Comics

Mad Max: Fury Road takes place in a world so full of detail and imagination that it shouldn’t come as a surprise to learn that director George Miller has a backstory for just about everything on screen. In the finished film, everything feels like it has a history. Every corner of every frame is alive. Rather than confine this information to his imagination, Miller has put it in a comic book.

Avengers: Age of Ultron is the eleventh film in Marvel Studios’ ongoing quest to dominate your disposable income for the rest of your moviegoing life, the biggest, loudest and most expensive chapter yet in what is quickly becoming a triumph of Hollywood marketing and corporate one-upmanship. But it is also, somehow, totally, the work of writer/director Joss Whedon, whose clear voice, honed over decades spent working in film and television, rings through all of the noise. While The Avengers was directed by Whedon, his messier, crazier sequel is truly, at its heart, a Joss Whedon Film.

Just before filming began on Avengers: Age of Ultron, Scarlett Johansson found out she was pregnant. A movie like Avengers can't just be delayed, so Marvel used a variety of tricks to hide the pregnancy including shooting her from the waist up, using three stunt doubles and CGI-ing out her growing belly. This is just one of the facts packed into the latest episode of You Think You Know Movies, which follows the latest adventures of Earth's Mightiest Heroes!

Man, it’s just all about Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice this week. And this movie doesn’t come out for almost another year! You’ve got the first teaser, you’ve got the first posters, and now there’s a new video, from Bleacher Report, that features NBA player DeAndre Jordan touring through Warner Bros. Studios’ Batman exhibit, and getting a special sneak preview of the Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman costumes from Batman v Superman, along with the brand-new Batmobile. It’s not enough that he’s hugely successful and wildly rich? He gets to see the Batman costume before the rest of us too? Lucky son of a gun.

Here's a badly kept secret about me: I love Shaquille O'Neal. Always have. I taste-tested every flavor of Soda Shaq, for crying out loud. Ask me to tell you about my never-written script for Caddy-Shaq someday. Dark Horse comics editor Jim Gibbons and writer/artist Ethan Young clearly feel the same way. As a palate cleanser to cheer themselves up after collaborating on Young's amazing-looking but also emotionally draining graphic novel Nanjing the Burning City, the two teamed up for another, wholly different project in which the Shaq of 1993 is convinced by former Charlotte Hornet Larry Johnson in the guise of Grandmama (remember Grandmama?) to spring ahead to the year 2030 to challenge a mysterious dictator to a game of one-on-one for the fate of the world. You thought the NCAA championship game was big? This is bigger.

Listen, February was a pretty rough month. Sure, we're getting into March now and the sun has finally returned to cast its warmth upon our fragile world once again, but for a while there, it was just snow, gloom, and gloomy snow. Clearly someone had to take a stand and rise up against our natural oppressors, and that person was Lue Nuwame, the Homemade Game Guru, who built a Superman-shaped snow shovel in order to tackle the apocalyptic snowfall that hit Canada this winter. And as weird as it might sound, it's one of the most soothing videos I have ever watched. Let it flow over you like a gentle snowfall, a snowfall that you will eventually dig yourself out of with the help of Superman.

Potentially huge news today, as Denys Cowan, Reginald Hudlin and Derek Dingle have announced that they'll be relaunching the legendary Milestone Media this year as 'Milestone Media 2.0'.

Despite my love of the Caped Crusader, my collection of Batman stuff -- i.e., not comics -- is actually pretty small. I've got a couple of action figures a few pieces of original art and a few bits and bobs, but really, there's not a whole lot out there that I want. Except, of course, for a full set of those awesome, surprisingly violent trading cards from 1966 featuring the artwork of Norm Saunders. I've been wanting a set of those for years, but I've only got a couple of them. Unfortunately, even if I had found myself a set of every card that was actually released, it still wouldn't be complete. It seems that there's one last card, never released to the public: "Batman On Bat-Throne," featuring the World's Greatest Detective on what I can only assume is the World's Greatest Toilet

The last twelve months offered comic book readers a wide variety of work ranging from the most crowd-pleasing superhero epics to the most idiosyncratic of indies, and the return of old favorites to the emergence of exciting new talent. It was a busy and productive year for the industry, and one we’re pleased to celebrate with what we’re certain will be an uncontroversial, unenumerated list of awards that will prompt only resounding agreement and unbroken fellowship amongst our readers in the comments below. Welcome to part one of ComicsAlliance’s Best Comic Books of 2014.