Best Hellblazer Runs: 6 Comics Ranked, from 1988 to 2020

John Constantine has a series of 300 issues, published with no change of numbering from January 1988 to February 2013. This continuity is misleading: nobody reads three hundred single issues in one go, and the writers followed one another like so many distinct series under a single title. Ranking the "best runs" of Hellblazer therefore means ranking writing periods, each with its own voice, its own London and its own way of making the magician pay.

As always in this guide, only verified information (creators, issues, dates) is stated as fact; the analysis is our own, with no reproduction of protected panels or dialogue.

How we ranked six writing periods

A practical test served as the rule: can you open the period at its first issue, without having read what precedes it, and stay to the last page of the set? A period that requires three hundred issues of context drops in the ranking, however brilliant. Those that open on a closed arc and close on a choice by the character rise. Hellblazer is a series that runs against the superhero grain: Constantine almost never wins without losing someone, and the best run is the one that makes you feel that price over time.

Top 1: Garth Ennis, William Simpson and Steve Dillon, Hellblazer #41 to #83 (1991-1994)

The run opens with "Dangerous Habits" (#41 to #46), drawn by William Simpson. In it Constantine learns he has lung cancer and sets the powers of hell against one another to buy time. It is the arc from which the 2005 film takes its starting point, and it is also the series' best entry point: a beginning, a middle, an end, and a recurring adversary, the First of the Fallen, who will return throughout the period.

Ennis, who came like Jamie Delano from the British weekly 2000 AD, installs a Constantine who drinks, loves and loses. Steve Dillon takes over the art for a large part of the run. The narrative peak comes with "Fear and Loathing" (#62 to #67, 1993), where Constantine, in a relationship with Kit, celebrates his fortieth birthday surrounded by friends including Zatanna and Swamp Thing: one of the rare stretches of happiness in the series, written to better prepare the fall. #63 is also the moment the series moves under the Vertigo label.

This run matters for the character because it fixes the version the general public identifies: the ordinary man who bluffs hell. It is for all adult readers, including those who have never opened a horror comic. Ennis leaves the series at #83 to rejoin Dillon on Preacher, whose 1995 issue number 1 continues the same vein, before a brief return from #129 to #133.

To collect it, two routes. Single issues from #41 to #83 often circulate in lots, since no intermediate issue has the rarity of a starting issue, and #41 is the only one truly sought. DC's collected editions, which follow publication order, present "Dangerous Habits" and "Fear and Loathing" in separate volumes: this is the most economical way to read.

Top 2: Jamie Delano, John Ridgway and their successors, Hellblazer #1 to #40 (1988-1991)

The founder remains unavoidable. Jamie Delano places Constantine in a Thatcherite England that the story observes with a frank political anger. The first arc introduces a famine demon and Papa Midnite, an adversary who will return, while Dave McKean's painted and collage covers give the series its visual identity. The taxi driver Chas becomes the magician's companion.

The period matters for the character because it invents his tone: the horror comes from the era, from unemployment, from state violence, before it comes from demons. It is for the patient reader, ready for a slow pace and arcs that stretch over several months. The sequence of issues is less sharp than with Ennis, and the best standalone episode is not by Delano. #25 and #26 go to Grant Morrison, and #27, "Hold Me", is a one-off episode by Neil Gaiman drawn by McKean, which many readers recommend as a single-issue sampler.

For collecting, this is where the piece to aim for sits: #1 from January 1988, published before the creation of Vertigo, remains the second most sought-after single issue of the saga after Swamp Thing #37. For reading, the first collected editions, including the one titled Original Sins, spare you from hunting issues most of which have no interest on their own.

Top 3: Mike Carey, Hellblazer #175 to #215 (2002-2006)

The third longest run of the series, Mike Carey's period changes scale. Where Ennis and Delano line up arcs, Carey builds a long-haul serial, with threads launched in the first issues and closed months later, around the magician's family. Carey was writing Lucifer at Vertigo at the time: the supernatural world becomes a system, not just a backdrop.

This run matters for the character because it gives him a structured past and consequences that last. It is for the reader who has already read Ennis or Delano and wants to see Constantine age in a more architected story. It is ill-suited as a first read: it assumes you know the character's allies and debts, and some arcs are better understood with the previous one in mind. Carey then returns for a single issue, #229, after Denise Mina's stint.

In collecting, the period is the easiest to complete: no issue plays the role of a rare piece, and the entire run fits within a reasonable reading budget. Collected editions are the normal route; single issues are only justified to complete a series already begun.

