2007: The Year in Review - The Knave Proclaims the Best of 2007

Here they are, the Knave's annual picks for which comics were the best on the stands.

Best Graphic Novel

The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier

This long-delayed installment to Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's dense journey through (what has now widened from Victorian novels to basically include) all of literature is among the most groundbreaking graphic novels ever published. Armed with a diversity of style, format and dimension, all of which are handled with impressive versatility by both creators, Black Dossier's lack of traditional narrative structure is its greatest asset, as the reader explores a false but familiar universe concocted from our own literary history, a literary history that is enriched by Moore's commentary.

Best Single Issue

Captain America #25

To say it simply: superbly done. "The Death of Captain America" marks the rarest instance in which the sales and the hype, both of which were prodigious, still did not do justice to the excellence of Brubaker and Epting's masterpiece (and I use masterpiece like how they used it in the old guild system of artisans, meaning that Brubaker and Epting have both now achieved the rank of Master Craftsman, not that either of them have created their best work and consequently peaked... oh, nevermind).

Best Book

Justice Society of America

In in extremely tight race for Best Book, since there are several can't miss series in print, it is Geoff Johns' flawless re-integration of Golden Age grandeur into the DC Universe that is truly the finest book on the market, with its sprawling cast, spot-on artwork from Dale Eaglesham and, tipping the scales in its favor, the covers and design work of Alex Ross.

Best Event

52

Civil War edged out 52 last year, before either had finished, and while I don't wish to take anything away from CW, I think that what truly made 52 sing was the back half, the breathless final 20 issues that, after all the set up and exposition, were able to careen toward a riveting conclusion every week without a break. It really did make comics history. Civil War may be remembered as a crossover event that did everything right (and so will, I think, both the superb Sinestro Corps War and X-Men: Messiah CompleX), but 52 will be remembered as a true pioneer of sequential storytelling possibilities.