HOME WEB NEWS IMAGES CLASSIFIEDS YELLOW PAGESPOLLS - SURVEYS WIKI COUNTRIES PHOTOS US UK INDIA
Cities Stocks Weather Movies Coupons Travel Blogs Health Horoscope Maps ASIA EUROPE Classifieds Yellow Pages
 1
|
Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher known for its many series featuring the fictional teenage Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle and Forsythe "Jughead" Jones characters created by Bob Montana. All characters were based on people he knew in Haverhill, Massachusetts.
Archie\'s first appearance in Pep Comics #22 on December 22, 1941, was drawn by Montana and written by Vic Bloom. With the creation of Archie, publisher John L. Goldwater hoped to appeal to fans of the Andy Hardy movies starring Mickey Rooney.
Archie Comics is also the title of the company\'s longest running publication, the first issue appearing with a cover date of Winter 1942. Starting with issue #114 the title was shortened to simply Archie.
Archie Comics started out in 1939 as MLJ Comics, named after the first initials of its three founders: Maurice Coyne, Louis Silberkleit, and John L. Goldwater. Early MLJ titles featured generic superheroes remembered in the lore of comic collectors\' trivia. The Shield was the first flag-themed superhero, a year before Captain America. The Comet was the first superhero killed in the line of duty. 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 called 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 MLJ changed its name to Archie Comics in 1946.
In the 1950s and 1960s, 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 comics Sabrina, the Teenage Witch and Josie and the Pussycats.
The enduring Archie legacy has spanned dozens of Archie titles, including spin-offs, digest collections, and magazines focused on particular characters. Some of the older 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, feature straight adventure and/or mystery stories.
In May 2007, Archie debuted what they call a more "dynamic", realistic art style since its title characters\' debut in Pep Comics #22 (December, 1941), also features longer serialized 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 bubblegum pop band, The Archies, earned a gold record with their #1 hit "Sugar, Sugar". In 1974, a network television pilot was made in an attempt to bring a live-action Archie show but was unsuccessful.
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. Occasionally, some appear in their comics, if only for the sake of maintaining a trademark.
The February 1962 issue of Harvey Kurtzman\'s Help! magazine featured a parody of the Archie characters in its Goodman Beaver story, Goodman Goes Playboy, written by Kurtzman and illustrated by frequent collaborator, Will Elder (the magazine itself hit newsstands on December of 1960). Attorneys for Archie Comics filed suit shortly thereafter, for copyright infringement. An agreement was reached in March 1964, with $1000 in damages paid, and an apology was issued.
Later attempts to reprint the Goodman Beaver story, with names and artwork altered by Kurtzman and Elder to minimize similarities to Archie characters and trademarks, were again met with threatened legal action by Archie Comics. After much back-and-forth, Kurtzman and Elder agreed to pay damages and turn over all materials to Archie\'s publisher. Excerpts have appeared from time to time, but the entire strip itself has not been republished.
Despite the above legal wrangling, Archie Comics took no action against Kurtzman, Elder nor publisher William Gaines for the 1954 Mad Magazine story Starchie, which has been reprinted numerous times.
Archie Comics sued music duo The Veronicas for trademark infringement in 2005 over the band\'s name, which was taken from the comic book character. Archie Comics and Sire Records (The Veronicas\' record company) finally resolved their problems through a co-promotion deal. [1]
Fanfiction.Net received a cease and desist order from Archie Comics to remove any Archie comic based fan fiction from its site, as they are derived from their copyrighted and trademarked properties and were stated to damage Archie\'s public image. It included public statements by Archie Comics, who have stated that they do not allow (even family-oriented) fan fiction based on Archie comics works.[citation needed] (It should be noted, however, that story contests are frequently run through the official Archie website, allowing fans to create their own stories in accordance with site\'s rules).
On April 4, 2003, Dad\'s Garage Theatre Company in Atlanta was scheduled to debut a new play, Archie\'s Weird Fantasy, which depicted Riverdale\'s most famous resident coming out of the closet and moving to New York. The day before the play was scheduled to open, Archie Comics issued a cease and desist order, threatening litigation if the play proceeded as written. Dad\'s Garage artistic director Sean Daniels said, "The play was to depict Archie and his pals from Riverdale growing up, coming out and facing censorship. Archie Comics thought if Archie was portrayed as being a total sucker, that would dilute and tarnish his image." [2]
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 attended Horace Mann School, which is located in the Riverdale section of the Bronx in New York City. In the early years of Archie, Riverdale was located in Massachusetts, with Mr. Lodge being a senator for that state, but this is no longer considered canon.
