What makes the best comic book covers? It’s a great topic for debate. For us as individuals there is no wrong answer, of course. It’s purely subjective. But with a little thought it is frequently possible to explain what it is about a particular image that grabs you. The best ones are the ones that make you stop and check out something you weren’t previously going to purchase – and in some cases, you even end up picking up a title you’ve never even heard of before.

Ilya and Alexander Salkind, who had produced the Superman feature films in the 1970s brought Superboy to the small screen in the fall of 1988, and DC launched Superboy: The Comic Book as a companion title to the series two years after Superboy had disappeared from continuity following John Byrne’s Man of Steel mini-series.

The comic changed its title to The Adventures of Superboy with #11, and eventually ran 22 issues in all. While there are some good stories in the series, Superboy: The Comic Book #8 is the standout.

First, I’ll admit this is much more hit or miss, much more subjective than any of the already subjective covers we’ve highlighted in our Cover Story column. Either you get Kevin Maguire’s cover and think it’s hysterical, or you don’t really get it and it’s just so-so.

I definitely fell into the first group. I think it’s one of the funniest covers ever on a comic.

With its different styles, clean lines and familiar, pop culture-themes, the cover makes full use of the comical elements in Bizarro’s nature. While Bizarro can be a powerful, scary villain in the hands of the right creative team, he’s also just pretty weird at times. This image plays that up to great effect.

It also is definitely worth noting that the interior art in the issue is by Art Adams.

— J.C. Vaughn