By John R. & Carol Q. Sansevere, illustrated by William Rieser (Octopus)
ISBN’s: 978-0-70643-186-5 and 978-0-70643-307-4
Let’s all pop back once or even twice more to the ever-so-now 1980s with these stylish, radically different and frankly peculiar experimental graphic novels that pretty much typified and encapsulated the dichotomies of the age of Big Hair and Brash Money, and layered them lavishly over a pastel-tinted attempt to glam up the old formulas that worked so well for the Famous Five, Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys.
The Pink Flamingos are a close clique of fashionably attractive Palm Beach teens whose taste for glamour and adventure draw them into some pretty tricky situations. These Chic Chicks are Lana the model, Carla the singer, Amber the waitress/biker babe, Jackie the TV intern and Jody the spoiled rich one…
In volume 1: Bring Down the Night the quirky quintet first get together when a mutual friend commits suicide. As with everything in that swank locale, sophisticated, connected drug-dealer Joey De Silva is at the heart of the web of temptation, corruption and death and the feisty females decide that if the cops won’t touch him then they’ll take him down in their own unique way…
The in-your-face, unashamed hedonism and seductive shoulder-padded indolence continues in Maybe Next Time… Maybe Never as the Material Girls follow Carla to New York City and her big break in the music biz, but sadly, behind the glitz and glamour, drugs and depravity are never too far way… Meanwhile as romance rears its well-coiffed hunky head for one of the Flamingos, Poor Little Rich Girl Jody discovers that for some families money never could buy love…
Originally published by Shuster & Shuster in the US these books appear to be more fashion sketches and studies than straight comics narrative and the oddly removed, if not outright distant writing style looks uncomfortably like an actual recycled unsold pitch “bible†and shooting script for a proposed TV show (and believe me I’ve worked on far too many of those to mistake the feel) but even so the overall effect is not unpleasant or lacking in entertainment value when considered as graphic novels.
Rieser’s bold and vivid storyboard-based illustrations blends well with the faux-TV script narrative captions, and despite a rather static, lifestyle-mag, fashion shoot feel to the action, if you’re a fan of Miami Vice, 21 Jump Street, Dallas, Dukes of Hazzard or even early Neighbours there’s a nostalgic buzz to be gleaned from these rather wholesome adventures for Young Adults.
™ & © 1987, 1988 Angel Entertainment, Inc. All rights reserved.