s introduction to the Spanish oppressors of colonial California. It may lack the romance and bombast of the film Mask of Zorro, but this is easily the best of the name properties the smaller imprints are currently handling with abundance. Considering that the Fox is the father of the modern superhero, it’s also nice that he’s finally got a comic worth talking about. It only took ninety years!

11. Robin (DC) (44) Being a favorite character of mine growing up (in 1989 when Bat-mania was sweeping the world I was wondering where the Boy Wonder was in all the hype), I was happy when this book was finally launched in 1993, and it’s been something I’ve read the bulk of my comics experience. After the interlude of 1999-2004, I discovered the loss of writer Chuck Dixon from the series had also distracted my interest in reading it. I skipped Bill Willingham’s run, even Spoiler’s brief turn as Robin, and even her death, when I was getting reacquainted as a comics reader in 2005. It wasn’t until the “One Year Later” gimmick began in 2006 that I hopped back in, and have made the effort to retake the saddle, mostly regardless of how unstable it‘s been. This year was an eventful one for Robin from the start. Spoiler’s return also brought Dixon back for a time, and that was all well and good, but the reason the title is this far up begins with #176, my first experience with Fabien Nicieza on the title (I subsequently learned of and read his introduction an issue earlier). That issue is exemplary of the reason Tim Drake got his own title in the first place, his positioning as the Robin who got to earn his own wings without having to sneak off with the Teen Titans (though he’s done that, too) like his predecessor, Dick Grayson (who currently moonlights as Nightwing). Over the years, Tim has gotten closer and closer to mentor Bruce Wayne’s mindset, has even become an orphan himself, and Nicieza has done an excellent job relating that. Earlier issues in the run were better focused, but he’s managed to sustain the momentum by laying down a number of continuing plot points, including the return of Tim’s biggest rival, the General, a twisted version of Robin himself, a young ingénue who’s learned all the wrong lessons from history.

12. Countdown to Final Crisis (DC) (38) The second year-long weekly from the company, in many eyes and certainly including mine it had tall boots to fill following in the footsteps of 52 (named my favorite book on both previous lists, in fact), and the first half in 2007 didn’t seem to prove it was up for the task. You can cite any number of reasons why things eventually turned around (hey, even 52 only got better in its second half), but momentum certainly helped, a sense of where the characters were going, the appearance of Superboy-Prime, the Buddy Blank issues that gave Kamandi a modern origin (#s 6-5, two of the best issues of any comic this year), Keith Giffen consulting with Paul Dini and his stable of writers (who were, after all, never going to live up to the prestige of Morrison, Johns, Waid, & Rucka). Issue 3’s clash between Superman and Darkseid, or #2’s between Darkseid and Orion, performed exactly the showstopper that was always required of the book, enabling Grant Morrison the platform he would later need for his own project. In many ways, Countdown, if you look through the trade collections now available, is better than it might have seemed, right from the start. DC did a fair bit of confusing the point with the extravagant number of side projects it added to the table (side projects for a year-long side project?), obscuring the work that adds up to a cosmic odyssey if not similar than akin to the journey 52 presented, with characters even lower on the totem pole and with less chance at redemption (the old Flash foe-turned-friend Piper best illustrated that point, or even Mary Marvel’s descent, or Jason Todd’s conflicted role). Without the seeming pressure of keeping up with it week to week, Countdown is worth the second look.

13. The Trials of Shazam! (DC) (21) For a writer whose career started out to so much acclaim, Judd Winick has certainly had to put up with a lot of grief lately. I didn’t have room for it here, but his run on Green Arrow & Black Canary capped off a worthwhile effort at making the characters relevant again, as did his tenure with the Outsiders, which ended with the reboot that reunited the team with Batman last year (an irony, because it was during Winick’s run with the Dark Knight that Jason Todd made his return, culminating in the excellent Batman Annual #25, and for some reason, the new series had no room for Judd). This year, however, saw the worst of this trend in the release of Winick’s final issues on this book, a revamp of the Captain Marvel mythos that saw protégé Freddie Freeman inherit the mantle. Consistently a fascinating read, the series concluded with exceptional art from one of the year’s biggest finds, Mauro Cascioli (apparently now attached to a new Justice League series with James Robinson). What should have become a platform for redemption was simply overlooked.

14. Y: The Last Man (Vertigo) (25) A conclusion (only one issue this year but it was certainly worth noting) that wasn’t overlooked, this capped a year of my reading the acclaimed series, which launched right in the middle of my transition period back into comics. I just hadn’t been ready for it, but I was granted the chance when by sheer luck I sampled it just as the wind-up began, the revealing of just how Yorick Brown became the last man on Earth. Endlessly compelling and expertly written, it now has the chance to live on in the trade collections.

