Die: Loaded #1

The world of Die returns in 2025 with this striking first issue of Loaded, subtitled "The Funeral Party" — and Stephanie Hans's cover sets the tone immediately, framing a blue-haired woman cradling a small fox inside the cavernous, tooth-lined maw of an enormous dark bear, whose glowing red eyes loom above. The geometric red diamond overlaid across the composition gives the image a ritualistic, game-like menace that longtime fans of Kieron Gillen's mythic roleplaying-inflected storytelling will find instantly compelling. Hans's painterly artistry is on full display here, balancing delicate beauty against something genuinely threatening — a combination that makes Die unlike anything else on the shelf.