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[http://www.canoe.ca/Columnists/tilley.html
The'80s - the yuppie decade is back
Topsiders, legwarmers, Baltimora, Swatches
By STEVE TILLEY
Edmonton Sun
January 23, 2002
I never had a Flock of Seagulls 'do or a Thompson Twins hat. I almost always wore socks and never, to my recollection, owned a Sonny Crockett-style pastel blazer. I could only ever solve one side of a Rubik's Cube and I wasn't able to memorize the patterns that would let you rack up high scores in Pac-Man.
I will plead guilty to Sperry Topsiders, a couple of Swatches and even the odd Duran Duran cassette (hey, Seven and the Ragged Tiger still holds up), but overall the '80s was a cultural void best forgiven and forgotten. Especially by those of us who lived through them.
Well, too bad. There seems to be a standard two-decade sentence in purgatory before fashion, music and fads of any given era are allowed to come back, and the '80s is now officially out on day parole. Thankfully, Miami Vice mesh shoes, Flashdance legwarmers and Izod alligator golf shirts with the collars turned up haven't quite come back into the mainstream, but it's only a matter of time.
The buildup has been slow over the last few years - tiny blips like Adam Sandler's The Wedding Singer, New Wave band reunion tours, commercials starring Mr. T and shirts sold with safety pins already attached - but it's hard to tell whether tonight's premiere of the new comedy series That '80s Show is the latest harbinger of an all-out '80s tidal wave or a much-needed finger in the dike.
Personally, I'm hoping for the latter.
Produced by the same people who did the bona fide hit That '70s Show, That '80s Show (tonight at 9 on CTV and Fox) follows a circle of twentysomething friends living in San Diego in 1984. And if the mere mention of that year gets the "controversial" Eurythmics tune Sex Crime going in your head, then you know you were there.
Corey (Glenn Howerton) is a struggling musician working at a record store, his sister Katie (Tinsley Grimes) is a perky college dropout who dresses like a virginal Madonna, and their pal Roger (Eddie Chin) is all about Reaganomics, the Me generation and climbing the corporate ladder.
Tonight's premiere episode is peppered with '80s references and in-jokes, some of which are pretty funny when viewed from this side of the irony lens: Robot dancing to Talking Heads' Once In a Lifetime, cellphones so huge they'd choke an elephant, Dynasty drinking games, Blue Lagoon hairstyles, wine coolers, shoulder pads and even a passing nod to cocaine use. ("Is my nose bleeding?" "Nah, you're good.")
Decade references aside, tonight's debut of That '80s Show also introduces the kids' successful dad (Geoff Pierson), Corey's bisexual ex-girlfriend (Brittany Daniel) and "punk rock rooster" Tuesday (Chyler Leigh), who's being set up as a love-hate interest for Corey.
Katie pretty much steals the entire show because she's so damn cute and perky and dances to Pat Benatar, but the rest of the characters will hopefully undergo the kind of development their counterparts on That '70s Show have seen. Comedy cannot live on Aqua Net and M.C. Hammer alone, and hopefully the producers understand that That '70s Show is great not because it's about the '70s, but because it's about of a bunch of charming, funny, well-written characters who happen to live in the '70s.
But still. This is the '80s we're talking about. Are we ready to relive a decade primarily known for its LACK of coolness? John Hughes movies, fine. The A-Team, OK. Flock of Seagulls coming to Edmonton - how can you knock that? Punk will never die (Zeus willing) and the sound of a Moog synthesizer never gets old. But the sight of skinny ties, parachute pants and fingerless gloves makes me a little queasy unless it's at a costume party, and bands like Bananarama, Baltimora and Berlin are best left buried, pardon the alliteration. And no matter how much distance we put between ourselves and Mork and Mindy, "Nanoo, nanoo!" will never, ever be funny. Ever.
I guess everyone who goes through their teens in a particular decade feels the same sense of resignation when the fashions and fads of those bygone years come back in style for the yutes of today. If the '80s have truly returned, then bring on the Intellivision marathons, Bo Derek posters and repeat viewings of Ferris Bueller's Day Off. If you can't beat 'em ...
Steve Tilley can be reached by e-mail at steve@compusmart.ab.ca Letters to the editor should be sent to letters@edm.sunpub.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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