15. Green Lantern (DC) (19) Robin may have been an early favorite, Spider-Man being my first choice well before I ever read a comic, but when I finally broke in as a reader, there was only one superhero for me, Hal Jordan’s Green Lantern, who had the good fortune of sporting my favorite color. While I had only read a miniscule portion of his adventures (Kyle Rayner had fallen into the role by the time I was a hands-on fan), Hal’s story and background, the Corps mythology, had become a significant fixture of my comics experience when Geoff Johns set about revamping it in 2005, redeeming Jordan and setting on one of the most famous creative runs in recent years. At first, I was reluctant about it, but as I continued reading, I became more and more involved, invested. Last year, Johns upped the ante with the “Sinestro Corps War,” but he’s been building to something greater, “Blackest Night,” for longer. The majority of his issues this year dealt with his own version of how Hal became Green Lantern in the first place, and though it has become a secret origin almost as famous for me as Superman or Batman’s, Johns once again rose to the occasion, doing some of his best work with the character to date. Did I mention the guy was working on some other books as well during the year? I may have forgotten to mention them…

16. Black Adam: The Dark Age (DC) (10) The team of Peter Tomasi and Doug Mahnke in their final issue of last year’s blockbuster follow-up to the villain’s epic adventure in 52. The genius of the mini-series was that it didn’t take sides, but rather followed Adam on his desperate quest to collect the final pieces of his deceased wife Isis’ skeleton so Felix Faust could resurrect her. It wasn’t hard to find sympathy for the guy, either, a victim of circumstances with a firm belief in his own perspective, and whether it’s because Adam is never mired in any particular megalomaniacal need to conquer the world but rather a rage that lashes out against the injustice he sees all around him(in his own mind, he is a hero, after all, and despite the way the arc in 52 changed his methods, I don’t think he ever saw himself differently, just a little happier with his beloved Isis, who challenged him on equal intellectual footing), he’s become one of the most fascinating characters in comics. He had a small role to play in Countdown, and is due to make a return in the pages of Justice Society, where his journey began in its previous incarnation, but now is a great time to remember that he was given a solo shot, too, and it worked just as well.

17. All Star Superman (DC) (37) Because of the erratic publishing schedule and trying to keep step with All Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder, it was easy to begin taking this one for granted, especially because of its gentle approach, whose impact could be lost over time. Initially, of course, everyone fell in love with Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s grand scale Man of Steel, their epic examination of what Superman might do if he knew he was going to die. In short, he would become all the more a super man. The final issues were an affirmation, whether #10’s acknowledgement of the old maxim that in a world without him, Superman would need to be invented, to #12’s final confrontation with Lex Luthor, leaving the project another one for the ages.

18. Justice League of America (DC) (24) When Brad Meltzer relaunched the book in 2006, the team immediately found its next great era, after Grant Morrison’s fabled Big Seven version of a decade earlier, but after a year working on the series, he passed the torch to Dwayne McDuffie, who became a victim of circumstances, fumbling along an awkward arc of the League versus yet another coalition of the world’s mightiest foes. I stopped reading the book for the duration of 2007. Then, because I had more or less pegged McDuffie as the problem, 2008 seemed to cure the ailment by bringing in Alan Burnett as the temporary lead writer (Dwayne continued on with back-up character features), and suddenly, the book was rejuvenated, leaving even the lunatic “Salvation Run” scenario salvaged. Then McDuffie took back the helm, and by #s 25-26, Vixen’s confrontation with Anansi, the being responsible both for her powers and the recent confusion in them, I knew affairs were back in order. It certainly didn’t hurt to have Ed Benes onboard. He’s exactly the sort of artist you want for a book of this caliber, commanding in every way. So his women are definitely sexy. In a book, in a Justice League like this one, they’re every bit the focus of attention as the men who usually hog the spotlight. Whatever works, right?

19. The Flash (DC) (9/40) What a state of flux the Flash has been in for the past few years. First, the book is relaunched in 2006, Bart Allen assumes the mantle, and it looks like a new era is underway. Marc Guggenheim takes over as writer, and seems like the second coming of Mark Waid as far as mythology goes (responsible for the 9 ranking last year). A handful of issues in, Bart’s dead, the series is cancelled, and Waid is brought back in, Wally West returns, and he brings his family with him (responsible for the 40 ranking). Fans revolt, probably because Mark isn’t writing the book, back to its original numbering, like he used to, causing him to beat a hasty exit early in 2008, even though he’s more in his groove than was first realized. Tom Peyer succeeds him, and seems eager to get the book back into a Silver Age feel before realizing what he can do with recent developments, including a classic issue with Wally’s guilt over Inertia (#241), then completing the saga Waid started with the Wild Wests, his own run along with it. Alan Burnett (remember him from the above entry?) then takes over and he’s a house of fire, picking up where Guggenheim and Peyer left off, revitalizing the franchise for new readers looking for their own shiny new era with the character, and suddenly, news leaks that this is going to be yet another truncated chapter. The book’s being cancelled, to make room for yet another reboot, next year, with Barry Allen. Whatever. I’m okay with it, just as long as someone, anyone, gets to spend a decent amount of time with the Flash. Whoever said his writers had to move along at the same speed as he does?

