Reed Gunther #9

Shane and Chris Houghton's frontier adventure kicks off "Fiends Forever" with a cover that pulls no punches: a massive, red-eyed bear with dripping jaws has a hapless cowboy pinned to the railroad tracks, a steam locomotive bearing down in the smoky background. Chris Houghton's linework gives the scene a wonderfully cartoonish energy that somehow makes the peril feel both genuinely tense and gleefully fun. If this is Part 1 of 2, things are clearly off to a very bad start for our hero — and a very entertaining start for readers.