21世紀少年 [Nijūisseiki Shōnen / 21st Century Boys] #1

Naoki Urasawa's 21st Century Boys opens with a striking cover featuring two eerie, pale-blue masked figures flanking a warm golden vignette crowded with fragmented imagery — robots, a rotary telephone, a child's drawing, and echoes of a shared childhood imagination. The juxtaposition of those blank, unsettling masks against the nostalgic collage in between them sets a tone that is equal parts mystery and melancholy. Urasawa's visual storytelling is unmistakable even before you turn a single page.