Which manga is good as or better than Watchmen or Sandman?

[Mister Mets]

Is this some kind of joke?

Have you seen the bricks of BERSERK lately?



So say you don't know manga then.



You are aware that comics professionals rate Carl Barks' comics above Moore and Gaiman and most anything, right? And that these comics have had an exceptional influence across different art mediums?

Your assumption that Tezuka is good like Carl Barks (while correct in that Tezuka merits the same status) runs on several false assumptions at once.

I don't know if the Berserk tomes are quite on the level of the absolute editions in terms of presentation. It's a nice looking hardcover, but the Absolute editions go beyond that.

Obviously, there are gaps in my experience. This would be the case of most consumers of culture. That said, I'm reasonably familiar with manga, which should be evident from a post in which I echoed someone's recommendation of 2,001 Nights.

I am unaware that most comics pros rate Barks' Scrooge above Watchmen or Sandman. I know they admire the work, but I've yet to see any polling on comics professionals on this specific question.

We're not talking about influence here. There's overlap between perceived quality and influence but these are slightly different questions.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I don't know if the Berserk tomes are quite on the level of the absolute editions in terms of presentation.

It's a big shiny hardbound looking package. That's all Absolute Editions are.

It's a nice looking hardcover, but the Absolute editions go beyond that.

You are aware that 'Absolute Editions' are essentially marketing editions to bilk money off collectors right? You are acting like it's the Criterion Collection of comics, or the Library of Congress editions, when stuff like Identity Crisis or Geoff Johns garbage get Absolute Editions.

I am unaware that most comics pros rate Barks' Scrooge above Watchmen or Sandman.

Barks is ranked Number 7 (Donald Duck) and Number 20(Scrooge) on The Comics Journal's Top 100 Comics of the 20th Century far ahead of the highest ranked superhero entries.
(https://ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelected...threadid=16375)

And The Sandman isn't on the list.

I honestly don't know why this is a surprise but...Watchmen and The Sandman, while they are great works, largely owe their elevated status to being outliers in the superhero fandom -- the fact that the former features riffs and deconstructions of superheroes, while the latter is a fantasy series nominally set in the DC universe and features some DC villains and heroes. But among the wider comics community, they wouldn't rank quite so highly. Nobody with serious taste would put Watchmen above Krazy Kat, EC Comics, Will Eisner, Barks, Robert Crumb, and so on. It would be like ranking Beyoncé over Aretha Franklin. In the case of Gaiman's THE SANDMAN, he's largely updating and reviving horror and fantasy ideas from the '50s EC Comics as well as Eisner's The Spirit (which he admitted was his main inspiration) while borrowing some ideas from European comics.

So that's why I think this OP is bizarre and weird, because I don't see Watchmen and The Sandman as some kind of universal standard to ask other comics' traditions and go "what've you got as good as this". Mainly because it acts as if the main idea of serious comics storytelling people have are these two works, and again they're at the tippy top for stuff a superhero reading fandom might be familiar with but the reason is that it's made by people who have a wider culture than superheroes.

[Timothy Hunter]

I agree with Revolutionary Jack that what comics get the Absolute Edition treatment has more to due with mainstream popularity than what constitutes as a "great" comic. This is why you see Jeph Loeb and Geoff Johns' work gracing that line and not, say, Jack Cole's Plastic Man or Joe Kubert's Sgt. Rock.

I don't know how you can possibly determine whether or not Carl Barks' Donald Duck or Sandman and Watchmen is objectively superior, because those are two completely alien types of comics which are great for largely different reasons. This is why the Comics Journal 'top 100' list is so baffling. Having New Yorker cartoons compete with something like Joe Sacco's Palestine seems to be a matter of apples and oranges to me.

[K7P5V]

Akira
-Uneven in terms of quality, the volumes after the second destruction of Tokyo are superior to the volumes that preceded it. However, from that point on, Akira is just as effective as Watchmen in capturing apocalyptic dread.

If you like Akira, then I highly recommend...

