Masks #4

Alex Ross's striking golden cover for Masks #4 pulls you straight into the pulp era, depicting a tense crowd of suited men and a woman pressed together against a vivid yellow background, their long shadows looming dramatically behind them. The mood is all urgency and unease — figures glancing, listening, bracing — evoking the conspiratorial atmosphere at the heart of this Dynamite crossover series. With Chris Roberson writing and Dennis Calero handling the interior art, this 2013 series continues to be one of the more ambitious pulp-hero ensemble projects of its era.