Duane Jones

Debuting in Chris Giarrusso's contribution to the Image Holiday Special 2005, Duane Jones is a Modern Age character whose catalog footprint is modest but whose company is anything but — he shares pages with Rick Grimes, Carl Grimes, Michonne, Abraham Ford, and Morgan Jones across The Walking Dead and its deluxe reprint editions. That's some of Image Comics' most celebrated post-apocalyptic company to keep, and the fact that his appearances stretch across nearly two decades of publishing speaks to his place in that world's ongoing story. A small piece of a very big, beloved universe — and for devoted Walking Dead completists, every character in that saga carries weight.