TALES OF THE CLOSET by Ivan Velez Jr.

As I mentioned before, Ivan Velez recently had the welcome news that he would be republishing his TALES OF THE CLOSET series. It'll be three volumes collecting the existing nine issues, then a fourth all-new volume, resolving the cliffhanger ending from #9 and setting up future stories.

For those not familiar with the series, it was published from 1987 to 1993 by New York's Hetrick-Martin Institute for the Protection of Gay and Lesbian Youth, and features eight main characters who meet in high school and come to terms with their sexuality.

Here's a page from #2 (click for a larger scan), showing an early meeting of the eight main characters, which I think does a nice job of showing how Velez differentiated them in dialogue and artwork.

While the comic could get a bit preachy and teachy at times, as it explored various educational issues of importance to the community it was aimed to, Velez did a good job of integrating those aspects to the character bits, and weaved an interesting melodramatic soap-opera type plot that weaves through the entire series. There are a lot of characters to follow in addition to the main eight, and each has an interesting story that keeps popping up at points with some clever twists.

Anyway, very good news that the series will be reprinted and completed, and I'll post more news as I get it.