Enemy Ace Special #1

Joe Kubert's cover for this 1990 DC special says everything about why Enemy Ace endures: a grim, goggled German pilot looms large against a smoky black sky, his scarf streaming behind him as a WWI biplane tears through the foreground and a second aircraft erupts in flames nearby. The stark two-tone palette and Kubert's precise, expressive linework give the whole image a haunting, almost painterly weight. Inside, writer-artist Joe Kubert delivers the original Enemy Ace story by Robert Kanigher, and the issue also features an introduction by George Pratt, writer/artist of Enemy Ace: War Idyll — making this a fine showcase of the character's enduring power.