A review by caedocyon
The Best American Comics 2010 by Jessica Abel, Neil Gaiman, Matt Madden
3.0
Obviously, some were better than others. There are a few excerpts I might seek out the full versions of, but it's probably more useful in that it got me to read comics I never would have picked up otherwise. Like the Chris Ware comic(s): I've seen his books at the library and flipped through them, but they're so dense and nothing about them managed to capture my attention. I read the entire Acme Novelty Library short story, and by the end I could see why Art Spiegelman likes his work so much (did I mention I saw Art Spiegelman talk recently? because I did; it was pretty awesome), and while I still have no desire to read the rest at least I have some idea what his work is now.
The most memorable one was Norman Eight's Left Arm. It's also the one that held together best as a single story, so much so that when I went back to find the name I was surprised to find that it's also an excerpt.
Some others that were successful as stand-alones which I also liked: Lobster Run, The Alcoholic. Ex Communication was self-contained but also hard to follow, somehow---I found myself having to concentrate and read panels multiple times to figure out what was going on.
The Flood gave me the strongest "wow, I really want to read the rest of this!" feeling.
Scott Pilgrim is obnoxious on many levels, and reading a disjointed scene from it did nothing to change my opinion, but it probably does count as influential. Or something.
The most memorable one was Norman Eight's Left Arm. It's also the one that held together best as a single story, so much so that when I went back to find the name I was surprised to find that it's also an excerpt.
Some others that were successful as stand-alones which I also liked: Lobster Run, The Alcoholic. Ex Communication was self-contained but also hard to follow, somehow---I found myself having to concentrate and read panels multiple times to figure out what was going on.
The Flood gave me the strongest "wow, I really want to read the rest of this!" feeling.
Scott Pilgrim is obnoxious on many levels, and reading a disjointed scene from it did nothing to change my opinion, but it probably does count as influential. Or something.