20. DC Universe Zero/DC Universe Last Will and Testament/DC Universe: Decisions (DC) Probably didn’t need to name the publisher with this entry, the first big cheat job on the list, lumping three separate projects together. The first one’s a status marker that followed Countdown and was meant to prepare readers for Final Crisis. I didn’t get to read it before I heard the initial reactions from fans who didn’t think it’d done the job, but upon reading it, I couldn’t disagree more. Last Will and Testament was a standalone issue from Brad Meltzer in which he mostly handles Geo-force’s need for vengeance against Deathstroke, and in the most painful way possible, gets it. Finally, Decisions was an ingenious four-issue number that introduces politics to the superhero process (in the book, it’s the other way around). Each project was an excellent reward for long-term fans as well as ways newer ones might have a look at what DC is currently doing without getting too bogged down. Hey, Final Crisis is a dense as Grant Morrison gets. I won’t deny that…

21. Countdown to Mystery (DC) It’s my greatest mark of shame in 2008 that it took Steve Gerber’s death to make me realize the quality of the work he was doing in his final project. I had already read the first issue in 2007 but had somehow decided it wasn’t worth continuing, despite my vested interest in the comic that was effectively concluding the Helmet of Fate saga (a series of one-shots released last year) which was supposed to culminate in a new Dr. Fate book. DC had reneged first when they’d made the decision to group Fate instead with an Eclipso story (also worth checking out, by the way) in a book that for no discernable reason got the Countdown tie-in title. I guess I figured that if the publisher didn’t care enough I shouldn’t have either. It was a mistake, as I said. When Gerber’s death was first announced, I didn’t know why I should have cared, but then I was reminded about this series. Starting with the fifth issue, I became once more engrossed. By #8, the final issue, a cabal of creators had come together to complete Steve’s story for him, with a number of versions extrapolating what he might have intended. I had come to realize for myself that I wasn’t reading out of some sense of obligation, but because, in his death I had come to appreciate at last Steve Gerber’s impact as a writer. Too late. And because I know no one prior to 2008 would have really thought this statement would be uttered, we’ll always have Howard the Duck.

22. All Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder (DC) (15) Throughout 2007, it was something of a guilty pleasure for me that every time a Grant Morrison Batman was released, the same week I got to read a Frank Miller All Star Batman. Guilty because I simply couldn’t believe my luck; to my mind, never before have two better creators been writing the Dark Knight simultaneously. It’s become popular, if people are to write about this book at all, to remark on its camp appeal, that the out-size Batman Miller writes now is like a parody of his work on The Dark Knight Returns. The thing is, I’m the guy who thinks, blasphemously, that if The Dark Knight Strikes Again, the follow-up of a decade and a half later, isn’t just as good, it’s better, or that Batman: Year One, pales in comparison to Loeb and Sale’s The Long Halloween as a window in the early caped crusades. Okay, so only two issues were actually released in 2008. Superman’s All Star book got in its final three chapter during the same period. But it’s almost become a miracle when any new All Star Batman is released. Miller and Jim Lee’s interpretation of the early Batman is a perfect counterpart to the latter-day adventures, full of the growl you always expected from the guy’s reputation but somehow never got, if not Christopher Nolan’s version then perhaps Tim Burton’s, someone who isn’t exactly user-friendly but whose heart still beats with the same pathos it first discovered in Crime Alley. The presence of Robin, the chaos of the greater world Batman isn’t ready to deal with, that’s what this book exists to relate. It’s the myth struggling to outlive the man, but slowly crumbling away. And that’s what Batman, at heart, has always been about.

23. Final Crisis: Revelations/Rogues Revenge/Superman Beyond 3D/Legion of 3 Worlds (DC) If not for the lack of Mark Waid, this is exactly what you would have expected from the publisher in a heavily-hyped event post-52; the writers responsible working on side projects acting as tent poles. Still, with Geoff Johns succeeding Waid with the Legion as he already had with the Flash as he continues with the Rogues, the spirit is still there anyway, with Grant Morrison supporting his own Final Crisis with a Superman flooding his All Star version into Technicolor (okay, 3D) and Greg Rucka performing his best work to date with Renee Montoya as the new Question, with the Spectre thrown in for good measure. Not knowing quite how to rank these projects separately because their release schedule has staggered them along so oddly (especially the latter two), I feel perfectly fine grouping them together.

