Catwoman #74

Part of DC's sweeping "No Man's Land" crossover event of 1999, this issue drops Catwoman into Gotham's lawless ruins with style to spare. Jim Balent's cover says it all — a confident, smirking woman holds Catwoman dangling upside-down by the ankle, lightning crackling behind them against a backdrop of barbed wire, the power dynamic deliciously reversed. John Ostrander and Balent make for a sharp creative pairing, and "A Slight Detour" promises exactly the kind of tense, street-level intrigue that makes Catwoman's corner of No Man's Land so compelling.