Ok, here's a bunch of stuff across Marvel/DC/Image I pulled from an older thread. I'd very much recommend reading a series outside of Marvel/DC, some of the most creative and inventive reads are Image/Vertigo series. The best entrypoint there is
Saga. For an interesting take on the cape comic, please try out
Black Hammer (Jeff Lemire). Plus side: you definitely won't need background or continuity knowledge there.
MARVEL
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Iron Man: Extremis (Warren Ellis). Great introduction to Iron Man in only six issues, essential.
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Ultimate Spider-man (Bendis, 2000). This is still the only long Spidey run I've read and it's consistently great. Every arc is about 5 or 6 issues so you can just jump in from the beginning as it's meant to be a series for new readers.
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New X-Men (Grant Morrison), Astonishing X-Men (Whedon), Uncanny X-Force (Remender). Your essential X, but maybe read the Dark Phoenix Saga before all this. Pretty short and a very important chapter in X-Men history
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Vision (Tom King). The Vision family tries to find out what it's like to be human. Modern classic.
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The Superior Foes of Spider-Man (Spencer): (short) series that follows some D-list Spidey rogues. Very smart and funny book, can't recommend enough.
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Old Man Logan (Millar). All your Marvel heroes in the Mad Max universe. Fun and quick read.
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Daredevil (Bendis, 01-06): seminal run on the character that's easy to pick up. The rabbit hole goes deep once you get into DD, because the
Frank Miller, Brubaker and Waid runs are also acclaimed. But if you want to read something short and essential, check out Frank Miller's
The Man Without Fear (origin story) and Born Again. These are standalone stories collected in a single trade each.
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Marvels (Busiek). This book sometimes gets forgotten but it's great if you're getting to know the Marvel universe, because it shows all the heroes and their early seminal moments from our perspective.
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Welcome Back Frank (Ennis). First arc of the Marvel Knights Ennis Punisher run. This is pure comedy, but later Ennis also made a much more noir and gritty series in
Punisher MAX, which you can (and should) also check out.
- Thor has a lot of great stories and runs.
Aaron's is very easy to recommend because it starts off with great Ribic art (God Butcher) and delivers what you want out of a Thor story. It's still ongoing and Aaron has managed to keep this interesting for 5 years now. He's made it in the pantheon of all-time great Thor writers. A short but sweet intro (only 4 issues) is Jonathan Hickman's
Ultimate Comics Thor. If you want a quick introduction that will get you in the mood for more Thor, that's a fun story to start with. For eyecandy there's also the
Straczynski run with Coipel's awe-inspiring art. The most acclaimed Thor run however is Walt Simonson, who introduces Beta Ray Bill... and so much more. It's very long though.
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Planet Hulk (Greg Pak). Hulk smash... in space. Want to see the inspiration for the Hulk you see in Ragnarok? Read this
- If you've read a bit of Marvel and feel like tackling a long overarching story that's a bit more ambitious, please consider
Jonathan Hickman's run on Fantastic Four. It's my favorite Marvel story and is considered one of the best Marvel runs full stop.
Here's the reading order. Hickman goes on writing Avengers and can't help but do that in the most ambitious way as well. It ends with the grand conclusion Secret Wars. Once you've read through this entire saga, nothing you'll see in the MCU will feel as epic as this.
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Immortal Iron Fist (Brubaker and Fraction)
- I don't know if you're into Star Wars, but there have been some fantastic comics.
Lando (Soule) is a great miniseries. Kieron Gillon wrote a fantastic Vader run which features some homicidal droids and introduces Dr. Aphra, who also got her own series later. There's actually a new
Vader series going on right now (by Charles Soule) and imo it's the most exciting SW material you can follow right now. Just spectacular.
I made a thread about it
DC
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Watchmen: I agree with everyone saying this should be one of the first series you read.
