Just caught The Watchmen's full trailer and I object to the above statement. There's no denying that The Watchmen was among the great, but the greatest??? I don't think so.

So make a list of your top ten: only rule is that a creator can only appear once in the list.

My list:

10) When the Wind Blows by Raymond Briggs

Don't let the cute art style fool you, this is a deadly serious book, right to it's tragic ending.

9) Maus by Art Spiegelman

Story of the artist's father's experiences under Nazi Germany. Well worth the read.

8) Sandman series by Neil Gaiman

This one is a large ball of different media, as there are comics and graphic novels and... well... 'other' things that make this up, and they're all inter related. If I was to pick I'd name Dream Hunters as the best of them, but the whole ball of wax gets a nod.

7) Hellboy: Seed Of Destruction by Mike Mignola

If I was to pick one Hellboy, this would be it. the original is by far the best.

6) Girl Genius series by Phil and Kaja Foglio

My god is this funny. I'm more a fan of serious comics, but this one is so well done and so titanically hilarious that... well... go read it.

5) Lone Wolf and Cub by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima

The baddest-assed Samurai comic of all time. nuff said.

4) Watchmen by Alan Moore

Watchmen only gets 4 in my book. It's good. It's very good. It's also one of the few 'superhero' books that I consider worth while. But anything it does, something else does better. However, it does all of them well enough to make a solid 4.

3) Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow

"The" cyberpunk sci-fi tale. If you haven't at least heard of it, you've been living under a rock.

2) The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller

I bet you all had been wondering where Miller would show up on this list, and which one I'd pick. Sin City and 300 were both the other, excellent, stories I thought about picking, but it's his re-imagining of Batman that makes this one his best.

And the number one is...

1) Akira by Katsuhiro Otomo

Akira is a masterpiece. The art, story, and originality of it make it the best series of graphic novels I've ever read. I'm not going to spoil it for you, but if you've only seen the movie, then you have only caught a glimpse of it.