Ex Machina #40

Tony Harris's cover for this 2009 Wildstorm series captures a quietly tense waiting-room scene rendered in warm sepia tones — a seated woman in a robe, a man with a cigarette leaning back, and a sharp-suited figure working at a laptop, all beneath a framed portrait on the wall. Brian K. Vaughan's politically charged series continues with issue #40, subtitled "Ruthless," and this restrained, almost cinematic composition promises the kind of measured drama the book does so well.