Many obscure, exceptional works from legendary creators like Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, and Stan Lee showcase why they’re the best in comics.
Comics is a creator's field. Sure, there are fans of Marvel, DC Comics, Image Comics, and more, but in the end the creators are what make the comics so special. The greatest comic creators have put out brilliant stories, and had star-making turns that turned them into voices that everyone wants to hear. Their best works have made them into fan-favorites.
However, many of these creators have fantastic works that aren't as well known as the ones that made them famous. Some of them are better known than others, but all of them are worth checking out, as they showcase these creators doing what they do best.
Saga is up there with the best sci-fi comics of all time, but writer Brian K. Vaughan built up quite a career before it. Y: The Last Man was his biggest break, but while he was writing that, he was also doing Ex Machina, with artist Tony S. Harris. Published by DC/Wildstorm, the book took place in a world where there was only one superhero, the Great Machine.
The book follows the former hero, Mitchell Hundred, as mayor of a post-9/11 New York City. It takes place both in the present and past, outlining Hundred's life and how each of his lives affects the other. It's a brilliant piece of superhero fiction.
Stan Lee helped create the Marvel Universe in the Silver Age. He was at his best when working with creators like Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, John Romita, and others who brought something unique to the work. For most, Stan's greatest work was in the '60s, and there's really nothing else that a reader needs to hunt down.
These are people who never read Silver Surfer: Parable. Lee worked with legendary French artist Jean Giraud, aka Moebius. The two-issue story sees Galactus return to devour Earth, with only the Silver Surfer standing in his way. Not only is it Lee's best latter-day work, but it ranks up there with the best stuff he's ever written, with Moebius's amazing art bringing it all to life beautifully.
Jonathan Hickman is considered to be a superhero writing genius, melding his vast knowledge of their history with sci-fi concepts and amazing characterization. His early work for Image Comics showed off how formidable a talent he was. It's hard to pick just one of these books to pinpoint, but The Nightly News is probably the superior one.
Written and drawn by Hickman, The Nightly News centers on the Voice, a terrorist group out to fight against the news media. The story uses actual facts about the news media and their wrongdoings, making it a very powerful work. It's a brilliant white-knuckle thriller and a lesson on the wrongs of the news media.
Alan Moore has put out brilliant horror, out-of-this-world sci-fi, and amazing epics, especially after leaving DC and the mainstream forever. Moore is a legend because of comics like Watchmen, V Is For Vendetta, Swamp Thing, and From Hell. However, the book he worked on the longest was the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series, alongside the late, great artist Kevin O'Neill.
LotG created an entire shared universe of literature, movies, and TV shows. It's not as groundbreaking as some of Moore's other works, but it's extraordinarily fun. It's easy to see the love that Moore and O'Neill had for classic literature on every page. It's telling that LotG was where he did his final work in comics.
Marvel has some great twelve-issue stories, and an amazing one is The Twelve, by writer J. Michael Straczynski and writer Chris Weston. Straczynski is the creator of Babylon 5 and wrote the best The Amazing Spider-Man run of the 21st century. Weston is a superstar British artist that's worked with the best of the UK and the US.
The Twelve stars obscure Marvel Golden Age heroes waking up in the present. It's an amazing ride that highlights the humanity and the alienness of each hero. It's full of casually brilliant writing and art and will give readers a new obsession.
Image's founders upended the comic industry. The seven of them all launched books, but Jim Lee tired of his WildC.A.T.s. So, he put out an entirely new book in 1997, Divine Right: The Adventures of Max Faraday. Lee wrote and drew the series and published it on his Wildstorm imprint. It was his last work before selling the company to DC and leaving Image.
The book follows multiple forces trying to get their hands on the Creation Wheel, when Max Faraday gains amazing powers. The twelve-issue story starred many characters from around the Wildstorm universe and wasn't a massive hit, but the art is amazing. Like many older Image books, the art is the star. The comic is out of print, but it's worth finding.
DC has mastered the 12-issue series, with some of the best comics of all time running for 12 issues. Writer Tom King is known for 12-issue masterpieces, but his first is still one of his best. Omega Men, with art by Barnaby Bagenda, followed the titular group as they fought a violent insurgency against the rulers of the Vega Sector.
Omega Men isn't a superhero book, although superheroes are in it. It's about the realities of guerilla warfare and the effect it has on people and society. It's definitely in King's wheelhouse and would show off how he'd treat superheroes later in his career.
Kieron Gillen is currently killing it at Marvel. He's writing Immortal X-Men and is responsible for A.X.E. Judgment Day, Sins of Sinister #1, and Eternals since he returned to the publisher. His long-time artistic partner Jamie McKelvie is also a legend, recently drawing Batman: One Bad Day: Catwoman. The two have teamed up often, but many fans loved their work on Phonogram the most.
The three-volume Image series follows British phonomancers, magicians who use pop music as the basis for their runic magic. It's an amazingly inventive series that combines amazing characters with fun plots, beautiful art, and endless excellent soundtracks.
The Sandman is brilliant. The book made writer Neil Gaiman a star and is his most well-known work in comics. However, there are plenty of excellent Gaiman comics out there, including a few from Marvel. 1602, with artist Andy Kubert, is his most interesting pre-Miracleman Marvel work.
The book takes place in the titular year and has the Marvel Universe's Silver Age characters show up during Queen Elizabeth I's reign. It's a weird take on the characters, but it works. Gaiman is able to capture the familiarity of Marvel and weld it to an entirely different time period and it's completely flawless. On top of that, Andy Kubert's art is never anything less than beautiful.
Grant Morrison is a comics' wunderkind. Working at DC, Marvel, and every major comic company, they've created amazing superhero epics like no other. Their non-superhero work is also top-notch, with Morrison often throwing in autobiographical flourishes. There is a treasure trove of great Morrison comics, but few are as underrated as Kill Your Boyfriend.
Working with artist Phillip Bond, the book tells the story of a middle-class British schoolgirl who falls for a bad boy and goes on a drug and sex-fueled romp through '90s England. It's pure '90s Morrison madness. The one-shot is unlike any other Morrison book out there.
David Harth has been reading comics for close to 30 years. He writes for several websites, makes killer pizza, goes to Disney World more than his budget allows, and has the cutest daughter in the world. He can prove it. Follow him on Twitter- https://www.twitter.com/harth_david.
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