Sunday, February 14, 2010

Update to the Best Comics of 2009 Meta-List

2005 Meta-List | 2006 Meta-List | 2007 Meta-List
2008 Meta-List
| 2009 Meta-List

After I posted the Best Comics of 2009 Meta-List, I found fifteen more lists to add to the original 130 lists.  So here's an updated Meta-List, along with some comments on the changes.

Rank Title Points
1 Asterios Polyp, by David Mazzucchelli 5315.23
2 Parker: The Hunter, by Darwyn Cooke 1785.29
3 Pluto, by Naoki Urasawa 1659.3
4 George Sprott: 1894-1975, by Seth 1637.17
5 Monsters, by Ken Dahl 1532.88
6 Detective Comics, by Greg Rucka and J.H. Williams III 1430.86
7 A Drifting Life, by Yoshihiro Tatsumi 1373.98
8 The Book of Genesis Illustrated, by Robert Crumb 1090.39
9 Scott Pilgrim vs. The Universe, by Bryan Lee O'Malley 1089.8
10 Stitches, by David Small 1072.89
11 Scalped, by Jason Aaron and R.M. Guera 1041.31
12 The Photographer, by Emmanuel Guibert and Didier Lefevre 964.25
13 Batman and Robin, by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely 878.55
14 You'll Never Know: A Good and Decent Man, by Carol Tyler 868.63
15 Chew, by John Layman and Rob Guillory 824.27
16 A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge, by Josh Neufeld 774.21
17 Pim & Francie: The Golden Bear Days, by Al Columbia 757.48
18 The Mourning Star vol. 2, by Kazmir Strzepek 738.63
19 Footnotes in Gaza, by Joe Sacco 663.75
20 Johnny Hiro, by Fred Chao 662.87
21 20th Century Boys, by Naoki Urasawa 591.98
22 Tales Designed to Thrizzle, by Michael Kupperman 567.8
23 Driven by Lemons, by Joshua Cotter 539.97
24 The Complete Jack Survives, by Jerry Moriarty 497.19
25 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man, by Matt Kindt 495.22
26 Masterpiece Comics, by R. Sikoryak 487.8
27 Far Arden, by Kevin Cannon 481.28
28 Wednesday Comics, by various 480.75
29 I Kill Giants, by Joe Kelly and J.M. Ken Niimura 479.06
30 All Star Superman vol. 2, by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely 468.75
31 The Muppet Show, by Roger Langridge 450.76
32 The Squirrel Machine, by Hans Rickheit 447.06
33 Incredible Hercules, by Greg Pak, Fred Van Lente, and others 445.33
34 Daredevil, by various 443.83
35 Prison Pit, by Johnny Ryan 435.32
36 The Complete Essex County, by Jeff Lemire 433.17
37 Cecil and Jordan in New York: Stories, by Gabrielle Bell 411.89
38 King City, by Brandon Graham 405.95
39 The Unwritten, by Mike Carey and Peter Gross 392.7
40 The Act-I-Vate Primer, by various 384.19
41 Ex Machina, by Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris 382.46
42 Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth, by Apostolos Doxiadis, Christos Papadimitriou, Alecos Papdatos, and Annie Di Donna 380
43 Little Nothings vol. 2, by Lewis Trondheim 376.92
44 The Umbrella Academy vol. 2: Dallas, by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba 374.14
45 The Unknown Soldier, by Joshua Dysart and Alberto Ponticelli 365.34
46 Beasts of Burden, by Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson 352.95
47 The Eternal Smile, by Gene Luen Yang and Derek Kirk Kim 351.27
48 Ochre Ellipse #3, by Jonas Madden-Connor 348.35
49 B.P.R.D., by Mike Mignola, John Arcudi, Guy Davis, Fabio Moon, and Gabriel Ba 348.11
50 League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Century: 1910, by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill 342.6
51 Ganges #3, by Kevin Huizenga 338.13
52 Incognito, by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips 336.22
53 Phonogram: The Singles Club, by Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie 335.35
54 Blackest Night, by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis 334.98
55 Gogo Monster, by Taiyo Matsumoto 334.11
56 Northlanders, by Brian Wood and Leandro Fernandez 328.35
57 Oishinbo, by Tetsu Kariya and Akira Hanasaki 328.19
58 Seaguy: The Slaves of Mickey Eye, by Grant Morrison and Cameron Stewart 325.88
59 The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young 325.66
60 Criminal, by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips 319.6
61 Luba, by Gilbert Hernandez 318.9
62 Jonah Hex, by Justin Gray, Jimmy Palmiotti, and others 318.52
63 Mouse Guard: Winter 1152, by David Peterson 308.61
64 Invincible Iron Man, by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larocca 295.4
65 Planetary #27, by Warren Ellis and John Cassaday 285.37
66 Grandville, by Bryan Talbot 279.97
67 The Color of Earth/Water/Heaven, by Dong Hwa Kim 274.6
68 Amazing Spider-Man, by various 270.67
69 Green Lantern, by Geoff Johns and Doug Mahnke 270
70 Irredeemable, by Mark Waid and Peter Krause 268.34
71 Captain Britain and MI-13, by Paul Cornell and Leonard Kirk 267.29
72 Ball Peen Hammer, by Adam Rapp and George O'Connor 263.35
72 Bodyworld, by Dash Shaw 263.35
74 The TOON Treasury of Classic Children's Comics, by various 261.94
75 I Want You, by Lisa Hanawalt 245.96
76 Everybody Is Stupid Except For Me, by Peter Bagge 240.97
77 The Winter Men, by Brett Lewis and John Paul Leon 240.53
78 Sugarcube, by Sam Gaskin 238.35
79 Just So You Know #1, by Joey Sayers 238.34
80 The Bun Field, by Amanda Vahamaki 236.68
81 Thor, by J. Michael Straczynski and various 226.67
82 Locas II: Maggie, Hopey, & Ray, by Jaime Hernandez 222.22
83 Low Moon, by Jason 220.03
84 Powers, by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming 220.01
85 Agents of Atlas, by Jeff Parker and others 219.59
86 Sweet Tooth, by Jeff Lemire 216.47
87 Another Glorious Day at the Nothing Factory, by Eroyn Franklin 210.84
88 Adventures in Cartooning, by James Sturm, Alexis Frederick-Frost, and Andrew Arnold 210
89 Funny Misshapen Body, by Jeffrey Brown 209.54
90 The Walking Dead, by Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard 206.93
91 Kramers Ergot #7, by various 206.27
92 Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary, by Justin Green 203.55
93 Final Crisis, by Grant Morrison, J.G. Jones, and Doug Mahnke 202.87
94 The Natural World, by Damien Jay 201.68
95 Popeye vol. 4: Plunder Island, by E.C. Segar 201.23
96 The John Stanley Library: Melvin the Monster, by John Stanley 201.05
97 Nine Ways to Disappear, by Lilli Carre 199.58
98 Like a Dog, by Zak Sally 195.13
99 Sandman: The Dream Hunters, by Neil Gaiman and P. Craig Russell 194.58
100 Young Liars, by David Lapham 194.57


