As reported earlier, Marjorie M. Liu and Sana Takeda once again won the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story, for Monstress, Volume 2: The Blood. The creative team won it last year for the inaugural volume, and the analysis and voting data can be found in my report from last year.

The Hugo Awards are a fan award, voted on by anyone purchasing a membership to that year’s Worldcon. The 76th Worldcon, which rotates geographically each year, was hosted last weekend by San Francisco Science Fiction Conventions, Inc. in San Jose, California.

After two years of slate voting by disgruntled fans who loaded the ballot, the voting system was changed to offer a more fair system of voting. (If you’re really curious or bored, it’s detailed in my 2017 post.)

What makes the Hugo Awards so interesting is not just that it is a respected and long-running award honoring the best in Science Fiction, judged by some of the most well-read fans, but that the voting results are posted publicly after the awards are announced. This data includes the long list of the top fifteen nominees, which also serves as a recommended reading list from science fiction fans. (Check out 17776! Sportsball meets sci-fi fandom!)

Again, science fiction fans are wonky, and the voting system is different from others… Voting is preferential, in that all nominees are ranked by the voters, including “No Award”. As you’ll see below in the matrices, votes are counted, and the least-popular nominee is eliminated, and those ballots are then recounted, with emphasis placed on the second-place titles. (“Hey, our choice didn’t win, but here’s who we would have picked for runner-up.”) This continues until a winner is determined, and the cross-checked against “No Award”.

Then, it starts all over, with the winner being ignored, the votes tallied to determine with winners for the remaining places. You might think that the initial tally would predict the final order, but as seen below, Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time placed third in the first round of voting, but ended up as fourth overall.

Another interesting bit of data: Monstress, Volume 2 was not as popular as Volume 1.

Or 2018 had a stronger field than 2017. (I tend to the former… Ms. Marvel, Vision, Paper Girls, Saga…)

2018: 1,393 valid ballots cast in category. Final tally: 687 / 919 runoff

2017: 1,496 valid ballots cast in category. Final tally: 864 /1272 runoff

Here’s the vote breakdown for Best Graphic Story:

The full voting statistics can be found here. (Including the voting for long- and short-form dramas!) (Including the voting for long- and short-form dramas!) Result for Best Graphic Story 2,828 valid ballots cast. 25% cutoff = 708 voters. 1,393 valid ballots cast in category.

Winner Finalist Pass 1 Pass 2 Pass 3 Pass 4 Pass 5 Pass 6 Runoff Blood 365 365 380 443 552 687 919 Saga, Volume 7 246 246 282 318 378 438 Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time 213 214 223 262 303 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 215 218 228 246 Bitch Planet, Volume 2: President Bitch 180 181 197 Paper Girls, Volume 3 101 101 No award 73 103 Preference 1393 1325 1310 1269 1233 1125 1022 No Preference 0 68 83 124 160 268 371 Total votes 1393 1393 1393 1393 1393 1393 1393 Second Place Finalist Pass 1 Pass 2 Pass 3 Pass 4 Pass 5 Saga, Volume 7 333 333 392 447 576 Bitch Planet, Volume 2: President Bitch 255 256 283 363 493 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 264 267 285 327 Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time 258 259 272 Paper Girls, Volume 3 144 144 No award 75 Preference 1329 1259 1232 1137 1069 No Preference 64 134 161 256 324 Total votes 1393 1393 1393 1393 1393 Third Place Finalist Pass 1 Pass 2 Pass 3 Pass 4 Bitch Planet, Volume 2: President Bitch 322 323 396 558 Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time 304 306 352 446 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 290 297 349 Paper Girls, Volume 3 233 234 No Award 85 Preference 1234 1160 1097 1004 No Preference 159 233 296 389 Total votes 1393 1393 1393 1393 Fourth Place Finalist Pass 1 Pass 2 Pass 3 Black Bolt, Volume 1: Hard Time 410 413 512 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 326 333 436 Paper Girls, Volume 3 325 326 No award 88 Preference 1149 1072 948 No Preference 244 321 445 Total votes 1393 1393 1393 Fifth Place Finalist Pass 1 Pass 2 Paper Girls, Volume 3 446 450 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 478 439 No award 102 Preference 976 889 No Preference 417 504 Total votes 1393 1393 Sixth Place Finalist Pass 1 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 681 No award 131 Preference 812 No Preference 581 Total votes 1393



Is this because Hugo voters (WorldCon attendees) are older, and not as cognizant of the diversity of graphic storytelling?

