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Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher known for its many series featuring the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle, and Forsythe "Jughead" Jones.

Archie's first appearance, in Pep Comics #22 on December 22, 1941, was drawn by Bob Montana, and written by Vic Bloom. Archie was conceived by John L. Goldwater, who some believe was influenced by the Andy Hardy movies starring Mickey Rooney.

History

Archie Comics started out in 1939 as MLJ Comics, named after the first initials of its three founders Morris Coyne, Louis Silberkleit and John L. Goldwater. The Hangman (the Comet's younger brother) might be the most brutal superhero of the 1940s.Roy the Superboy preceded Superboy by half a decade, and Steel Sterling was dubbed "the Man of Steel" before Superman. None remained popular. In 1941, a teenage humor strip, Archie, began as a new back-up feature in Pep, replacing Madam Satan. Striking a popular nerve with emerging youth culture, Archie and his gang were such a hit that in 1946, MLJ changed its name to Archie Comics.

In the 1950s and '60s, cartoonist Dan DeCarlo ceased work on Atlas Comics' Millie the Model, and brought his influential style to the Archie Comics universe. DeCarlo is primarily responsible for the modern look of the Archie characters, and the creation of popular Archie spin-off characters Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Josie and the Pussycats.

Some of the odder series feature Archie and his friends cast as superhero versions of themselves or playing spies in a parody of The Man from U.N.C.L.E.. Some series such as Life With Archie and Archie at Riverdale High featured straight adventure and/or mystery stories.

The Archie characters have been continually successful in other mediums since the comic's inception. The Archie Andrews radio program debuted May 31, 1943 and ran on various networks until September 5, 1953. The "Archie" newspaper comic strip was launched in 1946, and was drawn by Bob Montana until his death in 1975. In 1968, Archie was adapted into a Saturday morning cartoon series by Filmation, The Archie Show. In 1969 the teen's bubblegum pop band, The Archies, earned a gold record with their #1 hit "Sugar, Sugar".

In the 1970s and 1980s, the Archie characters were authorized for use in a series of Christian comic books written and drawn by Al Hartley for Spire Christian Comics.

Several attempts have been made to revive MLJ's original superhero line, without success. Today Archie Comics largely ignores its superheroes, but occasionally some appear in their comics, if only for the sake of maintaining a trademark.

Archie Comics sued music duo The Veronicas in 2005, stating that they had broken copyright laws because of the name of their band. Archie Comics and Sire Records (The Veronicas record company) have resolved their problems.

The Archie "universe"

Archie is set in the small town of Riverdale, the state, or even the general location of the town, is unclear. It is known, however, that John L. Goldwater went to school at Horace Mann, which is located in New York City in a part of the Bronx called Riverdale.

For the comics' sixty year anniversary in 2002, several geographical and historical hints to the location of Riverdale were printed in every issue. At the end of the year, it was revealed that the hints point to Riverdale being located in the "Missouri area," but that officially Riverdale has no location; rather, it is essentially located wherever the reader wants it to be.

Characters

The Archie "Gang" (Main Characters)

Parents (of the Main Characters)
Of all the parents, it is Veronica's father and Archie's parents who appears most frequently.
  • Mr. Hiram Lodge, *Veronica's rich father.
  • Archie's parents are Fred and Mary Andrews. Fred is pear-shaped, highly conservative, old-fashioned, and is losing his hair. Mary is a typical all-American suburban mother.
The other parents appear less frequently:
  • Mrs. Hermione Lodge, * Veronica's mother. Appears far less frequently than her husband, and rarely plays a significant role.
  • Betty's parents are Hal and Alice Cooper.
  • Jughead's parents are Forsythe Pendleton Jr. and Gladys Jones. His father is very slim. In older comics, Gladys is portrayed as a slim, older woman with a "needle" nose not unlike Jughead's, but more recently is usually portrayed as being younger, less thin, and with a nose normal in appearance.
  • Reggie's parents are (?) and (?) Mantle.

Other Family Members
  • Jellybean, Jughead's little sister. Her real name is Forsythia
  • Hot Dog,* Jughead's faithful pet canine.
  • Betty has an older brother, Chic, and older sister, Polly, both of whom primarily appear in the Little Archie series.

