CBR's Top 100 Comics of 2015: The Master List

by Albert Ching
– on Jan 01, 2016
in Comics, Comic News

Another year has begun, and another CBR Top 100 Comics countdown has ended. Whether you're getting a jump start on your resolutions or slowly bouncing back from a night of year-end revelry, welcome to 2016! But before we get too far into the New Year, let's take one last look back at our massive, staff-compiled list of CBR's Top 100 Comics of 2015 -- here's the full ranking of No. 1 to 100, plus links to our commentary on each pick.

Lists are a weird thing. Everyone loves reading them, and no one agrees with them -- but that's kind of the fun, right? Even with 100 picks, given how wide and wonderful the world of comics and graphic novels is, there's bound to be some notable omissions (in the parlance of Comedy Bang Bang, "snubs and flubs"). But every year I'm darn proud of what the CBR staff prodcues for this list, and the passion and enthusiasm shown by all of our contributors. As pointed out by Kurt Busiek on Twitter, the mere fact that there are enough good comics to fill a Top 100 is an achievement in itself -- and on top of that, 100 spots isn't even enough to cover all the worthy candidates out there. (More than 200 comics received votes from the more than 40 contributors to this list.)

So while this might not be a complete and exhaustive list of every worthwhile comic that came out in the past year -- what list could be? -- it's a remarkable and diverse reflection of the high-quality comics material released in 2015, one we're proud to stand behind. It's fun to see "Shaft," "The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl," "Step Aside, Pops," "Jem and the Holograms," "Stray Bullets," "Batman" and "The Arab of the Future" all on the same list, and that's a testament to the industry that we're fortunate to cover. Given how much attention there often is on behind-the-scenes happenings, it's always nice to focus on the content of the comic books themselves.

This year, Image Comics once again led all publishers with 27 books in the Top 100. Marvel was second with 18, and DC Comics was close behind with 16 -- but equaled its Big Two competitor when the two Vertigo series that made the list are added. Dark Horse Comics, Fantagraphics, Drawn & Quarterly, IDW Publishing, Dynamite Entertainment, Archie Comics, Top Shelf Productions (acquired by IDW in January 2015), Oni Press and Abrams each also had multiple books on the list. Like last year, "Saga" and last year's No. 1, "Ms. Marvel," both received by far the most votes from the CBR staff, though this time "Saga" narrowly edged out Kamala Khan for the top spot -- its second victory after coming in at No. 1 in 2012, the year Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples' creator-owned sensation debuted.

If you're wondering how the list is made, every contributor from across CBR's network of sites who elects to participate (all thanked individually below) submits a personal list of favorite comics in 2015 -- any genre, publisher or format is fair game, provided it's new material released in 2015 -- and each choice on an individual list gets a point value based on its placement. It's all averaged together and through the power of mathematics (thank you, Google Sheets), CBR's Top 100 Comics is born.

Alright, enough yapping -- here's the full list of CBR's Top 100 Comics of 2015, and we're already excited for even more great comic books in 2016. Happy New Year!

Big-time thanks to the following list-making, blurb-writing all-stars for contributing to CBR's Top 100 Comics of 2015: CBR News reporters and commentators (in alphabetical order) Brigid Alverson, Josh Bell, Tom Bondurant, Tamara Brooks, Marc Buxton, Rob Cave, Alex Dueben, Casey Gilly, Ryan Ingram, Heather Knight, Michael C Lorah, Shaun Manning, Steve Morris, Tim O'Shea, Mike Pallotta, Kiel Phegley, Jeffrey Renaud, Dave Richards, Joe Streckert, Allison Shoemaker, Jason Strykowski and George A. Tramountanas; CBR reviewers Jennifer Cheng, Marykate Jasper, Jim Johnson and Greg McElhatton; CBR columnists Ron Marz, John Mayo and Hannibal Tabu; the Comics Should Be Good team headed up by Brian Cronin and including Greg Burgas, Greg Hatcher and Chad Nevett; guest contributor Heather Johanssen; plus the bulk of CBR's day-to-day editorial staff, including Assistant Editor/In Your Face Jam columnist Brett White, Assistant Editor/Reviews Editor Meagan Damore, Assistant Editors Brendan McGuirk, Anthony Couto and Lauren Gallaway, Robot 6/Spinoff Online Editor Kevin Melrose and Senior Editor Stephen Gerding. (Also, me.) Of course, big thanks to CBR Executive Producer Jonah Weiland, the founder of our feast.

Tags: marvel comics, dc comics, image comics, archie comics, top shelf, unbeatable squirrel girl, star wars, drawn and quarterly, ms marvel, idw publishing, dynamite entertainment, fantagraphics, oni press, saga, omega men, paper girls, top 100 comics of 2015, march book two, step aside pops, bitch planet, the fade out

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