Northlanders #44

Part three of Brian Wood's Icelandic Trilogy arrives with a cover by Massimo Carnevale that is quietly unsettling — a red-haired woman in a dark hood rests her hands on a severed pig's head dripping blood, while a bearded, axe-wielding man looms in the background. The stark, muted palette and the brutality of that central image set a sobering tone for this Viking-age story of bondage and survival set in 886. Vertigo's Northlanders continues to be one of the most atmospheric historical comics of its era, and this installment looks to be no exception.