Comic – Marked for Plot

Monkey Meat: The Summer Batch

Back in April, I read the first collection of Monkey Meat stories and fell in love. Juni Ba’s art, humor, and themes were catnip for me. The vibes are Sunday Morning cartoons focusing on the dystopian nature of late stage capitalism, with heaping of weirdness thrown into the mix. Overall, I think The Summer Batch is (mostly) a direct upgrade, but the two can really be read in any order. Each story is self-contained, with only a few characters appearing in multiple stories – and never requiring you to have read earlier tales to understand what’s going on. All that’s important is that you’ve returned to Monkey Meat Island! Don’t worry, all we ask for access to the theme park is your immortal soul.

The Premise:
Welcome back to Monkey Meat island! Like last time, there’s a wide variety of stories within this volume. This time however, the book itself is a magazine created by the Monkey Meat corporation, meaning you also get complementary ads. Isn’t that great?

Read if Looking for: the corporation always wins, irreverent humor, in-book recommendations for real-world art, meta-commentary

Avoid if Looking for: optimism or escapism, realistic characters or situations, subtlety

Comparable Media: The Triangle Agency, Dungeon Crawler Carl, Rick and Morty

East of West – Star Wars meets Silverado

I’ve run into a lot of disappointing Weird West novels this year (followed by a really fantastic Fantasy Western in The God Eaters). East of West is a comic famous for being the Weird West of the comic world, though it mixes in more Sci Fi than true weirdness. Considering I read a trade, I only got about a tenth of the entire story to be told, which may not be enough to make a real judgement with. A lot of pieces got put on the gameboard, but none were developed enough to be anything other than introductory archetypes. There was enough interest here to make me want to read more, and the art style is just captivating

The Premise
Death is one of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse, but he has broken away from his fellows. He now stands in opposition to them as he seeks revenge on those who killed his wife. Meanwhile, the other Horseman are trying to bring about the End of Times. Death will assassinate world leaders, wage war, and bring his inevitability to bear. Meanwhile, War, Famine, and Pestilence work behind the scenes to chase Death down and destroy the world as they know it. Threaded through all of this is a vast Science Western world, giant fights, and political maneuvering from human leaders.

Read If You Like: genre blending, tropes on tropes on tropes, epic stakes from page 1, the feeling of being small

Avoid If You Dislike: archetypical (stereotypical?) characters, multi-pov comics, plentiful violence

Comparable Media: Descenders, Mistborn Era 2

Karmen – Deadly Bad Decisions

After loving my time with The Many Deaths of Laila Starr, I decided to chase down some comics that people have shared are comparable. I can see why Karmen was mentioned: it asks a character to confront death as they grow and change. Despite being published in 2020, the book felt dated. It’s an enjoyable enough read if you don’t think about things at all. Plus, its a short and quick read. However, it definitely irked me in ways that modern media rarely does. This story triggered thematic red flag after thematic red flag despite being a great book to read on a long car ride.

The Premise
This comic follows Cata, who commits suicide after learning that her longtime best friend (since elementary school) Xisco is cheating on his girlfriend with Cata’s roommate. Turns out Cata’s been in love with him the whole time and this was the last straw. At this point, she turns into a ghost and meets Karmen, an immortal responsible for helping souls pass from one life to the next, determined by how they have cultivated their virtues in their life. Cata is destined to reincarnate as a lower life form. Karmen asks Cata to confront various parts of her personality, eavesdrop on others to learn lessons from them, all in an effort to help Cata’s soul improve in her next incarnation.