For the comics\' 60th anniversary in 2002, several geographical and historical hints to the location of Riverdale were printed in every digest 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. It is essentially located wherever the reader wants it to be. Indeed, the geography of Riverdale is far too inconsistent for it to be any one specific location (see below).
Of all the parents, it is Veronica\'s father and Archie\'s parents who appear most frequently.
The other parents appear less frequently:
From time to time the writers would drop in real people and locations as elements in a story.
|
|
This article or section may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (September 2007) |
Aside from very basic characteristics, many of the characters\' traits, and even personalities, can change from strip to strip, usually depending on the writer. In certain strips, Betty does not mind being Archie\'s second choice as long as she gets a date with him on occasion, but in other strips she is insulted when Archie considers her a second choice and responds with either anger or sadness. In addition, sometimes Veronica dominates Archie\'s love interest 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 most of the gang have one or more main love interests, they often date other people who appear only once.
There are inconsistencies regarding the source of the Lodges\' wealth: some stories depict Mr. Lodge as a self-made man who grew poor or middle-class (thus wanting 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."
There are also inconsistencies surrounding the gang\'s personality traits. Reggie Mantle is usually portrayed as being part of the gang (sometimes mean and rude, but deep down really a good person), but in other strips he an outsider and an antagonist to Archie and the gang.
In some issues, Moose Mason is portrayed as too dumb to solve the simplest math problem, but in other episodes he can complete in-class tests, win spot on knowledge-based game shows, and even place ahead of other characters in these shows. A few stories justify this by stating that he has a learning disability and just has to try harder, with the students being very kind and supportive. Midge, Moose\'s girlfriend, is usually respectful of Moose\'s limited intelligence, but has been known to make comments suggesting otherwise.
Archie is sometimes depicted as a complete hopeless klutz of only average intelligence, while in other stories he is highly athletic and/or intelligent. He is sometimes good at any given sport, but at other times, is the worst player on the team. While rarely mean-spirited, he sometimes thinks nothing of dating other girls behind Betty or Veronica\'s backs and even lying about it, while in other appearances, he is scrupulously extremely honest and extremely moral (particularly in the Christian comics produced by Spire).
Betty sometimes appears traditionally feminine, as she can be seen cooking, sewing and cheerleading. On the other hand, other stories display her as more of a tomboy, content to wear sporty clothes, go fishing or fix cars. While she definitely has some traits associated with both, there is inconsistency as to which is more prominent.
Each character has numerous relatives who have appeared once and never again. The inside of each character\'s house is almost always inconsistent, as is the layout of the town. 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 other strips where Veronica\'s mansion is within walking distance.
The grade of the main characters usually appears to be Grade 11. In one comic, Miss Grundy says to Archie that when he grows up, he will be a junior in Riverdale High, like he is now, unless he starts studying. In high school, a "junior" is a Grade 11 student. Additionally when their age is given, it is virtually always 16 or 17, meaning that they are all in Grade 11. However, their grade remains ambiguous.
When they are on summer vacation, they are always implied to be going to school next year, but it is never mentioned if it will be their last year or not. Students who are older than them are rarely mentioned, as is a \'senior class\'. However, in one of the stories, the class talks with Miss Grundy about their future plans after high school, explicitly stating that college is "two years away". In another story, Archie and Jughead prepare for the prom saying it will be the last time their class will be together, which implies graduation.
One of the most inconsistent things in the Archie universe is the geographical location and size of Riverdale Sometimes it is portrayed as being near enough to a beach for the gang to drive there; other times there seems to be no beach, as such as a story where the gang say that they have nowhere to go on a hot day.
Riverdale often seems to be surrounded by farm land and woods, as well, but one story shows Archie and his father buying lobsters from an old fisherman who says to a critical Mr. Andrews that he should "either buy lobsters or do like I do on Sunday -- \'jes keep yer trap shut." In still other stories, mountains are sometimes said to surround or be located near Riverdale, making it appear to be located in a valley.
