The Best Comics & Graphic Novels of July 2018

Bad Girls, by Alex de Campi and Victor Santos
On the eve of Fidel Castro’s 1958 takeover in Cuba, three women decide to take advantage of the chaos. After the night takes at the El Edén Casino takes a dark turn, Jazz singer Taffy, gangster’s moll Carole, and mambo star Ana have just 12 hours to escape Havana. They’re leaving behind a dead body, but carrying $6 million. De Campi has crafted a stylish and fast-paced retro-noir, and she’s  well-matched in Santos, whose high-contrast pop art style is perfectly suited to the story.

Rome West, by Brian Wood, Justin Giampaoli, Andrea Mutti, Lee Loughridge, John Hill, Ryane Hill, and Matthew Taylor
Spanning centuries, the story follows a family over an epic span of time, retelling the history of the United States in a world where a Roman trading fleet becomes lost before arriving on the shores of what would have otherwise become North America, about 1,000 years before Columbus. Trapped, they found a new colony called Roma Occidens, changing the course of world history.

The Adventure Zone: Here There Be Gerblins (B&N Exclusive Edition), by Clint McElroy, Griffin McElroy, Justin McElroy, Travis McElroy, and Carey Pietsch
If you’ve ever heard the Maximum Fun podcast of the same name, then you’re undoubtedly already a fan and you don’t really need to be sold on this one. For everyone else: The Adventure Zone is, essentially, a Dungeons and Dragons campaign crossed with a comedy improv routine, plus a fair bit of heart. What began as a one-off audio experiment from veteran podcasting trio the McElroy brothers (Justin. Travis, and Griffin as Dungeon Master) and their dad (D&D neophyte Clint) became a cult sensation, attracting a loyal following and a million pieces of Tumblr fanart over the course of a three-year run. Here There Be Gerblins! is a graphic adaption of the first campaign, and it makes the transition surprisingly seamlessly, preserving the in-jokes and references fans will eat up, while remaining perfectly accessible to new readers. Worthy of particular praise is co-writer/artist Carey Pietsch, who accomplishes with aplomb the seemingly thankless task of creating a visual style for a story that has taken on a life of its own in the fan community. The B&N Exclusive Edition has cool extras, including a fancy variant cover and a double-sided poster with art thumbnails.

Dark Nights: Metal: The Resistance, by Joshua Williamson, Ethan Van Sciver, Liam Sharp, Jeff Lemire, and Tyler Kirkham
The companion to DC’s (surprisingly good) big summer event stars Batgirl, Harley Quinn, Killer Croc, Black Canary, Green Arrow, and many other heroes (and villains) fighting to survive the invasion of the Dark Multiverse and its seven Dark Knights. The League members are trapped in pocket worlds with the evil Batmen, while the Suicide Squad battles to escape the nightmare that is Gotham City during the events of Metal.

CALEXIT, by Matteo Pizzolo, Amancay Nahuelpan, and Tyler Boss
What happens when the resistance gives way to a revolution? In California, the world’s sixth largest economy, an incoming president loses the state by almost two votes to one. Sound familiar? In the latest provocative book from Black Mask, a publisher not afraid to go there, the autocratic Commander-in-Chief is met with mass protests that shut down the state’s two largest airports. Before long, it becomes clear that California won’t allow itself to be ruled.

Ms. Marvel, Vol. 9: Teenage Wasteland, by G. Willow Wilson, Nico Leon, and Ian Herring
Kamala Khan has vanished…long live Ms. Marvel! While Kamala studies in Wakanda, a whole army of Jersey City citizens and superheroes step in to fill the void that she’s left. Even Captain Marvel steps into the fray. But nothing but the real thing will suffice when Ms. Marvel’s old adversary, The Inventor, shows up. Nine volumes in, this series is still flying high under the watchful eye of originating writer G. Willow Wilson.

Rat Queens, Vol. 5: The Colossal Magic Nothing, by Kurtis J. Wiebe, Owen Gieni, and Ryan Ferrier
For once, things are looking pretty good for the hard fighting, hard drinking, hard living adventurers. A series of successes has the Rat Queens ready for a rest and some good times in Palisade, which is, of course, entirely off the table. A new wizard is in town with the ability to erase people from existence. Fortunately for Palisade, the Queens aren’t having it.

Rocko’s Modern Life, Vol. 1, by Ryan Ferrier, Ian McGinty, KC Green, Fred Stresing, and Jorge Monlongo
It’s a good time to be a ’90s kid (whether or not you were actually a kid back then). Case in point, this revival of the cult classic Nickelodeon cartoon Rocko’s Modern Life. Rocko and his pals Spunky, Heffer, and Filburt are in dire straights when the neurotic wallaby finds himself out of work, with the bills piling up. He’ll take on an increasingly wild, funny, and desperate series of odd jobs just to make ends meet.

