Thanks to double
shipping by Marvel AND DC, I probably bought the most comics I ever have in a
calendar year to date. I am reading all kinds of comics now and the double shipping
is the bane of my existence. However, that is a discussion for another post.
Now is that time where I try to recall stuff from this past year from my old
man brain.
Anyways, without further
ado, here is my review of 2019.
Dearly Departed (The Comics
I dropped this year)
Before I get into the
rest of my list, a moment of silence for the number of comics that I dropped
this year after giving a good go at it:
- Catwoman - DC
- Mighty Morphin Power Rangers – Boom Studios
- Young Justice – DC
Favorite Comic Book
Movie of 2019
Avengers: Endgame
(Marvel Studios) – There was a lot
of comic movies that came out this year, but I will go with Endgame, simply
because it closed the door on an era. Was it perfect? No. Three hours is a lot
to ask of anyone. However, it gave enough comic book nerd moments that I was
perfectly happy. I just haven’t watched it since cause it is three hours!
Honorable Mentions: Spider-Man: Far From Home (Marvel
Studios), Captain Marvel (Marvel Studios)
Worst Comic Book Movie
of 2019
X-Men: Dark Phoenix
(Fox) – This was the easiest
choice on this list. I had forgotten this movie had happened and with good
reason. I gave my thoughts on this in a past review, but this movie is really bad. I don’t
think I need to spend any more time on it than that. Probably the easiest
choice I will make here.
Honorable Mention: Joker (Warner Brothers)
Favorite Comic Book TV
Show of 2019
The Boys - Season 1
(Amazon Prime) – This came as a
surprise. People kept hounding me to watch it and when I did, I couldn’t stop. It was a nice and tight, 8
episodes. The actors were enjoyable, the story was easy to follow and it was an
all around good show. Not appropriate for kids at all, so if you value yourself
as a parent, don’t show this to them!
Honorable Mentions: Watchmen (HBO)
Worst TV show of 2019
The Punisher – Season 2
(Netflix) – Look, I loved
the first season of the Punisher. For some reason, I really disliked this season. Frank Castle is a
bullet sponge of cartoonish proportions and I just can’t deal. To me,
he’s at his best when he is giving more than he gets. In this season
especially, people are beating the crap out of him left and right. The only super
power he has (and they establish this with flashbacks) is he’s really stubborn.
I think that is it. I didn’t watch Jessica Jones season 3 yet, so this show
takes the dubious spot.
Honorable Mention: N/A. This show sits alone.
The “Oh you still come
out and I buy you” of 2019
Saban’s Go Go Power
Rangers (Boom Studios) –
After the huge crossover they had last year with all the other Power Ranger
characters I know nothing about, I dropped the main book. I kept this book on
the list because it stars the original team of Power Rangers. However, I don’t
know it’s place in the timeline or what they are doing now. I just now I have
it on my list and haven’t dropped it yet. I think more out of laziness and so I
can keep getting the discount at my comic book for the number of titles I
subscribe too. I will drop this and add something else, because my time on this
book has come…
Favorite New Artist of
2019
Javier Garron – Miles
Morales: Spider-Man (Marvel) - This category is misleading. I don’t mean this
artist is new, they are just new to ME. When I saw the issues of Miles Morales:
Spider-Man that started with a new number one, I could tell this guy has it. He
draws the teenagers in the appropriate style for the times, including their
haircuts. It may not sound like a lot, but that is a big deal. For this kind of
story, you did an artist that is at least aware of popular culture. His layout
and action pages are also something to behold. He narrowly edges out Jamal
Campbell, who also put in some great work this year. I think Garron has been
tagged as Marvel’s new wave of “Young Guns”, so that only means we will see
more of his work over time.
