New to comics sort of...

[Michiyo_Yoshiku]

So what's worth reading for a comics noob?

I have all the Batman Essentials or I'm getting them.

Read and Loved the Watchmen.

I have Frank Miller's ronin

Wolverene Evolution is all I have from Marvel right now.

and a bunch of old comics from when I was a kid with only 2 being worth anything.

[KazumaII]

right now Im reading and I would reccomend

Joker

and

X-men: dangerous

[SlackerDude]

Try "Preacher"

[kittynboi]

A warning; this will be a long post.

I second Azzarellos "Joker". Great art, great noir crime story.

Here are others worth checking out;

DMZ by Brian Wood, VERY cool series about a future where the U.S. has been torn apart by civil war and Manhattan Island is a demilitarized zone. It follows the travels of a young journalist trapped in the DMZ and his efforts to report the truth on what is doing on in there.

Transmetropolitan; crazy hilarious incisive observant comedic sci-fi set in a future where technology and science seem able to give people godlike potential, but most just use it for sex, drugs, and mindless entertainment.

V for Vendetta, Alan Moore's great gaphic novel, way better than the film.

DC Comics: The Works of Alan Moore. Lots of cool stories in here about Superman, Swamp Thing, Green Arrow, Green LAntern, and other DC icons told in the way only Moore can do.

Almost anything by Grant Morrison, but in particular, his recent Batman run (which is distirbuted in 3 graphic novels; Batman and Son, The Black Glove, and Batman:RIP.) Also, The Filth is great, and if it's not too daunting, The Invisibles. (Possibly the biggest mind**** you will ever read, and it's 7 vols., 100 issues essentially.) We3 is a cool, short work by Morrison about 3 animals used in a twisted government weapons experiment. 7 Soldiers of Victory, the 4 vol. "megaseries" by Morrison uses some older, obscure DC characters to weave a strangely decentralized narrative.

Alan Moore's Swamp Thing is great.

Here's my absolute favorite of all time; Cerebus, by Dave Sim. 300 issues, over 16 trade collections, coming to a total of 6000 pages. Wildly uneven, from Conan the barbarian parody to a work on the life and death of Oscar Wilde to political narratives and satirical stories on the nature of religion and politics to a 200-300 page story of nothing but the protagonist living in a bar for years, with upside down pages, sideways pages, stretches of nothing but text, VERY non-PC rants on women, and ultimately culminating in a 100 plus pure text analysis of the torah by the main character, who happens to be an Aardvark. Cerebus is loved and hated at the same time by the same people, and it's probably one of the most ambitious, experimental works of comics art from anywhere in the world. It's a daunting work, but it is VERY satisfying to read all the way through.

The Sandman by Neil Gaiman is great if you like fantasy, mythology, and horror, especially the kind that weaves in lots of real life history.

Y:The Last Man is one of the best things Vertigo comics has ever published. Great sci-fi that satirizes modern life and gender relations while still being possible to read it as nothing more than a good adventure yarn.

If you like Westerns, DC's current Jonah Hex series is worth checking out, and it often has awesome, hyper-realistic artwork. Some rough content, and as westerns go it's probably more Deadwood than Bonanza.

Another good Western, this from Vertigo, is Loveless. A shorter series set in the post civil war south.

Vertigo is heavily favored in this list, as my next rec. is also Vertigo. The Exterminators is a HILARIOUS sci-fi tale about a group of exterminators, with political and business intrigue, ancient evils, and white trash characters the like of which you won't see outside daytime talk shows. Nice sense of humor, almost like Ghostbusters, only with bugs.

If you like Marvel, and the Marvel characters, check out Civil War and some of the tie ins.

Jack Kirby, a highly influential creator (he co-created most ALL Marvel icons, including the Fantastic 4 and the X-Men) has had much of his work collected in high quality hardbacks. The Fourth World stuff might seem odd, as will OMAC, but they're worth a shot. Those are his DC works. His Marvel stuff is nicely summed up in the Marvel Visonaries: Jack Kirby collection.

More Marvel Visonaries hardbacks include Stan Lee (who really needs no introduction) and Steve Ditko (co-creator of Spiderman.)

Persepolis is good, but it might not be for everyone. Autobio about a girl growing up in Iran during the Iranian Revolution of the 70s. Interesting look at the time and place, but I know autobio doesn't appeal to a lot of people. I don't care for the genre much myself, unless it's something like this that takes place around some notable historical event.

Blankets is another one you may or may not like. I personally like it. It's an autobio type book by Craig Thompson about his teenage romance years. now, it's GOOD, but for every fan of it there's also someone who finds it whiny and self-indulgent, and though I like it, I can certainly see where they're coming from.

Bone by Jeff Smith is one of the great comic works of all time, and available in a reasonably priced single edition collection. Good mix of Tolkenien fantasy and Carl Barks/Looney Tunes style light heartedness. I think Jeff Smith once said that, the feel of Bone could be describes as Bug Bunny kissing Aragorn. Anyone who likes good high fantasy should enjoy Bone.

The work of Chris Ware is another mixed bag. I like it to a point, but it's like Blankets. It's not autobio, but much of it is very navel gazing and self indulgent. It's appealing to the comics intellegenstia who spend all their time hating on superheroes, but Ware's work, like Jimmy Corrigan and some of his Acme Novelty Library stuff, may be a little TOO "Artsy" in the worst sense of the world to most general readers and those new to comics.