Domu: A Child's Dream

[Amadeus Arkham]

Nausicaa and Lone Wolf Cub come to mind. I’ve also heard 20th Century Boys is also great as well.

If you like Akira, then I highly recommend...

Domu: A Child's Dream

Fun-fact: This manga was one of the main sources of inspiration for Rian Johnson’s Looper.

[Timothy Hunter]

If you like Akira, then I highly recommend...

Domu: A Child's Dream

Thanks. If I come across it, I'll immediately pick it up, although it's notoriously hard to find.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I don't know how you can possibly determine whether or not Carl Barks' Donald Duck or Sandman and Watchmen is objectively superior, because those are two completely alien types of comics which are great for largely different reasons.

I think people might rank Watchmen higher on the principle that serious comics with fleshy human figures > funny animal comics but that falls under the category of comedy not being high art which isn't how things work, like nobody would say Charlie Chaplin isn't an all-time great or deny he's superior to the likes of say Spielberg and Scorsese. In terms of influence and legacy, Barks is definitely at the very top.

This is why the Comics Journal 'top 100' list is so baffling. Having New Yorker cartoons compete with something like Joe Sacco's Palestine seems to be a matter of apples and oranges to me.

Fundamentally that's true of any list, but the Comics Journal rightly or wrongly, represents comics' scholarship and its viewpoints and they look at Western comics from a full field rather than simply superhero comics.

[Mister Mets]

It's a big shiny hardbound looking package. That's all Absolute Editions are.



You are aware that 'Absolute Editions' are essentially marketing editions to bilk money off collectors right? You are acting like it's the Criterion Collection of comics, or the Library of Congress editions, when stuff like Identity Crisis or Geoff Johns garbage get Absolute Editions.



Barks is ranked Number 7 (Donald Duck) and Number 20(Scrooge) on The Comics Journal's Top 100 Comics of the 20th Century far ahead of the highest ranked superhero entries.
(https://ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelected...threadid=16375)

And The Sandman isn't on the list.

I honestly don't know why this is a surprise but...Watchmen and The Sandman, while they are great works, largely owe their elevated status to being outliers in the superhero fandom -- the fact that the former features riffs and deconstructions of superheroes, while the latter is a fantasy series nominally set in the DC universe and features some DC villains and heroes. But among the wider comics community, they wouldn't rank quite so highly. Nobody with serious taste would put Watchmen above Krazy Kat, EC Comics, Will Eisner, Barks, Robert Crumb, and so on. It would be like ranking Beyoncé over Aretha Franklin. In the case of Gaiman's THE SANDMAN, he's largely updating and reviving horror and fantasy ideas from the '50s EC Comics as well as Eisner's The Spirit (which he admitted was his main inspiration) while borrowing some ideas from European comics.

So that's why I think this OP is bizarre and weird, because I don't see Watchmen and The Sandman as some kind of universal standard to ask other comics' traditions and go "what've you got as good as this". Mainly because it acts as if the main idea of serious comics storytelling people have are these two works, and again they're at the tippy top for stuff a superhero reading fandom might be familiar with but the reason is that it's made by people who have a wider culture than superheroes.

I specifically said that Watchman and Sandman don't seem out of place in Absolute Editions, rather than that having an Absolute Edition is a marker of quality.

I love Criterion editions and the Library of America collection, but being collected in that kind of format isn't that exclusive. Criterion's got over a thousand films, so it's not really a measure of what's in a top ten, and there are exclusions due to rights issues. The Library of America collections have over 300 books, many of which each collect multiple novels. It's often an exhaustive overview, which means it's not just about collecting the best.

I'll make a sidenote that you're unduly dismissive of the opinions of people you may be trying to persuade, if you think no one with serious taste would rate Watchmen above Crumb, or enjoy the work of Geoff Johns.

There is an absurdity of ranking really different material, but that is generally done in analysis of an artform. Best film lists will rank Mad Max: Fury Road, Fantasia, Stalker, Rules of the Game, and The Searchers. List of the best novels would have to consider Jane Austen's Emma, Charles Dickens' Bleak House, Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man and Thomas Pycheon's Gravity's Rainbow.

