Proof #22

The tagline says it all — "If you believe in monsters, you need… Proof" — and issue #22 brings that promise vividly to life with a cover by Riley Rossmo that layers a snowbound night scene with unsettling beauty. A lone figure in a wide-brimmed hat strides through a wintry landscape of dark pines and a pale moon, while the foreground is dominated by the enormous, haunting face of a fallen creature staring up with pale, vacant eyes — a skull icon and cryptic red markings adding to the eerie atmosphere. Alex Grecian and Rossmo's "Julia: Part Five" looks to deliver exactly the kind of cryptozoological dread this 2009 Image series does so well.