Comics/GN’s are probably far to vast, and opinions to subjective to make a list that pleases everyone.
I would say though that if one were to compose a list of which creators have the kindest disposition to their fans and compatriots… I believe Sergio Aragones would have to take the #1 slot.
I think Elfquest was mainstream in the sense that a lot of its audience didn’t read (m)any other comics.
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I disagree, but guess it depends how you look at it. I thought of the superhero comics that were coming out at the same time as the mainstream comics, whereas EQ and Cerebus were part of the alternative comics scene. I was part of the crowd you mentioned, EQ was just about the only comic I followed religiously in adolescence, but have since followed a bunch, over the years. If you’re defining popular comics as inherently outside the mainstream, but the less known EQ as somehow in the mainstream, I think your hydrology definitions are nonstandard.
you sir, are clearly a Mendicant of some repute!
what defines “mainstream” in comics depends on what 1-2 year period you wish to discuss apparently… EQ was “indy”, then was published by Marvels “EPIC” imprint for some time, thus by some peoples criteria that made it “Mainstream”, then moved elsewhere etc etc… just as an example. What used to be “indy” or “small press” in some cases became “mainstream” over time, if they were more successful. Or in order to be considered “mainstream”, did it require a CCA stamp? or just Marvel/DC on the cover? shrug
I say hang the sense of it, and just read what you like, theres plenty for every body.
Depending on how you want to define “fantasy”, when I was a kid, “Little Annie Fanny” was the greatest.
Lists like these are always going to be missing something by their very nature, but when it comes to Groo, you gotta ask:
Skipping Bone is pretty bone-headed.
Aaaaand, not to ruffle too many feathers, but, uh… isn’t Elf Quest properly classified as science fiction … like Dragonriders of Pern et alia?
BoingBoing Reader’s Choice Awards in the category of Fantasy Comics?
The nominees appear to be…
Any further nominations?
But Moebius is a person, which one of his works specifically? 
Actually, that sounds like my last trip to the comic store, except it was driving through 12 foot snow drifts in white-out blizzard conditions to get our Usagi Yojimbo fix (an amazingly sweet looking poster for the upcoming MSU Comic Forum being held in Lansing, MI in February. Oh, Dark Horse has just announced the release of their new Elfquest series.
I might as well throw in my two cents worth on this topic since I did actually read this article when I saw it the other day.
CBR’s list:
a. Is it just me or what? I have never heard of Demon Knights. Is it still around? Will it even be remembered next year?
b. Kull, Red Sonja, and Conan could easily have all been combined under a single Robert E. Howard heading and made room for other stuff. Kull originally appeared in Creatures on the Loose, a comic which a short time later also featured the adventures of Lin Carter’s Thongar of Lemuria who was cast in the same mold as Conan and Kull.
c. Dungeons & Dragons? Never played the games, never read the comics. Those who have done both probably liked it. I have read a few of the books set in the D & D, Dragonlance, and Forgotten realms series and they were not bad.
d. Warlord by Mike Grell. I bought DC Comic’s “first Issue Special” #1 which contained the first appearance of the Warlord new way back when I was in the 6th grade. Years later, after getting burned out on reading Marvel’s Conan Universe titles (Conan, Kull, Red Sonja, etc), I rediscovered DC’s The Warlord series. This was the first comics I actually associated with a specific creator (Mike Grell). I quickly lost interest in it after he first stopped drawing, then writing the comic.
e. Tellos, Fables - Heard of them, never read them.
f. Elfquest - One of the pioneers in creator owned comics. Soon to be a new series at Dark Horse Comics. I bought a bunch of them. I really wanted to like them. Unfortunately I was already too burned out on fantasy comics at the time and could not relate to the characters enough to want to follow the series.
g The Sandman - Best fantasy comic? That is like saying Star Trek is the number one comedy show because sometimes it is funny!
My top picks (maybe 10 of them)
1. I fell in love with Groo the Wanderer with the first issue I ever read. I own every issue and every story published from Pacific, Eclipse, Epic/Marvel, Image, Dark Horse, and Wizard. Maybe a few others.
2. Usagi Yojimbo would have to be tied with Groo for first place at this point in my life. Another series that has brought out the obsessive compulsive collector in me.
