Comics I'm Thankful For
Happy Thanksgiving! Here are 5 comic books that I am thankful for!
Hello friends!
Since it is November (the month of Thanksgiving in the United States), I figured now would be a great time to discuss some comic books that I’m thankful for. Even though I’m Irish and we don’t celebrate Thanksgiving in Ireland, I still wanted to show my gratitude towards these comic books and why I’m so happy they exist in the world. I have picked five comic books in particular that I have a reason to be legitimately thankful for.
This was a hard list to come up with because there are so many comic books out there that I love but I don’t know if I would say I’m thankful for them. Anyways, without any further delay, let’s get into it!
1. Empowered
To kick off this list, I’m going with the Empowered series by Adam Warren. I love this series so much and I would definitely say that this is my favourite comic book series of all-time. It has everything I love - superheroes, awesome female friendships, girl power, and some smutty scenes here and there too. And it’s just a super fun series overall. I personally love Adam Warren’s manga inspired art style too.
So why am I thankful for Empowered? Well, I read this series back in 2014 and it completely blew me away. I become so addicted to the storytelling and the art style that this series pushed me to want to start making my own comics. My biggest regret is not keeping up with drawing in my early twenties and this series definitely encouraged me to want to make my very own comic one day so I am so thankful for that. Luckily enough, I rediscovered my love for drawing in 2022 and I fell back in love with drawing again.
Even though it took a couple of years for me to figure out just how much I loved drawing and how much I wanted to become a comic book creator, I’m so glad I read Empowered when I did. It was so inspiring to see one person (in this case, Adam Warren) do everything by himself - the writing, the illustrations, everything! So yes, I do owe a lot of the Empowered series by Adam Warren and I definitely think you should read it if you love superhero satirical comedy.
I discuss this comic book series in more detail in my ‘Top 10 Comics’ blog post if you want to check that out. You can read it here:
2. Spider-Man: Blue
The next pick on my list is Spider-Man: Blue by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale. I wouldn’t call myself the biggest Spider-Man fan in the world but this particular Spider-Man comic gave me chills the first time I read it. It’s a story that has never left me and I think that’s what makes a great comic - when you just can’t stop thinking about it after finishing it.
Spider-Man: Blue is a story that deals with so many themes I really resonate with such as grief, death, regret, loss, and coming to terms with accepting your mistakes and learning to move on after something horrible has happened to you. In this comic, it’s Valentine’s Day, and Peter Parker is looking back on his past relationship with Gwen Stacy - how they met, how they fell in love, and how she died at the hands of the Green Goblin. It’s a very melancholic story but there is so much hope in it too which I love. One of my favourite comic books for sure and a comic book I will be forever thankful for.
If you’d like to read more on my thoughts on Spider-Man: Blue, you can check out this blog post where I talk about the importance of good storytelling in comics:
3. The Crow
I also talked about my love for James O’Barr’s The Crow in my ‘Top 10 Comics’ blog post so I won’t go into too much detail here but The Crow is a very special graphic novel to me. I read The Crow for the first time in 2015 which was the year my sister passed away. This graphic novel helped me so much during that time because it helped me to deal with the grief and sadness I was feeling towards my sister’s death.
If you’ve never read The Crow before, I cannot recommend it enough. It’s beautiful, it’s fantastical, it’s tragic, and it’s weirdly comforting in ways. The main character, Eric Draven, is resurrected by a creature called The Crow, after he and his girlfriend are brutally murdered by a gang. With his new powers granted to him by The Crow, Eric plots his revenge against the members of the gang who stole his life away from him. I love this graphic novel so much and James O’Barr’s artwork is breathtaking. I owe so much to The Crow and I will always recommend it to people whenever I can.
4. Ghost World
So Ghost World by Daniel Clowes is another one of those graphic novels that I read back in 2014 that made me want to create my own comic books one day much like Empowered did. I remember reading this story and just relating so much to Enid, the main character, as well as falling in love with Daniel Clowes’ incredible writing and illustration style.
Ghost World is a story that I always go back to and reread just because I love it so much and it definitely pushed me to want to start writing and drawing my own comics. Like I mentioned before, I do deeply regret not getting back into drawing earlier in my life. Ghost World was one of those graphic novels that made me appreciate the beauty of comic books and how comic books can tell such a vivid and interesting story.
5. Heartstopper
Heartstopper by Alice Oseman is a very recent read for me but I am so thankful it exists. This is a graphic novel series that I wish I had read back when I was teenager. It is a young adult coming-of-age contemporary graphic novel series about two boys, Nick and Charlie, who meet at a British all-boys secondary school, and who eventually fall in love with one another.
This story is just so sweet and cute and wholesome and is bursting with unapologetic queer joy. I love it so much. Alice Oseman is probably one of my new favourite cartoonists and I absolutely adore her simplistic sketchy art style. I think it fits really well with the story she was trying to tell. If you haven’t read Heartstopper yet, please do. You won’t regret it.
What comic books are you thankful for? Let me know!
As always, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to read this and I hope you all enjoy the rest of your day!
Love,
Laura-Louise xoxo
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Very cool to see your inspirations! 😄
Unfortunately, Spider-Man: Blue is the only one that I've read on this list, I'll have to try and check out the others!
I read Blue not long after I had read The Death of Gwen Stacy, and I thought that Blue was a very good expansion of the latter (as well as being a good retelling of the romantic story of Peter and Gwen)!
As for me, I'm thankful for Ultimate Spider-Man (for getting me into Marvel and DC style superhero comics) and Kingdom Come. If we're counting manga as well, then also Dragon Ball for getting me into comics in general! 😄