Amazing Adventures #34

The cover of this 1976 Marvel issue pulls no punches: a masked, blue-suited villain stands triumphant over a heap of fallen Freemen — figures in varied costumes sprawled across rocky ground — while a red-haired woman cradles one of the wounded and Killraven himself leaps into action in the background. P. Craig Russell's cover art frames the grim promise of "A Death in the Family" with real emotional weight, selling the threat to these resistance fighters billed as "Earth's Last Hope for the Future." Don McGregor's Killraven: Warrior of the Worlds saga was consistently one of Marvel's most ambitious science-fiction series, and this issue — touted right on the cover as "the story you thought you'd never see" — looks like a genuine turning point.