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Batman Year One: as is this one if you have interest in Batman. Only 4 issues, great retelling of the origin. I have reread this so many times over the years that the trade is in shambles
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The Dark Knight Returns: another influential DC classic. Bats comes out of retirement and beats people off his lawn. Dark sociopolitical satire that still holds up, even though some think otherwise. Very much an 80's vibe though. Don't bother with the sequel
- More Batman, I'll second the recommendations for Snyder's Court of Owls and City of Owls, also Black Mirror. If you like that you can just continue Snyder's run. Apparently Tom King's current run is also great.
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Kingdom Come + The New Frontier for ensemble stories
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All Star Superman: one of my favorites. 12 issues that capture the essence of Superman. If you're not a big fan of his, you might be after reading this, or...
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Superman for all Seasons: one of the few truly great series Jeph Loeb has ever written
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Superman Red Son: Supes in the Soviet Union
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Superman Secret Identity and Birthright (Waid)
- Frank Miller's
Ronin
- Aquaman (Geoff Johns, New 52): Johns takes the tropes and jokes about Aquaman and turns them into weapons. The first issues are all about handling that history of ridicule and setting the foundations for his own story... which is no joke and goes into some serious family drama above and below water. The scope gets so big that the Justice League needs to get involved as well.
- Black Hammer (from Dark Horse): A couple of superheroes get stranded in a rural town and have to deal with the townfolk, but more importantly eachother. We learn the origins of all the team members, which are flashbacks to golden age superheroics and form a nice juxtaposition to the 'normal' country life. This series excels in what other superhero comics are lacking: developing and fleshing out interesting characters. That's always important to me in any book and Jeff Lemire is fantastic at that. Truly outstanding series.
NON CAPE STUFF
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We3: 4 issues to get introduced to the mad genius of Grant Morrison. Check this out. He has done more weird but great short stories like Seaguy of Vinamarana. There are also longer runs like Animal Man, Doom Patrol, The Invincibles... I'd start out with something short because his style is particular and could be you won't like it. He's one of my favorite writers though and I still have read only a sliver of his output.
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Saga: one of the most acclaimed ongoing comics right now, recommended here multiple times for good cause. A sci-fi/fantasy epic that lives up to its name. Part Star Wars, Romeo & Juliet but with more sex and violence and wildly creative in the visuals. A true showcase of the medium.
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Y The Last Man: from the Saga writer, Brian K. Vaughan. Very addictive series, Vaughan is master of the cliffhanger
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The Wicked + The Divine. Your pop idols are gods
- Jimmy Corrigan, The Smartest Kid on Earth
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Southern Bastards: ribs, hicks, college football and crusty old guys beating the shit out of each other. Jason Aaron is now famous for Thor, but don't miss out on his own series. I hear
Scalped is also very good.
- More Vertigo classics:
Preacher, Sandman, Transmetropolitan
- If you like noir, try anything by
Ed Brubaker: The Fade Out, Criminal, Fatale (this mixes with Lovecraftian horror, pretty good), Velvet, ... The Fade Out is very short and impressive so you could try that out first.
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Trees by Warren Ellis
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Deadly Class (Remender): assassin school
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V for Vendetta
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Lazarus (Rucka): no surprise this is picked up for a tv show because it reads like one. Dystopian tale where the world has gone to shit and everything is run by the richest families. Those are each protected by a Lazarus, a defender that can't be killed.
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The Manhattan Projects (Hickman)
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Zero (Ales Kot), not for everyone but this is one of my favorite Image series
From what's recommended, the only popular tip I'd have to disagree with is the big Marvel Cosmic Saga that starts with Annihilation and goes on to Thanos Imperative. Those bookends are actually the most interesting arcs, in between the quality gets spotty imo. You have to do a lot of reading to get little in return. War of Kings in particular is a tragic mess and has one of the worst villains you can find in the Marvel-verse. The Nova and GotG series are consistently great though. Annihilation is really cool, but the subpar art in some of the series brings it down a bit.
