The Last Resort (31st Anniversary Review)

[tomswift2002]

Published: November 1989
Author: Unknown as of June 2020

Plot:  #5 - The Last Resort
#4 #6


NANCY DREW is called to be part of a dream team of super sleuths at a glamorous winter playground. Major rock star Brad MacDougal is shooting a big-budget video at fabulous Mount Mirage, and owner Ken Harrison is worried. The deadly prankster who's been plaguing the resort may target the video for sabotage.

MEANWHILE...

THE HARDY BOYS have also been asked to join the security force. At first Nancy, Frank, and Joe manage to cover all bases and have fun doing it. Joe even gets close to country singer Roseanne James. Then a music mogul is found murdered. Suddenly the posh playground becomes a combat zone where rock stars and billionaires rub elbows with cold-blooded killers. And where someone has scheduled the teen trio to check out sooner than planned.


Review:  For many fans this is a "BIGGIE" in the Casefiles-Files continuity as it features an interesting development in the relationship between Frank Hardy and Nancy Drew.  And while I haven't reached the scene yet, it's interesting to see how the author builds up the tension.

Also of note from the Files side,  #34 "Vanishing Act" is referenced.

[MacGyver]

I know exactly what scene you're talking about and yes- this book is definitely a biggie for Frank and Nancy romance fans.
    I never realized it before when I was reading the books as a kid but the Frank and Nancy romance of course was also previously seen on The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries show. (I never watched the whole series until years after I'd read the books, when the show was released to DVD.) I wonder if Frank and Nancy were paired up mainly because of Parker Stevenson and Pamela Sue Martin's already established chemistry working together in an earlier project? It seems like it makes sense. For that matter, Joe is also seen to have an interest in Bess Marvin on the show, a theme that also continues in the Supermysteries series.

[tomswift2002]

Even in the 2 episodes of the 95 series Frank and Nancy seemed to get paired up.  They didn't seem to introduce any romance, but they were paired more than Joe and Nancy (and Bess and George were not in the episodes).  Maybe if the series had gone longer they might've introduced a romance angle.

In The Last Resort pages 134 to 139 (End of Chapter 13 and going into 14)contain quite a huge continuity error.  On 134, the Hardy's and Nancy leave Bess and George in the resorts restaurant, and Joe goes off on his own, while Frank and Nancy head for the video editing bay that the music video's crew to view rushes, and Frank and Nancy find a window open with snow blowing in.  As they go to close the window they overhear two people outside talking.  And then they try to trail them.  But trailing them requires going outside in a blizzard—-and yet Frank and Nancy don't have their outdoor clothing, but by the time Nancy catches up with Frank at the cabin on the hill, Nancy has mitts and her outdoor coat on, and Frank does too and yet they never stopped at their rooms to get them, and they weren't planning to have them at the restaurant.  So how did they get them?

[MacGyver]

They always carry all that stuff in their fanny packs and super compress it to make it fit.

[tomswift2002]

They always carry all that stuff in their fanny packs and super compress it to make it fit.

Maybe they are Link & Zelda in the 1980's Zelda cartoon where they had a magical pouch that shrunk everything down. 

Anyway, I finished The Last Resort and I had forgotten how good it was and the author had it end where I thought the main bad guy was killed, before revealing that the guy had been badly injured but would live. 

Now then I did find that I was having trouble figuring out whether the author was writing Nancy, Frank, Joe, Bess, George and Ned as young adults or teenagers, since some passages read as if the other characters were talking to young adults in their early-20's, but then there were other passages (that kind of felt written by someone else like an editor) it felt like they were writing them as teens.

Rating: 8.5/10

[MacGyver]

They are supposed to be written as teens. I think some ghostwriters did a better job of that than others.

[tomswift2002]

That may've been S&S's position, but as I go through the Casefiles-Files continuity, it seems as if Mega-Books was trying to follow Edward Stratemeyer's idea for the series in that the characters would age, graduate high school and eventually get married.  But then when Stratemeyer's took over, they decided to lock the boys ages at 17 and 18.

But in "Last Resort", Frank, Joe and Nancy seemed to get into situations that were meant for older audiences.  Remember the Casefiles-Files were aimed at a more mature audience than the regular series and the later books in the continuity.

[MacGyver]

Yeah- I get it with how the Casefiles and Files are written- I'm just saying they're all officially supposed to be teenagers.