Annual: Best Of 2023

We’ve reached the end of another calendar year and once again, Mike and Alex have come up one week short on stories to talk about. But fear not! Earlier this month, Mike, Alex, and great friend of the show Andy took a quick road trip up Interstate 71 to attend GalaxyCon Columbus 2023 and decided that was a perfect opportunity to record a podcast episode. In the car. So with Andy driving, Mike handling the recording, and Alex contributing pretty much nothing, the trio run down their top 5-ish lists of the best comics they read in 2023 (with many cheats and honorable mentions) and discuss what made these books standout and worthy of recognition. A list of all of the comics we mentioned in this episode can be found here.

Thank you so much for listening to Storied Arcs! We’ll be back next week to kick off a new season diving deep into another great comic!

Here are the comics listed in order of discussion:

Night Fever by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
Kill Your Darlings by Ethan Parker, Griffin Sheridan, and Bob Quinn
Do A Powerbomb by Daniel Warren Johnson
Blacksad: They All Fall Down Part 3 by Juan Diaz Canales and Juanjo Guarnido
Daredevil by Chip Zdarsky and Marco Checchetto
Black Cloak by Kelly Thompson and Meredith McClaren
The Cull by Kelly Thompson and Mattia Del Iulis
Birds of Prey by Kelly Thompson and Leonardo Romero
Transformers by Daniel Warren Johnson
Traveling To Mars by Mark Russell and Roberto Meli
Cereal: Sweet Darkness by Mark Russell and Peter Snejbjerg
w0rldtr33 by James Tynion IV and Fernando Blanco
Fishflies by Jeff Lemire
Phantom Road by Jeff Lemire and Gabriel Hernandez Walta
How I Became A Shoplifter by Tom Breyfogle, Daniel Hillyard, Jordi Perez, Gabriele Falzone, and Johnny Kucaj
Animal Pound by Tom King and Peter Gross
Wonder Woman by Tom King and Daniel Sempere
Saga by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
Public Domain by Chip Zdarsky
Stillwater by Chip Zdarsky and Roman Perez
G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero by Larry Hama and Chris Mooneyham
Gospel by Will Morris
Eight Billion Genies by Charles Soule and Ryan Browne
Parasocial by Alex de Campi and Erica Henderson
The Great British Bump-Off by John Allison and Max Sarin
Hairball by Matt Kindt and Tyler Jenkins
X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023 by Gerry Duggan and various artists
Star Wars: Darth Vader by Greg Pak, Raffaele Ienco, and various artists
Nightwing by Tom Taylor, Bruno Redondo, Tom Reilly, and various artists
G.O.D.S. by Jonathan Hickman and Valerio Schiti
Once Upon a Time at the End of the World by Jason Aaron, Alexandre Tefenkgi, Leila Del Duca, and Nick Dragotta
Kaya by Wes Craig
Briar by Christopher Cantwell and German Garcia
All Against All by Alex Pakandel and Caspar Wijngaard
Damn Them All by Si Spurrier and Charlie Adlard