Additionally, rivers and lakes in the area may vary. Normally, the beach (when it appears) is on the ocean, but at least one story declares that the beach is on a lake with no other land in sight. This matches the description of some very large bodies of water, such as the Great Lakes, and may suggest the gang living in Riverdale, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.
The climate is also inconsistent. Snow is very common in "winter" comics. Often the gang will be seen on seemingly impromptu and convenient ski holidays. This would suggest it might be somewhere in the northern states. On the other hand, the temperature can get very high in Riverdale. Heat waves are occasionally featured, and beaches (when they appear) are very warm in the summer.
One story has Betty, Archie and Jughead trying to escape a tornado, which would suggest Riverdale is in the Midwest -- Betty says, "We shouldn\'t laugh about tornadoes in this part of the country." There is also one story in which Riverdale is shown on a small map as being in about the same place as Des Moines, Iowa. One plot in the 1990\'s involved Jughead possibly being forced to move to Ohio, in which Betty, looking at a map, comments that Ohio is extremely far away.
Despite seeming to be an idyllic small town, occasional stories have taken part in a rough, seemingly crime-ridden part of town. Tall buildings sometimes appear to make Riverdale seem a larger town than it is supposed to be. In the live-action film adaptation (Archie: To Riverdale and Back Again), Riverdale is portrayed as being located in California.
Overall, it seems that the writers of the comics 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 of other comics who are accustomed to an established comic universe with strict canon. See also:
(It should be noted however, that "Riverdale" is an actual town in New York, and is only a few miles away from the actual headquarters of the publishers of Archie Comics in Mamaroneck. This does not necessarily imply however that it is also the "Riverdale" in the comics.)
Little Archie comics were originally produced in the 1950s. This series featured the familiar teenagers as Elementary School-age children. It became the longest running alternate universe published by Archie Comics. A number of Little Archie series were produced, and new stories are occasionally published even today.
It introduced a number of characters that had never before existed in the Archie continuity. These included Archie\'s dog Spotty, Betty\'s cat Caramel, Betty\'s older brother Chic and older sister Polly, and new kids Ambrose Pipps and Fangs Fogarty. This made the series more non-canonical. However, around the 1990s, the creators of Archie Comics began to tie Little Archie in to the main continuity by featuring appearances by these characters. Some became recurring characters in the gang\'s teenage years. Additionally, stories that take place in the main continuity sometimes feature flashbacks to the gang\'s childhood.
A few contradictions remain between Archie and Little Archie. One is that, in Little Archie, the Riverdale High faculty is the Riverdale Elementary faculty. Archie has established that characters like Mr. Weatherbee have worked at Riverdale High too long to have ever been elementary school teachers when the gang was young.
In the 1980s, the creators experimented with a different art style which made the characters less realistic and less like the art style used in the main continuity. Their heads became unnaturally large, their arms, legs and bodies were disproportionate in length, and their eyes were simply pupil-dots without irises or scleras. However, this was eventually dropped, and Little Archie reverted to its old style.
In 1969, Little Archie inspired a segment within the "Funhouse" segments of The Archie Comedy Hour (which is not the same as the later "Archie\'s Funhouse" series). This segment however was called "The Little Archies".
The Archie Comics line published the occasional dramatic action-adventure superhero comic.
(Hangman and The Wizard become villains during that period)
Archie would later license their superheroes to DC Comics for use on the Impact imprint in the 90s.
Archie and his friends sometimes appear in stories in which they turn into superheroes to fight varied villains. They normally change from street clothes to superhero costumes and back again in a split second. Below are the characters with their superhero identities:
|
|
Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones. |
The film Chasing Amy, in which all the main characters are comic book writers/artists, includes a scene in which two of the characters debate the sexuality of Archie.
The American sitcom Friends episode "The One that Could\'ve Been", Chandler writes for Archie Comics and sells a story based on working as Joey\'s assistant.
In the Duel Masters episode, "Win, Lose, or Draw", a girl named Betty greets Shobu. She introduces her friends, whose names are Veronica, Archie, and Reggie.
In the Mystery Science Theater 3000 parody of Eegah, Joel, Crow, and Tom Servo often refer to Arch Hall Jr. as "Archie" and sometimes make references to the comics.