Top 4: Brian Azzarello and Marcelo Frusin, Hellblazer #146 to #174 (2000-2002)

Brian Azzarello, creator of 100 Bullets with Eduardo Risso, writes an uprooted Constantine. The first arc, "Hard Time", begins at #146: the magician finds himself in an American prison, far from his London. The rest of the run extends this displacement, with a crossing of the United States built like a noir thriller, where the supernatural weighs less than in the previous periods.

The period matters for the character because it tears him from his geography and tests what remains of him outside working-class England. It is for fans of noir fiction as much as fans of the occult, and it is the run that strays furthest from horror in the strict sense.

It ranks behind Carey because the story, tighter, leaves less hold for a reading through narrative threads. For collecting, the "Hard Time" volume is the reading entry point; single issues follow the usual logic of lots, with no sought-after issue.

Top 5: Peter Milligan and Giuseppe Camuncoli, Hellblazer #250 to #300 (2008-2013)

Peter Milligan writes the longest run in the title's history, fifty-one issues, up to the end of the original series in February 2013. Constantine is married there, and finally ages, as he had been aging in real time since 1988. #250 marks a return by Jamie Delano, like a loop: the founder opens the final stretch. Milligan is already the author of Shade, the Changing Man at Vertigo.

The period counts for its value as a conclusion: it can only be appreciated with the series behind you. It is therefore for the reader who has already gone through two or three of the previous periods, and probably not for one looking for an entry. #300, done with Giuseppe Camuncoli, is a completist's object above all: the last issues of a long series are often printed in smaller numbers than the first, without that making the story a masterpiece.

For collecting, the best value comes down to two milestones, #250 and #300, plus collected editions for everything else. The fifty-one single issues of the run do not have to be hunted down one by one.

Top 6: Simon Spurrier and Aaron Campbell, John Constantine: Hellblazer (2019-2020)

The relaunch from November 2019 to October 2020 is not a continuation of the original series: it has its own numbering. Simon Spurrier, author of The Dreaming in the Sandman universe, puts Constantine back in a contemporary setting, with a tone that goes against the grain of the aged character at the end of the original series.

The period counts as a modern entry point: no continuity to know, current covers, a short format. It is for the reader who wants to test the character without committing to three hundred issues of references. It ranks last because its place in the mythology remains thin: no collecting milestone in it has, to date, the importance of the 1985 and 1988 issues.

For collecting, it is better to treat it as a separate series, to be indexed under the year 2019 rather than in the 1 to 300 sequence, to avoid confusing it with its namesakes. Collected editions are enough to read it.

What the ranking leaves aside

Several periods are not in the standings, by choice. Paul Jenkins writes #89 to #128, an intimate and very British period, where the series seeks a balance between pub humor and domestic horror, but which lends itself less to ranking than to continuous reading. Warren Ellis signs #134 to #143, opened by the "Haunted" arc: a parenthesis too brief for a top. Denise Mina (#216 to #228) and Andy Diggle (#230 to #249) form the transition to Milligan, with the magician's return toward his Liverpool roots.

There is also the prelude. Constantine is born in Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, where he first appears in #37 from 1985. It is not a Constantine run, but that issue 37 weighs more on the market than any single issue of the series that carries the character's name.

Which to start with, depending on your profile

If you come from the 2005 film and want the closest paper Constantine, open #41: "Dangerous Habits" is a closed arc that reads alone. If you want the character from his first day, start with Delano's #1 and read the period up to #24, then Gaiman's #27.

If your taste runs to noir more than to the occult, try Azzarello from #146, accepting that the horror is discreet there. If you already have three periods behind you, Carey then Milligan offer an end-of-series path. Finally, if you refuse to commit to three hundred issues, Spurrier's relaunch reads with no prerequisites. To place these choices among the imprint's series, see our ranking of Vertigo comics.

What these runs are worth in a collection

The value of a Hellblazer collection is concentrated in very few single issues. Swamp Thing #37 and Hellblazer #1 carry most of the demand; everything that comes after trades in lots, because the intermediate issues of a run look alike and buyers look for complete ranges. Buying a run issue by issue therefore almost always costs more than a coherent lot.

A simple method to evaluate a complete run: note completed sales of lots covering the same range of issues, divide each price by the number of single issues, then compare the result with the cost of the collected edition that contains the same stories. A wide gap means you are paying for the original object, not the reading. For the starts of periods, #1 and #41 deserve to be bought separately and in the best condition, because their condition changes the gap with an ordinary copy.

Two traps: collected editions that reuse the original covers, to be told apart by format and pagination, and recent relaunches with similar titles, to be noted with their year. To go deeper into format strategy, our guide omnibus or single issues offers a decision grid, and the entry on Constantine's key issues details the series' milestones.

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