Is this because many comics publishers aren’t campaigning for votes via the reader packet? (This is a digital download available to all Worldcon attendees, containing excerpts and full texts of nominees, offered by the publishers.) Large publishers Looking at the “Preference” data, you can see how the aggregate voters cast their ballots. Everyone voted for First Place (with 73 voting for No Award), but only 812 (53%) filled out a complete ballot. It should also be noted that of the 2,828 total ballots submitted, fewer than 50% voted in the Best Graphic Story category.Is this because Hugo voters (WorldCon attendees) are older, and not as cognizant of the diversity of graphic storytelling?Is this because many comics publishers aren’t campaigning for votes via? (This is a digital download available to all Worldcon attendees, containing excerpts and full texts of nominees, offered by the publishers.) Large publishers do not exhibit at Worldcon; it’s unknown if it’s worth the trouble, given a general attendance of 10,000. Granted, those attendees include industry professionals and ardent fans who read a lot of fiction. Well read and educated, the quality of fan is higher than most shows.

Along with the above voting data, the Hugo Awards committee also releases the data on nominations.

Best Graphic Story (572 ballots) Place Finalist N Pct 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 1 Monstress, Vol.2: The Blood 159 27.80% 95.98 96.57 97.32 98.75 100.85 101.1 105.2 109.03 111.95 2 Saga, Volume 7 84 14.69% 40.12 40.2 40.87 42.67 47.1 47.18 48.12 50.78 51.7 3 Black Bolt, Vol. 1: Hard TIme 67 11.71% 40.18 40.18 40.35 41.23 41.4 41.98 43.37 44.78 47.37 4 Bitch Planet, Vol. 2: President Bitch 64 11.19% 30 30.5 31.33 31.6 31.93 32.6 33.7 35.95 36.28 5 Paper Girls, Vol. 3 55 9.62% 26.57 26.73 26.9 27.15 28.7 28.7 30.25 31.75 32.25 6 My Favorite Thing is Monsters 40 6.99% 28.03 28.03 28.03 29.62 29.67 29.83 29.83 30.5 30.5 7 Ms. Marvel, Vol 7: Damage Per Second 39 6.82% 16.77 16.77 17.02 17.73 17.87 18.03 19.2 20.12 21.95 8 Ladycastle 37 6.47% 21.23 21.23 22.15 22.92 22.92 22.92 23.33 24.08 9 The Wicked + The Divine, Vol. 5: Imperial Phase I 38 6.64% 17.75 17.75 18.67 18.67 18.83 18.83 19 10 Ms. Marvel, Vol. 8: Mecca 37 6.47% 14.95 15.2 15.87 16.18 16.32 16.82 11 17776 20 3.50% 16.42 16.42 16.42 16.42 16.42 12 Saga, Vol. 8 29 5.07% 13.48 13.48 13.48 14.07 13 Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation 28 4.90% 14.1 14.1 14.6 14 Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Vol. 6: Who Run The World? Squirrels 22 3.85% 11.83 11.83 15 Above the Timberline 14 2.45% 11.58

Note that both Ms. Marvel and Saga had two volumes on the long list.

Note that Image had four of the six finalists, and six of the fifteen longlist.

Publishers and creators should note: A supporting membership to Worldcon 76 cost $50. For that, members could nominate and vote for the 2018 Hugos, and nominate for the 2019 Hugo Awards. Theoretically, for $2000, a campaign could get a group of titles on the final ballot. Of course, with the new voting restrictions on slate ballots, a publisher would have to randomize the titles on each nominating ballot.

Or the publisher could campaign for the next year by buying a table in the dealer’s room, promoting current and upcoming titles, and creating a website just for Worldcon attendees where members can read everything online.

In 1988, when Watchmen won the Hugo Award for Best Other Forms, there were 418 nominating ballots. Voting data isn’t readily available (was it published in Locus?), so it is not known how many nominations were received for the somewhat obscure “other forms” category, or how works were defined or categorized by the Awards committee. Still, it doesn’t take much to get on the final ballot, or to win.