Honorable Mentions: Jamal Campbell – Naomi, Far Sector (DC),
Luciano Vecchio - Ironheart (Marvel)
Worst Artist of 2019
Lalit Kumar Sharma –
Daredevil (Marvel) – Lalit filled in
for Marco Checchetto for a few issues on Daredevil and the drop off was
extremely noticeable. There was some bad art this year, but this stood out to
me because everything just looked off. One of the main characters (Mindy
Libris) goes from being skinny to fat within a couple of pages. So that shows
the artist is not consistent. The big two are guilty of just getting artists to
fill in at times, but it was very glaring in this book. The art for this arc
almost made me drop the book completely.
Honorable Mentions: N/A
Favorite Artist of 2019
Pepe Larraz – House of X
(Marvel) - I only saw a few
issues of art from Pepe, but it was definitely worth it. It speaks volume that
the guy who only put out a few issues was far and away my favorite. Don’t get
me wrong, there are now a lot of artists out there that I like, but Pepe is my
new favorite right now. I can’t wait to see more from him and I hope he ends
back up on an X-book.
Honorable Mentions: Khary Randolph - Excellence (Image), R.B.
Silva - Powers of X (Marvel)
Favorite New Writer of
2019
Brandon Thomas –
Excellence (Image) – This is another
guy that has been around for a while, but Excellence is my first exposure to
him. I was compelled enough to write a specific write up about this series after two issues
because of how it impacted me. He has set up a fantastic world in Excellence.
Also, being a black writer, his dialogue feels appropriate for all the
characters. I’ve started to go back and look for other books that he has
written so I can experience more of him. I will keep an eye out.
Honorable Mentions: Bryan Hill (American Carnage)
Worst Writer of 2019
Matthew Rosenberg –
Uncanny X-Men (Marvel) – I
realize that Matthew was in a tough spot. He had to drive the X-Men ship before
the big reboot that Hickman was going to be spearheading. That means the stakes
are low and you can do anything because it will probably be undone anyway. That
gives no excuse for how dull and boring his run was. I hate to say it, but I
was actively bored each issue. It just didn’t feel like X-Men. That combined
with the Resurrection of Phoenix he did last year only shows me that these were
not the right projects for him. This just left a bad taste in my mouth.
Honorable Mentions: – N/A. (I can't remember anyone else that
should be on this list)
Favorite Writer of 2019
Brian Michael Bendis – Superman, Event Leviathan, Naomi,
Young Justice (DC) – I wanted to pick someone else, because I gave
this title to him last year, but he has been so rejuvenated at DC that I can’t
ignore it. I’m loving his Superman run and loved the mini-series, “Event
Leviathan”. He has also put out other titles such as Naomi, Young Justice and
Legion of Super Heroes. He has been very prolific and continued to expand his
reach within DC. He also brings in top artistic talent, so I have to give it to
him. He has really gotten to the core of Superman, while also making it
enjoyable to read. We ended the year with Superman revealing his identity to
the world. I can’t wait to see the impact this has on future stories.
Honorable Mention: Saladin Ahmed (Magnificent Ms. Marvel,
Miles Morales: Spider-Man), Rainbow Rowell (Runaways)
Pleasant Surprise of
2019
Assassin Nation (Image)
– Throughout the year, I
read the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl and got fully caught up in the art of Erica
Henderson. She had a great eye for comedy and I couldn’t get enough. Then I saw
that after Squirrel Girl, she was working on this book. It took me a
while to get the title (it’s a book about assassins). This was just a mini-series,
but it was chock full of humor and gore, in a comedic way. There are double and
triple turns. What would you expect from a bunch of assassins? The book shows
you a ranking system to show who is the top assassin. All the characters had
wonderfully cartoonish personalities. It surprised me how fun it was and I
wished that there had been more.
Honorable Mentions: Excellence (Image)
Shocker of 2019
Walking Dead (comic
series) Ends! - I created this entry
solely to express my absolute shock that the Walking Dead series ended. Also,
that it just ended out of nowhere. It took a huge pair of stones to just end
your cash cow so suddenly. As is Robert Kirkman's way, he had a plan, he just
didn't let us know about it. Nor did he have to. I really respect that. For a
book that constantly kept you on your toes, this was the biggest surprise yet.
