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So I was thinking about this the other day and figured it would be good to get opinions on here. So who do people to be some of the consistently best writers in comics?

While there's of course going to be the usual few who are always suggested (Moore, Morrison, Gaiman etc), I figured people might have some other ideas too. Especially as there's definitely room for debate about how consistently good people think some writers are rather than simply having a couple of outstanding stories among many average ones.

One of the first people who came to mind for me was Warren Ellis, it terms of both how high quality any given one of his works are but the fact that he pretty much consistently writes on that level (I can't think of a poor title he's written, but haven't read everything).

Moore Morrison Gaiman Snyder Brubaker Johns Kirby Gerber Loeb Waid, Jurgens Giffen Dematties Byrne Ennis Willingham Miller Dixon Azarello O'Neil and Millar.

There's a few more, but these are the bulk of the go to guys for great arcs.

Kurt Busiek, Gail Simone, Mark Waid, and Greg Rucka come to mind. Like, if I see those names, I know it's going to be solid stuff, to flat-out great.


Mike Mignola may almost exclusively write Hellboy-related stuff, but I'd still toss him in. It does kinda feel like a cheat to use people who've worked on what's effectively one gigantic story....

Originally posted by Juntai
Moore Morrison Gaiman Snyder Brubaker Johns Kirby Gerber Loeb Waid, Jurgens Giffen Dematties Byrne Ennis Willingham Miller Dixon Azarello O'Neil and Millar.


Those are popular names, but there's a number there I wouldn't call *Consistent*. Loeb did Ultimatum and the Red Hulk stuff, Byrne has both his famous X-run with Claremont and plenty of misses, Millar has his share of flops, Miller isn't what he used to be (Holy Terror anyone?), etc..



Brubaker does seem like a good addition, yea.

Loeb was consistent until his family tragedy, so I give him a pass tbh.

Mine:

David Mack
Geoff Johns has far more hits than misses
Mark Waid
Simonsen(s) was/were awesome
Chuck Dixon
Paul Dini
Gail Simone
Dennis O'Neil
Stan Lee
Chris Claremont was consistent for a very long time before he went off the rails
Same with John Byrne

lol at Loeb.

Anyway I like a lot of Joe Casey's stuff. It doesn't hurt that he wrote one of my favorite minis in years in Vengeance.

Same with Keith Giffen and JM Dematteis. Pretty much everything I've read by them either together or alone has been good.

Waid, Ellis, Simonsen and Morrison imo.

I've enjoyed almost everything they've written.

A couple of misses in massive stretches of great stories doesn't mark badly against your consistency.

Originally posted by Juntai
A couple of misses in massive stretches of great stories doesn't mark badly against your consistency.

Loeb's comics don't hold up to scrutiny imo. His Marvel and Superman stuff is straight up garbage. Even most of his Batman stuff, which I really liked, doesn't look that great in retrospect. I really enjoy the character Hush, but it's not that great an arc.

Originally posted by Branlor Swift
lol at Loeb.

Anyway I like a lot of Joe Casey's stuff. It doesn't hurt that he wrote one of my favorite minis in years in Vengeance.

Same with Keith Giffen and JM Dematteis. Pretty much everything I've read by them either together or alone has been good.
yeah. Loeb.

Batman The Long Halloween.
Dark Victory.
Hulk Grey.
Daredevil Yellow.
Spiderman Blue.
Our Worlds at war.
Superman for all Seasons.
Emperor Joker.
Hush.
Superman/Batman for over 2 years (including the Supergirl and Public enemies storylines.).
Fallen Son.
Heroes Reborn.

^At lot of those aren't as good when you reread them, not even close.

Not to mention that he hasn't been consistently holding up a certain level of quality, which was the OP's stipulation.

Most of those are year+ long arcs.
That's pissing excellence for like 2 decades.

Some of those on the list are great, some of 'em are merely ok (I mean, I like OWAW, but it's not exactly a classic. And the Public Enemies Superman story has some big holes, like 'why are so many heroes listening to Luthor just because Kryptonite showed up'), and then off that list are really trash, Ultimatum and all that.

With consistency the question, 'puts out stories across the entire spectrum' is pretty much the opposite!



So are many of his weak ones.

Picking up a random Loeb story is really a roll of the dice.