24. Trinity (DC) Remember a few years ago when Jeph Loeb’s Superman/Batman inexplicably launched into being one of the most popular comic books around? Well, welcome to Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley’s sandbox. This is easily Busiek’s strongest work for DC to date, and Bagley’s first. Both are better known for their Marvel work. It’s also the third year-long weekly series to date from DC, and I bring up Superman/Batman because in the early issues it was easy enough to interpret this as Superman/Batman/Wonder Woman. They’re the trinity of the title, yes, so in a way that’s perfectly obvious, but the storytelling has actually evolved in recent months past them, by necessity, because for all the world they don’t exist anymore. The web Busiek and Bagley weave is an intricate one, encompassing new characters and old, plenty of surprises, and back-up stories from Busiek and Fabian Nicieza featuring art alternating between Tom Derenick and Scott McDaniel that provides a consistency that was never possible on either 52 or Countdown. It’s been an interesting ride so far, one I look forward to following, once again, weekly until another year’s through.

25. Captain Britain and MI13 (Marvel) Another pleasant surprise from the House of Ideas in 2008 was another attempt at an England-bound book that actually worked, featuring a team of characters I could possibly have been less familiar with previously but find more endearing in any other context than with writer Paul Cornell and artist Leonard Kirk. Launched during Secret Invasion, the book featured the best version of those events as the team effectively declared “no more Skrulls” on their turf, turning back a plot to steal away magic. Since then, the motley team has soldiered on, working their own magic, adding Blade to the fold and adding further intrigue to things like the Black Knight’s strange relationship with the Ebony Blade or Captain Britain’s return after a brief interlude, in the most ingenious feature of the early issues, of being dead (an impact that was smartly contrasted with his American counterpart’s). Imagine my surprise, reading not one but three Marvel books as a regular, eager fan?

26. Blue Beetle (DC) (6) Sometimes, when they vanish, they come back. After I moved from Massachusetts to Colorado, I learned not all comics stores are created equal. Shocking, I know! But one of the biggest blows was also one of the more shocking ones, that the new store all of a sudden seemed to stop carrying Blue Beetle, which according to the 2007 ranking you can see was a favorite of mine. Chronicling Jaime Reyes’ budding career as the new Beetle, armed more literally with the Scarab than any previous incarnation (the last one, Ted Kord, never even had anything to do with it, working more or less like a Nightwing who’d not only inherited Batman’s toys, but could create his own). With a terrific supporting cast around him and a keen sense of what it means to try and get into this whole superhero scene, Blue Beetle was like the Captain Britain and MI13 of its day, launching as part of the “One Year Later” project, from the frying pan directly into the fire. So to my relief, halfway through the year the book magically reappeared on the store’s shelves, and I got to read a few more issues before recently discovering no manner of championing the book from the DC offices could in the end save it from low sales in a bad economy. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the series was the fact it was able to remain consistent through every guest and new creator that came along, which became all the more important when Matt Sturges came aboard as the new writer this year. Despite his friendship and frequent collaboration with Bill Willingham, whom I respect greatly, my own experience with Sturges has been less cordial. But the Blue Beetle charm didn’t fail. Even better news was that exactly the issues I’d missed were collected in a trade paperback. I haven’t gotten around to reading them yet, but that was another of the best developments I came across this year.

27. Superman (DC) (48) When I say in the Trinity write-up that it’s the best work he’s done for DC to date, that’s no small praise coming from me for Kurt Busiek. For the past few years he’s had to compete with Geoff Johns in Superman books, and the winner was never hard to call. Except for “The Third Kryptonian” (the actual brilliance of which is solely responsible for the book’s ranking at all last year), Busiek seemed interested in generic or just plain bad writing, which was a contrast both with Johns’ work and the era I came up from reading the Man of Steel’s adventures, when four excellent teams worked side-by-side, working together to boot. His final issues this year, however, were a continuing effort at redemption, and he was certainly aided by the work of Renato Guedes, who to my mind has become the definitive Superman artist of the modern day. And then James Robinson came aboard, and like Mark Waid before him started out a little shaky trying to reintegrate with the DC mainstream. But thanks to the “New Krypton” arc and his own particular contributions, notably the Guardian angle, he seems to have found his footing as a creator linking the last decade to this one, which is refreshing for this Super-fan to read.