Read If You Like: meddling immortals, confronting your character flaws, cat ladies, emotional conclusions

Avoid If You Dislike: men and women unable to have a close platonic relationship, lots of female nudity (all non-sexual, but it’s nonstop), committing suicide because a man didn’t love you

Comparable Media: The Many Deaths of Laila Starr, It’s a Wonderful Life

Insectopolis – Bad for Entomophobes, Good for Fun Facts

As I’m continuing to explore the ways that I can use graphic novels in my classroom, I’ve begun taking a look at more and more graphic nonfiction. Insectopolis is kind of odd, as it’s half nonfiction and half post-apocalyptic xenofiction (humans die and it turns out bugs can talk like you or me), with plenty of fun tidbits inside. Lesson learned though, graphic novels are NOT to be read on my cell phone. I’ve got to figure out a better way to e-read comics.

The Premise
Set in an insect exhibit at the New York public library both before and after humans have died off the face of the earth, this book pops from topic to topic in the insect world. It touches on biology, ecology, and biographies of human naturalists as it takes you on a tour of the bug world.

Read If Looking For: a survey of the insect world, notes on how bugs have affected the course of human history, ants that complain a lot

Avoid If Looking For: a rigorous examination of any particular insect or event, anatomical diagrams of bugs, nonfiction without frills or fluff

Comparable Media: Magic School Bus, the educational movie you watched when your science teacher was sick

Monkey Meat – An Anticapitalist Fever Dream

I knew nothing about Monkey Meat other than its title and cover art. I didn’t quite know what to make of a hand crushing a Spam-esque can with a monkey on the front, but I knew I was interested in reading more. Monkey Meat: the First Batch is a zany and dark anthology that I fell in love with. It’s not the most original critique of capitalism I’ve seen, but it’s certainly one of the most engaging. I truly believe that if companies could get God to sign over the rights to people’s souls, they would absolutely do so. My only regret is that it doesn’t seem likely to get a sequel, but I will certainly be chasing down more of Juni Ba’s work in the future.

The Premise:
This anthology (though it might be better described as a mosaic comic) focuses on Monkey Meat Island. Once an untouched paradise, it is now ruled by a capitalist megacorporation cranking out questionably sourced meat, energy drinks made out of souls, and action figures showcasing the indigenous cultures the company eradicated to ‘honor’ them. Each story follows a different protagonist, but several characters run through the series, including the enslaved enforcer Lug and the supernaturally persuasive Salesman

Read If Looking For: unbridled creativity, unconventional art styles, episodic structures

Avoid If Looking For: consistent worldbuilding, subtlety and nuance, grounded characters

Comparable Media: Dungeon Crawler Carl, Invader Zim, Rick and Morty

Lunar Boy – Isolation and Identity in Middle Grade Comics

Talking about books with kids is one of the best parts of my job. Unlike most adults, they’ll gush about their favorites unabashedly and rip books they disliked to pieces. This means that I get a pretty good pulse on what books are worth a look – though my tastes don’t always line up with the kids. Lunar Boy is one of those books that kept coming up as phenomenal. Since nobody was reading it, I took my classroom copy home to read as a way to kick off my Spring Break. The kids were right; it’s good.

Elevator Pitch:
Indu grew up on The Moon before being rescued and adopted by an astronaut. When his new mother takes him home to Earth to join a new family, Indu deals with not knowing the language, siblings who don’t want him there, and feeling like he doesn’t know how to belong somewhere anymore.

Read If Looking For: immigrant narratives, a focus on inner conflict, familial struggles & triumphs, adorable pen pals

Avoid If Looking For: hard sci fi, adult fiction (this is very middle grade, with all the tropes and idiosyncrasies that come with that label), books that ask difficult questions

Comparable Media: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, A Song for You & I, Root Magic

Drome – A Modern Ode to Mythic Hero Stories

Drome is probably the platonic ideal of comics for me. It was adrenaline injected directly into my brain. I couldn’t stop thinking about it when I tried opening up my current novel. I had meant to spread this read out over five days – the book is split into five sections. Instead I finished it in a single day that was also filled with book club, yard work, and a friend’s Irish folk music concert. While Drome doesn’t quite top the emotional resonance of The Magic Fish, it captures so many of the things I love in Fantasy and Comics. It honors mythology without being a pale imitation, it leverages simplicity for power, and it uses its visual medium as an asset to be leveraged. Drome is on a lot of ‘Best of 2025’ lists in the comic world, and it’s clear why.

