which are the best DC Comics writers in history?

[TheDevil]

hey guys!

i was just curious what the CBR community thinks about this.
Which you think are the top5 DC Comics writers in history? Please, post your ranking (1st place to 5th) and if you want to reason it, i’d be very happy to know your opinions!

Just in order to put some little rules in this: when you judge a writer’s work, you should only take into account of the work he\she did for the DC Comics superhero universe -no vertigo or similar publications, thus out of continuity stories involving DC characters still count- (you may think, for instance, that Alan Moore is the greatest writer ever, but is it the best DC Comics writer if you count only what he did for DC? -Watchmen doesn’t count as it wasn’t DC universe earlier-)

so, gentleman…. word to you!

[Dark-Flux]

Im slightly drunk and have in no way put any real thought into this but;

Denny O'neil
Marv Wolfman
Mark WAid
John Byrne
Grant Morrison

[Stingo]

Gardner Fox, John Broome, Robert Kahniger, Roy Thomas, James Robinson

[Mike]

1. Denny O'Neil
2. Roy Thomas
3. Paul Levitz
4. Arnold Drake
5. Gardner Fox

[Thanos]

My favorite is Mike Grell. I love his Green Arrow run and his Warlord run.

[Zero Hunter]

The problem with a topic like this is that a writer might be amazing on one book but be absolutely horrid on another book. Mark Waid is a good example. Amazing on most every book he did for DC except for his reboot of the Legion of Superheroes which was just generic garbage. How much does that one bad book take away from him overall?

[CaptCleghorn]

The problem with a topic like this is that a writer might be amazing on one book but be absolutely horrid on another book. Mark Waid is a good example. Amazing on most every book he did for DC except for his reboot of the Legion of Superheroes which was just generic garbage. How much does that one bad book take away from him overall?

I actually see it as a strength to discussion. Where writing is impossible to quantify in terms of quality, all we have is a combination of a gneral consensus and our own knowledge.

Personally, I'd go for Gardner Fox and Denny O'Neil. As far as "best", I'd go with these two over writers like Moore and Gaiman because of the depth and breadth (is that a word?) of their overall DC work.

[colonyofcells]

Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, etc.

[SiegePerilous02]

The creators of the characters or the ones who put them in their most iconic situations should probably get credit by default: Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Bill Finger, William Moulton Marston, John Broome, Gardner Fox, etc.

Then there's the big names like Alan Moore, Frank Miller, Grant Morrison and Neil Gaiman. And the guys like Marv Wolfman (though I always suspected Perez was a vital part of those early stories and NTT started to fade once he left), Mark Waid, Geoff Johns, Denny O'Neil, etc.

[joybeans]

Grant Morrison
Alan Moore
Mark Waid
Greg Rucka
Marv Wolfman

[Carabas]

In alphabetical order:

Alan Moore
Ed Brubaker
Garth Ennis
Grant Morrison
Neil Gaiman

Substitute Ennis for Greg Rucka if you think he hasn't done enough DC to qualify.

[JackDaw]

I agree with a lot of the above choices.

But I am always amazed that Jonn Ostrander is not an automatic pick on these kinds of threads. Great long runs on Suicide Squad and Spectre. Excellent long runs on Firestorm, Martian Manhunter, and Hawkman. A goodly amount of other good stuff.

And I've probably been niggardly on the stuff I've described as excellent...put it this way personally I've enjoyed his "excellent" stuff more than large majority of output of other writers mentioned in this thread.

[dr-brainwave]

in my opinion:

1- Gardner Fox: he has pretty much created the DCU! he created the Sandman, Flash, Hawkman, Dr Fate, Red Tornado, Atom/ Ray Palmer, the JSA, the JLA, he even created the Multiverse in "Flash of two worlds".
2- Roy Thomas: All Star Squadron, Infinity Inc, America vs the Justice Society.
3- Gerry Conway: Firestorm, All Star Comics, Justice League of America.
4- James Robinson: i know most people would think about "Starman" but as far as i am concerned "the Golden Age" is the greatest super-hero tale ever told.
5- Geoff Johns: mainly for his Green Lantern run and Hawkman.

[BFF]

I agree with a lot of the above choices.

But I am always amazed that Jonn Ostrander is not an automatic pick on these kinds of threads. Great long runs on Suicide Squad and Spectre. Excellent long runs on Firestorm, Martian Manhunter, and Hawkman. A goodly amount of other good stuff.

And I've probably been niggardly on the stuff I've described as excellent...put it this way personally I've enjoyed his "excellent" stuff more than large majority of output of other writers mentioned in this thread.

Agreed. Spectre and Suicide Squad alone make him an all-time great.

[codystarbuck]

These things tend to skew with the era you grew up in (as do most pop culture things); so, in that spirit: Cary Bates and Elliot S! Maggin. They wrote the best Superman stories out there; and, yes, I am including Moore and Morrison in that comparison. "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" and All-Star Superman borrowed heavily from their work, as well as their predecessors. Bates had tremendously interesting plots and Maggin wrote the best Luthor of all. He made him a rounded character, something that no one else did, until Smallville, in my eyes.

After that I will throw out Len Wein, Archie Goodwin and Allan Brennert. They did some tremendous Batman and Batman-related material. Wein co-created Swamp Thing and made it THE cult book of the period. Brennert wrote some of the best stories period; but Goodwin was in a class all by himself. Manhunter is probably the greatest American adventure comic story ever created. It has action, intrigue, great chaarcters, and moves at breakneck speed, yet still fills in the details, all in 8-page installments. In an era where 6 issues are used to tell a story that has, at most, 2 issues worth of story, it is amazing to see what a true master could due in 8 pages, along with an artist who really plays on his A game.

And then, I will say it: Bob Haney. Malign him all you want, complain about how he ignored continuity, whine about silly hipster dialogue; he still wrote great stories.

Finally, he's mentioned above; but I will expand: Robert Kanigher. Forget Wonder Woman. Look at the body of work he did for DC's war comics and say he wasn't one of their best writers. Sgt Rock, Enemy Ace, the Losers, Mademoiselle Marie, The Haunted Tank, The Unknown Soldier. Kanigher created all of that and wrote multiple classics for each of them. Month after month he churned out classic tales, with the aid of artists like Joe Kubert, Russ Heath, Gary Taloc, Sam Glanzman, Jerry Grandenetti and many more. Some of these rivaled great works of literature, like All Quiet on the Western Front, The Thin Red Line and The Naked and The Dead. They were that good. If Warner had any sense, they would be looking at those properties for movies. Done properly, they might actually garner award nominations.