3 Marvel’s Oz series by Skottie Young and Eric Shanower have been awesome productions which I have loved buying for my niece. From the issues which I read, my only complaint is the amount of ads Marvel insists on putting in the comics.
4 The Warlord by Mike Grell (see my comments above)
5 Robert E. Howard Universe (Conan, Kull, Red Sonja, Soloman Kane, etc) My introduction to the fantasy and sword & Sorcery genres. I was really big into these for two or three years during my early teens, then I started to switch over to reading more fantasy novels and less comics as I started high school. I base this early infatuation on sword & sorcery comics for my instant addiction to Sergio Aragones’ parody of the genre several years later.
6 Bone - I read Bone, all of it. For me, that actually says a lot. I read it after the series was completed, from books borrowed from the local library. If I had started reading it early on when the series was still being written, I might have been hooked on it more.
Other than ‘Fantasy’, where would you put (or how would you describe) a comic covering part of the existence of an *-morphic (anthropo-, in my case(1), and in most of the comic as well) personification of an idea?
Consider, for example, the idea of giving a couple of characters giving a man an indefinite lifespan, just to see what happens. Why? Because one can and they are curious.
Yes, Sandman occasionally flirted with other genre, but it never lasted very long. So, yeah, fantasy.
Other than that, and some minor quibbles about ordering, I pretty much agree with you. Nope, I don’t recall Demon Knights or a couple of the others either.
(1) As far as you know.
What’s wrong with established for decades? You may as well ask what’s wrong with the Simpsons, of with Garfield. Better yet, ask Bill Watterson why he ended Calvin and Hobbes.
As for how mainstream Elfquest is? It’s like Doctor Who - even if you aren’t a fan, or aren’t even a geek, odds are you’ve at least heard about it and know vaguely what it is.
While we seemed to be trying to outhipster each other, I did read Elfquest back when the initial 20 (21?) came out, and knew almost no one else was reading it. I don’t know if it’s cool now, but if it is, I certainly read it before it was cool. I haven’t followed it since, but thought those initial 20 stood up well on their own. I don’t know anyone outside of the geek community who read them, and it was not a common read. I can’t recall it ever being referenced in pop culture. So what do you think is a better list of comics?
Are you inviting me to make my own, or to offer up someone else’s as an example? 
I consider it presumptuous to talk about the “best” of something as subjective as literature and entertainment, but if pressed and given quite more than enough time to sit and think deeply with lots of available reference materials and nothing else to do, I suppose I could start to make a dent on a “best” list - but first I’d have to establish a baseline and quanitify what, exactly, would be the basis for comparison. “Best” is just so very subjective - which was kind of my original point.
Are you inviting me to make my own, or to offer up someone else’s as an example?
Either.
but if pressed and given quite more than enough time to sit and think deeply with lots of available reference materials and nothing else to do, I suppose I could start to make a dent on a “best” list - but first I’d have to establish a baseline and quanitify what, exactly, would be the basis for comparison.
I’m just making conversation, not using this as a basis for creating a extradimensional wormhole that will require precise coordinates based on quantifying an individuals preferences for fantasy comics. My definition for “best” is unabashedly subjective, largely meaning “which books did you most enjoy reading?”
The list needs at least one SPACE-set sword and sorcery book; John Carter of Mars, the Wm Kaluta Carson of Venus backup from Korak son of Tarzan. Gullivar Jones of Mars also of the aforementioned Creatures on the Loose. Killraven in Amazing Adventures.
“Elfquest is mainstream and its fans didn’t read other comics” smells suspiciously to me of a certain “Fake Geek Girl” cologne. Here’s hoping not.
I need to get back on the “Fables” train. I stopped reading floppies a year or so before I stopped buying them, and sold all of them before a cross-country move. In that transition, I failed to keep picking up “Fables” graphic novels, and now I’ve rather lost the thread, which I’m sad of. (I have read a couple of Willingham’s in-universe novels; one I rather liked and one I found disposable.)
I never read “Groo” or “Bone” but their omissions do seem weird. I’m also rather surprised Alan Moore’s “Promethea” didn’t make the cut - it went some exceptionally strange places but they were wonderful. Roman Dirge’s “Lenore” didn’t run long but it was also marvelous and weird.
