Content Warning: Suicide, Torture, Sexual Themes, Bondage, Cartoon Violence. Not for kids.
After Pinky’s lethal performance art piece, her devoted girlfriend Pepper follows her into death, only to find that in Hell, Pinky is… thriving?!
Pinky & Pepper Forever is a dark comedy full of furry fun and a little gay Catholic guilt. Follow these two puppygirls’ relationship and artwork on Earth and their new life along the River Styx.
This was a hard read, but it was good. Pinky and Pepper are art-school girlfriends, but their relationship gets complicated when Pinky dies and goes to hell and Pepper decides to follow her. Hell itself is cartoony and its torture is more like a Ren and Stimpy cartoon than anything, but it makes for a good backdrop for the intense unhealthiness and harsh ups and downs of their relationship.
A Silver Sprocket production by Ivy Adams in part inspired by a line of fashion dolls, Jet Set Pets, Pinky and Pepper are two art students, or "puppygirls," one of whom actually commits suicide in a final performance art piece, and who is promptly sent to Hell for her "lesbianism." This is dark satire in the guise of gaudy, garishly colored anthropomorphic dogs. With a splash of jokes about Catholic guilt. There's some bdsm played for laughs. Oh, it's all played for laughs.
Let me pause there: Atoms opens the book with content warnings about suicide, bondage, sexual themes, cartoon violence.
When Pinky goes to Hell she caustically dismisses the torments as nothing compared to what she once endured from Pepper, who shows up so they can do art in Hell forever! Yay! Pinky and Pepper forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. . . .
Some of the drawings are colored with crayons, or whatever was available. Cartoon outsider art!
Maybe this book really doesn't deserve 4 stars. There isn't much of a plot and its too short. I wish I got to know both pinky and pepper better. I liked them both but i know nothing really about the two of them. Just enough that you cane see they love eachother but have problems in the relationship. The arts not really that good either (but I like that oddly as long as the characters aren't ugly I think its cute in comics at times*does a confused shrug*) But this book has a hell of a lot of charm to me. AND ITS ALL IN COLOR. THANK YOU. at times it looks like its just colored with crayons or colored pencils. but yeah im A-OKAY WITH THAT. CHARM AND CUTENESS ARE OVERWHELMING BC OF DOING THAT. Its got a unique amateur feel that I'm digging it.. it's not overly sloppy or lazy looking. Nicely colored and i can make-out whats going on so im fine with it. The book was like $12 and i dont think i even paid that much. I just wish it was longer. I would definitely get another Pinky & Pepper book from this person. Or other things like this. I keep picking it up and looking through it. I want more time with pinky and pepper. 4 stars i fully enjoyed it. im staying with 4 If you like weird stuff than enjoy this
[spoilers maybe although the plot of the book is pretty upfront in the blurb, a thematic discussion of the book]
in mainstream media, if there's queer characters in a story one of them is going to die. pinky and pepper feels like the intervention into this narrative i didn't even know i needed.
roughly the first half of the book shows the pinky and pepper's relationship. they're two puppygirls in art school, and there are so many touches here i immediately fucking loved, just small things pinky's bath having dog legs or the characters' great outfits . we only see small snapshots of pinky and pepper's relationship, but the artist has a wonderful ability to capture the character's expressions in a way that makes them feel extremely vivid and real. the dialogue also is very effective, rather than being a back and forth it's like the worlds of the characters colliding with each other and orbiting around gaps between each other and the wider world, you get a sense of histories behind scenes without everything needing to be explicit.
pinky and pepper's relationship is complicated- carta monir in her review for the comics journal described the relationship as two puppygirls who love each other but don't know how not to hurt each other and that feels very true to me. while there's a role for straight-forwardly positive and upbeat lgbt stories, i really welcomed this narrative which didn't conform to this.
about half way through the book is the most obvious turning point - pinky's death. tbh this hit me with a force i wasn't expecting, given that it happening is hardly a surprise being right in the blurb. i think i thought pinky going to hell would be some kind of metaphor. but no. pinky is clearly literally dead.
mainstream media is saturated with resurrection as a theme, where the hero dies but you never feel the weight of their death, and that's because their dying saves the world. in those kinds of stories, queer characters also die, but the narrative rarely shows the weight of the death, and their dying doesn't save the world either. it's never even a possibility that their death would be anything other than useless but in a cast off kind of way, maybe a tear jerking plot point that's quickly forgotten. this story feels like a different kind of resurrection.
