When The Filth isn't terrifying and Black Comedy, it's almost heart-breakingly tragic.
Madame Xanadu #26 starts with a very young boy, Sammy, who drifts from place to place, who for some reason has an unbearable stench. Dogs are particularly angry at him at all times and he can't remember where he went to school, though he naturally drifts to playgrounds. In dreams, he's a brave space adventurer, whose only fear is the mysterious Space Witch that keeps popping in his dreams. And one snowy night, as he's escaping from another pack, one of he dogs manages to bite him... and his foot comes off. Suddenly, the winds heralding the Witch swirl, and Madame Xanadu soothes the dogs and sends them home. Then, she gently asks him to trust her, and to show her where he sleeps. He takes her to the abandoned storeroom where he always sleeps, and she casts a memory spell to help him remember - his mother, a teenage mother unable to raise him, descending to prostitution and drug abuse, left him in the storeroom to get her fix, telling him to wait for her. Turns out, he never left; all that remains of him is the tiny skeleton in the floor. Madame Xanadu soothes him, and tells him he can go now. Sammy sinks into his body, and finally goes to sleep forever.
Preacher #10. An issue dedicated to the incredibly sweet story of how Jesse and Tulip met. They realize that that there was no reason at all that they shouldn't be together and that he'll "love her 'till the end of the world." And then a man walks into the room and shoots Tulip in the head.
Swamp Thing:This body moves... it has life... but a heartbeat is not a woman... a breath is not Abby. I close my eyes... and when I open them... Abby is still dead.
Floronic Man, despite being a genuinely despicable person gets one when his cruel actions and the Swamp Thing's intervention lead the Green to abandon him and he realizes that he's once again utterly alone.
We3 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely. You wouldn't think that a comic about stray animals being transformed into robotic killing machines would make you cry. You'd be wrong. "Home... is run no more." Even the covers are kinda heartrending. Especially the third one.
One Hellblazer one-shot involved John Constantine encountering the original Spirit Of Christmas, now a homeless derelict as he has long since been transplanted by Christianity's holiday. He was originally a personification of the Winter Solstice celebration. He even refers to himself as The Ghost Of Christmas Past.
