2019 Comics in Review - Part 5

I may have bought a few more new comics in 2019, but back issue purchases were way down from 2018. That year, I had these two plastic crates, plus with smaller magazine holder things that were basically full. This year, the five magazine things were full, but I was only halfway on the crates. I think I was looking for stuff I wasn't as likely to find in random shops, so I didn't have as much success. Or, the stuff I was looking for was pricier, so I bought less of it. I thought trades and manga purchases were down too, but no. It just feels like the things I want to buy stubbornly refuse to drop to a price I'm willing to spend.

As usual, the categories here may have certain minimum requirements, which will be listed. And as always, this is restricted to things I actually purchased. So after the last four days, you should know what the possible contenders are. I couldn't very well nominate something for my favorite ongoing I didn't read.

Favorite Ongoing Series (minimum 6 issues bought):

1. Giant Days
2. Black Cat
3. Unbeatable Squirrel Girl

There were only two other candidates - Magnificent Ms. Marvel and Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man - and seeing as how I dropped both of those mid-year, they couldn't really be in the running. I guess Infinity 8 might qualify, but it wouldn't edge out any of the three above.

Giant Days remained the most consistently enjoyable book I read, the one I most looked forward to each month, so it keeps the title. And Jed MacKay and Travel Foreman are doing pretty much exactly what I would want a Black Cat series to do - take advantage of the setting they have available to do cool "heist gone wrong" stuff. Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is almost always solid, and occasionally really funny and clever, so it's a strong third place.

Favorite Mini-Series (at least half of it shipped in 2019):

1. Ghost Tree
2. Atomic Robo: Dawn of the New Era
3. Steeple

Coda only shipped 5 of 12 issues this year, so it's out of the running. Question: The Deaths of Vic Sage only shipped 1 of 4 issues this year, so no go. I dropped Dial H halfway, so that counts it out. Same with Mega Ghost and Astro Hustle. Domino: Hotshots' story was a little too muddled for me. Smooth Criminals suffered from how rushed it felt at the end. Infinity 8 is solid, but hasn't really been great so far. Gwenpool Strikes Back had some really funny moments, but just doesn't feel like it was good enough to be in the Top 3. Even if I didn't always follow what Sebela and Hickman were getting at on the first go-round (or the second), Test was still interesting. Trying to figure out what was happening, what would happen, why. It was really close to making the cut, but I enjoy Steeple too much.

Having an Atomic Robo mini almost devoid of fighting or explosions was a real change of pace, but I like the way it set up a lot of stuff that will hopefully pay off in a cool way down the line (whenever the next mini-series pops up). Ghost Tree was really effective about how comfortable it is to hide in other peoples' problems, or in the past, to avoid dealing with what's going on now, without entirely dumping on the idea of the importance of those things. There was just enough comedy in there to keep it from being a total drag.

Favorite One-Shot:

1. Black Cat Annual
2. Giant Days: As Time Go By
3. Power Pack: Grow Up!

Most of the one-shots I got this year were random Marvel ones, and most of those weren't very good. So it came down to these two. Power Pack: Grow Up! wasn't bad, but I'd put it pretty far behind both of these. The Black Cat Annual edged out the Giant Days send-off because, I guess I wanted more from the latter. I wanted to see Dean Thompson in ruin, if Ed and Nina were still together, that kind of thing. It wasn't enough, which isn't fair, but them's the breaks. The Black Cat story was its own tidy little heist thing that got Felicia and Spidey teaming up to steal for a sort of good cause from some scumbags, and I had a lot of fun reading it.

Favorite Trade Paperback/Gravel Novel (anything purchased in 2019 is eligible):

1. Rob Schrab's Scud: The Disposable Assassin - The Whole Shebang (plus a whole mess of other people)
2. Tim Truman's Scout, Volume 1 (with Tom Yeats, Steve Oliff, Sam Parsons, and Timothy Harkins)
3. Legends of the Dark Knight: Norm Breyfogle Volume 2 (with Alan Grant, Steve Mitchell, Adrienne Roy, and Todd Klein)

31 total options this year, up from 27 the year before. Unlike last year, there aren't a few titles that dominate. A couple of Abnett/Lanning Legion books, a couple of manga series I bought two or three volumes of, the second and third Infinity 8 volumes.

Scud is first because it has a manic energy I love, that sense that anything could pop up on the next page. The kind of thing I love about Dr. McNinja or Earthworm Jim. But the ending was something I wouldn't have expected at all, which was extremely cool. It's nice to be surprised in a good way. Scout is that story where a character has a specific thing they're trying to do, but they need to be paying more attention to what's left in their wake. It's one of the things I love about GrimJack, how stuff builds on itself. What Santana leaves in his wake doesn't come into play until after this trade, but you can see the start of it, and Truman comes up with some pretty memorable designs for monsters in here.

Most of the Norm Breyfogle collection are solid done-in-one Batman stories, which is fine. The second half gets into Tim Drake becoming Robin, which is more interesting, but I got it just for Norm Breyfogle's art, so it delivers on that count.

Favorite Writer:

1. John Allison
2. Dan Abnett/Andy Lanning
3. Tim Truman

Other than Allison, there wasn't any writer I bought more than one series from this year among the new stuff. But I did track down all of Tim Truman's Scout work, and close to two dozen Legion comics, a series and concept I have never cared about, because they were written by Abnett and Lanning. That has to count for something.

Favorite artist (min. 110 pages):

1. Max Sarin
2. Joe Quinones
3. Audrey Mok

Mok is on here because I love the character designs and how well action and movement is conveyed. Quinones did a heck of a job mimicking other artists, without his work losing its coherence or energy. It would have been easy to just ape the typical postures Akira Toriyama uses, but end up with something flat and posed, but he didn't. You could tell whose work was the influence, but it was still Quinones' art, and it still worked in service to the story.

But Sarin has such a knack for facial expressions and body posture, which is critical in a series that is so much about gags and people reacting to absurd situations, sometimes in absurd ways. She can exaggerate when she needs to, but saves it for when it's needed, so it maintains effectiveness.

That's that. Sunday we're back to the Splash Page, and the typical posting resumes Monday.