"Eye of the Beholder" webcomic with Ruben Cordero, page 8

Here we are at the end of this particular story.  Yes, it's a sad occasion, but weep not - I write other stuff, too.  Like Teddy and the Yeti.  You should totally buy it.

And speaking of shelling out good money for things with my name attached them, "Eye of the Beholder" is published in the collection Strip Search from Dark Horse Comics.  This book is available at lots of places, like Amazon (click on the links!), Things from Another World, Mile High Comics, Midtown Comics, heck...if you give 'em the ISBN (1593070993), big stores like Barnes and Noble will order it for you!

I'm really lucky to have been a part of this project, and I can't thank talented individuals like editor Adam Gallardo and, of course, artist Ruben Cordero, who is a heck of an artist and a heck of a guy, enough for everything they did to bring this dream to life.  This is the story that convinced me to try to make comics on a semi-regular basis, and I'm thankful for the opportunities it's granted.  May everyone who wants one have their own "Eye of the Beholder".

I'll post some "extra" stuff in a few days - character designs, sketches, pages in progress, etc. - things that haven't been published before.  It should be a fun way to wrap this short story up.

"Eye of the Beholder" webcomic with Ruben Cordero, page 7

Here we are with page seven of "Eye of the Beholder" - one more page to go and the suspense is at its height.  I certainly went with "religious fury" with this story, didn't I?  There's even a "Kraka-DOOM!" sound effect!

Strip Search isn't only my first comic book publication, but also perhaps my best reviewed work to date. A hundred years ago, I wrote about how reviews are tough to come by for me and what I write (for whatever reason), but Strip Search was reviewed by none other than the American Library Association, which, even if you've never heard of it before, sounds pretty official.  I didn't read the review until several years after the book was released (way to keep up on it, Jeff), but I was still taken back when I did.  Here's what the ALA had to say in their publication, "Booklist":

After the plug was pulled on the anthology series Dark Horse Presents, editor Gallardo found himself griping about where emerging artists were going to get their first exposure. So he started up a Web-based version of DHP, and here he presents the cream, according to site visitors, of what he put up on the site monthly, July 2002-June 2003. Pretty obviously, the genre won't run out of artistic talent any time soon. The Brownlee brothers' faux photographic style and Steve Morris' gorgeously manipulated and photographed models may be the most technically adroit stuff on view, but the other contributors' highly varied drawing styles are just as impressive, whether in color or black and white. The story element is frequently rather thin, however, and many may give best story honors to Jeff McClelland and Ruben D. Cordero Jr.'s straightforward inversion of Hansel and Gretel. All the others beg for more development, which makes the collection's point that each of these newcomers could reward a much longer look at his or her work. -- Ray Olson 

Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

 Let me highlight the interesting part of that review, just to make sure no one missed it: "...many may give best story honors to Jeff McClelland and Ruben D. Cordero Jr.'s straightforward inversion of Hansel and Gretel."  Wow.  I have no idea who you are, Ray Olson, but what a nice thing to say.  I'm still not sure what I did to deserve it, but I'll take a compliment where I can get one, without a doubt.

"Eye of the Beholder" webcomic with Ruben Cordero, page 2

Here we are with page two of the "Eye of the Beholder" story that ran in Dark Horse's Strip Search anthology.  Here we see the "demons" for the first time - angry little fellows who carry on the Hansel and Gretel metaphor by eating this poor old lady's house.  The colors really stand out on this page, I think - it's something that this piece really had going for it.  Even though this was being put together in 2003, when webcomics were much less prevalent, Ruben had a keen eye for what worked on the screen and how it was different than a printed comic book page.

I mentioned in my last entry that each submission to the Strip Search contest was voted on to see which ones would eventually get printed - that is, readers could choose which ones they liked best each month. I'm sure that nearly everyone did this, and even though it didn't matter in the end, I still have a little twinge of guilt when I think back to the dozens (and dozens) of times I voted for myself.  It went against the democratic nature of the contest, but man!  I saw this as a chance to break in to the industry and I couldn't resist temptation.  I voted for myself every day when I got up, every day before dinner, and every day before I went to bed - multiple times.

Some time after the voting was complete, main editor Adam Gallardo (who later went on to write the title 100 Girls for Arcana Studio) explained that to calculate the winners of each round, only votes from unique I.P. addresses were tallied - meaning that although I probably spent hours of my life clicking "submit" on the Dark Horse website, only one of my votes actually counted.  Part of me feels good that this story did apparently win on merit, and not just my obsession, but another part feels stupid for wasting all that time.

I'll post the next page on Tuesday or Wednesday.  In the mean time, enjoy page two!