The Arctic Marauder

The Arctic Marauder is a 1974 comic book by the French writer and artist Jacques Tardi. Set in an alternative late 19th century with Jules Verne-inspired technology, it concerns how ships mysteriously explode in the Arctic region and how a medical student goes there to investigate, finding a connection to his scientist uncle.
When The Arctic Marauder was published in English in 2011, Publishers Weekly called it "a baroque masterpiece" and NPR called it "ur-steampunk — one of the works that laid the groundwork for a genre".