You voted, and now, after over 1,000 ballots were cast, here are the results of your votes for your favorite comic book storylines of all-time (this is the third time we've done this countdown. We're on an every four year schedule)! The top ten will be posted this first day and I'll post more storylines until we hit December!

To recap, you all sent in ballots ranking your favorite storyliness from #1 (10 points) to #10 (1 point). I added up all of the points and here we are!

100. "No Normal" by G. Willow Wilson. Adrian Alphona and Ian Herring (Ms. Marvel #1-5) – 98 points (1 first place vote)

After the Inhumans released the Terrigen Mist into the Earth's atmosphere, regular people began turning into Inhumans and in this opening arc of Ms. Marvel, we meet young Kamala Khan, a huge fan of Captain Marvel (she's part of the Carol Corps) who gets exposed to Terrigenesis and gains the ability to shapeshift. She subconsciously turns herself into her idol, back in her Ms. Marvel days, and soon we see Khan's true heroism shine through...

Alphona and Herring deliver some amazingly striking artwork for this series, while Wilson builds up Jersey City beautifully, especially the Kamala's supporting cast of her friends and classmates and her family. It's rare for a new superhero ongoing series to hit the ground running as fast as Ms. Marvel did with its opening arc, which is the reason why it went through roughly a gazillion printings.

99. "Safeword" by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra and Jose Marzan Jr. (Y: The Last Man #18-20) – 100 points (6 first place votes)

In this storyline, Yorick (the titular “last man” on Earth) is tortured by an associate of his bodyguard/traveling companion, Agent 355. The associate, Agent 711, reads 355’s journals of their travels so far and determines that Yorick is suicidal, so she basically does an intervention for him – although to him, it appears to be torture. What is striking about this storyline is that Vaughan really turns the book on its end a bit, by having Yorick almost be re-envisioned. He had always been a wiseass, and that had been seen as part of his charm, but in this story, Vaughan’s strips him of this defense mechanism in a highly abrupt fashion. By tearing down the character, Vaughan allowed him to grow as a character. It’s really quite striking work.

This story also has probably the most memorable moment of the entire Y the Last Man series, the famous scene where Yorick tells of his first sexual encounter with a member of the opposite sex.

Penciler Pia Guerra and inker Jose Marzan Jr. do a bang-up job on the art for the arc.

98.“Love and Death” by Alan Moore, Stephen Bissette, John Totleben and Rick Veitch (Saga of the Swamp Thing 28-34 & Annual #2) – 102 points (1 first place vote)

Love and Death is the storyline responsible for Swamp Thing officially moving from a regular Comics Code Approved comic to a “Mature Readers” comic, only in the case of Swamp Thing, it was termed “Sophisticated Suspense” to deter youngsters from reading it.

Alan Moore had already made quite a name for himself on just the first eight issues of his run, but this storyline, which involved Abby Cable’s evil uncle Anton Arcane taking over the body of her husband before killing her (and officially ending her husband’s life) – well, it took the book in a whole different direction of darkness.

After Swamp Thing defeated Anton (killing him once again), he decides to go to Hell to rescue Abby’s soul.

Nowadays, with the proliferation of pretty much every DC Universe character, it is hard to imagine how fresh someone like Moore using Deadman, The Demon and the Phantom Stranger was, but it was – and that’s on top of the fact that he used them all extremely well. Moore’s use of the Demon (who he had used a couple of issues earlier) was extremely influential on later writers of the character, and Deadman, heck, he had not even been USED in YEARS before Moore featured him here.

The storyline concludes with Abby’s return and the famous “sex issue,” where Abby and Swamp Thing make love.

Stephen Bissette and John Totleben are almost shocking at the level of excellence they reach on this storyline – from the darkness of the early story (Bissette’s zombies are gruesome) to the tender euphoria of their love-making (like a kaleidoscope has exploded), they master it all.

Go to the next page for #97-94!

97. "The Great Cow Race" by Jeff Smith (Bone #7-11) – 104 points (1 first place votes)

This story, which is the second story arc in Jeff Smith’s acclaimed series, gives you a quick and telling introduction to the world of the Bones.

Our hero, Fone Bone, is his traditional heroic and love-sick self. The greedy Phoney Bone has cajoled the dim-witted Smiley Bone into another one of Phoney’s hare-brained ideas – disguise themselves as cows and win the Great Cow Race against Gran’ma Ben!

