Astro City: The Dark Age #1

A vivid, colorful figure — alien or otherworldly in appearance, with glowing yellow eyes and brilliantly colored ribbons of energy swirling around them — dominates Alex Ross's striking painted cover for this collected hardcover bringing together Kurt Busiek and Brent E. Anderson's *Astro City: The Dark Age*. The dynamic composition, with the figure lunging forward against a darkened cityscape, captures the tension and visual ambition that has always defined this series. If you've been waiting for the right entry point into one of comics' most thoughtful superhero worlds, 2008 delivered it in style.