Rick and Steve: Season 1

In the gay enclave of West Lahunga, "Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay Couple In All The World" (2007) are your typical thirtysomething guppies, complete with an attitudinal spoiled cat named Pussy. Rick is the sensitive one, a trendy Fillipino-American computer programmer, deeply in love with Steve, a gym-obsessed hottie who sells overpriced houses to the locals. Rick (or is it Steve?) is the father of the child being co-parented by their best friends, Kirsten (a boyish lipstick lesbian) and her partner Dana (a sarcastic self-described J.A.B., Jewish American Bulldyke.) They're also friends with Chuck, a 50ish HIV+ paraplegic, and his shallow but devoted 19 year old boytoy, Evan, and neighborhood "fag hag" Condi Ling.

When I caught the first episode of this series on LOGO, I was a bit taken aback by the rather unapologetic and definitely non-PC tone of some of the humor, including the stereotypes (Rick and Steve are shallow, often sex-obsessed, don't know what end of a hammer to hold, and depend on Dana to do any minor repairs around the house) and the concept of having a character with HIV, now healthy on the new drugs, using his antibody status as a way to get extra attention and considerations from others. I relaxed a bit by the second episode, and began to better understand and appreciate the intentional "in your face" tone of the show that made the humor work all the better. (Apparently, I'm not the only one who found this taking some getting used to, as actor Peter "Queer As Folk" Paige - the voice of Steve - mentions in the DVD extras, that the intent was to make a gay urban Simpsons, where you can get away with things using cartoon characters that you wouldn't dream of doing with live actors. For example, we laugh at Homer stranging his son Bart, but could you imagine the outcry if John Goodman had stranged a misbehaving DJ on "Roseanne"?) It is indeed a topical, creative, daring and highly original series, dealing humorously with a myriad of situations including GLBT cruises, ageism, swinging, codependence, homophobia and other forms of bigotry. My personal favorite of the six episodes is #2, which features an Ebony and Ivory, an interracial lesbian couple, who carry political correctness to a hysterical extreme, in that they don't want to even know their own baby's gender (They close their eyes when they change diapers) in order to avoid possibly pushing him/her into any stereotypical "gender roles."

The episodes are still on rotation on LOGO-TV, with some clips also available for free on their website. But I recommend renting or buying the (rather bargain priced) DVD, for all six episodes as well as some interesting extras, including segments on how the stop-action annimation is done, interviews with Peter Paige (Steve), Wilson Cruz (Evan), Alan Cumming (Chuck) and Margaret Cho (Condi), and 12 brief "digisodes" that were not aired. With well-deserved extra points for originality and chutzpah, I'll give it five stars out of five.

This stuff is hilarious. Originally a set of stop-motion shorts, they've been adapted into a season of animated shows. The humour is so dead-on it hurts.

This animation is awesome - can't get enough of it and each time that we watch it we find more to laugh about. Really well worth adding to a collection and can't wait for series two.