Originally posted by -Pr-

Mine:

David Mack

Good one.




Also, even his misses tend to be of the 'haven't I seen this from Johns before....?' phoning it in rather than trainwrecks.




On the flipside, they've made so much stuff after that point.

Post-X-men, I find Claremont hit and miss but still putting out some good stuff, and I don't even remember the last time I read a good Byrne story.

Remember the time when Byrne had a Justice League story where the villains were crappy vampires, and the whole thing was just a backdoor launch for a crappy doom patrol reboot...?

Originally posted by Juntai
Most of those are year+ long arcs.
That's pissing excellence for like 2 decades.
He has no vision though, a lot of the dialogue is convoluted tripe, etc.

We're moving into pure opinion here.

My point is that the OP specified someone who's consistently maintained a high level.

Loeb hasn't been consistent.

The top 3 for me are Morrison, Hickman and Giffen. I have thoroughly enjoyed almost every story they've written over the years.

Next, in no particular order:
Abnett/Lanning
Casey
Kirkman
Aaron
Dematteis
Millar
Ellis
Starlin
Waid
Johns

Anyone for Mike Carey?

^ I thought about him, but I can't really say if he's been primarily consistent, because aside from Lucifer I've only read a handful of his projects.

James Roberts has been an amazing writer for More Than Meets the Eye.

Ever since Last Stand of the Wreckers, he's been hitting them out of the park. MTMTE isn't just one of the best Transformers series, imo it's one of the best comic series, period.

How much has Rucka done? any opinion on him?

Also, most of the British writers has maintained a steady level of quality imo.

Originally posted by Galan007
^ I thought about him, but I can't really say if he's been primarily consistent, because aside from Lucifer I've only read a handful of his projects.
Okay, I can't really think of too much myself.

I think the unwritten is excellent, and I liked his x-men stuff, but it really suffered because of the art (Ramos).

His hellblazer was good, but I haven't read his batman.

Originally posted by Juntai
yeah. Loeb.

Batman The Long Halloween.
Dark Victory.
Hulk Grey.
Daredevil Yellow.
Spiderman Blue.
Our Worlds at war.
Superman for all Seasons.
Emperor Joker.
Hush.
Superman/Batman for over 2 years (including the Supergirl and Public enemies storylines.).
Fallen Son.
Heroes Reborn. Ellis, Ennis and Moore seem to be the most consistent in terms of quality.

For another fairly recent one, Kieron Gillan.

Hm, there's gotta be more female writers on the list other than Gail... I mean, I can think of some great *art* names (Fiona Staples, of course), but writing's a bit harder. Though some of the good female artists do contribute to the writing, like Becky Cloonan.


Originally posted by krisblaze
How much has Rucka done? any opinion on him?

A good amount, and 'very good'.

I'm currently reading Lazarus, which takes a concept that I thought I wouldn't be grabbed by (in a somewhat post-apoc world, an enhanced female character with a sword fights for her family, as the family engages in internal politics and clashes with other families) and makes me love it. Absolutely love-love it, one of the top books I'm reading right now.


He did Gotham Central, one of the best Gotham books ever. He made Batwoman and did her Elegy miniseries. One of the writers in the original 52. Checkmate. One of the very best runs on Wonder Woman (leaves the Azarello run in the dust). Various other works for DC and Marvel.

Originally posted by Q99
He did Gotham Central, one of the best Gotham books ever. Indeed.

Aside from that, I've always enjoyed how he's treated Mxy, and the Imp-World.

Hurts to see Gotham on TV when material like Gotham Central exists.

Originally posted by krisblaze
I'm familiar with Lazarus, his 52 work and Gotham Central, but these are so good that I can't imagine them being representative of his average, haha.


Rucka also did Batman/Huntress: Cry For Blood, the one where Helena gets trained by Richard Dragon.

Countdown to Infinite Crisis: OMAC (the Ted Kord and aftermath thereof, in short).


And a smattering of others. Even his stuff which isn't in the league as the top ones mentioned, are still very solid, at least out of what of his I've read.

Two of the series by him I haven't mentioned or read have won Eisners (Whiteout and Queen & Country), which speaks well of what I *haven't* read, for that matter.

Didn't know that Rucka was behind OMAC

He's a contender in my book then. This thread is about consistency after all, not peaks.

