Dynamite’s press release for Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys would have you believe that they are adapting corny Americana into sordid noir, not unlike the press for The CW’s upcoming Riverdale would have you believe that the former Riverdale was a saccharine place unlike their steamy interpretation. What is closer to the truth is that the original Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew mysteries contained murders, drug trafficking, smuggling, medical malpractice, grand theft auto, and espionage, and they were already produced by writers that had been weaned on the American cinema and the dark, twisted, comics page that contained the incredibly violent adventures of Little Orphan Annie and Dick Tracy.
What may be true is that Dynamite’s comic readership is ready for the dark pulp literature of the 20s-50s, and it is a great idea to update the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys adventures for today’s readers.
Art preview and original press release:
NANCY DREW AND THE HARDY BOYS: THE BIG LIE
FEATURES AMERICAN ICONS LIKE YOU HAVE NEVER SEEN THEM BEFORE!An All-New Hardboiled Crime Series Casts Beloved Sleuth
Nancy Drew as a Femme Fatale Alongside the Hardy BrothersDecember 20, 2016, Mt. Laurel, NJ: Earlier this year, Dynamite Entertainment further solidified claim to the industry’s leading publisher of licensed comics with news of an exclusive arrangement with Simon & Schuster to bring the beloved characters Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys to comics with all-new adventures!
And with the 2017 release of Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys: The Big Lie, they are creating a Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys mystery unlike any other you’ve ever read…
In this modern take, teenage brothers Frank and Joe Hardy are accused of the murder of their father – a detective in the small resort town of Bayport – and must team up with the femme fatale Nancy Drew to prove their innocence (and find the real guilty party in the process) in a twisting, hardboiled tale, complete with double-crosses, deceit, and dames.
Inspired by new crime classics like Ed Brubaker’s Fatale and Darwyn Cooke’s Parker series, writer Anthony Del Col (Assassin’s Creed, Kill Shakespeare) and artist Werther Dell’Edera (Batman: Detective Comics, House of Mystery) bring the iconic teen detectives into the modern age, and redefine noir for a new generation of readers!
Writer Del Col, a big fan of the characters, conceived this unique take years ago and worked to find and secure the license with Dynamite to bring this tale to life.
“I often come up with a lot of bizarre ideas, and two years ago I had this vision of a modern-day noir story with femme fatale Nancy Drew aiding accusing criminals the Hardy Boys,” says writer Anthony Del Col. “It was an idea that, upon further thought, actually wasn’t that bizarre. And now Werther, Dynamite, and I are using it as a launching pad to examine who these characters really are, and why they’re still so beloved.”
“We wanted to do a take on the iconic characters the world grew up on unlike any that had come before,” says Dynamite Entertainment CEO and Publisher Nick Barrucci. “Anthony Del Col had a true passion for the source material that Werther Dell’Edera was able to bring through perfectly. This series does the characters justice, with a modern take that fits perfectly alongside Dynamite’s other popular crime titles!”
Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys: The Big Lie will be solicited in Diamond Comic Distributors’ January 2017 Previews catalog, the premier source of merchandise for the comic book specialty market, and slated for release in March. Comic book fans are encouraged to reserve copies with their local comic book retailers. Nancy Drew & The Hardy Boys will also be available for individual customer purchase through digital platforms courtesy of Comixology, Dynamite Digital, iVerse, and Dark Horse Digital.
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