John Carter, Warlord of Mars #4

Edgar Rice Burroughs' planetary adventurer faces a truly harrowing predicament on this 1977 Marvel cover: a muscular, sword-wielding John Carter is ensnared by the writhing tentacles of a monstrous, fang-filled Martian creature, its glowing red eyes and gaping maw dominating the foreground — all set grimly atop a field of scattered skulls. The cover tagline perfectly captures the tension — "To rescue Dejah Thoris, John Carter must save the fiend he's sworn to kill!" — promising the kind of desperate, morally complicated heroics that make Burroughs' Barsoom so compelling. Gil Kane's pencils and Pablo Marcos' inks give the scene real kinetic energy, with Carter's defiant posture suggesting he's far from finished despite the odds against him.