Batman #272

The cover of Batman #272 makes an immediate impression: the Dark Knight lunges forward fists-clenched above a globe of the Earth, while a colorful crowd of armed criminals from seemingly every corner of the world swarms below him. The tagline "The Underworld Olympics '76!" perfectly captures the globe-spanning premise, promising Batman pitted against Earth's greatest crime-champions in a competition as dangerous as it is audacious. José Luis García-López's cover art — both penciled and inked by him — gives the whole scene a bold, kinetic energy that makes this 1976 issue hard to put down unread.