I have been collecting comics for many more years than I care to admit and was wondering how many players are also readers and collectors. I thought I would list a few "must reads" or people jumping in. Please add your own! The Dark Knight Returns Watchmen Whatever Happened to the Man Of Tomorrow Kingdom Come DC The New Frontier Long Halloween Dark Victory All Star Superman Superman For All Seasons Crisis On Infinite Earths Court Of Owls No Man's Land Every one is a gem!
The Long Halloween was def one of my all time favorite reads. The Killing Joke and Last Laugh were also epic graphic novels in my opinion.
The Secret Six run by Gail Simone Green Lantern:Rebirth and Flash:Rebirth by Geoff Johns The Omac Project by Greg Rucka and last but not least, pretty much the entire run of the Sandman by Neil Gaiman and Hitman by Garth Ennis Honorable mention for the books of magic (miniseries by Gaiman, monthly run by John Ney Rieber) oh and Lucifur by Mike Cary (of Fables fame) Transmetropolitan by Warren Ellis Preacher by Garth Ennis Hellblazer, with particluar shout out to Delano's run, Paul Jenkins and again Garth Ennis (who could forget 'Rake at the gate of hell') Damn! so many good reads, so little time.
The white martian storyline by Morrison The nail by Davis/Farmer (epic scene when Batman hits Jimmy with the lantern ring)
Steve Ditko's - Creeper & Hawk and Dove (Side Note: Ditko's Blue Beetle and Captain Atom for Charlton Comics were very good as well.) 1970's Horror - House of Mystery, House of Secrets, Witching Hour were the big three Showcase - The original run gives you a nice variety of content and origin issues Swamp Thing - original run Madam Xanadu - original run, Marshall Roger's One Shot, and Matt Wagner series Brother Power the Geek - Just because it was goofy as hell. Prez - Just because the villain later became the mascot for Wal-Mart.
The new 52 reboot may not have been universally liked but I gotta say, Batman: Death of the Family and the Red Lantern run from #21 onwards completely blew me away. You'd kinda need to be a batman comic fan previously to fully get Death of the Family but regardless its pretty much a perfect story. And the work that went into Red Lanterns after Guy Gardner takes over, whether it be the story or art, was amazing.
I have just recently got back into reading comics again. The first series I picked up was The Long Halloween and it was AWESOME. The art and the story was just really great stuff. I am also reading Pitt from Image comics and liking that so far. Can't saw as I have read any other from the OP's list. I did read Iron Man and Hulk comics a lot growing up, but I can't say that I kept track of what I was reading.
I'm finding Dark Knight isn't holding up as the years go by. At the time, it was a necessary book to break DC in particular out of it's reputation for "safe" comic books. At the time every Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman etc book was essentially the same. The company needed a shake up, and the writers needed to say they could stretch their wings. Moore and Miller both did that. However, 30 years later, going back and rereading Dark Knight, on top of the examination of Batman's neuroses, there's also an underlying pessimism and cynicism that I think was harmful to comics in the long run and has ultimately led to reboot after reboot because heroes are getting too dark. Watchmen holds up a little better, but I think that's because the protagonists in that book are self contained in their world. Dark Knight also has the misfortune of telegraphing Miller's later weird arch conservative racist views that he later manifested. In the 90's I loved Miller, because he was doing stuff that nobody else was doing, and I believe in rewarding originality. Unfortunately, as more people imitated him, and he became less original, his dystopic view of the world became tiring. Having said all this, 100 bullets is one my favourite series, same with Y the last man. Both are Vertigo books which is owned by DC, so I'm exercising a loophole.
I am an older collector and have been a Grren Arrow fan since Ollies' days of running around with Hal in the GA-GL series. You can get those in a collected book. It's a fun and sometimes serious series to read. As a fan of Ollies; yes on a first name basis, The Longbow Hunters kind of brought him back into the light. It's another series I would recommend. The Killing Joke for the story and art is another I would recommend. I liked that one so much I bought the poster of its cover art and framed it. Nerd and proud I am.
I agree. I liked The art so much the I actually bought the different versions of the different printings of The Killing Joke. I am about 10 years clean and sober now.
Being a big Wondy fan, I would recommend: Wonder Woman: Eyes of the Gorgon - Greg Rucka (Actually, read his entire run v.2 #195-226) Wonder Woman: The Hiketeia - Greg Rucka Wonder Woman: The Circle - Gail Simone (or pretty much her entire run on v.3 #14-44) Wonder Woman: Gods and Mortals - George Pérez (v.2 #1-7) Wonder Woman: Spirit of Truth - Paul Dini Enjoy!
