Amala's Blade #2

Amala stands front and center on Michael Díalynas's cover, black-clad and hooded, raising her curved blade with cool, focused intensity while a crowd of rough-looking figures — soldiers, brawlers, and assorted characters — looms in ghostly blue behind her. The contrast between her sharp, fully rendered presence and the sketchy, spectral mass at her back gives this second issue of the four-part Dark Horse miniseries a genuinely atmospheric sense of a lone warrior surrounded by forces closing in. Steve Horton and Díalynas's steampunk-tinged world is on full display here, and it's easy to see why this series earned its devoted following.