I guess what really surprised me was Fables... A few months ago, I went through this funk trying to find a good graphic novel to get into. I've been tossing around the idea of reading through Sandman again, but decided to give Fables another go. I had picked up the first few issues when they first came out -- the story was okay, the concept behind it was kind of cool, but it didn't strike a cord with me. But friends heaped praise after praise about how good Fables was. Now I've read some of Bill Willingham's other works and to some degree or another, they were cute stories, but I wouldn't seriously consider following them for a long time -- a little trite and predictable, not the epic story to hold my attention. And to be honest, the first few Fables graphic novels still didn't do it for me, until about March of the Wooden Soldiers (Vol. 4)... up until that point, the stories where ok, just not great, but each time, it grew on me a little bit -- either I connected a little more with the characters (Boy Blue), or he adds a little background mythos that adds a little more depth to the story, or slow moving away from just pitching the story idea, to (doing research and) actually telling the story. Whatever it is, I'm growing fond of it.
I don't know what it was, at first if felt like Willingham picked a few characters from fairy tales/nursery rhymes and threw them into a Fabletown. It's not like picking up an issue of Top 10 where every page had some sort of subtle homage to superheroes; there could have been more nods to other fables in the background... or fable artifacts. And maybe this is a failing of the story artist, and not of Bill's. But with following novels, Bill seems to be adding more to the over all background, with nods to other fables (either directly in text or in directions to the comic artist) that are adding layers to make the story better.
