100 Bullets #5

The fifth volume of Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso's Vertigo crime series opens with a striking Dave Johnson cover: a bandage-wrapped, blood-spattered man in a white suit levels a pistol at the viewer while a looming blue-toned figure lurks behind him and a press of grasping hands reaches upward from below — an image that radiates menace and moral ambiguity in equal measure. "The Counterfifth Detective" signals a noir-drenched new chapter for the series, and the cover's tense composition makes clear that whoever this wounded figure is, he's surrounded on all sides. If Azzarello's sharp writing and Risso's atmospheric art have kept you hooked this far, this 2003 collection gives you every reason to stay.