Nick Fury vs. S.H.I.E.L.D. #5

The penultimate chapter of this 1988 prestige-format Marvel limited series arrives with a cover by Kevin Nowlan that is genuinely striking: a cigar-clenching Nick Fury crouches on the edge of a rocky precipice, rifle slung at his back, gripping the wrist of a green-skinned woman who dangles over a void lit by a dramatic beam of light — ghostly falling figures trailing through the blue background behind her. Bob Harras, Paul Neary, and Kim DeMulder bring "The Ascension Call" to life inside, and with only one issue left after this, the tension surrounding Fury's conflict with S.H.I.E.L.D. itself has rarely felt more precarious.