Shelfdust Presents: The Fifty Best #1 Issues

This week we're reluctantly leaving our cave to revisit the comic which reached 26th place: Transmetropolian #1 by Warren Ellis, Darick Robertson, Nathan Eyring and Clem Robins. Angry, bitter, and politically charged, Transmetropolitan follows reformed journalist Spider Jerusalem as he's forced to return to the Big City so he can trade his words for money - and then trade that money for various ps...

This week we're heading across to an island paradise, to look at the comic which ended up in 27th place: House of X #1  by Jonathan Hickman, Pepe Larraz, Marte Gracia and Clayton Cowles. When it debuted House of X immediately stood out as an issue which people will be talking about (and re-reading) for years. It set out not only to define the X-Men: but to rebuild what they've always been. The res...

This week we rise up from our miserable grave to look at the comic which ended up in 28th place:  Immortal Hulk #1  by Al Ewing, Joe Bennett, Ruy José, Paul Mounts and Cory Petit! In The Immortal Hulk, when Bruce Banner dies, Hulk rises at night to take vengeance. The opening issue provides a straightforward example of that, as a botched robbery sees Bruce take a bullet to the head – and an innoce...

This week brings politics into our superhero comics, as we look at the comic which ended up in 29th place:  Ex Machina #1  by Brian K. Vaughan, Tony Harris, Tom Feister, J. D. Mettler and Jared K. Fletcher. The first issue of  Ex Machina  doesn't let up for a second as it follows the career path of Mitchell Hundred as he goes from civil engineer to aspiring superhero and then into the role of Mayo...

This week brings us a whole new superhero universe, as we look at the comic which ended up in 30th place : Astro City #1  by Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson, Steve Buccellato and Richard Starkings. The first issue of the series explores a single day in the life of a hero, but through the adventures and rescues sits a beautiful character study which would go on to become the definitive voice of the ser...

This week brings us the perfect comic for 2020, and one which ended up in 31st place:  Crowded #1  by Christopher Sebela, Ted Brandt & Ro Stein, Triona Farrell and Cardinal Rae. The first issue of  Crowded  – about a crowdfunding app which allows people to hire assassins to take out people they don't like – runs on cheap coffee and cigarettes, with a wiry, spiky energy which propels its mismatched...

This week brings us the best comic of all time which ended up in 32nd place:  Love & Rockets #1  by Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez. Los Bros Hernandez are regarded as two of the greatest cartoonists of all time, and although a little rougher, you can see their style showing through in this very early work from the pair. There are several different shorts in the issue, but of perhaps most note is the...

This week brings us four young ninjas who are also turtles, as we look at the comic in 33rd place:  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1  by Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird and Steve Lavigne. One of the most unexpected success stories in comics started off with four turtles, some mysterious chemicals, and a surly rat.  Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles  is exactly what it says it is, only far darker than anyone...

This week it's time to bring in the A-Listers, as we look at the issue which reached 34th place:  JLA #1  by Grant Morrison, Howard Porter, John Dell, Pat Garrahy and Ken Lopez. That creative team played into every dream about each character and let them all feel powerful or inspiring in their own way, rather than trying to beat them down or offer some kind of subversive take. Batman was the smart...

This week it's time to pop on a trenchcoat and demand some coffee, as we look at the issue which reached 35th place:  Planetary #1  by Warren Ellis, John Cassaday, Laura Martin and Bill O'Neil. Planetary  sees a team of exceptional pricks working together to save the world from unbearable pricks. It's a specifically Ellis sort of story, with magnificent bastards lording it across one another throu...

This week brings us a hard-hitting exploitation series which reached 36th place:  Bitch Planet #1  by Kelly Sue DeConnick, Valentine de Landro, Cris Peter and Clayton Cowles. There isn't a moment for readers to breathe in  Bitch Planet.  The opening issue understands that readers will get what's going on, and so it spends its pages making sure that every incident has purpose rather than trying to...

This week brings us THE  REIGNING DEFENDING UNDISPUTED  UNIVERSAL CHAMPION, who reached 37th place:  The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #1 by Ryan North, Erica Henderson, Rico Renzi and Clayton Cowles. Okay, so you might be cynical about Unbeatable Squirrel Girl making it into this list: but that's what Squirrel Girl is all about, isn't it? The first issue gives us a Squirrel Girl who is suddenly the mo...