The Great Cow Race itself shows readers the wacky nature of the valley folk, and the irascible nature of Gran’ma Ben (the lady races cows!!!).

At the same time, there is a dark side, too, and we see that through the rat creatures and through some new details about Thorn, the love of Fone Bone’s life.

This is a fun, engaging story arc with great Smith art – a real winner.

96. "The End is Here" by Tom King, Barnaby Bagenda, Toby Cypress, Jose Marzan Jr., I.G. Guara, Hi-Fi and Romulo Fajardo Jr (The Omega Men #1-12) – 107 points (4 first place votes)

Throughout comic book history, the greatest comic books have been those that take our expectations and challenge them in new and unique ways. That was certainly the case with The Omega Men, a series by Tom King, Barnaby Bagenda and Romulo Fajardo Jr. (plus some other fill-in artists, like Jose Marzan Jr. actually inked the sample I'm showing here today). The new twist on the classic DC cosmic heroes now envisions them as rebels against an intergalactic corporation that makes its money mining a special mineral to keep other planets from blowing up like Krypton. The corporation (known as the Citadel) conquers worlds, strips them of their material and either destroys them when they are done or kills the planet's population if they try to rebel against them. They have destroyed a number of populations over the years and a band of survivors of those slaughters have formed the Omega Men to stop them. As the series begins, Earth has begun negotiations with the Citadel and Kyle Rayner (then the White Lantern) was sent to oversee the negotiations and he lost his ring and he was soon kidnapped and made an example of in this stunning opening sequence that was a sneak peek for the main series...

Of course, Kyle isn't actually dead and instead he has been taken in by the Omega Men, who show him the truth of the Citdel's evil and the now ring-less Kyle ends up fighting along side them. Kyle is great because he's just a decent guy and that is the sort of thing that doesn't hold up well when you're in a group like the Omega Men and I love how King contrasts Kyle with the rest of the group. King turned the whole DC cosmic universe up on its ear with this striking series, with great art by Bagenda and Fajardo.

95. "The Doll's House" by Neil Gaiman, Mike Dringenberg and Malcolm Jones III (Sandman Vol. 2 #9-16) - 108 points (1 first place votes)

the main plot of this story is that a young woman Rose Walker finds herself at the center of a sort of dream vortex. Dream of the Endless (Morpheus) might be forced to destroy her to save reality. What he doesn’t realize, though, is that Rose’s current circumstances might very well be part of a sinister plot against Morpheus, in the sense that Morpheus’ devotion to his duty is SO strong that anyone who knows him would know he’d feel obligated to destroy Rose. Thus, that knowledge could be turned against him. But who knows Morpheus that well? That’s a mystery that you’ll have to read the book to discover.

Other notable parts of this storyline is the introduction of the immortal Hob Gadling in a powerful one-off examination of what it would really be like if a guy just could not die. Hob would soon become one of the most popular recurring characters in Sandman.

In addition, we see Gaiman tie in the 1970s Jack Kirby Sandman revamp with the current Sandman series, we see the introduction of a number of characters who live in the same boarding house as Rose (these characters all become much more important in later stories) and we meet another interesting supporting characters, an escaped nightmare named Corinthian, who has become a legend among serial killers. He attends a serial killer convention (that Rose accidentally ends up, as well) where Morpheus shows up and delivers some Spectre-level punishment on the serial killer scumbags…

This story, interestingly enough, was the first Sandman story to get collected into a trade, ahead of the opening arc of the series!

94. “The Death of Speedy” by Jaime Hernandez (Love and Rockets #21-23) – 110 points (4 first place votes)

For a story that is actually CALLED “The Death of Speedy,” you would figure that by the time it came around, the actual death would not have as much impact.

You would be wrong.

In one of Jaime Hernandez’s strongest story arcs in his long and accomplished tenure on Love and Rockets, the Death of Speedy focuses on a small group of young men and women in the barrio, as Hernandez brilliantly lays their limited life options out plain to see, and it is depressing while still being quite moving.

Even as you sit there and think, “How foolish can these kids be?’ when you marvel at the problems their machismo gets them into (and the girls, with their own form of machismo – what IS the female equivalent of machismo?), you still get that this is not really much of an overstatement of the reality of the situation.