28. Nightwing (DC) (5) Remember what I was saying about Robin earlier? Well, when Nightwing got his own series in 1996, I couldn’t have been happier. Dick Grayson was the original Robin, right? Readers who’d followed him through Batman and the Teen Titans might have felt stronger about it, but I was pleased as punch to be there when he reached this new milestone, and the book quickly became one I knew I had to follow if I was reading comics. Through a hundred fifty-one issues, there’ve only been five writers to work on the series, Chuck Dixon and Devin K. Grayson, who logged the most time establishing what it meant for Dick to carry his own title, then a brief “One Year Later” run with Bruce Jones, Marv Wolfman returning to his Titans lead (responsible for last year’s rank, and finally this year Peter Tomasi. I’d grown familiar with Tomasi as a writer through his work on Green Lantern Corps and Black Adam: The Dark Age, so was eager to see what he’d do. Since Devin Grayson left the book, Jones and Wolfman had established a pattern of more or less rebooting Dick’s circumstances, and I was eager to see what Peter could do to establish a new, hopefully more permanent status quo. Funny thing was, he didn’t seem to have the same firm grasp for Nightwing as for the other characters I’d seen him handle, but it soon became apparent he had a plan. His first arc put Dick through the Talia (daughter of Ra’s al Ghul) ringer, which had the pleasant side-effect of seeing a new dynamic, a family one, emerging between Nightwing and Robin, while the second one pitted our hero against one of the summer’s most prominent villains, Two-Face. Both arcs had their highs and lows, and through it, Tomasi seemed insistent to push Dick into a new interest of skydiving, and sometimes it seemed more relevant than others. The best issue by far also had the best art (sorry, Rags Morales), a reunion with Doug Mahnke on December’s #151, a culmination of a year’s work. This is another book being cancelled early next year, which either means Nightwing is going to be more important post-“R.I.P.” than he was post-“Knightfall” or that he might get a real relaunch next time.

29. The Brave & The Bold (DC) (32) Mark Waid’s last DC baby was this classic team-up book, the “Book of Destiny” arc concluding early in the year making way for some more self-contained stories over the summer involving Green Arrow, Deadman, and hey! my man Nightwing (in case Dan DiDio was still wondering what Dick’s role is in the wider DC sandbox, the Batman people actually get along with, as Geoff Johns put it during Infinite Crisis), plus a standalone with Superman and Catwoman. From there I pretty much quit reading after Waid left (DC in general), waiting for J. Michael Straczynski to come aboard next year. Last year I didn’t end up being very kind to Mark in the QB 50, and I would very much have loved to remedy that this year, and saying his work here was brilliant doesn’t amount to much except to say that if there had been more, it would have ranked better, this book having easily become a favorite of mine to read, Waid’s shear grasp of DC lore being invaluable as a fan. He’s a creator who’s an indelible part of the medium, but he’s as mercurial as they get, one moment here, one there, and in between always trying to buck up the independent scene. If he were creating more original characters, he’d easily be the Jack Kirby of the modern era.

30. G.I. Joe: America’s Elite! (DDP) (11) This series came to an end this year, as did DDP’s licensing of the property, making way for a reboot from IDW that’s just getting underway. It’s a tragic irony, too, because the book’s “WWIII” arc was all about concluding old continuity, the stuff that goes all the way back to the original Marvel comics in the 1980s, with the Joes finally conquering Cobra with the final issue, #36. Though the year-long arc had grown thin, it still produced its share of key moments, including #33’s Cobra Commander sacrificing his own son Billy just to make a point. More ironically still, next year’s G.I. Joe movie will owe this series more than the new comics that will be publishing during its release, including the new prominence of the Baroness, the key arc for whom originally got me aboard the book. The focused, literate writing from Mark Powers was always a highlight for me in any given stack of comics.

31. Batman Confidential (DC) (7) What was probably released last December but I didn’t read until this year, #12, marked the conclusion of “Lovers and Madmen,” still the best Joker story done during the period of The Dark Knight’s hype and release, from writer Michael Green, currently co-writing Superman/Batman. Like Superman Confidential’s “Kryptonite,” it was a high watermark for these Confidential anthology books, one unlikely to be matched soon (and solely responsible for the title’s high ranking last year, being an instant classic and must-read as it is). But unlike the Superman book, Batman’s seemed to inspire a consistent flow of worthwhile stories afterward, or at least a series that didn’t disappear from the shelves (could be both; the last Superman arc I saw was a Toyman arc with Phil Hester on art, the latter of which was my drawing item, and not enough to continue). Issues 13-16 featured Wrath, a vengeful character Detective Comics’ Hush might recognize, featuring Nightwing in a supporting role, then a Catwoman-Batgirl arc I decided to skip, and finally another Joker arc starting with #22, with art from Scott McDaniel.

32. Fantastic Four: The Lost Adventure (Marvel) Here’s something akin to 2006’s release of Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut, not so much something new as a project that makes amends to past sins. As the comic itself chronicles, this “Lost Adventure” is the final collaboration between Stan Lee and Jack Kirby on Fantastic Four, a story previously butchered from Jack’s original version and finally restored to its original vision. Notable not just for its history but for the fact that reading it also easily translated for me the appeal of one of comics’ most celebrated creative runs, which to this point I had been entirely ignorant of, which is one of the seven deadly comic book sins (another involves Mort the Dead Teenager, but that one’s too complicated to get into right now).

