Review: Archie 01
Writer: Mark Waid Artist: Fiona Staples
Color: Andre Szymanowicz, Jen Vaughn
Letters: Jack Morelli
Publisher: Jon Goldwater As my name suggests, I'm a longtime fan of Archie Comics. Growing up, they were fun, lighthearted escapes from the dark starkness of Marvel and the Übermensch undertones of DC. I even enjoyed the realtime drama of Life With Archie and the unsettling creepiness of Afterlife With Archie. Waid, better known for his epic multivolume tales of drama and imagination (Kingdom Come and Superman: Birthright) has managed to tap into something I'd long thought I'd lost: Teenage angst and a desire for peer recognition. Can I care about these people while still maintaining my distance? So far, yes. Our story opens on a Spring morning outside Riverdale High School. Archie introduces us via voiceover to many familiar faces and many new ones, and tells us right off the bat "Don't pay too much attention to me. I'm not exactly the most interesting guy in town." While he recounts an unexplained lipstick incident that ended his longtime relationship with Betty Cooper. We have no idea who's to blame or if there even is blame. Suspense in a teen drama on the first page and I'm already hooked. Rather than a Ferris Bueller or a Zack Morris, Archie is... shy. He has friends, is respected by his peers, and has supportive parents. But he's still just a teenager on the cusp of life. We're literally seeing him at the start of his slow rise to fame.
Staples' art is a welcome change from the button noses and anime eyes of yesteryear, everything has that authenticy you see in real life, not television.Hell, the characters even wear different clothes on different days. Although, there is a feel of manga about it.The backgrounds are also a welcome change, often appearing as a single color to convey mood.
I also enjoyed that the publisher included the first Archie story from Pep Comics 22 printed in 1941.
I like what I see, and if issue one is the sign of things to come, I'm climbing aboard.
Writing: 9 Art: 8 Cover: 8
Total 8.3