Hellblazer #194

Hellblazer #194 arrives from Vertigo in May 2004 with one of the most unsettling covers in the series' run — a blood-spattered hospital file for one John Constantine, scattered candy, and a pair of scissors lying ominously across the chaos, all rendered by cover artist Tim Bradstreet with his signature clinical dread. The patient description visible on the documents — blond, British, born Liverpool — leaves no doubt whose fate is under examination in "Ward 24." Mike Carey and Leonardo Manco were clearly building toward something grim for everyone's favorite occult troublemaker.