Days of Hate, Act One, by Aleš Kot, Danijel Žeželj, Jordie Bellaire, and Tom Muller
Like CALEXIT, Days of Hate isn’t afraid to raise trenchant questions about modern American politics. Not a ton of escapism here, as the opening pages offer up a quote from Steve Bannon and follow the investigation into a firebomb at a gay nightclub that had been covered in swastikas. It’s 2022, and two women who were driven to very different paths by the disintegrating state of America meet up again. The art is grimy but gorgeous, with the engaging story of Huian and Amanda making for a compelling story above and beyond the troubling look at the world.

Ex Machina: The Complete Series Omnibus, by Brian K. Vaughan, Tony Harris, Tom Feister, Jim Clark, and JD Mettler
This series from Saga‘s Brian K. Vaughan is a bit less known than some of his more recent work, but it deserves a much higher profile. Mitchell Hundred is a New York City civil engineer who winds up with the ability to communicate with machines. A timely intervention in a shocking, real-life tragedy propels him to mayor’s office and into the fray of NYC politics and fights over still-relevant issues. Mysteries and storylines introduced in the first issue bear fruit by the end, making for a very satisfying read. This new edition collects the entire 50-plus issue, 1,400-plus page series, and thus also qualifies as an arm workout.

Star Wars: Journey to Star Wars: The Last Jedi—Captain Phasma, by Kelly Thompson, Marco Checchetto, Andres Mossa, and Clayton Cowles
She’s had a rough go of it in the movies, but Phasma has done quite a bit better for herself on the page. This spin-off prequel to The Last Jedi opens during the conclusion of The Force Awakens. Phasma has been trapped in a garbage chute by Finn and company. She doesn’t stay there for long. Before she can escape Starkiller Base, she stops to cover her tracks by erasing any record of the fact that she was the one to bring down the shields. No problem except, oops… someone already accessed the logs. Really, really bad news for that dude, as Phasma begins a quest to hunt him down before returning to her First Order duties. Writer Kelly Thompson (Hawkeye, Jem and the Holograms) proves herself well-suited to writing about AGFFA’s most intriguing woman villain, and the art (from a team of Marvel regulars) is on par with the rest of the saga books, which is to say, top-notch.

Star Wars: Rogue One, by Jody Houser, Duane Swierczynski, Oscar Bazaldua, Emilio Laiso, and Paolo Villanelli
It’s been a long-time coming, but the comic adaption of the 2016 Star Wars prequel is finally here. Jyn Erso and Cassian Andor lead a rag-tag team to secure the plans for the Empire’s ultimate weapon in hope of finding a weakness. In addition to the six-part adaption, this collection also includes a bonus story detailing the first meeting between sulky rebel Cassian and his sassy droid, K-2SO.

The Ballad Of Halo Jones, Vol. 2: Book 2, by Alan Moore, Ian Gibson, and Barbara Nosenzo
There’s no question Alan Moore is one of comics’ most influential writers, with a long career that’s seen many of his early works fall out of print, only to be rediscovered later. That’s the case with The Ballad of Halo Jones, a feminist space opera from 1984 (and the pages of 2000 A.D.),  featuring the art of the similarly legendary Ian Gibson. Halo Jones is a young every-woman of the 50th century who escapes from the drudgery of life at an underwater housing estate to become an interstellar adventurer and freedom fighter. It’s great to have the series back in print, and colored and remastered for the first time.

Wild’s End: Journey’s End, by Dan Abnett and I.N.J. Culbard
Lower Crowchurch was a small and quiet English community in the 1930s, until an alien invasion forced the town to confront life-and-death scenarios on a daily basis. Oh, and the people are all anthropomorphic animals. In the conclusion of the acclaimed trilogy, hope fades as the military is unable to overcome the might of the invaders, but the survivors of Crowchurch look to old enemies to turn the tide. It’s The War of the Worlds meets The Wind in the Willows; adorably thrilling stuff.

Avengers: No Surrender, by Mark Waid, Al Ewing, Jim Zub, Pepe Larraz, Paco Medina, and Kim Jacinto
This very fun, self-contained Avengers mega-story is a cosmic adventure in which almost every team member ever comes together to stop a series of interconnected threats triggered by the theft of Earth itself. The Challenger and the Grandmaster, two Edlers of the Universe, have taken Earth to a pocket dimension and forced the heroes to square off against the Black Order and Lethal Legion to win it back. The expanded team is joined by a returned Hulk, as well as Voyager, the original Avenger who no one remembers. Plot-wise, it’s nothing groundbreaking, but the assembled writing and artistic talent craft an incredibly entertaining 16-part story—it’s the comics equivalent of a solid summer action movie.

I, Rene Tardi, Prisoner Of War In Stalag 2B, by Jacques Tardi
Legendary French cartoonist Jacques Tardi has tackled telling the story of his father’s life before, but here he takes on the four years and eight months René Tardi spent as a prisoner of war under the Germans during World War II. The art is some of the best and most meticulous of the younger Tardi’s long career, with a depth and attention to detail rooted in his own childhood memories, his exhaustive research, and his father’s own notebooks.