Shade, the Changing Man #52

This October 1994 Vertigo installment of Peter Milligan and Sean Phillips's surreal series arrives with a cover image that's equal parts macabre and mesmerizing — a pipe-smoking figure in a red cravat tends a cast-iron stove whose open firebox reveals a burning skull, while a second figure in a swirling black-and-white patterned coat tumbles overhead, all set against a background dense with scattered bones and skulls. Sean Phillips's painted linework gives the whole scene a smoky, darkly atmospheric quality that suits the "Hot Cross Bones" chapter heading perfectly. It's a striking piece of 1994 Vertigo design that captures the off-kilter dread this series does so well.