Review: Chelsea Boys: Steppin’ Out

Artist(s): Allan Neuwirth, Glen Hanson.

The second collection of Allan Neuwirth and Glen Hanson’s strip Chelsea Boys has been published by Bruno Gmünder in late 2006 (available from Amazon). It’d been three years since the first collection, so it was a real pleasure to see that the strip only improved in the meantime (you can see some strips on the official site).
While the 3 roommates began as stereotypes (Nathan is the grumpy Jewish Guy, Soirée is the fabulous, strong-mouthed drag queen, and Sky is the seemingly innocent twink with a perfect bod), their development in this second collection takes them even further from what some readers felt was a one-dimensional presentation. I’d be surprised if anybody said that now. They’ve all grown into fully realized characters, and the larger cast the authors have introduced little by little has certainly helped. The variety of age, ethnicity, outlook on life and physical appearance is very appealing, as are the storylines, ranging from silly to rather serious: Sky becomes a contestant on a reality TV show, but at the possible cost of his personal ethics; Nathan’s mother seems to develop Alzheimer’s; Soirée might not fit with his boyfriend’s friends’ milieu…

The art is a real delight. Hanson manages to blend a very cartoony style (his characters have only four fingers, for example) with a caricaturist’s talents, which gives us a combination of Jerry Mills‘ style on Poppers and mainstream magazine illustration (see his website for all those aspects in his work). He also draws very hot guys of all ages and shapes, in my opinion.
Chelsea Boys has become a fun but definitely not superficial strip, with warm and engaging characters. Let’s hope we’ll get a lot more collections.

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