Green Lantern #43

This September 2009 issue serves as the prologue to DC's Blackest Night event, and Doug Mahnke and Christian Alamy's cover sets an immediately unsettling tone — a sinister, armored figure crouches over a gravestone bearing the name Bruce Wayne, clutching wilting roses while a glowing energy crackles from one outstretched hand, all bathed in eerie green light against a darkened cemetery. The atmosphere is genuinely haunting, blending grief and menace in a way that makes this one of the more striking covers of Geoff Johns' celebrated Green Lantern run. With Johns writing and Mahnke on art, this is a compelling entry point into one of 2009's most ambitious DC storylines.