Been a while since I did these. But I’ll be CRAZY biased next year thanks to my work on IDW’s JEM AND THE HOLOGRAMS with Ross Campbell so I figured I should get in a final year. I did a comprehensive “Best of 2014” over on CSBG for this week’s SHE HAS NO HEAD! and this is simply an extension of that piece.

As always, you can see my biases in my choices. Title integration is important to me (which is why I’m only showing cover art with the titles on it), so are interesting compositions and great use of positive/negative space. I also tend to love bold colors (and a lot of white is a personal favorite) as well as simple, graphic, iconic images. Creativity is obviously key, but a lot of what makes a cover work for someone is just gut – how it makes you feel – and that it DOES make you feel. All these covers make me feel to some degree or another. This list is also only single issue comics – usually US since that’s what I have access to (no graphic novels or trade covers were considered for the list). As always I’m never quite sure if I got the order right, but it is what it is!

Here we go, counting down from 52 – one for each week of 2014.

52. THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #1 BY MARCOS MARTIN

51. ALL-NEW ULTIMATES #5 BY DAVID NAKAYAMA

50. ADVENTURE TIME #24 BY MIKE HOLMES

49. LUMBERJANES #8 BY NOELLE STEVENSON

48. UNCANNY X-MEN #17 BY CHRIS BACHALO

47. SHE-HULK #3 (Variant) BY KRIS ANKA

46. DETECTIVE COMICS #32 BY FRANCIS MANAPUL

45. BATGIRL #36 (Variant) BY CLIFF CHIANG

44. WINTERWORLD #4 BY BUTCH GUICE

43. ADVENTURE TIME #33 (Variant C) BY NIKKI MANNION

42. LIFE WITH ARCHIE #37 BY TOMMY LEE EDWARDS

41. STORM #4 BY STEPHANIE HANS

40. MS. MARVEL #3 (Variant) BY ANNIE WU

39. FATALE #23 BY SEAN PHILLIPS

38. UNCANNY X-MEN #27 BY CHRIS BACHALO

37. VELVET #5 BY STEVE EPTING

36. SHE-HULK #1 BY KEVIN WADA

35. TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: TURTLES IN TIME #1 (Variant) BY ROSS CAMPBELL

34. SHE-HULK #5 BY KEVIN WADA

33. DAREDEVIL #4 BY CHRIS SAMNEE

32. MAGNETO #1 BY PAOLO RIVERA

31. INHUMAN #7 BY RYAN STEGMAN

30. HARBINGER #25 BY LUCY KNISLEY

29. EAST OF WEST #11 BY NICK DRAGOTTA

28. WYTCHES #1 (Variant) BY BECKY CLOONAN

27. DEADLY CLASS #3 BY WES CRAIG

26. ELEKTRA #6 BY MIKE DEL MUNDO

25. BATGIRL #36 BY CAMERON STEWART

24. BATMAN #31 BY GREG CAPULLO

23. THE WICKED + THE DIVINE #1 BY JAMIE MCKELVIE

22. CATWOMAN #37 BY DARWYN COOKE

Full size, horizontal cover:

21. BATMAN/SUPERMAN #14 BY JAE LEE

20. GOTHAM ACADEMY #1 BY KARL KERSCHL

19. LAZARUS #11 BY OWEN FREEMAN

18. CAPTAIN MARVEL #4 BY DAVID LOPEZ

17. THE SHAOLIN COWBOY #4 BY GEOF DARROW

16. HAWKEYE #17 BY DAVID AJA

15. SOLAR: MAN OF THE ATOM #5 BY JUAN DOE

14. ELEKTRA #1 BY MIKE DEL MUNDO

13. BATGIRL #35 BY CAMERON STEWART

12. BATGIRL #35 (Variant) BY BABS TARR

11. SHE-HULK #7 BY KEVIN WADA

10. THE WICKED + THE DIVINE #1 (Variant) BY BRYAN LEE O’MALLEY

09. ELEKTRA #9 BY MIKE DEL MUNDO

08. BITCH PLANET #1 BY VALENTINE DE LANDRO

07. DEADLY CLASS #1 BY WES CRAIG

06. B.P.R.D. HELL ON EARTH #124 BY LAURENCE CAMPBELL

05. ELEKTRA #5 (Variant) BY CHRIS SAMNEE

04. THE WICKED + THE DIVINE #5 (Variant) BY BECKY CLOONAN

03. BLACK WIDOW #6 BY PHIL NOTO

02. SILVER SURFER #1 (Variant) BY FRANCESCO FRANCAVILLA

01. ELEKTRA #3 by MIKE DEL MUNDO

Mike Del Mundo looks like he pulled it out this year with four spots – and two of those in the top 10. Elektra the book actually got five spots…a crazy THREE in the top 10 with Chris Samnee’s variant making it into the top 10 along with two of Del Mundo’s.

Kevin Wada takes second place with three mentions – and his book – She-Hulk takes second place to Elektra with four mentions since Kris Anka’s She-Hulk variant also made the list.

Cameron Stewart, Chris Bachalo, Becky Cloonan, Wes Craig, and Chris Samnee all got two mentions each.

Only 8 covers were by women (and with 2 by Cloonan, that means only 7 different women) and we can do way better than that – I’d like to see that number double next year. With Marvel doing some “women variants” this year and new talents like Stacey Lee and Babs Tarr doing more major comics work I hope it won’t even be a question. Already Stacey Lee’s Silk #1 variant and Uncanny X-Men #33 Variant are on my shortlist.

Marvel ate up nearly half the spots with 22 places, easily winning the day and with 5 in the top 10. Image comes in second with an impressive 11 covers, 4 of them in the top 10. DC is close behind at 9. Almost all of those are covers from the last few months, which means they closed out 2014 really strong. They didn’t get any in the top 10, but they’re looking strong for next year what with so many of their fantastic Darwyn Cooke covers still to release and some very strong movie homage covers debuting in March 2015. Dark Horse only has two covers, but both in the top 20 and one in the top 10. Boom manages 3 spots, IDW snags two, while Dynamite, Valiant, and Archie each nab one.

A really strong year for covers overall. And with so many books with female leads, a lot of them had lovely ladies commanding the page – 35 of the 52 have women as leads or “co-leads” (i.e. making up about 50% of the cover) and . Yay!