Locke & Key: Keys to the Kingdom #3

From Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez, Locke & Key: Keys to the Kingdom #3 carries a quietly chilling cover: a February wall calendar smeared with vivid red handprints and dripping bloodstains, pinned above it an illustration of the snow-swept Keyhouse mansion and lighthouse surrounded by churning waves — and overlaid across the scene, an ornate winged key and a small red key that feel anything but innocent. The juxtaposition of something as mundane as a monthly calendar against that ominous imagery is exactly the kind of unsettling visual storytelling that made this 2010 IDW series so compelling. Rodriguez's linework renders both the cozy domesticity and the dread with equal precision, making this issue's cover hard to look away from.