Checkmate #26

This March 1990 issue of DC's espionage series delivers a cover that means serious business — a steely-eyed man with a lit cigarette clenched in his teeth raises a smoking pistol, radiating the kind of cold determination that the cover copy makes explicit: somebody has kidnapped his children, and he's getting them back his way. The cover pencils by Steve Erwin and inks by Michael Bair give the portrait a gritty, noir intensity that fits Checkmate!'s world of high-stakes covert operations perfectly. With Paul Kupperberg writing and Bill Jaaska on interior art, "Knight Job" looks like exactly the kind of personal, pressure-cooker thriller this series did so well.