He also ended this book at the right time because it had grown stale for years.
He had just created the biggest shocker of all and that is killing the series
main character, Rick Grimes. His death was issue #192 and then issue #193 was
the end of the series with no indication that would be the case. We had just
started to wrap our heads around what the book would look like going forward
and that was taken out of our hands. I meant to talk about this earlier in the
year when it happened and never did. So I just did it now. Because it's my
blog.
Worst Mini-series of
2019
Heroes in Crisis (DC)
– This was a pretty easy
pick too. I get what Tom King was trying to do here. Also, DC trying to tie
this into their line of Crisis events probably doomed this book in my eyes.
This is supposed to be a book about super heroes dealing with PTSD, which I can
imagine they would. However, it got billed as a book that would change things
in the DC Universe. If it had been simply about PTSD and let us see heroes at
their most vulnerable in a case study, this would have been great. Super hero
comics are going to be super hero comics, so you had to have a murder mystery
and involve a bunch of people and then have a convoluted answer to everything.
I wanted to like this book, but I just couldn’t. That’s why it gets this
dubious honor.
Honorable Mentions: Contagion (Marvel)
Favorite Mini-series of
2019
House of X/Powers of X
(Marvel) – The X-Men are BACK,
baby! Well, let me dial it back a bit. It was nice to see the X-Men get a real
push from Marvel and handing over the reigns to Jonathan Hickman. I think he
can get too smart for himself in some of his stories, but he has a style and he
sticks to that. I can appreciate it. The man is who he is. He worked wonders
with the Fantastic Four. I didn’t care for his Avengers stuff, but I knew with
the X-Men, he could do some good. X-Men haven’t been that good for years. In
this series though, he pushes out some bonkers ideas with the X-Men and I love it. It also actually changes their status
quo in the Marvel Universe. Trade paperback is out now, so you should pick it
up.
Honorable Mentions: Event Leviathan (DC), Assassin Nation
(Image)
Favorite New Series of
2019
Bitter Root (Image) – This technically started last year, but
this was probably my favorite new series of 2019 and there was a lot of stiff competition.
This is the book that stood out the most to me though. I loved David Walker and
Sanford Greene’s work on Power Man/Iron Fist over a year ago, so I gladly
followed them on to their next project. This is a series that is ambitious and
sets up a cool world. I don’t like monster stuff that much, but I still liked
what they do here. The art is kinetic as always. The dialogue feels authentic.
The only problem is that we only got a few issues this year, as they are on
hiatus to get more in the can. I think it is also being picked up for a movie
or TV show, so I guess they must be really busy.
Honorable Mentions: Excellence (Image)
Worst Series of 2019
Batman and the Outsiders
(DC) – I hate to put this
here because I really do like Bryan Hill’s writing. Something about this book
has just felt off. The art of Dexter Vines really hasn’t helped either.
Everything about this book makes it feel like a third tier book, which is a
shame. We get Black Lightning leading his own team and it is interesting. It just
feels so rote and most of the cast is the most boring of castoffs from the Bat
Family (excluding Cassandra Cain).
Honorable
Mentions: N/A
Favorite Series of 2019
Outer Darkness (Image) – Given how I have reaped praises on other
books, this may come as a shock, but I really liked this book. I loved John
Layman’s work on “Chew”, so I gladly picked up this new series that he has been
working on. That combined with Afu Chan’s art has made this an enjoyable
series. There has been a lot of world building that has happened and it
continues to get more and more bizarre. I love it. We have characters turning
on each other, a space captain that is a major a-hole and great art. Also, it
combines ghosts and sci-fi in a mashup of genres that work here. Yeah,
I’m all in on this book and the more I write about it is why I consider this my
favorite series of the year over my normal super hero fare. I would recommend
checking this out.
Honorable Mentions: Fantastic Four (Marvel), Runaways
(Marvel), Ironheart (Marvel), Superman (DC)
