Growing up, my family always had Archie comics in the house. My younger sister was obsessed, carrying them around in place of a security blanket. Archie, Betty, Veronica, Jughead and Moose came with her everywhere she went. They were stacked beside the bed, left on the back of the toilet seat, and thrown on the playroom coffee table.
I wasn’t a fanatic like my sister (I was a bit too old for Archie when she was all about it), but I loved the juxtaposition of Betty and Veronica: good girl vs. bad girl. Any Betty and Veronica Double Digest special issue was my favourite. The books that took place on the beach were always littered with scandals and great outfits. It was even better when Cheryl Blossom showed up: The threat of her redheaded vixen presence bound Betty and Veronica together in the quest to keep any girl’s lips away from their beloved dork, Archie.
Because Archie was kind of a dork, right? I know he was supposed to be the stereotypically sweet, likable American teenager when he was initially dreamed up by John L. Goldwater and Bob Montana in the early 1940s, but he was really just a big nerd. It was all part of his charm and success. Archie satisfied the baby boomers’ love of just being “normal.” At times, he was a total sycophant for Betty and Veronica, but by never choosing one or the other, he kept them in crush purgatory, and solidified himself as eternally desired. (I think this is what millennials would call “game”?) Archie was so innocent and oblivious, it practically handicapped him at all walks of life, except when it came to women. The chicks adored him. How did a scrawny, freckle-faced nerd with caterpillar eyebrows, a cheesy band and a pretty “meh” athletic career retain the love and attention of every hot girl in Riverdale?
The Archie series was addicting, like emotional heroin for kids. I hadn’t revisited the characters for years – that is until this past weekend, when my sister showed me the new CW teen drama, Riverdale. This live-action TV series is based on the Archie comic book, but it throws the original’s 1950s innocence out the window and replaces it with heavy doses of sex, murder, slut-shaming and scandal. The whole gang is here: Archie, Betty, Veronica, Cheryl, Miss Grundy, Mr. Weatherbee, even Big Ethel makes an appearance.
But they’ve upped the hunk factor on Archie. After spending the summer lugging concrete for his father (played by 90210 blast-from-the-past Luke Perry), Archie has developed a six-pack and some serious glamour muscles. Betty stares at Archie’s body from across their neighbouring bedroom windows, while her mother relentlessly knocks on her door, reminding her to get her Adderall prescription refilled. Veronica shows up in town and, unlike in the comics, her rivalry with Betty doesn’t last long. (A feminist twist for the modern generation? At one point, they take down most of the senior football team for an alleged sexual-assault diary.) On Riverdale, Veronica isn’t wealthy anymore, but formerly so. He dad ends up in jail and her mother is forced to go from New York socialite to waitress (yet somehow still live in a townhouse with a butler). Though Archie is a football stud, his real passion is music, and soon Josie & the Pussycats let him in to their rehearsals. Jughead isn’t just a burger-huffing string bean who’s terrified of girls, but a moody, aspiring writer whose alleged “book” about Riverdale narrates the series. (Spoiler Alert: Jughead’s father is the head of a sketchy local biker gang and also played by a former ’90s heartthrob.) Moose is bi-curious. Like most teenagers mid-20th-century, they fuck at the drive-in or by the river, yet they also have to deal with modern dating woes like raunchy Photoshopping and false sex rumours. (Do you know what a “Sticky Maple” is? Because I didn’t before Episode Three and I’m from goddamn Canada.)
Above all this, though, the true wholesomeness of Riverdale is smashed to pieces when the mysterious death of Cheryl Blossom’s twin brother, Jason, sends a ripple of disaster through the town.
It’s the perfect soap opera: dramatic, over-the-top, campy and grossly addicting. Everyone is overdressed, manicured and attractive. Veronica’s eyebrows could have their own mini-series. I forgot how enjoyable it is to watch romantic, dramatic television that unfolds like a play. In a world of cheap reality programing, we get our drama fix from “real people” in “real situations,” but it’s really just a producer putting drunk, crazy people in situations that make them overreact. Riverdale is engrossing because it’s so farfetched. I forgot how much I miss fiction. It can be really satisfying.
Instead of watching another rerun of Chopped, I suggest you test-drive a few episodes of Riverdale. If you don’t find yourself reacting to the episodes like it’s the NFL, then I concede: Go watch Chopped. But something tells me any fan of the Archie series will fall hard for this program.
