John Carter, Warlord of Mars #22

Rudy Nebres delivers a gripping cover for this March 1979 Marvel installment, showing John Carter and Dejah Thoris scrambling desperately up a sheer rock face as enormous pale hands reach out to drag them back into the Canyon of Despair. The cover copy teases what awaits the pair at the end of their treacherous eight-mile climb, and that looming threat — rendered with Nebres's striking linework — makes it easy to see why this series kept Burroughs's Martian adventures feeling so alive on the comics page.