Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer #[nn]

The premise alone earns a second look: Pinocchio, the little wooden boy, reimagined as a stake-wielding hunter of the undead. The cover, illustrated by Dusty Higgins, places a determined, pint-sized Pinocchio front and center, his elongated nose poised like a weapon, while a massive, grinning vampiric face looms behind him in bold red and black. It's a wonderfully unsettling image that makes this 2010 Slave Labor release feel like exactly the kind of offbeat gem the indie comics world does best.