Beasts of Burden #4

The finale of Evan Dorkin and Jill Thompson's first Beasts of Burden miniseries arrives with this 2009 Dark Horse issue, "Grave Happenings" — and Thompson's cover sets the mood perfectly. A motley crew of neighborhood dogs and a small orange cat are gathered in an overgrown, gravestone-dotted cemetery, their eyes wide with alarm as a skeletal figure erupts from a broken, rune-marked tomb at the scene's center. It's the kind of image that captures exactly what makes this series so appealing: earnest, beautifully painted animals facing down something genuinely eerie, with Thompson's lush watercolor style making every blade of grass and weathered headstone feel wonderfully alive.