Other Teens/Expanded Archie Gang (supporting)
  • Marmaduke "Moose"/"Big Moose" Mason *(earlier Moose McGee), a muscular star athlete who is not so good in his studies and is possessive about his girlfriend.
  • Midge Klump,* Moose's girlfriend.
  • Dilton Donald "Dilly" Doiley, * the very intelligent nerd and inventor.
  • Ethel "Big Ethel" Muggs (earlier Ethel Dinklehof)*, a tall, stringy teenager who always tries to win over Jughead, albeit unsuccessfully.
  • Charles "Chuck" Clayton,* an athlete and cartoonist.
  • Nancy Woods, *Chuck's girlfriend.
  • Cricket O'Dell, *a teenage girl with a great nose for money, appearing occasionally.
  • Cheryl Blossom, A rich yuppie love interest of Archie, debuted in 1982.
  • Jason Blossom, Cheryl's arrogant brother and a rival of Archie's. Interested in Betty but hindered by his clique's disdain for "townies".
  • Ginger Lopez, a fashon obsessed teen friend of Betty and Veronica.
  • Harry S. Fulmonovich, A recently immigrated (from the far-away land of Fosnia, born as Arrishtotolo Suleymanokh Fulmonovich) U.S. citizen who getrs hired by Mr. Lodge to work at his software company RSI (Riverdale Software International). After dating both Betty and Veronica each once, Harry then hooks up with Saranda (see below), and starts going steady with her.
  • Saranda Yates Jones, A daughter of now-deceased yuppie parents, who works as a secretary at RSI with her steady love Harry (see above). She originally worked at Riverdale Court House with Judge Jack Bookum, where she debuted in early 1997.

Kids Who Left Town
  • Ambrose, a small, clumsy boy whose hat always covered his eyes. He was the "tag-along" who never quite fit in with the gang, despite trying with all his might to help. He moved away from Riverdale. One comic has him visit the town; Archie, recalling how often he was rude and even mean to Ambrose, feared that Ambrose would want to get back at him--but all Ambrose remembered was how Archie had included him in the gang.
  • Fangs Fogarty, the town bully--"Fangs" over his prominent teeth. He, too, moved away. The comic that has him visit the town reveals he has had dental work that gave him perfect teeth, and that he now goes by the name "Smiley." He asks forgiveness for the terrible things he did as a kid.

The Faculty

The Townsfolk
  • Pop Tate, * owner of the Choklit Shoppe where Archie and his friends frequently hang out.

Inconsistent Themes and Character Portrayals

Aside from very basic characteristics, many of the characters' traits and even personalities can change from strip to strip, usually depending on the writer. For example, usually Archie is very good at any given sport but sometimes he is the worst player on the team. In one strip, Jughead has a very strong interest in anime, which helps him meet a girl who becomes his friend. Jughead's anime obsession and new friend, however, are gone in all subsequent strips. In certain strips, Betty does not mind being Archie's second choice as long as she gets a date with him sometimes, but in other strips she is insulted when Archie considers her a second choice and responds with either anger or sadness. In addition, sometimes it's depicted that Veronica dominates Archie's love interests and Betty plays a distant second fiddle, while other times both girls seem to have Archie split 50/50 in a heated love triangle. Even though Archie's main love interests are Veronica and Betty, he often goes on dates with many other girls, the vast majority if not all only appearing once and never again. Veronica and Betty also often go on dates with other boys that only appear once.

There are some similar inconsistencies regarding the source of the Lodge's wealth; some stories depict Mr. Lodge as a self-made man who grew up in a poor part of Riverdale (who thus wants his daughter to study in a public high school to avoid making her a snob), while others depict the Lodge family as "old money" with a long history of wealth and a gallery of pictures of famous wealthy relatives. One comic's punchline ends, when Archie is trying to find out how Mr. Lodge gained his wealth with Veronica answering for him: "That's easy, when he married mom she was worth $40,000,000 at the time."

Reggie Mantle is usually portrayed as being part of the gang (as a character that's sometimes mean and rude, but deep down is really a good person), but in many other strips he is depicted as an outsider and is an antagonist of Archie and the gang. Each character has numerous relatives that have appeared once and never again. The inside of each character's house is almost always inconsistent. Other details will conflict between any two given stories. In Archie's Double Digest #165, Archie states that it takes a half-hour to drive from his house to Veronica's, which greatly contradicts the numerous previous implications in other strips that Veronica's mansion is only a few miles or blocks away from Archie's house.