This week brings a bunch of armed weirdos in a van as we look at the comic which came in 38th place:  Copra #1  by Michel Fiffe. "Inspired" by  Suicide Squad, Copra  is an action comic with the unmistakable hand of Michel Fiffe on the accelerator. The first issue sets up all the hallmarks of the series as it continues onwards: the gleeful chaos of the fight sequences, the death tally, the attachme...

This week brings a dark look at power and corruption, as we look at the comic which came in 39th place: Monstress #1  by Marjorie Liu, Sana Takeda and Rus Wooton. The first issue of  Monstress  offers a clever trick for readers: it shows them everything, and then reveals that there's far more to "everything" than they could have ever predicted. The story revolves around a young girl called Maika,...

This week brings a psychedelic revolution, as we look at the comic which came in 40th place:  The Invisibles #1  by Grant Morrison, Steve Yeowell, Daniel Vozzo and Clem Robins. Following their time together on  Zenith , readers could be forgiven for thinking that they knew what to expect from the team of Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell when they paired again for a new series at Vertigo. Yet whils...

This week it's a high-octane apocalypse, as we look at the comic which came in 41st place:  Akira #1  by Katsuhiro Otomo. Akira is set in a post-apocalyptic future, a world where a bomb was dropped in the 90s which resulted in the outbreak of World War III. Years on from that point, and the story kicks off in high gear before somehow ramping things up to move faster and faster in an exhilarating a...

This week it's time to clear up some of the mess left behind by superheroes, as we look at the comic which came in 42nd place:  Damage Control #1  by Dwayne McDuffie, Ernie Colon, Bob Wiacek, John Wellington and Ed King. Damage Control are a group who tidy up messes and repair the rubble after superheroes and villains have left the scene, and the first issue of the first  Damage Control  miniserie...

This week is an emotional one as we look at the issue which came in 43rd place:  We3 #1  by Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely, Jamie Grant and Todd Klein. The three-part miniseries follows three domestic pets escape from a military base where they've been experimented on by a sinister agency, who've grafted high-tech weaponry onto them. With everything they thought they knew about the kindness of thei...

This week things get gritty as we look at the issue which came in 44th place:  The Question #1  by Dennis O'Neil, Denys Cowan, Rick Magyar, Tatjana Wood and Gaspar Saladino. If you like noir you'll be in your element here, with a distinctly of-its-time first issue which sets up the story of vigilante Vic Sage (aka The Question) as a precarious stack of dominos, which then inevitably start to colla...

This week we celebrate the death of the Marvel Universe as we look at the issue which came in 45th place:  Secret Wars #1  by Jonathan Hickman, Esad Ribic, Ive Svorcina and Chris Eliopoulos. Jonathan Hickman had been writing the Avengers for years by the time he reached the first issue of this massive crossover event for Marvel, and he promptly uses the spotlight to… destroy the Marvel Universe an...

This week we turn to the comic which came in at 47th in our list:  Daytripper #1  by Fábio Moon, Gabriel Bá, Dave Stewart and Sean Konot. Daytripper is a complicated series as a whole, with each issue following a different path which lead character Bras de Oliva Domingos could take through life – and how each path will eventually lead to a different ending for him. It's a heady series, and the fir...

This week we turn to the comic which came in at 47th in our list:  Suicide Squad #1  by John Ostrander, Luke McDonnell, Karl Kesel, Carl Gafford and Todd Klein. It's an incredible concept: the US Government tell a group of super-villains that if they assist on black-ops missions, they will help commute their sentences in the long-run. If they follow orders and get the job done, they'll be out of p...

This week we turn to the comic which came in at 48th in our list:  The Dark Knight Returns #1  by Frank Miller, Klaus Janson, Lynn Varley, and John Constanza. Hold on just a moment. That's THE  The Dark Knight Returns , one of the most important and influential comics ever made, by one of the most incredible creative teams assembled anywhere in comics history. And it's only at position #48 in our...

This week we turn to the comic which came in at 49th in our list:  Sailor Moon #1 , by Naoko Takeuchi. Matt spoke with writer and critic  Kayleigh Hearn  about the first chapter of the series. There are only two Manga entries in the list as a whole – why is that? And of all the comics out there, why was it Sailor Moon which found support from our voters when they were compiling their lists? Kaylei...

In 2019 Shelfdust counted down the top fifty #1 comic book issues of all time, which you can find here!  Now the list is over and we know which issues made the master list, we've invited critic and podcaster Matt Lune to sit down with a different comic critic each week to look at every comic which charted into the top fifty, one issue at a time. Our first comic in the list is  Thunderbolts #1 by K...