In today’s 2011 in Review segment, we take a look at our choices for Best Graphic Novel.
This was a year that was highlighted by some ridiculously high profile releases (Craig Thompson, anyone?), some sneaky joints from some of our favorite publishers, and a whole lot more. We’ve got our picks for the top five(ish) after the jump, and beware because this is one of the categories that could easily change in six months. But for now, this feels right.
Thanks to Tim Daniel for the sweet 2011 in Review logo. You’re a champ!
5 (tie). Mark Twain’s Autobiography 1910 – 2010
Why it makes the list (Mike Romeo): One of the year’s best graphic novels certainly caught me by surprise. It came to my attention last fall, when I found Michael Kupperman in full Mark Twain regalia signing stacks of lovely, blue hardcovers at New York Comic Con. At that point, I had a passing familiarity with Kupperman, mostly because of his brilliantly titled Tales Designed to Thrizzle. He’s a funny guy. A funny, brilliant guy.
Mark Twain’s Autobiography 1910-2010 takes a look at the last century of Twain’s life. It reveals that he’s been cursed by a wizard to live forever, but cannot tell the tale of how that came to be for 1,000 years. It’s quite a predicament, as you can imagine, but it will take much more than a wizard to slow our hero. In these pages you’ll see Twain run head long into The Great Depression, World War II, an alien space ship, a castle full of monsters in the heart of Nazi Germany, and a doughnut shoppe. He grifts, dances, discovers rock ‘n roll, hypnotizes, and appears in some of America’s most popular sitcoms.
Part prose, part two color comic, this beautiful hardcover is a fanciful romp through history the way I wish it really was. I can hardly wait for the next hundred years to pass so we ca get the next installment.
“The report of my death was an exaggeration.” -Mark Twain, May 1897
5 (tie). Prison Pit: Book Three
Why it makes the list (Patrick Tobin): Prison Pit is the black metal of comics. It exists within its own side universe of influence and ambition, its lo-fi ethos at odds with the sweeping scope of its story. At the same, time, Prison Pit Volume 3 is 100-something pages of beefy men getting into violent, sexual fistfights. It’s the “Women in Love” wrestling scene on the worst drugs Dr. Benway has to offer. It’s a high school miscreant’s morbid fascination with violence and death set in the framework of a mature and skilled cartoonist’s technique. If it doesn’t make you sick, you shouldn’t be allowed to walk among the public in the first place. If it doesn’t make you giddy for the next one, you don’t deserve comics.
4. Hellboy: House of the Living Dead
Why it makes the list (David Harper): This graphic novel is the continuation of the Hellboy in Mexico one-shot from 2010, and, like that story, is quite brilliant in a way that really only Hellboy stories are. Written by Mike Mignola and illustrated by Richard Corben, this story is an engaging and emotionally-rich story from beginning to end, and it brings to light all of the strengths of Mignola’s monster movie influences.
We know that Mignola will continue to mine the fertile ground of Mexico for future Hellboy stories (from his past), and if they are any where near as good as this one, I can say I for one will be all over them.
3. Infinite Kung Fu
Why it makes the list (Matt Meylikhov): The kung fu/wandering ronin story is a cultural staple, and has been since before I was born. In fact, growing up in the suburbs, the realm of kung fu was actually one of the most popular staples for escapism between myself and my friends. We’d go to karate class in the afternoon, kick the air for a while, and return home to hang out and watch these over the top but exciting movies of assassins and ninjas and samurai, all battling for purposes unknown. Movies like Shogun Assassin, Enter the Dragon and Mortal Kombat (yes, you heard me correctly) were all staples of excitement, and growing up and seeing films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, the Matrix and Kill Bill all actively delighted in their ability to blend culture and fantasy.
Infinite Kung Fu basically takes everything I’ve ever liked about the sub-genre and blends it all together for a smorgasbord of excellence — and I mean that in the most literal way imaginable. The book has everything in it: epic quests, zombies, immortal kung fu masters, ludicrous styles of fighting, chi, cross-cultural blending, shogun, ronin, and a clear tribute to Jim Kelly. All of it amounts to some of the most fun you can have in an epic comic story this year, as the book moves from both a humorous pastiche to a serious drama in the span of a panel or a page. From its unassuming beginning to its dramatic conclusion, Infinite Kung Fu is a straight up punch to the face in the best of ways possible, as every great comic should be.
2. One Soul
Why it makes the list (Matt Meylikhov): The sequential art medium is an incredibly powerful one, boasting abilities that just aren’t available in other forms of entertainment. By sequestering individual moments to panels framed to the mind’s eye of a creator, art suddenly transfers from a single realm of function to one with a more fluid process of design. We get to view pieces of life and stopped moments in time that still remain in motion, and when jam packed together all of these individual singular moments evolve to create one longer fluid piece.
The stereotype goes, however, that when speaking of “comic books,” we’re often just speaking of men in tights, who fly around and punch each other over stupid black-and-white reasons of good against evil — but Ray Fawkes efficiently proved this year just how wrong that stereotype is. Laying out the book with 9 panels per page in a 3×3 format, Fawkes’ One Soul followed the lives of 18 unconnected characters as they grew from infancy to old age, or somewhere in between. These characters, unaware of the others’ existences and separated by culture and time periods, all showed life in its most unadulterated and painfully human form, moving from moment to moment as the embodiment of ideals. Some made it to old age and some didn’t, but each one offered a different yet unified look at the curiosity of life on this planet as we live it, as certain events overlapped and other moments became curiously synchronized.
The books’ final message became beautifully illuminated by the end of the book as the final few remaining characters struggled to survive in a world not of their choosing, and One Soul revealed itself as a stalwart meditation on life, the universe and everything. Fawkes’ work with this one book stands as one of the most brilliantly heartbreaking representation of the fleeting sadness of the human condition for this year, and is an absolute must have/an important example of artistic possibility for anyone who wants to even attempt to take the sequential medium seriously.
1. Habibi
Why it makes the list (David Harper): I don’t know if you guys heard about this book, but I think this Craig Thompson guy is going to go places.
Continued belowThompson had previously crafted one of the most well-received works in the medium in Blankets (at least in terms of those ones that made it to a wide audience), and he’d been crafting this follow-up for since its release in 2003 more or less. And you can see the time and effort he put in on these pages, as this is a real labor of love about love, religion, humanity, the effect of stories on everyone, and a range of other themes.
Artistically, it’s the most gorgeous book I read this year, with compositions and layouts weaving together effortlessly and with endless depth and detail. A page is a story unto itself, and this is a book that has a lot of pages.
It’s an outrageous success, and worth every bit of time Thompson spent on it. As great as this year was in comics, Habibi might have been the best thing I read in all of comics all year, and it makes me all the more excited to see what Thompson will be up to next.
