The problem with viewing such submissions through the prism of a competition is that one needs to start thinking about which entry will ultimately be considered better than other competing entries. And that requires some fairly subjective assessment, weighing any particular submission's strengths and weaknesses against any other's. This is why I asked two other webcomic peers - Lynn Lau (LL) and Steve Horton (SH) - to join me in reaching a decision. The process was essentially based on our three individual rankings which then ultimately determined the winner and runners-up. My thanks to them for their assistance.
As I intended on offering a bit of feedback for all the entries I asked Lynn and Steve to provide comments should they also want to. As I mentioned above all the entries were outstanding so our comments are provided here as constructive feedback and shouldn't in any way be seen as negative criticism.
Cheers
Stephen (SC)