In the Seinfeld episode The Wink, the character Kramer enters Jerry\'s apartment and is greeted "Hi, Jughead!" by Jerry. Kramer then greets each person in the apartment in reply by referring to them as Archie Comics characters: "Archie, Veronica...Mr. Weatherbee."
The 1994 pornographic film Cherry Pie, which featured such stars as Jenna Jameson and Kylie Ireland was a spoof of the Archie comics.
In Hey Arnold episode Monkey Business, Helga mentions Jughead, Veronica, and Betty.
In Mad Magazine, during its comic-book phase, writer Harvey Kurtzman and artist Bill Elder created an article titled "Starchie." "Starchie Standrews" is a juvenile delinquent, offering to treat "Salonica" (Veronica) to a Scotch-and-Soda, and threatening "Biddy" (Betty) and "Mr. Weathernot" (Mr. Weatherbee) with physical violence. Starchie and his sidekick "Bottleneck" (Jughead) decide to take "Wedgie" (Reggie) for a "last ride," and push him out of a moving car. "Bottleneck" takes off his mask and appears as Edward G. Robinson. Starchie winds up in prison as a middle-aged, balding man, still wearing the checkered slacks, sweater, white shirt, and bow tie, and torturing himself for chasing "Salonica" when "Biddy" \'threw herself\' at him. ("Jerk! Fool! Idiot!")
In Gordon Korman\'s Island Trilogy one of the men in charge of the boat cannot remember the teenagers names and ends up calling them all character names from Archie Comics.
Experimental comedy troupe The Firesign Theatre\'s third album, Don\'t Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers, contains a spoof of Archie Comics called "High School Madness," featuring two high school boys named "Peorgie" and "Mudhead."
In the Entourage episode "The First Cut Is the Deepest," Ari Gold tells Vincent Chase that the only role available to him is Jughead in a live adaptation of "Archie and Friends". Vince retorts, "I\'m more of a Reggie".
In the Robot Chicken episode entitled Veggies for Sloth, there is a parody of the film Final Destination featuring Archie and the gang. It has Archie characters dying in ways similar to specific characters from the film, such as Jughead dying in a bathtub like Tod Waggner, or Betty being hit by a bus like Terry Chaney. It also parodies the very long chain of events killing Ms. Valerie Lewton in the film with its own ridiculous chain of events that seem like a Rube Goldberg machine, with a candle burning a rope, dominoes set up like the face of death, and a car dangling above Ms. Grundy conveniently. Unfortunately, the DMCA demanded that the sketch had to be taken off of the Season 2 Uncensored DVD release of the episode because of copyright infringement.
In one episode of Malcolm In The Middle, Malcolm and Stevie are attempting a science experiment and Reese can be seen in the background reading a comic book. Reese comments to himself, "I wish Reggie would kill Archie and take over this stupid comic!"
The award winning indie comic Love and Rockets contains several long-running strips written and illustrated by Jaime Hernandez inspired by Archie Comics-style characters, art, and situations, but with a Mexican-American cast and a more mature punk rock sensibility.
The pop punk band The Riverdales is loosely based on the comic and includes various references to the comic in their lyrics, including the band name. References include the song "Veronica Hates Me," "Hampton Beach," "Blood on the Ice," among others. The band is a side project of the 80s pop punk band Screeching Weasel.
In her course of Finance Management, Marie-Hélène Allard used the characters of Betty and Veronica in her final exam. Betty and Veronica launch a jewel company which products among its goods Jugghead\'s crown.
In one Zits comic, Jeremy\'s band is seen debating the band\'s name. Two suggestions were Jughead\'s Hat and Veronica\'s Bikini.
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.
| Creators Syndicate Comics | |
|---|---|
| Currently syndicated | Agnes · Andy Capp · Archie · Ask Shagg · Ballard Street · B.C. · Cafe con Leche · Chuckle Bros · The Dinette Set · Doodles · Dog Eat Doug · Flo and Friends · Flight Deck · For Heaven\'s Sake · Free Range · Girls & Sports · Heathcliff · Herb and Jamaal · Liberty Meadows · The Meaning of Lila · Momma · On a Claire Day · One Big Happy · The Other Coast · Rubes · Rugrats · Speed Bump · State of the Union · Strange Brew · Thin Lines · Wee Pals · The Wizard of Id · Working It Out · Zack Hill |
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from Wikipedia