For those of you who don’t read many comics, I cannot stress enough that Drome is absolutely worth checking your public library for. Unlike many of my favorite comics, this one doesn’t have the same density, making it a very low time commitment for those who don’t spend much time with comics.

The Premise:
Drome bills itself as a creation myth, but I don’t think that’s accurate. It begins with the creation of life, but it quickly shifts focus. Instead, Drome feels much more like stories of Achilles, Gilgamesh, or Beowulf. It follows a demigod created by Day to bring control to a violent world. This warrior is herself rather violent, but does her best to shepherd humanity into a prosperous future. As with many of the best hero myths, her story isn’t always a happy one, but it’s one of the few modern stories that evokes the feeling of old mythology without retelling original myths.

Read If: you love reading about mythological heroes, enjoy visual experimentation, want a grand story that can be read in a single sitting

Avoid If: simple and predictable plots annoy you, you need a simple happy ending, lack of dialogue will hinder your enjoyment of a comic

Comparable Media: Tongues, The Spear Cuts Through Water, Hyperion

Wynd – A Casual and Delightful Middle Grade Adventure

I picked up the first book in this series as I collected books for a class on Queer Comics and Cartoons. It didn’t end up making the cut as a whole-class read, but it quickly found its way into my classroom library and has become quite popular. While the series isn’t quite finished – final book is releasing this year! – I figured finishing book 4 was enough to write a review about the series more generally. It won’t tickle the fancy of anyone looking for serious or deeply thematic fare, but it’s fun and quick and a truly delightful kids book that I think many adults would enjoy as a casual read.

The Premise:
In a city where being touched by the unnatural wilds marks you for death, young Wynd hides his ears at all costs. However, Pipetown is simmering with tension, and few realize how close the continent is to open warfare. Wynd ends up fleeing with a reluctant prince, a cute gardener, and his adoptive sister, and his adventures put him in contact with several human factions, a bug-faerie culture in the midst of its own political revolution, and a very militaristic society of vampires.

Read if: you love classic fantasy tropes, comics with vibrant illustrations are your style, faeries-as-bugs sounds fun

Avoid if: simplistic morality will bug you, you dislike chosen ones & prophecies, fantasy racism isn’t a worldbuilding trope that works for you

Comparable Media: Fablehaven, Septimus Heap, Cece Rios, Amulet

January & February Comic Mini Reviews

It’s been a slow month of comic reading. While I had some fantastic reads in early January (see the mind bending Tongues and the emotive Shadow Life), an awful lot felt fine, but not meaningful enough for me to keep investing in comics as aggressively as I did at the end of 2025. I’ve got a bunch waiting on my bookshelf, and I can see exploring them more deeply once r/fantasy’s bingo challenge resets in April.

r/Fantasy 2025 Bingo Card #2 – Comics and Graphic Novels

For the past three years, I’ve taught middle and high schoolers classes on reading and creating comics and graphic novels. What started as an impulsive decision quickly spun into a rekindling of my childhood love of sequential art. I grew up reading manga (unsurprisingly, I read a fairly equal balance of Shoenn and Shoujo; truly we gays get the best of both worlds) and finding my footing in what I like and dislike as an adult has been a fun adventure. Around November, I realized it would be pretty feasible for me to complete a bingo card comprised entirely of graphic novels. Some of these I read for school, others for personal enjoyment, and a few to explore things outside my perceived comfort zone.

Reviews are organized according to vibe so you can find the type of comic you’d enjoy, with my favorites within each category further towards the top. I anticipate that this is a challenge I’ll continue to pursue, though I think I’ll probably just read what’s interesting and see where the pieces fall for future years. Enjoy!