33. Detective Comics (DC) I’m afraid I gave Paul Dini’s run something of the cold shoulder early on. Too enamored of Grant Morrison’s more complicated, engrossing Batman, I didn’t see the point of following the revered creator of Batman: The Animated Series and its many descendents in his series of standalone issues. This year I finally made amends (I did that a lot this year?), the hard way. Blaming Dini as head writer for the tepid comparisons I’d been drawing early on between Countdown and 52, I was less eager still to read his parts of what I considered to be Morrison’s “Resurrection of Ra’s al Ghul” late last year and early this one. After The Dark Knight I was doing some research of my own about possible foes for a third film, and remembered Dini’s Scarface, and tracked it down to #843, just an issue after a Talia story a few months after “Resurrection” had concluded. Then “Heart of Hush” began with #846, which ended up being excellent counterweight to “R.I.P.” (and, uh, lasting five issues). Turns out he wasn’t so bad after all.

34. Amazing Spider-Man (Marvel) With #545’s much ballyhooed conclusion to “One More Day” and controversial decision to forsake Peter and MJ’s past for more of Aunt May’s future, I became one of the readers who actually came aboard. I’d read Spider-Man sporadically the last couple of years, but had never made a commitment. What really changed? Well, out of the stable of former 52 editor Steve Wacker’s team of mostly weekly writers was my old pal Marc Guggenheim, and throughout the year I hopped along his arcs (he didn’t even get to reveal Jackpot’s big secret!). Finally, that rascal Mark Waid joined the team and in two issues (#s 578-579) convinced me all over again that if he’s working on a character, it’s a definitive take.

35. The Stand: Captain Trips (Marvel) If Marvel burned me out on Dark Tower comics, then like a fox it already had this waiting to trap me again. Bastards! Adapting straight from the acclaimed Stephen King epic, it has everything the previous adaptation project ultimately lacked. Where the Dark Tower commanded the culture but lacked creative focus, Captain Trips plays loose with the culture but is laser-focused on the story. I’ve read one Dark Tower book, before reading the comic, but one issue of Captain Trips convinced me to plunk The Stand right at the top of my reading list. That’s just the way it goes sometimes, you kennit?

36. Mice Templar (Image) (29) Just about the only independent book I was able to keep track of in Colorado, this one’s the better version of the more popular Mouse Guard (at least, for a time, Mouse Guard was popular). The creative vision of Michael Avon Oeming and Bryan J.L. Glass is not all that different from Oni’s Wasteland, another indy favorite that was lost in the transition (though I was able to finally get my hands on the first issue, of all things), or Star Wars for that matter. But it’s not in the ways that it’s familiar but in the ways that Mice Templar is its own unique mythology that counts. The first arc concluded with #6, a hardcover collection is now available, and an animated film is in the works, making it a great time to become acquainted with one of the most heartfelt creations in today’s comics.

37. Batman: Gotham After Midnight (DC) Remember when I was talking about Steve Niles and side-projects with DC? Well, this is his latest one, a creepy (that’d be traditional vampire/Batman collaborator Kelley Jones on art) introduction of a new foe that happens to take a tour of Bruce Wayne’s world, a wonderful alternative for Dark Knight fans who want to have a look around but aren’t sure of their level of commitment with the backlog of material.

38. Booster Gold (DC) (45) The masterful “Blue & Gold” reunion arc with Ted Kord’s Blue Beetle concluded with #10 (thanks to special past “event” book numbering that included #0 and #1,000,000 this year, the count’s a little off, appropriately, with this book), which ended Geoff Johns and Jeff Katz’s run on the title, making way for a few guest spots from Chuck Dixon and Rick Remender before artist (and creator) Dan Jurgens finally took hold as writer with #15. If there’s been an alternative to The Brave & The Bold’s romp through the DC sandbox, this book has been it, only instead of just exploring characters this one plays with the timeline as a matter of course. Now that things have been properly established, Booster has the potential of doing even more bold and better things in the future. Ah, such terminology just doesn’t have the same ring to it anymore…

39. Wolverine (Marvel) (31) With the conclusion of Marc Guggenheim and Howard Chaykin’s “Death of Wolverine” arc with #61 (trade now in stores, so you can check out why this perfect collaboration led to my naming Chaykin best artist of 2007), I didn’t expect to be reading this title again, but then the Civil War team of Mark Millar and Steve McNiven launched into “Old Man Logan” with #66. I know people will suggest any number of stories to contradict this statement, but Marvel just didn’t seem to think of competing with The Dark Knight Returns in terms of exploring a character’s future until last year’s Spider-Man: Reign (excellent, too, check out the trade!) and now this arc. We’re still an issue away as of my writing this of finding out what exactly happened to make Logan seem like such a traditional old man, but it’s been a bold story so far, all the more shocking because it’s in the character’s regular title. But then, Marvel’s got a billion other places for Wolverine to stomp around.

