Best Vertigo ongoing series (Morrison and Moore excluded)

God, Vertigo was kind of terrible when you think about it.

"Was"? It still exists, I think.

No "One Hundred Bullets"?

Whoops, I seemed to have missed that one. Should I redo the poll? Would many people vote for it?

Scalped? Any good? Read the first trade, rather hum-drum crime griminess (which I've never really taken to as a whole - whenever anyone attempts a "pessimistic" tone, it always feels lazy), not great or awful. Maybe it gets better?

Shade meant the world to me when I was 14 years old. I'm afraid to read it again in case it hasn't aged well. Wasn't Milligan and Allred supposed to do a mini-series sequel?

I remember being very disappointed by how much I disliked Ellis's "Hellblazer". Then, I went back and read some issues written by other people and realized I just didn't like the book, period.

"Preacher" never appealed to me, either, and don't get me started on "Sandman" ugh. "Transmet" and "100 Bullets" were the only two series on Vertigo that I read and liked.

Shade meant the world to me when I was 14 years old. I'm afraid to read it again in case it hasn't aged well. Wasn't Milligan and Allred supposed to do a mini-series sequel?

Re-read some recently - certainly it's quite variable, but I labelled that ish where Shade became a floor my fave single issue ever and I wasn't compelled to change my mind.

I've never read Shade, but I'm tempted to vote for Human Target, which was mostly brilliant. It's a pity it got cancelled so quickly. I guess that's because it had neither a fantasy element nor excessive violence, and being a really popular Vertigo title seems to require either (or both). Then again, maybe being cancelled after 21 issues was good, since it meant Milligan was able to keep it focused. I'm not sure how long he could've continued with the concept, as intriguing as it was.

rip human target (i already made an impulse vote for something else but would change it to HT if i could)

I thought we'd already had a poll on Vertigo,

I thought we had too! Maybe it was over at the sandbox.

I'd probably vote 100 Bullets. In its absence I'd go for Y, which was flawed but still had me hooked.

Amazed to find myself choosing between Army@Love and Sandman Mystery Theatre here. Flinch probably had enough high points to beat either of them, but dragged down by the majority of the material (and it never had anything as great as the Morrison story about toys in the War mini, or the Ilya/Quitely one about a pavement-fucker in the Romance one...)

(Morrison and Moore excluded)

Moore never worked for Vertigo, he left DC about four years before it started.

Was Army@Love ever really an ongoing series? Doesn't much matter, I guess.

Human Target also got a 4 issue mini and a graphic novel. It's all a pretty good read.

100 Bullets had some amazing arcs and a couple of really good single issues, but the over arching story has not quite come through. I still like the comic quite a bit, even if the second half isn't quite as on. Wylie was one of the better characters and is at the center of the best arc about the trumpet player in New Orleans and after he goes, the series doesn't seem to have much of a center. Haven't read the end yet. Cool thing is that Eduardo Risso is now free to do some other comics, as I think he is really good.

Transmetropolitan is kind of the same. The early issues where Spider is just watching TV and all were really cool, but the whole storyline with the Smiler isn't quite as taking. Darick Robertson is one of my favorite artists, as he can draw some stuff that really cracks me up.

Young Liars was nutty. It made me feel like I was stoned. I'm going to read it again sometime when the second volume comes out. It is pretty much going to come to an end, but not the end pretty soon from what I understand.

I know it isn't a favorite around here (or Garth Ennis for that matter), but I thought Preacher was a scream. Saint of Killers is a great character. And if the end isn't as par with a couple of the finishes to some of the arcs, it is kind of hard to top some of the earlier stuff that went down in Monument Valley and the fight at the Grail compound.

DMZ and Northlanders are both somewhat unique comics. I wish there was more alternate future or historical comics or at least ones without super heroes. Some of the story lines are better than others, but I like the fact that the setting is really the star of the book. Riccardo Burchielli is a fine artist and the book seems to always have sharp and unique covers. I'm following both.

I've liked Scalped all right. I don't know how long it can ride out as at the end of the 3rd trade it seems like it is more than half way done. I have to figure after all that has gone down that the main protagonist is pretty close to snapping, so I don't see how it could ride out for that much longer. I like the artwork.

Sandman Mystery Theatre is one of the better costumed pulp comics made. I think it is slept on quite a bit.