pepper shows up in hell, through some kind of communication, it's suggested, with pinky. for me it feels really relevant that while pinky's death felt extremely real, while i get the sense that pepper is in hell, i never really get the sense that pepper is dead, or at least i don't feel the weight of her literal death. for me this means that the narrative holds the possibility that pinky's death is real and literal while also opening up a space for things to be different. while they're writing in a really different context, responding among other things to white supremacy and terrorism and the ongoing murders of black people in the US, this intervention reminds me of queer poet danez smith's poem “summer, somewhere” in their collection “don't call us dead” for instance these lines: “if snow fell, it'd fall black. please don't call / us dead, call us alive someplace better. / we say our own names when we pray. / we go out for sweets & come back.”
a key difference is that while pinky and pepper are shown as existing in hell, in danez smith's poem the vision is of a kind of paradise free of white supremacy. but what the narratives share is both holding the weight of the deaths of marginalised people while also imagining the possibility that things could be otherwise and on their own terms.
at one point, this is seen quite explicitly- just after pinky's death, pepper is sobbing in her studio, working on an art piece with pinky at the subject, surrounded by her (pepper's) paintings of pinky inserted as the subject of famous paintings throughout history. to me this shows so many things at once, pepper's love for pinky, the finality of pinky's death and the impossibility of bringing her back, but the possibility for pepper to create art work on her own terms.
although there are also other ways of approaching the book. while i read it in the context of what i consider an epidemic of lgbt suicides, pinky and pepper's time in hell is also about showing them discussing and working through the communication mismatches that existed in their particular relationship, rather than necessarily being a universal message about queerness. there are also other ideas the comic explores, for instance of religion and guilt, complicated kink relationships, and the role of art and art school amongst other things. i feel like this is a book that certainly rewards multiple rereadings.
anyway as i was writing this review i heard a mouse in my room for the first time in months really loud and out of sight gnawing through the rubbish on my floor and tbh i'm a bit scared but it feels like some ghostly creature relevant to the spirit of the book.
this was a nice and quick read! from what i was able to gather from this sweet, silly, and gory comic were several different queer/religious themes (as an ex-catholic queer person, i refer to queer and religious in this instance as two things that go hand in hand).
the fact that pinky and pepper had a miscommunication resulting in an argument in the everyday world but then were able to communicate and talk things out while a literal flaming hellscape surrounded them was one thing that stood out to me. because they struggled in life but were able to unapologetically say how they felt and love each other despite the consequences thereafter, i was reminded of the question that lots of us queer people ask ourselves in our relationships as a result of religious trauma: do my feelings warrant eternal burning, torture, and pain? and eddy atoms tackles this internal dark and emotional question in a goofy, lighthearted and comically charming manner-- and through a lovely, curvy, cartoony art style.
and maybe i'm reading into it, but i found the painting of them on the wall made from the blood of a murder scene to be tragically touching. through history the LGBTQ+ community has shown such courage and resolve to love each other despite the grief, pain, and bloodshed at risk for it-- so to proudly, shamelessly paint their love together with something emerging out of an act of violence was an aspect of the story that i found profoundly beautiful.
on a related note, this quote: "Am I evil? Because if I have to be evil to keep being your girlfriend, I will!" LOVING the identity symbolism here. love prevails through grief and pain. <3 a fine read overall.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
a lot of people like to reduce this to just "edgelord" material but i think there is something to be said about the concept of hell being a person you're not allowed to leave
The characters aren't inherently (at least explicitly stated to be) trans, but the author is and the story is queer focused so I'm covering it! Similar to May She Lay Us Waste(My Review), I looked at this less as a graphic novel or a linear story, but it seems more fitting to view it as a visual experience of multimedia artwork. Within this framework it works incredibly well for an interesting experience, but as the bad reviews indicate, seeing it strictly as a graphic novel will fail it as an experience. The concept is based on the discontinued Pinkie Cooper And The Jet Set Pets toy line, specifically the titular character Pinky Cooper and Pepper Parson with the physical dolls actually making appearances in the comics, albeit repainted slightly to match the characters and Atom's style. This is a surrealist multi media cartoon horror, with a loose story following college girlfriends Pinky and Pepper through their critique classes, tumultuous relationship, through life and death after Pinky's Final Piece. The two both arrive in hell, making their way until reuniting and making due with their situation. It's filled to the brim with fantastic illustrations, quite often spanning over both pages into detailed murals.