Comments:
The data from the new lists has moved some books around on the Meta-List.  Here's a breakdown of some of the changes:
  • The Top Ten:  Pluto (was #4, now #3) swaps places with George Sprott (was #3, now #4).  Monsters (was #6, now #5) and Detective Comics (was #7, now #6) overtake A Drifting Life (was #5, now #7), and The Book of Genesis gets bumped up two places (was #10, now #8) while Stitches drops two places (was #8, now #10).
  • Big Movers: Footnotes in Gaza (perhaps benefiting from now having been around long enough to have been read by the new list-makers), steps up ten places (was #29, now #19); Incredible Hercules lumbers all the way from #68 up to #33 (and in the process becomes Marvel's highest-ranking book); Prison Pit oozes from #69 up to #35; King City sneaks from #61 up to #38; Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth searches from #59 to #42; and Grandville hustles from #90 up to #66.
  • New Books: Eight new entries crack into the list: Beasts of Burden (way up there at #46), Thor (#81), Powers (#84), Agents of Atlas (#85), Final Crisis (#93), Like a Dog (#98), Sandman: The Dream Hunters (#99), and Young Liars (#100).  These newcomers bump eight other comics out of the top 100, including Alec: The Years Have Pants and You Are There.
The Meta-List now includes data from the following lists:
Acro's Thoughts
Bully Says: Comics Oughta Be Fun!
But Before I Kill You (Stefan Young)
Forbidden Planet (Joe Gordon)
Happpysad (Darryl Ayo Brathwaite)
Jackie Tam
Library Journal (Martha Cornog and Steve Raiteri)
Panel Patter
Paul Gravett
The Comics Journal (Rob Clough)
The Last Comic Blog
Warren Peace Sings the Blues (Matthew Brady)
Wednesday's Child (Paul DeBenedetto)
Yet Another Comics Blog (Dave Carter)
Zack Soto

Other "Best Comics of the Year" Meta-Lists:
2005 Meta-List | 2006 Meta-List | 2007 Meta-List
2008 Meta-List
| 2009 Meta-List

2 comments:

  1. Sandy, thanks for your hard work! Would you mind listing what other titles got bumped?

    Any theory as to how a latecomer like Footnotes went up while a latecomer like Alec went down?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks Sean. In addition to Alec and You Are There, the books that got booted off were James Jean's PR3, Geoff Johns and Gary Frank's Superman: Secret Origin, Scott Campbell's Double Fine Action Comics, Harvey Kurtzman's Humbug, Dan Clowes's Mister Wonderful, and Jack Kirby's OMAC.

    Those last four books had all received exactly 183.35 points, which means that for each book, one person had ranked that book as #1 on a list of only 5 books. That's the most points that a person could give to any one book. Now that those four have been bumped off, every book on the Meta-List appears on at least two individual "best comics of 2009" lists.

    As for the difference between Footnotes vs. Alec, it seems to me that Alec just hasn't caught on in the comics blogosphere in the same way that Footnotes has (I can't remember seeing a single review of Alec), which might mean that the people writing more recent "best of" lists didn't feel like they had to track down Alec before posting their list.

    ReplyDelete