Sovereign Seven #9

The "silent night... deadly night..." tagline sets an ominous holiday mood for this March 1996 DC issue, even as the cover presents a surprisingly playful scene — the Sovereign Seven engaged in a full-on snowball fight, laughing and diving through the drifts with genuine carefree energy. Looming large in the background, however, is a helmeted, masked figure rendered in ghostly blue tones, casting a quiet threat over the winter revelry that gives the image its uneasy edge. Dwayne Turner's cover pencils and inks balance that tension beautifully, making issue #9 — featuring the story "12th Night" by Chris Claremont — one of the more visually distinctive entries in the series.