It's short enough to warrant a reread to catch certain motifs (baths/underwater/torture) and how they play into the story. The subtle ways Pinky and Pepper both fail each other, culminating into a mutually destructive relationship which lands the two in hell, further exposing their flawed communication and combative behavior. There's plenty of subtextual exploration of lesbophobia (Characters hinting at Pepper eating a lot of clams while she's presenting her art, later saying she's in hell for "lesbianism") and the violence of it through the fates of Pinky and Pepper, think MONTERO by Lil Nas X. It's also an interesting dynamic subverting the classic one out of the gay pair dies trope, and continues their story beyond death, beyond hell, proclaiming eternal queer connection and solidarity. The reader has to think critically beyond their relationship and its clear pitfalls, and understand with the context of lesbophobia:
A) There's a need for queer solidarity especially in danger or isolation for safety and survival, despite any differences or disagreements. These can be overcame and communities can mutually heal and grow together when they find a place to breathe.
B) Not all queer relationships will be beautiful, healthy, straight-approved unions. They can be sloppy, messy, toxic, abusive, and downright dangerous, just like any relationship.
Summary: Readability: ★★★★☆, It's short, the titular characters are distinct, and the visuals are AMAZING. I've reread it like 3 times today now. The looseness of the story can make it take awhile to click and form conclusions on, so take it slow and reread!
Entertainment: ★★★★☆, Personally, I love a story that has the perfect balance of a fascinating universe/concept but enough mystery/questionability so the reader can come to their own conclusions, and I feel this just managed to create that condition. This works really well for me, especially with morally concerning characters, but can leave other readers unsatisfied and agitated. I also loved the art, it's rough around the edges but nails the 2000s Hot Topic edgy yet cute eyestrain aesthetic, feeling childlike yet refined.
Audience: If you're like me, you'll like it, if you like a clear and explicit story, you will likely hate this. It's worth checking out- and it's free online!
Pinky and Pepper Forever is “a dark comedy full of furry fun and a little gay Catholic guilt” depicting a college relationship between two members of my favourite cancelled anthro doll line, puppygirls Pinkie Cooper and her girlfriend Pepper Parson - and it’s a masterpiece, no doubt about it and no notes. EXCEPT: Where is our girl Ginger Jones?!
another book i took from bowie’s book shelf. fucking awesome, another little graphic novel, this one’s got art creation and lesbian catholic guilt messaging… I loved the art so much, I want pinky and pepper’s outfits, really well done!!! silver sprocket rocks, definitely recommend:)
Pinky and Pepper I love you both dearly. I love these toxic yuri lesbian dog art school students. The special edition version is so so so worth it and I’m so glad to finally have my own copy. As a fan of both the Pinkie Cooper dolls and Pinky and Pepper, this was everything I could have wished for.
This comic goes so hard. The art is SO good, with such a cute style contrasting with such horrible events and behaviors, mocking the immaturity and absurdity of the relationship.
The hell segment is reminiscent of Mike Diana, Rory Hayes and Mark Beyer but ultimately this looks like it was drawn by Chris Chan. Never liked the deviantart inspired era stuff, can't get into it.
Pinky and Pepper are two artists in love. They’re both students trying to refine their craft and find their audience, but neither one feels like they’re having much success. Pepper’s classmates criticise the singular focus of her art and her technique, whereas Pinky’s classmates applaud her technique, but argue that her work is devoid of meaning. Turning to each other for validation, the line between the devotion to their art and their devotion to each other becomes fuzzy. Co-dependent doesn’t even begin to describe their relationship.
Though they both feel down about their recent criticism, Pinky takes it particularly hard. She is unhappy and lashes out at Pepper, who decides to take a few days off and stays with her parents. Alone, feeling depressed, and misunderstood, Pinky plans one last piece: a lethal performance art piece. But despite the terrible cost, the disturbing piece finally gains her the attention and praise she’s always wanted.
A short and wild graphic novel about artistic expression and self-destruction via Catholicism and BDSM. Atoms's childish style and bright, eye-searing colours make everything soupy and a litle bit manic, which enhances the narrative. It's cool! I liked it a lot.
I was interested in reading some highly stylalized queer outsider art, but the main characters give me Harley-and-Joker abusive relationship vibes+ happy tree friends. It might be something for someone but it was not for me.
this was really deep. I think the plot really touched my soul and I will think about this story for many moons. Pinky and Pepper will follow me through my day to day life for a long time.
Super short, but this was for the Queer Book Club that meets at the end of the month, oop. But it leaves me room to read more? This was fun and cute and I loved mixed media, it was also quite fucked up too and violent but a ton of fun. I was really into this read and found the art to be exquisite. Is it silly? Yes. There's aspects I really enjoyed of this messed up ride. Oh, it should be mentioned that I read the most recent Special Edition of this book!
These girls are so completely toxic and messed up, but the art was mesmerising. I wish it was longer and went deeper into their relationship. I know I’m definitely rating this too high, but again, the art was scrumptious.