And I simply haven't seen a bad book by Rucka, ever. Maybe at some point he did make a bad one, even some writers that get on most people's lists do (Morrison for example), but if so I've not encountered or heard of it.

Originally posted by Q99
Two of the series by him I haven't mentioned or read have won Eisners (Whiteout and Queen & Country), which speaks well of what I *haven't* read, for that matter. Whiteout is a really good story--one that was later adapted into a film, iirc. I didn't much care for Q&C, though.

Morrison, Moore, Danny O'Neal, Elliott S Maggin (who is IMO one of the most underrated writers ever), Brian Azzarelo, Snyder, Busiek etc.

Also Rucka did the blackest night WW mini which was total garbage.

Originally posted by Juntai
yeah. Loeb.

Batman The Long Halloween.
Dark Victory.
Hulk Grey.
Daredevil Yellow.
Spiderman Blue.
Our Worlds at war.
Superman for all Seasons.
Emperor Joker.
Hush.
Superman/Batman for over 2 years (including the Supergirl and Public enemies storylines.).
Fallen Son.
Heroes Reborn. Like what others have said, half of those are just not good. And Heroes Reborn was complete shit only surpassed by Onslaught Reborn, which is what Loeb actually did. What Loeb wrote in Heroes Reborn was a forgettable Captain America.

Superman/Batman was fun, but that's not interchangeable with good. There was no actual good writing in most of his books in that series.

Pre Death Son Loeb was good though with spats of shit. Looking back on his entire career and you can see the spats of shit just pouring through. The shitty writing he put out sometimes became the norm. But I would never call him consistent at any stage in his career.

Adam Warren's a pretty consistent one. While maybe not top tier, his quality has been a fairly steady upward curve over the course of his career, and his latest work, Empowered, includes some *really* fantastic emotional gut punches, as well as some of the best relationships in comics.

Having some of the best art in the business doesn't hurt, either. No one does cheesecake quite like Adam.

^Wut? Empowered has some of the worst art I've seen.

Originally posted by krisblaze
^Wut? Empowered has some of the worst art I've seen.


.... ok, we have massively different standards.


Varied body types, dynamic action that's not hard to follow, expressive faces....

Originally posted by Juntai
Moore Morrison Gaiman Snyder Brubaker Johns Kirby Gerber Loeb Waid, Jurgens Giffen Dematties Byrne Ennis Willingham Miller Dixon Azarello O'Neil and Millar.


waid, morrison, gaiman, synder, azarello, millar are all very good. scott mcdaniel wrote my fave daredevil arc of all time, fall from grace. o'neil has done some great stuff as well. claremont did some great stuff back in the day and someone who was WAYYYYYY advanced for his time was gardner fox (who imo inspired the whole flashpoint, and maybe ALL the crises-related stuff....)

johns for sure would make my top 10. morre wouldn't make my top group. i've always thought he was overrated.

anyone want to take a crack at naming their top 5 and their fave arc by that writer....?

I'd differentiate between consistency and "best at their peak," but for me the list is largely the same. It begins and ends with Ellis and Gaiman. Everyone else is just scrambling for a very distant 3rd. I like other writers, but there's none even approaching those two for me.

Originally posted by krisblaze
Anyone for Mike Carey?

Also, Brian K Vaughan's self-contained stories (Y: The Last Man, Ex Machina, Saga) have all been favorites of mine, and his Runaways work is praised pretty consistently.

Apparently Pride of Baghdad is really good, though I personally haven't read it.

Originally posted by Digi
I'd differentiate between consistency and "best at their peak," but for me the list is largely the same. It begins and ends with Ellis and Gaiman. Everyone else is just scrambling for a very distant 3rd. I like other writers, but there's none even approaching those two for me.

Agreed.

Was shocked when a friend called Gaiman a hack, not realizing the dogpiling on him outside of his comic book work. But that's kind of par for the course when a writer's successful in anything outside of serious literature (Like how Yale professor's love to take Rowling and King down a peg, which just makes them look petty imo..)

Originally posted by cdtm
Agreed.

Was shocked when a friend called Gaiman a hack, not realizing the dogpiling on him outside of his comic book work. But that's kind of par for the course when a writer's successful in anything outside of serious literature (Like how Yale professor's love to take Rowling and King down a peg, which just makes them look petty imo..)

