Subexponentially solvable hard graph problems
Since every planar graph on $n$ vertices has treewidth $O(\sqrt{n})$, all problems which are solvable in $O^*(2^{O(k)})$ time for graphs of treewidth at most~$k$ (there are a LOT of such problems) have subexponential-time algorithms on planar graphs by computing a constant-factor approximation to the treewidth in polynomial-time (for example by computing the branchwidth with the ratcatcher algorithm) and then running the treewidth algorithm, resulting in runtimes of the form $O^*(2^{O(\sqrt{n})})$ for graphs on $n$ vertices. Examples are Planar Independent Set and Planar Dominating Set, which are NP-complete of course.