Gutter Talk's Recommended Reading List

Okay, so I've got this friend who sometimes asks me to recommend comics that I think he should read.  For him, and for anyone else who may chose to heed my wisdom, I present the following list of some of my favorite comics.  The ones I've written about previously on this blog are linked to.  I'll be adding to this list from time to time as I think of more comics that belong on it, and I'll add links for comics already on the list should I get around to writing about them.
I've disallowed comments on this page, but I do want to hear your opinions of the list.  Please leave any comments, criticisms, or suggestions here.

Super-Hero Comics:

  • Grant Morrison's Action Comics
  • Grant Morrison's Animal Man 
  • Ambush Bug (except for Year None
  • The Authority #1-#12 by Warren Ellis, Brian Hitch and Paul Neary
  • Roy Thomas' Avengers (#35-#105)
  • Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle's Batman stories (beginning in Detective Comics, moving on to Batman, and finally to Batman: Shadow of the Bat)
  • Batman and the Outsiders
  • Batman: A New Dawn
  • The Brave and the Bold especially #198-#131
  • Blue Devil (from the preview in Fury of Firestorm #24 to about BD #19)
  • Booster Gold (First Series) 
  • Clan Destine #1-#8 written and drawn by Alan Davis
  • Crisis On Infinite Earths
  • Daredevil: Born Again
  • Deadshot
  • Mike W. Barr and Alan Davis' Detective Comics 
  • Jack Kirby's The Eternals
  • Dr. Fate by J.M. DeMatteis
  • Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol 
  • Keith Giffen's Doom Patrol
  • Earth-2 #1-#16
  • Fantastic Four by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
  • Flex Mentallo
  • Green Arrow Mini-Series (1983)
  • Green Arrow by Mike Grell
  • Green Arrow: Quiver
  • Green Lantern  co-starring Green Arrow by O'Neil and Adams
  • Green Lantern #194-#200
  • Green Lantern: The Road Back (Green Lantern [Vol. 3] #1-#8)
  • Hawkworld
  • JLA by Grant Morrison
  • Peter David's Incredible Hulk--The Pantheon Era (#372-#425)
  • Keith Giffen's Justice League books 
  • The Last Days of Animal Man 
  • Legion of Super-Heroes by Keith Giffen and Tom and Mary Bierbaum*
  • The New Teen Titans by Marv Wolfman and George Perez
  • OMAC (New 52 Version)
  • Power and Glory by Howard Chaykin
  • Secret Six
  • The Superman stories of Alan Moore
  • The Spectre by John Ostrander and Tom Mandrake
  • Spider-Man: Kraven's Last Hunt (a.k.a. "Fearful Symmetry") 
  • Chris Claremont and John Byrne's Uncanny X-Men
  • Untold Legend of the Batman
  • Xombi

Non-Super-Hero Comics:

  • The Adventures of Barry Ween: Boy Genius
  • Amelia Rules 
  • Howard Chaykin's American Flagg
  • American Splendor
  • Blink (Max Ink's comic, not the Malcolm Gladwell book)
  • Bloom County: The Complete Library
  • Box Office Poison
  • about half of Dave Sim's Cerebus (#26-#200 including #0, from "High Society" through "Minds")
  • Clan Apis
  • Dog and Pony Show as well as everything else by Pam Bliss
  • Ghost World
  •  Grimjack 
  • Hopeless Savages
  • The Influencing Machine 
  • Jon Sable, Freelance written and drawn by Mike Grell
  • The Kents by John Ostrander
  • Milk and Cheese
  • Rat by Rich Watson
  •  Sandman 
  • The Sandwalk Adventures 
  • Transmetropolitan 
  • True Story Swear To God
  • Understanding Comics and Making Comics by Scott McCloud
  • Wasteland by John Ostrander, Del Close and various artists
  • With Only Five Plums
  • Why I Hate Saturn
(* Giffen's Legion gets an asterisk because I haven't actually read the entire run.  It remains uncollected and has proven rather difficult to track down in the back issue bins I've scoured across the great city of Columbus, Ohio.  Nonetheless, based on the few issues of the series I have read, I'm prepared to go out on a limb and include it on this list.)