I've got runs of Deadenders, Outlaw Nation and The Losers, but I have not read them yet. I've also got some Shade, but not not the whole run. All of these I found mostly out of 50 cent bins.

I've got a bunch of Hellblazer I haven't read that I got out of the 50 cent bin. Warren Ellis and Azzarello's runs were OK and I have re-read the first trade by Delano. I probably read the first 30 or so of it back in the 80s with maybe Ennis' first story being about the last ones I read. I want to re-read the Family Man story, as I remember that one and the one about the bomb by Morrison being the best of the early comics.

I probably read the first 20 or so Sandman back in the 80s and got the first trade sometime in my time in the comic woods. One day I will probably read it and the Death mini-series, but not yet.

Y the Last Man was also pretty good.

Was Army@Love ever really an ongoing series? Doesn't much matter, I guess.

Yep, commissioned as an ongoing; axed at 12 in order to re-commission as a “series of miniseries” cos the first trade had done well, then axed again before the first mini finished, because they didn’t bother to market the second trade as creatively as the first and it didn’t sell as well.

Moore never worked for Vertigo, he left DC about four years before it started.

Yeah, but I also included series like Sandman or Hellblazer that began before Vertigo but became Vertigo titles once the imprint started. If I'd included Swamp Thing on this basis, a lot of people probably would've voted for it based on Moore's run.

wow thats a lot of crap

Was there ever a conscious attempt to build a shared Vertigo universe similar to the mainstream DC universe? I know Sandman, Swamp Thing, Hellblazer, Books of Magic, The Dreaming, Sandman Mystery Theatre, and Lucifer are all connected via sharing the same characters, but I'm not sure if they really form a specific universe with same continuity. Of course Sandman, Swamp Thing, and Hellblazer all started out in the mainstream DC universe, but they're not a part of it anymore, rigth? There are some characters who seem to be able to jump between the two universes though, like Zatanna or Phantom Stranger.

Yeah, there was a crossover series called the Children's Crusade in 93/94 which established continuity across a number of Vertigo titles.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Children's_Crusade_(Vertigo_comics)

Swamp Thing and John Constantine are still part of mainstream continuity as far as I know - Constantine has certainly appeared in a mainstream title post-Crisis.

Yeah, but Costantine's own series doesn't take place in the mainstream DC superhero universe, does it? Maybe these magical types like Constantine or Zatanna are simply able to cross between universes.

Well Constantine was at the Green Arrow/Black Canary wedding recently... also GM wanted to use him in Doom Patrol but was told editorial policy was to wind back his appearances in the mainstream universe to keep the Hellblazer universe more 'real', so he invented Willoughby Kipling instead. Although Hellblazer #51 confirms the two know each other, therefore inhabit the same universe.

I'd agree with most of what earlnash says. I really dug Preacher at the time, but the growing reliance on knob-jokes and the feeble end soured it for me. The Losers was really good, but felt too short.

I should add that I'm only 85% through 100 Bullets, so I don't yet know how it ends.

And I read all of Transmet, but it fell apart once he went after the Smiler: that we were supposed to find kiddy-fiddling to be an abhorrent, ultimate crime in this values-free future really didn't ring true. And Warren Ellis really can't write more than one character.

I voted for Preacher--man, back in those days knob jokes were an _aesthetic_--although I am now rapidly warming to Young Liars. (Which I actively disliked at first. And now it's too late!!)

American Virgin was deeply flawed, but it definitely had its moments. I love bits of Y and Transmet, too.

And Warren Ellis really can't write more than one character.

Whoops, I seemed to have missed that one. Should I redo the poll? Would many people vote for it?

I would give One Hundred Bullets serious consideration.

i've had good times with preacher, lucifer, fables, and human target for sure. never finished catching up on sandman, and i was ready for y to end for the last 15 issues or so.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Hmm, I thought this poll would get more votes...

that's a lot for ILC!

considering the general amount of hate in this thread, not surprising we got this many votes for anything

I'm going to be challenging in a "holding up widely-held-opinion"-way and say that Sandman really is a pretty solid series, with a fair amount of variation and a good range of artists. Probably more so than Shade, although Shade has a lot more joy to it, even when it's acting like grittier Sandman-lite.

Then again, I also should have voted for The Losers because I think it's a decent action flick as comic, although I have no idea if it'll work well as an actual film.

I started the previous poll, if anyone's interested, and daftly gave it a search proof title.

Vertipoll

searching with an asterisk is a good idea.