Thor: Vikings #2

Glenn Fabry's cover for this second chapter of Garth Ennis's MAX series sets the tone immediately: a helmeted young warrior locks eyes — and bared teeth — with a grotesquely decayed Viking chieftain whose golden helm and rotting flesh suggest something ancient and deeply wrong has returned. The face-off is visceral and intimate, filling the frame with the kind of unflinching detail Fabry brings to bear on both the living and whatever that other figure is. "Kingdom of Iron" promises that this five-part mature-readers saga isn't easing up after its opening installment.