The Fat Slags

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The slags' eating frequently follows a night of binge drinking, and the circumstances of the sex or the partner in question are rarely an issue - they have been known to leap on delivery men or workmen for gratification (that usually being the sole reason for calling them over in the first place); with the targeted man rarely given an opportunity to resist, refuse, or escape. Both slags regularly enjoy carnal relations with Baz, a local jobless dropout who divides his time between drinking, committing crime, and having sex with San and Tray (even though Baz is already married). Baz's good-natured wife, Thelma, quite often finds out that Baz is cheating on her, but invariably forgives him. The other major character in the strip is Baz's slightly more successful friend, Dave, who works as a refuse collector (binman), but earns most of his income through massive benefit fraud.

Whilst most "Viz" characters are recognisably from North East England (the comic is largely written in Geordie dialect), Sandra and Tracey are said to come from Mansfield in Nottinghamshire. Despite their questionable antics and priorities, both characters are noticeably warm-hearted and easy-going, and their friendship is never undermined by their conquests. Their excessive lifestyle is a parody of British ladette culture.

"Viz" creator Chris Donald refers to this in his book, where he also mentions that the poryrayal of the Slags was criticised by feminists writing in The Guardian newspaper. At the time of these criticisms the Fat Slags had not appeared in the magazine for more than a year, but as a direct response to the criticism they were immediately resurrected for the next issue, in which they had a humorous run-in with the feminist Millie Tant. Donald later questioned why the "Guardian" had slated the portrayals of the Slags, but hadn't mentioned that the two male characters were portrayed as a cheating layabout and a fraudster, and that the strip's only "well-behaved" (although behaving like a doormat) character (Thelma) was a woman.

In 1992, a Fat Slags single was released, a cover of the 1963 Cliff Richard hit "Summer Holiday". The b-side was a track called "Dance of the Handbags (Oh Lordy! It's The Fat Slags)". Both tracks were produced by Mike Stock and Pete Watermen, two of the "PWL Hit Factory" producers Stock Aitken Waterman. It was a monumental flop though, and failed to enter the music charts.

Although both of the Slags are stupid - albeit good-natured - nymphomaniacs, Tray is marginally more intelligent (and literate) than San, who is marginally more nymphomaniac than Tray. These factors, combined with Tray's more dominant personality, make Tray the leader and San the follower in their adventures. One strip parodying the "Batman" films featured Tray as Batman (the leader) and San as Robin (the sidekick). In another strip, San got pregnant and brought the baby (a girl) to term, tearfully vowing that she was prepared to make any sacrifice for her daughter's happiness. In the very next panel, realising that motherhood would conflict with her pub-crawling, she gave up the baby for adoption.

Tray normally wears tight-fitting Capri pants whilst San normally wears a too-small skirt; since the latter garment (leaving her 'naughty bits' unprotected) has more potential for jokes, San tends to get involved in more slapstick than Tray does. Although neither Slag has ever refused alcoholic refreshment in any setting, their favourite place to tipple is a pub somewhere in Fulchester with the enchanting name the Dog and Hammer.

They once appeared in a UK Lucozade advert, saying "Get it out of our fridge!" in unison.

Fat Slags: The Film

In 2004, a feature film version (titled "Fat Slags") was released. It received extremely poor reviews, and it was reported that the strip's artist, Graham Dury was so demoralised by the treatment of his creations that he announced that he was dropping them from the comic altogether. This was actually a misquote by an over-enthusiastic press officer and Shiels had no intention of dropping the characters. For a short while the strip was drawn by Alex Collier but Dury started drawing them again a few months later. (Dury's strips have often had various artists drawing them, depending who's available at the time.)

External links

* BBC News Online - [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3759970.stm R.I.P. The Fat Slags]
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* [http://www.viz.co.uk/archive_strips/motorised_strips/viztv_popup_fatslags.html Online version] of the first Fat Slags strip