The Best Comics and Graphic Novels of 2025

Cannon and Trish bonded over shared experiences as queer second-generation Chinese teens in their small Canadian town. Now in their late 20s, they’ve somewhat drifted apart. But when Cannon needs her most, Trish rescues her from a nightmarish work situation and helps her find a way out.

Author-illustrator N.D. Stevenson, best known for the Eisner Award-winning comic Nimona, is back with a middle grade swashbuckler. Sick of waiting around for their missing parents, Viola and Wilmur make a deal with pirate captain Cadence Chase. She wants a mysterious book, one of the orphans’ only possessions, for her latest quest on the poison seas. And she can have it—but only if Viola and Wilmur can come, too.

While not technically a comic, this title is included because it does interweave illustrations within the narrative.

In 2005, 68-year-old actor-activist George Takei came out as gay. He took this decision seriously after long conversations with his partner, now husband, Brad. Along with his coming out story, he reflects on his experiences over the previous decades as a closeted gay man torn between authenticity and safety.

Periwinkle is a pampered cat adjusting to his new home in Kaleria, Nigeria. But when extraterrestrials invade, that suddenly becomes the least of his problems. Thankfully, Periwinkle has a double life as a spacefaring feline. He and his custom-built spaceship may be Earth’s only chance at surviving the alien invasion.

Growing up, Joanna Rubin Dranger’s grandparents rarely mentioned her Jewish relatives who “disappeared” during World War II. Her questions about who they were and what happened to them lingered in adulthood. In this multimedia graphic memoir, she seeks to reclaim her family history and confront the rampant and little discussed antisemitism in 20th-century Sweden.

Nitasha is exhausted from trying to meet her parents’ expectations of a perfect daughter. None of her friends seem to understand or care. Alienated, Nitasha turns to self-harm to numb the pain and struggles to get help without feeling crushed by mental health stigma.

This year, Ursula K. Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea finally received a graphic adaptation! It was wholeheartedly worth the wait. Fred Fordham is an experienced adaptor, with classics like To Kill a Mockingbird and The Great Gatsby already under his belt. He brings the world of Earthsea and the wizard Ged’s first adventure to life with the vivid, awe-inspiring detail it deserves.

After Stone Fruit, I longed for Lai’s second graphic novel about Cannon, a cook, and Trish, a writer, from Lennoxville. Every week, the best friends—“on the uncool side of [their] twenties”—watch a scary film until distance threatens their bond of 14 years. Opening in a trashed Montreal restaurant with a regretful Cannon, the story returns to three months prior. Featuring mostly black-and-white art, I devoured this, obsessed with the use of color, horror influences, and complex relationships. As I reread this stunning meditation on breath, intimacy, and care, I observed what appears in red, which frames birds populate, and how they converge. – Connie Pan

Denali Sai Nalamalapu, a climate activist, brings the story of the Mountain Valley Pipeline and the people who resisted it to vivid life. Spanning 300 miles through West Virginia and Virginia, the pipeline cut through farms and forests, devastating land. Nalamalapu spent hours with activists, organizing their experiences into six illustrated chapters. Each one depicts small but powerful acts of defiance, like Becky Crabtree chaining herself to her Bronco or Monacan seedkeeper Desirée Shelley preserving her community’s future. With its intimate storytelling, Holler shows how collective, everyday resistance can protect both land and hope. – Kendra Winchester

One of my favourite books of all time is The Tea Dragon Society by K. O’Neill. I’ve been searching for a book that is as comforting and beautiful as that one, and I’ve finally found it. When Lu stops getting letters from her ah-ma, the famous geozoologist, she and her best friend set out on a trip to find her, learning more about geofauna along the way. This queernorm middle grade fantasy graphic novel is a cozy story that also deals with grief and cultural divides between generations. The illustrations are so stunning that I finished the book and immediately ordered several art prints, which are now proudly displayed on my wall. – Danika Ellis

This sapphic YA graphic novel takes place in the ’80s, but its story of teenage alienation is timeless. Wilberton Academy’s resident It Girl, Elizabeth Woodward, is found dead the morning after she starred in the school’s rendition of Romeo and Juliet. She’s said to have died by suicide, but something about that doesn’t feel right. Outcast Abby Kita is determined to find out what really happened to one of the few girls at Wilberton who was ever nice to her. Turns out, Elizabeth had secrets—secrets that might have gotten her killed. – Erica Ezefedi