Black Orchid #2

Dave McKean's cover for Black Orchid #2 is a study in dread and restraint — a dark, textured composition split between an etched orchid rendered in ghostly pale lines and a shadowy figure whose elongated, claw-like fingers partially obscure a face with unsettling red eyes peering out from the darkness. The contrast between the fragile floral imagery and that lurking presence captures exactly the tension Neil Gaiman and McKean were bringing to DC's mature-readers line in 1989. "Going Down..." promises storytelling as atmospherically striking as this haunting cover suggests.