Comics were real good last year

January 11, 2024 1:16 AM

Comics I Loved In 2023 by Ritesh Babu

The Beat’s 34 Best Comics of 2023 [Comics Beat]
The 25 best comics of 2023 [GamesRadar+]
The best comics of 2023 [Polygon]
The Best Comics and Graphic Novels of 2023 [The Mary Sue]
CBR's Top 100 Comics of 2023 [CBR]

posted by chavenet (15 comments total)

The Best of 2023, as decreed by our contributors [Comics Journal].
posted by Paul Slade at 1:26 AM on January 11 [2 favorites]

So little overlap between the lists! I suppose that shows what a wealth of good stuff is out there.
posted by Phanx at 3:22 AM on January 11 [2 favorites]

My hunch is that prose books of the year lists generally have much more overlap than these. There's even more good stuff and diverse approaches to choose from there, but also more groupthink among reviewers.

I suspect this may have something to do with the fact that the publicity machine is far more developed in prose publishing, which leads to everyone gravitating towards the same handful of approved titles. If you want to find comics you enjoy, you have to be a little more active in seeking them out for yourself.
posted by Paul Slade at 5:32 AM on January 11 [2 favorites]

Thanks for sharing this - I learned about some really cool sounding comics I would not have known about otherwise!
posted by hepta at 7:04 AM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Since lists like these tend to ignore manga for the most part:

The Best and Worst Manga of 2023 (The Manga Critic)

Includes links to many other lists, including that giant Comics Journal one, Comics Beat's best manga of 2023, Okazu's best yuri of 2023, and ANN's best manga and light novels of 2023. I can highly recommend Akane-banashi, for one (free preview), and really need to check out The Summer Hikaru Died.
posted by May Kasahara at 8:34 AM on January 11 [5 favorites]

Here are a few comics I enjoyed this year that I haven't seen on the best-of lists:

Forged - Rucka & Trautmann - clearly influenced by Anne Leckie's Ancillary series, but from the space marines' POV. Fun sci-fi romp

Dai Dark - Q Hayashida - weird, Heavy Metal (both the music genre and the French comic anthology) style sci-fi manga with a dash of cute from the author of Dorohedoro
posted by thecjm at 9:09 AM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Thanks for these—I immediately ordered a copy of Shubeik Lubeik after reading Ritesh Babu's list, and there are a few others that crop up on multiple lists, which has to be a good sign: 20th Century Men, Blood of the Virgin, Roaming, Rare Flavours, Monica, Hungry Ghost, Do a Powerbomb... Roaming seems to rank highly on a few of them. I like Babu's focus on non-supes stuff.
posted by rory at 9:12 AM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Ooh love the desi/POC focus, and these look so good! Can't wait to get my paws on them.
posted by splitpeasoup at 12:40 PM on January 11 [2 favorites]

Thank you for this end of year list roundup, a lot of excellent comic recommendations here.
posted by star gentle uterus at 12:59 PM on January 11 [1 favorite]

I was just googling
"new graphic novels"
"new graphic novels 2023"
"new graphic novels 2024"
yesterday, so this post was perfectly timed for me, thank you! ^_^
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 8:16 PM on January 11 [1 favorite]

Mod note: [btw, this post has been added to the sidebar and Best Of blog!]
posted by taz (staff) at 3:39 AM on January 16

So many good suggestions here. thecjm, I really appreciated the recco for Forged, which I somehow missed; the description of the book includes "an over-the-top pulp adventure of sex, violence, and sci-fi inspired by Conan, Heavy Metal, and other comics you tried to hide from your parents."
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:53 PM on January 16

My copy of Your Wish Is My Command/Shubeik Lubeik turned up and I've read a third of it—it's terrific, just as Babu says. Well worth a look.
posted by rory at 3:02 AM on January 18

Read Shubeik Lubeik on the strength of that endorsement! And my goodness, what a bit of a looking glass experience. It’s a lovely book with wonderful art, it fleshes out Egypt as a real and substantial place, and… that was kind of it for me? A Fine And Beautiful Comic, but not one I feel particularly interested in reading again. Just an interesting gap in tastes. Give it a shot - maybe it will be a a perfect book for you.
posted by Going To Maine at 4:33 PM on January 22

Girl Juice and Roaming both just great, too.
posted by Going To Maine at 9:26 PM on January 28