I've fallen WAY behind on X-Men and Marvel in general these past few years, but the X-Books have had some cool stuff going on in them since 2007 or so, such as Extinction and Messiah Complex.

NYX is good deal. An X-Men comic set in the Marvel Universe, but focusing on a group of teenage mutants who are runaways and are trying to survive in New York. Gritty urban drama. I think the premise of it was once described as something like this; Nyx shows us what happens to the young mutants who never end up in Prof. Xaviers school and never enter the world of the X-Men.

I also have to point out Marvel's digital comics. Go to Marvel.com and sign up. It's like, $10 a month or something and you get access to THOUSANDS of back issues. Easily one of the best deals around.

If you like the music of Tori Amos, or just quirky anthologies in general, try Comic Book Tattoo, a collection of short comics based on the music of Tori Amos. It's kind of hit or miss, but overall it's fun.

Also, check out DC's Zuda, an online webcomics project. Some of it is hit or miss, but most of it is pretty polished and well done, even if it's not for everyone. Most seems to lean towards sci fi and fantasy, and there seems to be a decent amount of Weird West stuff (Cowboys fighting Werewolves is one example.)

Locke and Key is a good horror comic. Worth a look.

The recent run of The invincible Iron Man has been pretty decent as well.

Strangers in PAradise is a good romance/thriller comic, and one of my favorites. REALLY worth a read.

There is LOTS of "alt comix" type stuff, but I don't know if you or anyone else here would dig it. I'm very torn on most of it myself. There are collections like MOME and publishers like Fantagraphics, and some of it is good, but as one person once said, a lot of it falls under what could be called the "pretentious doodler" camp.

Well, that's all for now. Hope this is useful!

[Solid_Snake]

The Walking Dead.

The Darkness.

The Walking Dead.

Invincible.

The Walking Dead.

Punisher.

The Walking Dead.

Oh, and The Walking Dead.

Just had to make it stick. It is fantastic.

[Thousand Eyes]

Oh man, I don't even know where to start.

But, since you're a comics noob, try reading the 'Bone' graphic novels and Alan Moore's 'The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.'

Try some Deadpool if you can find any. Some of his new material is good, but his old stuff has some must-read classics lol.

[Arnold]

Aside from everything else already mentioned (I heartily second anything by Alan Moore, Y the last Man, and The Walking Dead) I have to single out:

Marvels by Alex Ross and Kurt Busiek
Kingdom Come by Alex Ross and Mark Waid
All Star Superman by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

And though it's not quite in the league of any other titles mentioned so far Marvel's "The Ultimates" is a hell of a lot of fun.

[JoeStrummer]

The Secret Wars
The Secret Wars II
Mike Grell's run on both The Warlord, and Green Arrow
Thor, and you've got 600 issues to catch up on
Uncanny X-Men, Phoenix/ Dark Phoenix Saga, Day's of Future Past
I concur on anything Alex Ross, Kingdom Come and Marvels are awesome
Astro City by Kurt Busiek
Wolverine, particularily the new "Old Man Logan" story

[The Million Dollar Prons]

If you like batman, and you liked the Dark Knight movie I suggest you read "The Killing Joke" and "The Long Halloween," as they were both sort of the inspiration for htat movie and you can find them in trade paper back. There's also Year One and the Dark Knight Returns.


I highly recommend Swamp Thing, the first 25 issues were interesting but mainly monster of the week, after Alan Moore came on it became really pscyhadelic. As I said before, I have issues 60-70 of it, and sometimes I just open it up and LOOK at it. It's really hard to find swamp thing though, most of it isn't collected in Paper Back form. I wound up downloading it.

Witchblade is a good comic if you like anime, because the storyline is very 'anime esque." Hell , there was even an anime based off it, although I haven't seen it.

The Ultimate Spider-Man is also good if you like anime. It gives you an "introduction" to the spider-man world and sucessfuly "freshesn up" a lot of classic characters and story lines. It does feel very manga esque to me.

The recent run of Spider-Man has been pretty weird to say the least. The storyline still hasn't quite recovered from the "One More Day" story arc.

If you liked watchmen, you can always check out his other works, I mentioned swamp thing already but there's also V for Vendetta and From Hell (That was alan moore, right?)

Lately I've been reading Moon Knight, the latest run of Moon Knight is really good, really violent and action packed. Moon Knight rips a guy's face off.


Dead Pool is a funny character, if you're into that sort of thing.

[pepin]

I'd reccomend Hellblazer, it's a bit daunting being 250+ issues and counting but a lot of the story arcs can be read stand-alone so that helps. For my money it's the best monthly series still going.

I enjoyed Army @ Love a lot too, it's a really spot on satire about the media and war in general but that has finished now.

[mooseegg1982]

Go with the Green Lantern Blackest Night story arc. It is awesome.

[Leader Desslock]

Try "Preacher"
Yeah! What he said!

I'll give an additional recommendation for V For Vendetta, and several of the other comics mentioned in this thread are quite good.

The one I don't see mentioned yet is one of my favorites: Mage: The Hero Discovered.