United States vs. Murder Inc. #5

The cover of this Jinxworld/DC thriller sets the mood perfectly: a trench-coated figure looms in the foreground, pistol in hand, while a bowling alley lane stretches into the distance — pins still standing, blood already pooling beneath them. Michael Avon Oeming's angular, design-forward art and Taki Soma's muted palette of olive, gold, and lavender give the scene a genuinely unsettling stillness. Brian Michael Bendis and Oeming's alternate-America crime saga continues to deliver exactly the kind of stylish, hard-edged storytelling that earned it that AIPT "brutal and uncompromising" badge of honor.