The Comics Journal Top 100 was based on the editorial staff of one magazine with niche tastes. It isn't much more meaningful than SFX's list of Top 100 graphic novels having Sandman at #6 and Watchmen at #1 (in between were Dark Knight Returns, From Hell, Perseopolis and Maus.) Neither list represents a consensus of comics professionals.

Watchmen is a really well-regarded graphic novel. Sandman is generally understood to be one of the regarded comic book runs. These would be useful benchmarks for a question about the most impressive manga.

I think people might rank Watchmen higher on the principle that serious comics with fleshy human figures > funny animal comics but that falls under the category of comedy not being high art which isn't how things work, like nobody would say Charlie Chaplin isn't an all-time great or deny he's superior to the likes of say Spielberg and Scorsese. In terms of influence and legacy, Barks is definitely at the very top.



Fundamentally that's true of any list, but the Comics Journal rightly or wrongly, represents comics' scholarship and its viewpoints and they look at Western comics from a full field rather than simply superhero comics.

https://www.theyshootpictures.com/gf...0directors.htm

Scorsese is at 11th place, Chaplin in 15th place.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I specifically said that Watchman and Sandman don't seem out of place in Absolute Editions, rather than that having an Absolute Edition is a marker of quality.

So are you ready to withdraw the notion that "seem out of place in Absolute Editions" qualifies as an aesthetic category, then?

I'll make a sidenote that you're unduly dismissive of the opinions of people you may be trying to persuade, if you think no one with serious taste would rate Watchmen above Crumb, or enjoy the work of Geoff Johns.

I stand by that claim. Nobody who seriously looks at comics, and doesn't center it around superhero genre, would have the same elevated view of Watchmen as people mainly familiar with superheroes would. And even fewer would rate Geoff Johns very highly.

The Comics Journal Top 100 was based on the editorial staff of one magazine with niche tastes.

Well so is Sight and Sound or Film Comment magazine. There's a reason why the Sight and Sound once-a-decade Top 10 List is valued far above most Top 10 lists. The Comics Journal has historically been considered the most serious comics scholarship magazine, having established its name for its detailed interviews with many professionals. It's not without criticism of course but then neither has S&S.

[kurenai24]

I'm gonna go for the low hanging fruit and do a well known one, ...and that's Attack on Titan, I know I can feel the eye rolls, but the story always stayed solid with a few exceptions here and there and while the anime helped further it's popularity and catapulted it to a almost mainstream consciousness, it is the story that will have lasting impact, just like Sandman and Watchmen which is something you can't say about the Big Three or even Kimetsu no Yaiba or other manga. I'm sure others here feel differently and think the manga shouldn't be counted or that it's below Watchmen and Sandman but I think AoT's footprint is a big stamp.

As for which is one is better, that can't be answered cause it's all about taste, which is why I went for impact and how fondly it'll be looked to in the future, but I did enjoy one more than the other 2.

[Waterfall]

Hear me out on this one - Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa

Yes FMA's a shonen manga but its world building and character arcs are second to none. Very quickly you realise there's more to this story then cool action and some complicated rules about how magic works. The law of Equivalent Exchange puts in stark contrast the extremes of human nature and what some are willing to do in order to break the limitations of the physical world.

But then perhaps FMA isn't for you seeing as how Monster is your favourite. Because FMA is ultimately optimistic about human nature and the eventual triumph of good people in the face of adversity.

This is a great answer. Maybe it falls more into All-Star Superman side of "optimistic" comics but FMA is a cult classic. Especially the manga version, Brotherhood censors a great deal of manga.

I'm gonna go for the low hanging fruit and do a well known one, ...and that's Attack on Titan, I know I can feel the eye rolls, but the story always stayed solid with a few exceptions here and there and while the anime helped further it's popularity and catapulted it to a almost mainstream consciousness, it is the story that will have lasting impact, just like Sandman and Watchmen which is something you can't say about the Big Three or even Kimetsu no Yaiba or other manga. I'm sure others here feel differently and think the manga shouldn't be counted or that it's below Watchmen and Sandman but I think AoT's footprint is a big stamp.