40. Green Lantern Corps (DC) (23) What’s become a reliable second act for themes Geoff Johns uncovers in the main Green Lantern title sees Peter Tomasi and if I’m lucky, Patrick Gleason explore such things as Mongul and Black Mercy, the return of Guy Gardner’s Warriors bar (this time on Oa!), the Star Sapphire issue, and creepy of all creepies, Kryb. Regrettably, the sacrifice has been the individual Corps members the series originally launched with, such as Sinestro’s “successor” Natu, or even the new Ion, Sodam Yat. But the series has hopefully proven that if you’ve got a Green Lantern Corps around, you might as well have a series for it, too.

41. PX!/HiberNation (8/14) Manny Trembley and Eric Anderson are the kind of creators you hope you don’t find working on the Internet simply because they deserve better than that, but I’ve had the privilege of following them there anyway for the past few years, toiling away at Panda Xpress, which has now completed two books, both of which have subsequently been published by Image under its Shadowline imprint (which also provided them the opportunity for the “legitimate” series Sam Noir, ranked in my 2006 top ten and again at 14 last year, with PX! at 8). Their passion project revolves around a girl, her (robotic) panda (did I mention that this year, I ate actual Panda Express food, which really has nothing to do with the comic?), a disco ninja responsible for the best quips in any recent comics, a double-aught British secret agent, and a goat bent on world domination (who, when he goats to say something that begins with “go” goats to say goat, and is named Pollo). I would literally compare the storytelling with Grant Morrison, no joke. It’s that assured. HiberNation, meanwhile, is a fine demonstration of their frequent madcap side-projects, a comic created for a 24 hour challenge. They say they’re aiming for new horizons, meaning now’s as good a time as any to snap up the soon-to-be-released second PX! book, so you can either say you were there before they finally exploded (I’ve been getting impatient; that’s the only reason for this miserable ranking in 2008), or at least, before Trembley and Anderson do another one. Support the cause! And punch a ninja. That’s how angels really get their wings.

42. Scalped (Vertigo) While Wizard was busy concentrating all its attention on the work Jason Aaron did for Marvel, I was still marveling, if you’ll pardon me, over the few issues I got to read of this series in 2008. Some of the best straight dramatic material I’ve read in comics any year, it’s set on an Indian reservation (in my experience, the title of the series is purely metaphorical). I wish I had more to say, but then, I wish more that I had been able to read more.

43. Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters (DC) (33) The third mini-series for the team, the second straight by this name (you can find the first under the title Battle for Blüdhaven, which has only become more relevant with Final Crisis), I wish more readers cared, more fans were around than those in the DC offices, because this is just another example of the potential for even minor characters to carry a major impact. And since Watchmen casts a large shadow, it’s worth noting that #5’s debut of the new Neon ought to be familiar with fans of Dr. Manhattan.

44. Infinity Inc. (DC) (50) Justifiably cancelled after #12, the series had already played all its cards before new art and actual costumes made a team out of characters too brooding for a mass audience. If Pete Milligan had played more toward the dynamic of Steel and his niece Natasha, maybe more people would have cared, but he was probably right to refrain from monopolizing the title with one already-explored dynamic. In the end, a noble if failed experiment in team books.

45. Young Avengers Presents (Marvel) The characters that originally brought me around to being an actual Marvel reader continued their shuffling along the editorial board this year, at least this time with a project worthy of them, a series of spotlight issues highlighted by the first’s Patriot story written by Captain America wiz Ed Brubaker. If Allan Heinberg can possibly find the time to write more of their actual adventures, I’d be even happier.

46. Shadowpact (DC) So disappointed last year by the transition between Bill Willingham and Matt Sturges as writer of this series, I apparently left it clean out of the QB 50. I guess there were enough bright spots of the final five issues to finally overcome that obstacle, if feebly. This was a team that deserved better, but at least has found a temporary home in Keith Giffen’s Reign in Hell.

47. Ultimate Spider-Man (Marvel) (39) Welcome to the book where I read the most of my Spider-Man in recent years, the end of the Bendis-Bagley era (I’d come in only during its version of the Clone Saga) and the beginning of Stuart Immonen’s work on art (now with more edge, perhaps to be more familiar with Bagley’s style). Stuart is another of those writer-artists who are floating around the landscape, and I’m happy to support him any way I can. Here is mostly the “Amazing Friends” arc, but if something else intriguing comes up, I’d be happy to swing by again (the bad puns!).

48. Death of the New Gods (DC) Being a huge admirer of Jack Kirby and John Byrne’s run with the characters last decade, I had to be there when they were killed off by Jim Starlin. One of the best elements was the book’s acknowledgement that Kirby had a soft spot for Superman (I think his Fourth World and Jimmy Olsen books were the only opportunities he had to play with the Man of Steel), who investigates the god-killer throughout the story. Between this, Countdown, Final Crisis, and the Lost Adventure, Jack really was King again this year!

