While Green Lantern remains perhaps my favorite character-specific franchise, Astro City is far and away my single favorite series, ever. It is superhero comics world-building done expertly, pulling together and twisting tropes in a way that has not been done as fully, consistently, or enjoyably by anyone else. Kurt Busiek has it all together here and presents it in full force with Alex Ross covers and (usually) Brent Anderson art. Astro City is a comic whose stories focus on the titular city (located on the west coast, standing in the place of San Francisco or Seattle), which is populated by more than a century of superhero history.