I read a short story collection by Gaiman called "Fragile Things" and it was excellent. But short stories don't capture most peoples' interest either. I've heard that his novels are more hit-and-miss. As someone who's done some professional writing, and attempted some styles of writing that I'm not normally used to, I can tell you unequivocally that not every writer is made for every genre or literary form. So it's entirely possible he isn't just as consistent in his other work; but I haven't read any of his novels to find out.

He's also done some screenplays for movies (mixed reviews), written cross-genre stories like Stardust (which was fairly well-received, both as a book and a movie), and has written an episode or two for Doctor Who (one quite positive, one quite negative). So he's not always brilliant, but that kind of versatility with ANY measure of success is a form of brilliance in itself.

Originally posted by Digi
I read a short story collection by Gaiman called "Fragile Things" and it was excellent.

i've read all of gaiman's novels and can tell you they are EXCELLENT. coraline was outstanding, as was american gods and anansi boys. i really enjoyed stardust and even the graveyard book was very very cool. i think gaiman is brilliant. ennis? meh, can give or take most of his stuff.

Bendis.

^ That is the only credible answer in this thread, truth be told.

Agreed, Bendis.

Mark Millar, too. You could keep your Watchmen, Dark Knight Returns, and Sandman, because this is the real deal:

https://theslowbullet.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/wanted2.jpg

Originally posted by leonidas
i've read all of gaiman's novels and can tell you they are EXCELLENT. coraline was outstanding, as was american gods and anansi boys. i really enjoyed stardust and even the graveyard book was very very cool. i think gaiman is brilliant. ennis? meh, can give or take most of his stuff. crackers

Kill yourself. Ennis rules.

Originally posted by Q99
Some of those on the list are great, some of 'em are merely ok (I mean, I like OWAW, but it's not exactly a classic. And the Public Enemies Superman story has some big holes, like 'why are so many heroes listening to Luthor just because Kryptonite showed up'), and then off that list are really trash, Ultimatum and all that.

With consistency the question, 'puts out stories across the entire spectrum' is pretty much the opposite!



So are many of his weak ones.

Picking up a random Loeb story is really a roll of the dice.



Good one.




Also, even his misses tend to be of the 'haven't I seen this from Johns before....?' phoning it in rather than trainwrecks.




On the flipside, they've made so much stuff after that point.

Post-X-men, I find Claremont hit and miss but still putting out some good stuff, and I don't even remember the last time I read a good Byrne story.

Remember the time when Byrne had a Justice League story where the villains were crappy vampires, and the whole thing was just a backdoor launch for a crappy doom patrol reboot...?

Oh, of course. I know they've done some bad stuff. I'm looking at it more as them being people who have had steady, good periods of being consistently good, even if they had their shit later on.

Originally posted by krisblaze
He has no vision though, a lot of the dialogue is convoluted tripe, etc.

We're moving into pure opinion here.

My point is that the OP specified someone who's consistently maintained a high level.

Loeb hasn't been consistent.

He was plenty consistent in DC. That counts, imo.

Originally posted by -Pr-
He was plenty consistent in DC. That counts, imo.
He's been consistent, but I don't think there's anything good about his writing.

He had some good stories, but I still think his dialogue is trash.

Originally posted by ODG
crackers

Kill yourself. Ennis rules.

ha! what do you think was his best effort? i liked preacher well enough and thor vikings was pretty cool. his style just doesn't always work for me.

another guy i like a lot of is giffen. i find some of his stuff funny as hell. his version of jla was great.

I've always liked Paul Jenkins. Perhaps obviously for one reason with him creating the Sentry. The story itself is very good. His run on Hellblazer, also his writing on Deathmatch (his relatively new series). I think he's a good writer.

Originally posted by leonidas
ha! what do you think was his best effort? i liked preacher well enough and thor vikings was pretty cool. his style just doesn't always work for me. Punisher MAX.

Originally posted by leonidas
ha! what do you think was his best effort? i liked preacher well enough and thor vikings was pretty cool. his style just doesn't always work for me.

another guy i like a lot of is giffen. i find some of his stuff funny as hell. his version of jla was great.

Hitman is Ennis at his best. If you haven't read it, go and read it.

i didn't actually like hitman too much.... shrug

Preacher is probably what got him the most fame, but I like Hitman more.

