Scalped #53

From writer Jason Aaron and artist R.M. Guéra, Scalped #53 continues "Knuckle Up" with one of Vertigo's most unflinching crime series still firing on all cylinders in 2011. Jock's cover is a quietly unsettling composition — a stack of casino chips looms in the foreground like a monolith, while reflected or embedded in the top chip's surface is an aerial view of a reservation community, its sparse streets and modest homes rendered in muted, amber tones. It's a striking visual metaphor that says everything about the stakes — economic, personal, communal — running through this series without spelling out a single word.