The Flash #25

Part of DC's sweeping "Zero Year" crossover event, this New 52 issue takes Barry Allen back to Gotham City before he ever donned the scarlet costume. Francis Manapul's cover captures a young, civilian Barry — orange shirt, blazing blue eyes, and blond hair crackling with lightning — sprinting straight at the viewer against a stormy, red-skied Gotham skyline, with armed figures and a Gotham City police cruiser visible in the chaos behind him. It's a striking portrait of the man before the Flash, rendered with kinetic urgency by Manapul and Buccellato.