Wild Ride in Riverdale: The Archie Reboot Is the Latest Bold Move for One of Comics’ Oldest Characters

The reboot finds young Mr. Andrews a student at Riverdale High. He’s just broken up with his childhood sweetheart Betty under somewhat mysterious circumstances. His pals are anxious to reunite the two, their efforts garnering very mixed results. Things get even more complicated when the wealthy Lodge family moves into town, and Archie catches the eye of the beautiful but socially misguided daughter, Veronica. Though much of the press coverage of the new series focused on what has changed (including baffling references to a “hipster” Archie), you’d be hard-pressed to find anything that violates the spirit of those old-school Riverdale adventures.
What the book does provide is something of an origin story and more serialization than the traditional series ever indulged in. There series always had its strongly soap-operatic elements, but the new book brings them to the forefront without sacrificing heart or, just as importantly, the comedy. It doesn’t hurt one bit that they assembled an all-star team to do the job: Mark Waid is a veteran writer whose name is a guarantee of a certain level of entertainment value, and artists Fiona Staples, Annie Wu, and Veronica Fish each bring a light touch to an art style that feels both modern and appropriately retro. I’m not sure Archie has ever looked this good.
This reboot hardly the boldest thing that Archie Comics has done over the better part of the last decade. A series of bold, weird, and interesting choices began in 2009 with a split storyline that saw Archie marry both Betty and Veronica; the book soon introduced a prominent gay character, and eventually wound up folding in zombies and witchcraft. An imprint that survived decades by following a very particular formula decided that the time had come to stir things up, and in the process, earned a reputation as one of the gutsiest publishers in the biz. Here are a few of the bold, sometimes completely nuts, events that have befallen the gang recently.
Warning: major spoilers ahead!

1. Death comes to Riverdale
To be clear, the entirety of Archie: The Married Life is nuts. The series depicts two parallel timelines, one in which Archie marries perennial girl-next-door Betty, and one in which he winds up with rich-kid Veronica. The two are tied together via Riverdale’s resident genius Dilton Doiley, who manages to travel between them. The gang’s timeless high-school antics transform into something much more complicated when they’re all allowed to progress into adulthood. In the Veronica-verse, Archie is an insecure office drone in the employ of his father-in-law, while in the Betty-verse Archie winds up trying to relive his high school glories by starting a band in New York, with disappointing results. Though it’s beyond bizarre to see such an ambiguous gloss on the Riverdale gang, the whole thing is rather brilliant soap opera, and a smart translation of Archie-esque sensibilities into realistic young adulthood. The series isn’t the downer it may sound like, but there are several heartbreaking moments. Chief among them? The death of much-loved teacher Miss Grundy, who realizes that she loves Mr. Weatherbee and marries him shortly before succumbing to a kidney disease. A little too real? Maybe, but also surprisingly moving.

2. Kevin Keller’s first kiss
Family-friendly Archie Comics might have been the last one you’d expect to see challenge the orthodoxy on gay comics characters. It’s not that there hadn’t been gay characters in books from the major publishers, but those efforts had generally ranged from well-meaning-but-tentative to downright offensive. The folks at Archie, on the other hand, introduced openly gay Kevin Keller, made him a major player among the Riverdale gang, and quickly gave him his own book. Like any other high-schooler, Kevin had crushes and love interests, his orientation never brushed aside or painted as insignificant. By the time issue #10 rolled around, it was almost surprising that Kevin hadn’t kissed his boyfriend on-panel. In spite of boycotts and protests (nodded to in the book itself), Kevin continues to be a key member of Team Riverdale, with a new book in the rebooted Archie-verse on the way.

3. Death comes to Riverdale, part 2: Jughead strikes!
Afterlife with Archie may represent the most bizarre left turn in comic book history. It plops the entire Archie gang into the middle of a gruesome zombie apocalypse a la The Walking Dead. The talents of writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and artist Francesco Francavilla are put to use creating a comic that’s not only one of the best horror books on the stands, but one of the very best looking. If you’re not familiar with the gang, it still reads as a solidly entertaining bit of survival horror. Even a passing familiarity with the main characters, however, provides added context that raises the stakes dramatically. One of the craziest bits comes at the very beginning: seeking to restore life to his beloved Hot Dog, Jughead seeks out the aid of teen witch Sabrina. She succeeds, but things quickly go all Pet Sematary, and Jughead becomes patient zero for the zombie contagion to come. If even Jughead isn’t safe, then no one is…including Archie’s own dad.
4. Jughead comes out
Speaking of Jughead, he’s the star of the second book in the rebooted Archie-verse, a more purely comedic entry from Chip Zdarsky. Around all of the wacky, food-related hijinks, we also learn something new about Jughead: he identifies as asexual. It’s probably not that big a surprise that a guy whose only significant relationship in three-quarters of a century has been with hamburgers, but it’s still a quietly bold move, reminding readers that there are more than two orientations.
5. Black Sabbath (Not the Band)
The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina is yet another alternate take on beloved characters, and yet another weird idea that somehow wound up being brilliant. Set in the ’60s, this book reads a bit like a vintage issue of Tales from the Crypt or Weird Terror. Sabrina, her aunts, and the cat familiar Salem are all on hand, but they’re not the cutesy versions of the old comics or the ’90s TV show. Hilda and Zelda are legit witches in the horror mold, with Sabrina herself a somewhat-conflicted acolyte of evil. The whole thing is creepy and not a little bit disturbing, especially in issue #4, when Sabrina’s traditional boyfriend Harvey Kinkle disappears. Given the choice, Sabrina gives in to the wishes of her aunts and aids in the ensuing cover-up, potentially sealing her fate as a bride of Satan.
6. The secret revealed
They tell us that healthy food and hard work are the keys to success in life, yet Jughead has managed to maintain an active social life and a trim figure for decades on a diet of hamburgers largely purchased with borrowed money (because who wants to work for it?). Chip Zdarsky’s new Jughead series wasted no time in revealing a secret that writers have avoided spilling since the character first appeared. His plan hasn’t worked out nearly as well for me, but I’m assuming that, with just a bit more commitment, I’ll be worthy of the Jughead crown.

6. AvP
Whereas Afterlife with Archie and Sabrina introduced horror to the Archie-verse via their own unique and distinct visual looks, the meeting between the Riverdale gang and one of film’s nastiest monsters in Archie vs. Predator happened in classic Archie style. The book reads like a traditional adventure with the gang, comic beats and classic love triangle intact. Except that there’s an alien monster stalking and killing in appropriately gruesome fashion. He even incorporates emojis into his Predator-vision. The blend of hijinks and gore makes for one seriously messed-up book.

7. Archie’s End
The Archie: The Married Life series concluded with a literal bang: a gunshot aimed at openly gay war-hero and Senator-elect Kevin Keller. No longer just the klutzy teen protagonist of the early days or the conflicted and struggling adult of the rest of the series, Archie meets his end by giving up his life for one of his best pals. Both the Betty and Veronica storylines dovetail into one emotional ending. It was big news in the media, even if it did happen in a kinda-maybe future story. The thing is, there will probably never be a 100 percent definitive ending to the story of Archie, which is as it should be. If this is as close as we get, Archie could do a lot worse than to go out a hero.
What do you think of the twists and turns of the Archie line?