Cable #64

Billed as a "Special Origin Issue," Cable #64 poses the question "Who Is Nathan Summers?" right on the cover, and Ladrönn and Vlasco's artwork makes it feel genuinely weighty — a lone silhouetted figure bearing the X-Men emblem and holding a long staff stands at the center of a blazing light, surrounded by a gallery of faces from Cable's complex past, including towering villainous visages and haunted allies rendered in an eerie green palette. The composition pulls you in like a spiral, each face a piece of a puzzle that the story promises to unravel. Joe Casey and Ladrönn were clearly swinging for something ambitious here, and this 1999 issue wears that ambition right on its sleeve.