Scalped #45

Vertigo's gritty crime saga continues with issue #45, opening a new five-part arc — "You Gotta Sin to Get Saved" — written by Jason Aaron with art by R. M. Guéra. Jock's cover is quietly arresting: a massive, skeletal deer skull dominates the composition in stark blue-grey tones, its wide antlers reaching upward like grasping fingers, while a solitary figure sits hunched in the shadows at its base. Named one of the ten best comics of 2010 by Comic Book Resources, Scalped arrives here with all the brooding atmosphere that earned it that praise.