Hernandez seems to truly give us a glimpse into the lives of real people here, and perhaps the most brutal aspect of the whole thing is that as they fight over ridiculous notions like “this is OUR turf” or “he’s MY man,” their lives continue to prominently revolve around LOVE.

Maggie, the story’s protagonist, particularly seems to view love as a motivating factor.

But even ideas based in love can end up in heartbreak and pain, and that’s what happens in the Death of Speedy.

That the whole thing is handled in Hernandez’s Dan Decarlo-esque artwork, allowing the pathos to almost sneak up on you, like a wolf dressed in sheep’s clothing.

Go to the next page for #93-91!

93. “The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck” by Don Rosa (Uncle Scrooge #285-296) – 111 points (1 first place vote)

The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck is the type of comic book project that really should not work as well as it does. Over his decades of writing Uncle Scrooge, Carl Barks threw in little details of Scrooge’s past here and there. Occasionally, the details even conflicted (although that might not be Barks contradicting himself, it could have been another Scrooge writer contradicting a Barks detail). So writer/artist Don Rosa decided to use all those little details about Scrooge and then fashion a 12-part detailed life of Scrooge from boyhood until his first appearance as regular comic book character.

That might sound like something better suited for an essay or a spreadsheet, yet Rosa’s brilliance as a storyteller make the whole endeavor an utter marvel.

Scrooge’s adventures are all pretty much “done in one”s, yet they continue an overarching character development that is quite impressive. Also impressive is all the actual historical details that Rosa peppers in with Scrooge’s travels. It’s strong historical fiction.

Here’s a bit from an early part of the story where young Scrooge is working as a cowboy and has to rescue a stolen bull from some cattle thieves…

You might recognize a certain future president there. As you can see, Rosa’s art is a detailed delight. He’s amazing.

92. “New World Order” by Grant Morrison, Howard Porter and John Dell (JLA #1-4) – 115 points

Grant Morrison’s JLA was perhaps THE most influential superhero book of the 1990s, as it influenced even the Authority (the widescreen aspect, at least).

“New World Order” was the first story arc of the “brand new” JLA, which consisted of the seven original members of the Justice League, or at least the seven superhero names of the original Justice League, as the Green Lantern and the Flash were both the successors of the characters who had formed the Justice League.

In this initial storyline, a group of aliens come to Earth and seemingly make the Justice League obsolete. The League knows that there is something up with these aliens, and soon discover that, yep, there are some sinister motivations going on behind these guys.

The secret behind the aliens is very clever, and it is especially notable how Batman discovers their secret (and how he exploits it).

This story first established Morrison’s take on Batman as the guy who prepares for everything (or “Bat God,” as some people refer to it)…

The other heroes in the book get notable scenes, as well, especially the Flash, who uses some of the knowledge the original Flash gave him to take down a villain.

The art by Howard Porter and John Dell is slick and apt for the sometimes over the top action of the book.

This series quickly became the most successful title for DC in the late 1990s, which was notable because the Justice League line of books had gotten pretty low in the sales charts before this title revitalized the group.

91. "Slavers" by Garth Ennis, Leandro Fernandez and Scott Koblish (The Punisher #25-30) - 116 points

In this story arc in Garth Ennis' long and acclaimed Punisher MAX run, the Punisher stumbles upon a slave ring, and as Ennis did throughout his MAX series, since Frank Castle is almost devoid of characterization (he’s basically a killing machine), Ennis goes into DEEP characterization on everyone else in the book, including the slaves, the slave ring leader and the son of the slave ring leader (imagine the kind of daddy issues you would have if you ran a slave ring with your dad), plus some cops who look to use the Punisher for PR purposes.

Everyone, in a way, is complicit in the horrors of the slavers, even the social worker who thinks that she can get one of the slaves out and instead ends up getting the woman's baby killed, causing the social worker to become the Punisher's informant despite him being everything she hates in the world.

Ennis weaves all of these plots together and does not flinch on showing us the extreme violence and depravity that goes on with forced prostitution, making it so much more cathartic when the Punisher klls all the bad guys, and in some cases, in increasingly poetic manners.

Check back later on Tuesday for the next ten storylines on the countdown!