American Vampire #34

Rafael Albuquerque's cover for this 2013 Vertigo issue pairs quiet melancholy with lingering dread — two figures, a man and a woman, stand with their backs to us holding hands as a vast, bleached landscape stretches before them, while above them looms a darkly beautiful, oversized flower rendered in deep crimson and shadow. The contrast between that tender gesture and the ominous bloom overhead gives the image a haunting, elegiac quality that feels entirely at home in Scott Snyder's world of American horror. "The Gray Trader" arc continues here, and this cover alone makes a compelling case for why American Vampire remained one of Vertigo's most atmospheric ongoing series of its era.