In summary, the writers of the comics evidently have no qualms about changing facts to fit the story even at the expense of continuity. The complete absence of established canon is an often noted aspect of Archie Comics and may be a turn-off to fans from other comics who are accustomed to an established comic universe with strict canon. See also:

Common themes in Archie Comics

The following are stories or story elements that are often used in Archie comics.

  • The prom is coming up and Archie cannot decide on who his date will be.
  • Archie accidentally invited two girls to the same date at the same time, which he usually does not realize until the last minute. He tries to run between one date and the other without getting caught by either. Sometimes he is caught, sometimes he gets away with it.
  • In a variation of the above, one character may break a date to go with another person, but runs into that person while on the date and has to hide from them. Archie and Veronica are the usual offenders.

  • A cash-strapped Archie attempts to borrow or raise money for an impending date with Veronica. Despite his best efforts, either he cannot pay for dinner or his jalopy breaks down. Veronica vows never to date him again.

  • Moose is jealous because Reggie is talking to his girlfriend, Midge. Moose beats up Reggie. Sometimes, Reggie has a plan that he thinks will help him get past Moose, or out of a beating (ie. Moose states Reggie will pay for kissing "his girl", Midge, and Reggie will give him money, or an IOU, but it backfires. Occasionally, it will be Archie who gets caught for some reason talking to Midge (almost always in a nonromantic way i.e. homework) , and chased or beaten by Moose.
  • Archie and his friends help Pop Tate get more business, or they prevent a greedy businessman from shutting him down.
  • Archie is late for school, accidentally breaks something, or disrupts class.

  • Mr. Weatherbee desperately tries to prevent Archie, Jughead, or both from clumsily disrupting or damaging the school when the superintendent visits. As if on cue, the boys accidentally blow up the chemistry lab. A variation on this theme has Mr. Weatherbee so obsessed with Archie not causing trouble, he brings it on himself, e.g. watching Archie's every move, he falls down the stairs.

  • The boys challenge the girls or the Riverdale High faculty to game in various types of sports. The boys think it will be an easy win, but they end up getting defeated.

  • Jughead shows everyone an item that he claims endows him with great luck, and Reggie and/or Veronica are skeptics. But when all sorts of events occur that support Jughead's claim, they do everything in their power to steal it.

  • Archie is at Veronica's house and ends up breaking countless priceless heirlooms. Mr. Lodge angrily kicks him out of the house.

  • An assortment of characters go to the beach. While there, Archie and Reggie love to look at the scantily clad women. Occasionally they organize "girl watching" contests.

  • In true Three's Company fashion, one character eavesdrops on another and misinterprets what they're saying.

  • Archie learns that Betty or Veronica is spending large amounts of time with, say, "Billy," which causes Archie to become enraged with jealously. However, by the end of the strip, we learn that Billy is actually a visiting cousin, neighbor's pet, or some other non-romantic and innocuous subject.

  • Archie (often dragging Jughead along) tries to "make points" with Mr. Lodge by doing chores for him, but fails miserably, causing Mr. Lodge to become very angry and damaging their relationship even further.

  • Mr. Weatherbee, stressed out from Archie's antics, decides to go on vacation or visit a quite, remote area of Riverdale to relax, but ironically ends up running into Archie.
  • Veronica abuses her wealth and connections in order to upstage Betty (for example, she flies to Paris and hires a renowned fashion designer to provide her with a dazzling dress for the prom, while Betty is left at home sewing by hand). Often, Veronica ends up dissatisfied with the results (for example, Betty independently creates an identical dress by hand).

  • Pop, Mr. Weatherbee, Mrs. Grundy, or Ms. Beazley decide to retire, and Archie and the gang persuade them to stay. For members of the faculty, one variation has the person in question in fact retire, but their replacement proves to be so horrible that the gang has no choice but to convince them to come back.

  • The boys become lifeguards and have many adventures while saving drowning people and flirting with the women on the beach.

  • Jughead eats an incredible amount of food, often in a food-eating contest. People watching him are amazed.

