Black Butler

Yana Toboso

Set in Victorian England, Black Butler is the story of the young Earl Ciel Phantomhive, and his butler, Sebastian, who can seemingly perform small miracles whenever his master requires it. With a colourful cast and some brilliantly constructed fight scenes (occasionally using improvised weaponry that should be silly and yet seems incredibly cool), this isn’t one to miss. The art is gorgeous, balancing the serious with the funny perfectly.

Kick-Ass

Mark Millar and John Romita Jr

Containing scenes of bloody violence and explicit language, this is not one for the kids, but Kick-Ass, which was translated wonderfully to film last year, is a fantastic look at what might happen if people in the real world, with no special powers, attempted to become superheroes. A black comedy of sorts, and the ’10 and ¼’-year-old Hit Girl absolutely steals the show, using possibly the most expletives of all of the characters, and certainly killing the most people. 

Death Note

Takeshi Obata and Tsugumi Ohba

This incredibly popular series details the story of a Japanese teenager with a strong sense of justice called Light Yagami, a genius detective known only as ‘L’, and the notebook dropped by a god of death, Ryuk. This notebook can kill any human being simply by writing their name in it, and when criminals begin dying of heart attacks,  and the media dub the mysterious killer ‘Kira’, it’s only a matter of time before this manga becomes so full of plot twists that saying any more would ruin it. The art, by Tsugumi Ohba, is really stunning, and perfectly offsets the incredible story.

 Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Bryan Lee O’Malley

Fully reviewed here: (http://www.warwickbooks.net/reviews/scott-pilgrim/), Scott Pilgrim is the tale of a 20-something Canadian who has to fight 7 evil exes to stay with his roller-blading Amazon-deliverer girlfriend, Ramona Flowers. Throw in an ex of his own (well, ok, so he hasn’t exactly told her he’s breaking up with her yet…), all of the videogame references you can possibly imagine, plus a few more you didn’t notice, and you have Scott Pilgrim.

Ouran High School Host Club

Bisco Hatori

Despite the long name, the premise to this series is fairly simple: poor student – Haruhi Fujioka -  at rich school – Ouran High – accidentally breaks something – a vase valued at eight million yen – and is forced to work for one of the clubs to pay off the debt. The spice is that the club is the illustrious ‘Host Club’, a group of seven attractive young men who sit and have tea with and essentially charm the girls of the school. Haruhi is roped into becoming a Host, but here’s the twist – Haruhi is actually a girl. A ridiculous romcom chock full of pretty boys and ridiculous overdramaticism. 

Fables

Bill Willingham

Set in a modern New York inhabited by characters from fairytales, Fables has a hard time pinning itself to one genre. The first volume is a murder mystery, the second a conspiracy thriller…overall, however, there is a tinge of the political to it, but can still be read by anyone who just wants a good story. The use of well-known fairytales provides a willing platform for readers to place their expectations on, and more often than not, Fables crushes those expectations in ways you couldn’t have imagined.

 X-Men

Various Authors

Of course, there are countless different versions of the mutant superheroes who fight against prejudice and crime, but my personal favourite is X-Men First Class, by Jeff Parker, which follows the very first group of X-Men – Cyclops, Iceman, Beast, Angel, and Jean Grey – during their teaching under Charles Xavier. The art is by a variety of artists, so the style varies from chapter to chapter, but this works surprisingly well, and the style always fits the story.

 Naruto

Masashi Kishimoto

No top ten list featuring manga would be complete without this sprawling, unbelievably long series featuring a young orange-clad ninja who has a demon fox sealed inside of him. Though it’s not one of my personal favourites, mainly due to its length (54 volumes since 1999, and still going) it is immensely popular and has a huge fan-following. Certainly the first few volumes are full of an excellent mix of humour, seriousness, and, of course, ridiculous ninja battles, which is in no way a bad thing.

 V for Vendetta

Alan Moore and David Lloyd

Many people would choose Watchmen as their Alan Moore comic for a top ten list. For me, however, V For Vendetta is the way to go. It has the perfect mix of character, story, and art. There are tones of 1984, but Alan Moore’s vision of Britain’s future is just as terrifying as Orwell’s. V himself is a striking figure, and the twists and turns that the plot takes are almost entirely unexpected every time. Added to the ending, this is a fantastic book, not just a great comic.

 The Sandman

Neil Gaiman

Did I say ‘no particular order’? Sorry, that wasn’t quite true. Sandman, the story of the personification of Dream, one of the Endless (Death, Destiny, Despair, Desire, Destruction, and Delirium being the others), is the best thing on this list. It has twelve volumes, each better than the last, and in true Gaiman style, takes its pick of all of the myths and legends one person can possibly conceive of, adds its own mythology, and churns it all up into one thing that is possibly better than the sum of its parts.