49. Age of Bronze (Image) It’s been a long-term ambition of mine to read Eric Shanower’s acclaimed adaptation of The Iliad, and this year I got to read two issues, so to finally include it on this list is something of an honor. At turns scholarly and talky, it proved to me that I can’t just step into random issues, and that I’m not too late, incredibly, to see the actual Trojan War start yet!

50. Air/RASL (Vertigo/Cartoon Books) A pair of intriguing launches during the year, Air is a thriller from writer G. Willow Wilson that explores the shifting notions of identity while RASL is Jeff Smith’s first new creation since Bone, one of the best sagas in comics history. Though I’ve read three issues of the former and two of the latter, I don’t feel I can pull the trigger on either one on what their real rank might be, so they tie at the end of this year’s list. I look forward to seeing where both go from here.

Best Single Issue 2008: Final Crisis #4 (DC) This award always goes to a comic that has achieved something of actual literary distinction. Two years ago I gave it to Savage Dragon #125, which featured some rather inventive storytelling in a superhero comic. Last year, to Batman #666, which envisioned a future where Damien had become the Dark Knight. This year, it stays in the Grant Morrison family, easily. You can thank his own “Rock of Ages” arc and specifically JLA #13 from way back in 1997 for that, the first time Grant pulled off magic with the Prince of Apokalips, the “Darkseid Is” slogan. This time it was a little more subtle. Time used to be Dan Turpin was only a tough cop in Metropolis, but that was a decade and a lifetime ago. When he factored in as an apparent lead player in Final Crisis #1, plenty of heads must have been scratched. Soon his investigations led him to Libra’s lair, and from there a captive of the New Gods in human bodies, the concept Grant first debuted in Seven Soldiers. By this issue, their designs for him had become all too clear. For a terrible mind like Darkseid, they would need a formidable body, and a will that, if turned against itself, would be worthy of that mind. The issue deals with Dan’s efforts to avoid that fate, but in the end, it’s like charred Anakin Skywalker being fitted for his Darth Vader suit, only this time, when the helmet slides into place, the transformation is already complete. Only Grant Morrison would have thought of this, and only he could have pulled it off, a moment worthy of an event called Final Crisis.

Best Writer 2008: Grant Morrison (DC) With all apologies to Marvel partisans and fans of Bendis and Millar, anyone who’s read this list or anything else I’ve written knows it can boil down to only two men. One of them won last year, and the other gets his turn in 2008. Geoff Johns was all over the place once again, but his work was eclipsed by Morrison, whose work on Batman alone might have been enough this year, but there was also Final Crisis, the Superman Beyond 3D issue, and All Star Superman, all of which demonstrated that a man of considerable powers was being allowed to demonstrate them all, on the brightest stage possible. DC gave him the confidence. I gave him my vote. It’s a simple as that. For those who might think the list above contradicts that vote, I will only add, if Final Crisis had actually finished this year, it would likely have taken the second slot, thereby giving Grant an unequivocal one-two punch.

Best Artist 2008: Scott McDaniel (DC) Relegated last year to one of the Countdown spin-off books (Arena, where parallel heroes squared off to no ultimate purpose), Scott wins this honor for the mere fact that I was pleased to care about what he was doing again. A favorite since his stint as the first artist on Nightwing, I’ve been waiting for this moment for years (he also worked on Superman during the years I was away, and I’ve since gotten to see an issue). Part of the reason I’m eager to read new issues of Trinity is because he’s part of the backup art team, and he’s doing a Joker story at last (didn’t it always seem like a natural fit?). I noticed a lot of artists this year, a lot of new names I hope will go on to considerable prominence (two years ago I gave this award to Daniel Acuña, who was working on DC books at the time, but has since moved on to Marvel, where he seems to still be developing his cache), and I noted all of them in the list. For McDaniel, it’s nice to see someone working the same style that made them famous more than a decade later. Few artists seem to do that, even though the style doesn’t have to go out of style, as they seem to think. New contexts, new challenges, it ought to still fit the bill. I think he’s proven that this year.

That’s all (he says!) for this year. The quality represented on this list is a big part of why 2008 was one of my better years, which either pegs 2009 to try and top it, or be something different entirely. I’d go with either one, really.

And that really is it for 2008. It was a pleasure to spend eleven weeks writing this column for Lower Decks, and I look forward to many more next year and beyond. If I’m really lucky (and possibly still somewhat stupid), I’ll read enough comics to make another QB 50, but in the meantime, there are plenty more topics to cover, including at least one movie that’ll dredge up the old topic anyway (I had some really nice thoughts about that I may end up reprinting from a review I did about it the first time I read it…in 2007), and I’ll let you guess which March-released movie I’m talking about. Since Lost finally turns next month, I’ll be writing about that for the first time in this column, and of course in May, some other big movie opens I may have indicated some interest in, prompting yet more material.

Soon you will realize these aren’t just my scars, but yours as well…