Hitman and the Boys, despite being very different, sell much of the same idea. The danger of macho-idiocy.

He's basically critique'ing the culture while praising it at the same time.

Originally posted by leonidas
i didn't actually like hitman too much.... shrug
You're dead to me.

uhuh

^if i had a dime.....

Originally posted by leonidas
^if i had a dime.....
You could hire Bada to protect you?

You're about 3.40$ short.

Ennis has both good points and problems. Like, when he does supers, he tends to make them so dumb and exaggerated, they don't really come off as a critique of anything, just his own exaggerated cartoonish view. Like in The Pro or The Boys.

Which is kinda sad, as in the rare occasions he does engage superheroes-as-superheroes rather than a cartoon version of them, it can be fantastic. And you know I'm talking about the Superman appearance in Hitman.

Ennis is better when he sticks to Punisher and Dredd types. Heck, that applies to a lot of the writers who aim for a 'gritty' style.


Originally posted by cdtm
Agreed, Bendis.

Mark Millar, too. You could keep your Watchmen, Dark Knight Returns, and Sandman, because this is the real deal:
*Panel from Wanted*


I see sooo many people mock that panel Basically it assumes the audience is reacting one way, and if they don't, it comes across as the writer being juvenile and failing at making a commentary on that kind of story too. It tries to be a jaw-dropper and it isn't. Or, at least for me it wasn't.


Though there is a nice edit of the end of Civil War with that dialog instead that fits scarily well ^^ And Millar reportedly signed a printed copy with the dialog replacement at a con once, which is cool.






Pride is solid.


On Ex Machina, I felt it was 90% good, but the ending fell flat. The big threat seemed a lot less interesting than he'd built it up in my head, I didn't buy some of the character moments, and the last-page zinger was way too topical. Compared to the actually-willing-to-engage-on-modern-politics and the interesting take on powers and the creepy hintings of vol 1-9 of the series, it just didn't work- like the series grew while he was writing it and when the ending came he stuck with a version that hadn't grown with it.

That said, I luv me some Saga and Runaways.

Originally posted by leonidas
ha! what do you think was his best effort? i liked preacher well enough and thor vikings was pretty cool. his style just doesn't always work for me.

another guy i like a lot of is giffen. i find some of his stuff funny as hell. his version of jla was great. Preacher.

His Punisher Max run is also great. His Hitman run is highly acclaimed. As is the Boys. Hellblazer. Midnighter.

Even his satirical efforts weren't bad. Especially if you were a fan of the character. He just reeks of consistency.

The only thing inconsistant about him is how he gives Superman a pass on trolling big name capes and anti heros (Batman, Lobo, Logan..)

i guess most of his work just seems the same to me. i liked some of his stuff. but a lot of it just feels like the same thing reworked over and again. maybe it's just a general impression, but that's the sense i get.

Barbara Kesel did several runs over at crossgen I really liked...

Oh, Wendy Pini did a reeeally long running classic run in Elfquest. *Only* did Elfquest, but I think it's long enough to count.



Originally posted by leonidas
i guess most of his work just seems the same to me. i liked some of his stuff. but a lot of it just feels like the same thing reworked over and again. maybe it's just a general impression, but that's the sense i get.


Which is, admittedly, one way to maintain consistency.

sure, i guess that is consistent. consistently good or creative....? meh. elfquest was supersweet at one time. loved it when it first came out.

Originally posted by leonidas
i've read all of gaiman's novels and can tell you they are EXCELLENT. coraline was outstanding, as was american gods and anansi boys. i really enjoyed stardust and even the graveyard book was very very cool. i think gaiman is brilliant. ennis? meh, can give or take most of his stuff.

I actually prefer Gaiman as a novelist. Yes, I loved his Sandman and the way he helped turned comics into literature. But as a novelist, able to work on his own ideas and create his own worlds without having to try to fit into an established universe, without having to explain his ideas to an editor or an artist, his flair for fantasy is finally given full reign.

Ellis and Gaiman. No one else comes close for me.

Ellis, Gaiman and Moore.

Originally posted by Digi
Ellis and Gaiman. No one else comes close for me. Have you read any of Warren's novels Digi, if you haven't you should. They are suprisingly good.