The Boys #30

Darick Robertson's cover for issue #30 sets a cold, unsettling tone: a broad-shouldered figure in a long dark coat walks away through a doorway, leaving a body crumpled face-down on the floor behind him — the whole scene rendered in deep shadows and institutional blues that make it feel almost clinical in its menace. Garth Ennis and Robertson's mature-readers series continues to find that unnerving space where dark humor and genuine brutality sit uncomfortably close together, and this 2009 Dynamite issue, bearing the characteristically blunt story title "Rodeo Fuck," suggests neither is letting up anytime soon. If you've been following the series, the cover alone makes a quiet, confident argument that you shouldn't stop now.