As for which is one is better, that can't be answered cause it's all about taste, which is why I went for impact and how fondly it'll be looked to in the future, but I did enjoy one more than the other 2.

I will give you this much: Isayama really wanted to be Moore during the final arc. Whether it's on par...debatable. But AoT is in the same genre as Watchmen, that much we can say.

[Mister Mets]

So are you ready to withdraw the notion that "seem out of place in Absolute Editions" qualifies as an aesthetic category, then?



I stand by that claim. Nobody who seriously looks at comics, and doesn't center it around superhero genre, would have the same elevated view of Watchmen as people mainly familiar with superheroes would. And even fewer would rate Geoff Johns very highly.



Well so is Sight and Sound or Film Comment magazine. There's a reason why the Sight and Sound once-a-decade Top 10 List is valued far above most Top 10 lists. The Comics Journal has historically been considered the most serious comics scholarship magazine, having established its name for its detailed interviews with many professionals. It's not without criticism of course but then neither has S&S.

Personally, I think "Hush" is out of place as an Absolute Edition.

My specific criteria was "One way to consider it might be whether there's anything that wouldn't look out of place in Absolute Edition hardcovers, and listings of best literature, the way Watchmen is a $75 Absolute Edition hardcover, and on Time Magazine's list of best books of the 20th century." It's not just that it merits a good hardcover, but that it can make a best of list that isn't exclusive to comics. I think Watchmen meets that standard. So does Sandman.

If you wanted to come up with two really acclaimed American comic book series, it's hard to top Watchmen, as a standalone graphic novel, and Sandman, as a series. The main exception would be Maus, but this was one guy's post and not an editorial at a magazine where they might hash things out extensively and still come to the same conclusion.

Regardless of our own preferences, there are certain things that have a reputation of being at the top of an artistic field.

So it's valid to ask what manga is on the level of the acknowledged best, even if there are some segments of the public that will disagree. If someone asks about Japanese films on the level of Citizen Kane, Casablanca or the Godfather, it's a distraction to argue that other films (Vertigo, Shawshank Redemption, Do The Right Thing, The Wizard of Oz) may be better-regarded by some segments of filmgoers. Likewise if you ask about TV shows on the level of The Simpsons or The Wire, the main thing is that those are really acclaimed, not that it's a dismissal of I Love Lucy, Breaking Bad or the Sopranos.

I haven't said anything about Sight & Sound or Film Comment's editors being representative of the community of people who have opinions on film worth discussing.

[Zauriel]

So it's valid to ask what manga is on the level of the acknowledged best, even if there are some segments of the public that will disagree. If someone asks about Japanese films on the level of Citizen Kane, Casablanca or the Godfather, it's a distraction to argue that other films (Vertigo, Shawshank Redemption, Do The Right Thing, The Wizard of Oz) may be better-regarded by some segments of filmgoers. Likewise if you ask about TV shows on the level of The Simpsons or The Wire, the main thing is that those are really acclaimed, not that it's a dismissal of I Love Lucy, Breaking Bad or the Sopranos.

.

If you are looking for an anime to compare with the Simpsons, I'd suggest Sazae-san. It has been going on since 1969 and is still in broadcast. The show lives on after the original manga ended in 1974. It even outlived the manga creator.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sazae-san

[Mister Mets]

If you are looking for an anime to compare with the Simpsons, I'd suggest Sazae-san. It has been going on since 1969 and is still in broadcast. The show lives on after the original manga ended in 1974. It even outlived the manga creator.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sazae-san

The thing that makes the Simpsons special isn't its longevity, but the quality of its artistic peak (the first 8 seasons.)

I do wonder if it's possible to have an anime equivalent of the Simpsons. The density of humor isn't typically associated with manga or anime, which tend to have a slower pace than American equivalents. The humor in a Japanese series may also not be as comprehensible to people outside that culture (American hegemony forces the world to be familiar with aspects of its culture.)