Things I Loved About Comics This Year Part One

Because I either won’t be able to limit myself to a Top 10 or have enough content to make it to Top 10! Also, why be like everyone else, when I can be a quirky variation on everyone else instead? Ha-HA! Merry Christmas you old building and loan!

Hawkeye

I think I’ve stressed how much I love this comic. IF you’re not a jerk, I will make sure it finds its way into your stocking this year (However, I have very low levels of consideration for jerkdom, so you likely ARE a jerk and will get nothing. Buy your own comics, cheapskate!) Anyway, Matt Fraction, David Aja, Javier Pulido are jamming a metric shit-ton into each and every issue of this series about the “Avenger that’s just a dude.” They’re joined by Matt Hollingsworth on color and Chris Eliopoulos rocking some sick fonts as letterer.

This is like a really advanced “How-to” comic book. In action scenes the characters MOVE, the colors POP (“Pop-pop!” – Magnitude), and other great stuff happens that I would put in CAPITAL LETTERS. The conversation scenes are also a welcome change from the “copy and paste the same head while borrowing the pacing from a Mamet film” scenes that have invaded comics in the past ten years under the guise of “inventive” and “mature.”

Fraction’s take also quickly expands beyond the “Avenger who’s just a dude” logline into “Avenger who’s just a dude and wants to make up for the crappy things he’s done but might still do more crappy things. Oh, and he has a female sidekick who he probably shouldn’t be a role model for, but it totally works and their relationship is screwed up and sweet, but you can’t help but kind of want them to kiss. Once. Even though she’s barely 18 (can’t wait to see what search results that gets me) and he’s 30 something. Oh, and ARROWS and PURPLE!” Ahem. I believe I got a bit carried away, but I’ve been a big fan of Hawkeye for years, mostly based on his look and a “Captain America can’t tell me what to do!” attitude that had carried over the years since Stan Lee was writing him. So it’s nice to have a GREAT Hawkeye book to back up my love of a character who can often be written pretty crappily (see the past 10 years of comics – Smilin’ Stan).

The Sixth Gun

The Sixth Gun is a western-action-horror (with a smidge of comedy) comic book written by Cullen Bunn with art by Brian Hurtt. Like Hawkeye, its creators know how to do great action, while creating memorable characters that you’ll care about. Drake Sinclair starts out as the typical “man with no name” but quickly becomes “guy with a name and checkered past chock full of self-loathing that maybe has a heart of gold,” and Becky, while starting in the “damsel” role has been slowly growing into her own as well. The first six issues are EPIC and jam packed. Like you’ll feel like the bartender did a couple rounds of buyback. Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, ladies and gents: the generous bartenders of COMICS! Tip them well!

It also has monks with guns, ghouls with guns, creepy hooded guys with guns…AND THE GUNS ARE MAGIC (well, 6 of them).

Some of you might read this rambling premise summary and say “That sounds like a great movie.”

No. Shut up. That would NOT be a great movie. It’s already a great comic book, it doesn’t NEED to be translated to the big screen. None of them do. Didn’t I say shut up already? Shut up.

Saga

Babies giggling! Arms getting cut off! Saga has it all!

No, but seriously, Saga does have it all (most importantly, action und comedy). Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples have BROUGHT the noise and that noise is a Girl Talk-style jam of Action, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Horror, and Comedy. THEN that jam is backing a classic boy meets girl, boy knocks girl up, girl has (girl) baby,  and they all go on the run (in a spaceship) story. It’s a fairytale. It’s a worthy successor to Star Wars (yeah, I said it Star Wars nerds). It’s a damned good comic that’s executed incredibly well.

So that’s part one of this “not a top ten” list! You know where you can buy all of these things, and if you DON’T, then I’ve given you sufficient information for a quick Googling. Part Two to come tomorrow, maybe with some comics I haven’t already written about in the past 6 months.