Doctor Strange #81

Part of Marvel's 25th Anniversary celebration, this February 1987 issue delivers one of the most unsettling covers in the Sorcerer Supreme's long run — Kevin Nowlan's artwork fills the page with the enormous, decaying face of a monstrous entity, its glowing yellow eyes each reflecting a tiny but defiant Doctor Strange in his full blue-and-red regalia. The tagline "The New Sorcerer Supreme" runs vertically down the left side, adding a provocative note of tension to an already striking image. With Peter B. Gillis writing and Chris Warner on interior art, this is a genuinely compelling entry in Strange's ongoing battle against forces that dwarf him in scale but perhaps not in resolve.