  • Veronica sees Betty and Archie together and develops a plan to separate them. The plan usually backfires on herself. Conversely, Betty attempts, usually without success, to separate Veronica and Archie. Can also happen with Archie and Reggie. One extremely common strip involves Reggie sabotaging Archie's sporting equipment so that he can win first place uncontested or play in the important game and therefore get all the girls. However, the plan backfires on him when the girls opt to take care of the injured Archie rather than Reggie the sporting hero.
  • Archie must cram for a test the next day but gets into a series of hijinks.
  • Veronica's father tries to introduce Veronica to men other than Archie.
  • Archie is assigned to do an errand, but he messes up along the way.
  • Middle-class Betty and wealthy Veronica wonder what it would be like to be in the other's shoes.
  • Archie and friends go on a vacation together.
  • Archie loses an important document that Mr. Lodge has asked him to deliver to a business associate. However, the document inexplicably still reaches its destination (i.e. via the wind), which causes a confusing moment for Archie when Mr. Lodge thanks him for a job well done at the end of the strip. Some minor variations occur.
  • Jughead runs away from women, especially Big Ethel.
  • Despite the fact that Betty sews her dress by hand and Veronica spends quite a bit of money on her own, they end up with the same thing and have a fight.
  • Reggie mocks Jughead's apparent stupidity or incompetence, then falls victim to Jughead's hidden cunning.
  • Betty investigates a strange occurring in the area. Sometimes, she gets help from her friends, like Moose and Dilton, to solve the case.
  • Archie saves Mr. Lodge from being swindled by a crooked business associate.
  • Mr. Lodge is convinced that Veronica needs to learn to value money and forces her to get a job. After a series of occurrences, she is forced to quit either by her father or by being fired, and sometimes ends up spending more money than she would have made.
  • Archie and/or Jughead attend one of Veronica's posh social events and stick out like a sore thumb.
  • Archie decides to finally choose between Betty and Veronica once and for all (but never does).
  • Jughead shows Archie how badly he is treating Betty. Archie takes Betty out to dinner or to a movie instad of Veronica, who is incsenced.
  • Cheryl Blossom decides to "slum it" in Riverdale and all the boys (especially Archie & Reggie) flock to her, leaving Betty & Veronica very jealous. The two always find some way to either A) run her off or B) keep Archie away from her.
  • Betty and Veronica compete for Archie's affections. Ex: Cooking for him, in which Betty always wins.
  • Jughead eats his friends (Archie, Betty, and Veronica) out of house and home.
  • Archie and Jughead's parents comment on how lazy they are and attempt to get them to either clean their room or do some sort of chore around the house.

Super heroes

The Archie Comics line published the occasional dramatic action-adventure superhero comic.

1940s

1960s (published as Archie Adventure Comics, Radio Comics, and Mighty Comics)

(Hangman and The Wizard become villains during that period)

1980s (published as Red Circle Comics)

Archie would later license their superheroes to DC Comics for use on the !mpact imprint in the 90s.

Archie spin-off titles

Other series published by Archie Comics

Currently published titles

  • Archie (Winter 1942-)
  • Archie and Friends (Sept 1992-)
  • Archie Digest Magazine (Aug 1973-)
  • Archie's Double Digest Magazine (1981-)
  • Archie's Holiday Fun Digest Magazine (1996-)
  • Archie's Pal Jughead Comics Vol. 2 (June 1993-, #46-up)
  • Archie's Pals 'n' Gals Double Digest Magazine (Nov 1992-)
  • Betty (Sept 1992-)
  • Betty and Veronica Vol. 2 (June 1987-)
  • Betty and Veronica Digest Magazine (Nov 1980-)
  • Betty and Veronica Double Digest Magazine (1987-)
  • Betty and Veronica Spectacular (Oct 1992-)
  • Jughead and Friends Digest Magazine (June 2005-)
  • Jughead's Double Digest Magazine (Oct 1989-)
  • Sabrina the Teenage Witch Vol. 2 (Jan 2000-)
  • Sonic the Hedgehog (June 1993-)
  • Sonic X (Sept. 2005-)
  • Tales From Riverdale Digest Magazine (May 2005-)
  • Veronica (Apr 1989-)

Archie comics in technology

Although the Archie search engine was not named after Archie Andrews, many users made this association; subsequently, the Veronica search engine was named after Veronica, and "Jonzy's Universal Gopher Hierarchy Excavation and Display" is named after Jughead.

See also

External links

Archie Comics | Comic book publishing companies | Teen comics

Archie Comics | Archie Comics

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Archie Comics".

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