Rio #[nn]

Doug Wildey's painted cover for this 1987 Graphitti Designs edition says everything you need to know about the title character: a weathered, mustachioed cowboy in a wide-brimmed hat, a cheroot at the corner of his mouth, fixing the world with a sidelong glance that radiates cool, unhurried confidence. The portrait fills the entire cover — close-cropped and bold — rendered with the kind of painterly warmth that makes you feel the dust and afternoon heat of the frontier. With Wildey handling the art, inks, and colors himself, this oversized volume has a singular, unified vision that western comics fans will find genuinely hard to put down.