To celebrate the end of the year, the staff of Sequential Planet will be listing their favorite things from 2019! Below are some of Tariq’s favorite picks of the year.
Comic Books
Best Series: Immortal Hulk
Was there really any question? Al Ewing completely rewrote the rules of the Hulk and continues to craft an amazing story. Each issue of this series brought something interesting and intriguing. The Jade Giant’s series continues to be amazing and I look forward to where it goes in the new year.
Honorable Mentions: X-Men, The Flash, Justice League, Amazing Spider-Man
Best Writer: Jonathan Hickman
For those who don’t know, the X-Men is one of my favorite teams. In recent years, the team hasn’t been doing so well as a whole. For every good X-Men series, there was another series killing off major characters. And then 2018’s Uncanny X-Men was riddled with controversy (the badly written death of Rahne Sinclair for starters). Just when there seemed to be no hope for the X-Men, Jonathan Hickman was announced to be on the books. He made the X-Men a household name again and undid almost an entire decade of bad X-related decisions. Mutants are united, almost every character that died has come back, and all the new series that came from the Dawn of X line have all been great.
Honorable Mentions: Donny Cates, Tom Taylor, Chip Zdarsky, Scott Snyder, Tom King
Best Artist: Pepe Larraz
Pepe Larraz became one of my favorite X-Men artists of all time. This year was a great art year, and it was pretty tough trying to pick my favorite artist. I picked Larraz because House of X #1 was just gorgeous. As the start of the new era of X-Men, it needed to be strong narratively and artistically. Hickman killed it storywise, and Larraz’s art was strong.
Honorable Mentions: Stjepan Sejic, Joe Bennet, Sana Takeda
Best New Series: Lois Lane
I had no doubts that the Lois Lane book was going to be good. I love her as a character and seeing her finally headline a book that wasn’t titled “Superman’s Girlfriend” was great. This book not only made me love Lois even more, but it reinvigorated my love for the Question. We see Superman as just a supporting character and seeing him trust his wife to handle things was a great way to show their relationship.
Honorable Mentions: Harleen, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Tales from the Dark Multiverse
Best New Series: Daredevil
Chip Zdarsky is amazing.
Oh, was I supposed to continue? I’m of the mind that Daredevil hasn’t really had a bad run, but of course, some runs are better than others. Zdarsky’s run on Daredevil rolled with everything established previously but brings in so much more. Daredevil is more into his mental state here than he has been in a while, and it really strengthens the series.
Honorable Mentions: Aquaman by Kelly Sue Deconnick, Venom by Donny Cates
Best Issue: Batman Annual #4
Alfred is the heart of the Batfamily, can we all agree? Seeing Batman’s adventures through the eyes of Alfred gives the parental pride that I love seeing. Tom King has consistently done a good job on Batman, and I honestly do like his run. His annuals are all on a different level, and they are each so much more than almost anything in the main series (except the double date issue, that’s forever my favorite thing to come from the run).
Honorable Mentions: House of X #2, The Wicked + The Divine #45
Best Miniseries: DCeased
I hate zombies. I’ve always hated zombies and zombie-related products. I just hate the concept, it always seemed boring to me. But every once in a while, there’s some zombie product out there that makes me interested. Zombieland and Dawn of the Dead for starters were some of the first zombie-related media that I ever watched that I enjoyed. This year, Tom Taylor wrote DCeased. I trust Tom Taylor. So I decided to pick up the book, and I loved it. It made me actually interested in zombies, and the story was really interesting. Nothing and no one was safe, and I really appreciated the unpredictability of the series.
Honorable Mentions: House/Powers of X, Silver Surfer: Black, Flash Forward, Symbiote Spider-Man