Abe Sapien #5

Spinning out of the pages of Hellboy, Abe Sapien: Sacred Places collects the fifth volume of the amphibious BPRD agent's solo saga, with work by Mike Mignola, Scott Allie, Sebastián Fiumara, Max Fiumara, and colorist Dave Stewart. The cover, by the Fiumara brothers, is a beautifully unsettling composition: a gaunt, skeletal figure clutches a cross-adorned bell while a young woman stands tensely at its side, a robed death-figure looms above them bearing a skull-crowned hood, and the snarling maw of a massive beast fills the shadowy background — all framed by guttering candles and scattered skulls that suggest rituals both old and dangerous. It's the kind of atmospheric, folk-horror imagery that makes this series one of Dark Horse's most quietly compelling corners of the Hellboy universe.