The 10 Most Useless Archie Comics Characters
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By Teague Bohlen
Who do we need to be in Archie comics? There’s the gang, of
course — Archie, Jughead, Betty, Veronica, and Reggie. We need Dilton to invent
shit, and Big Moose to threaten everyone. Ethel is there to make the other
girls feel hot by comparison (and to occasionally teach us all an important
lesson in not judging a book by its homely cover). Pop Tate runs the Chok’lit
Shoppe, and Misters Andrews, Lodge, Weatherbee, etc. are all there to
occasionally blow their stacks (literally — little mushroom clouds appear over
their heads, accompanying the steam shooting out of their ears).
But really? Just about everyone else can just pack up and
get the hell out of Riverdale, because you’re either stupid, redundant,
insulting, or otherwise useless. Including most especially the following ten — some of whom are so awful they don’t even have images on the internet. There are pictures of people
10) The Superteens
into superheroes and villains. But really? It is, at least in implementation. Archie
as Pureheart the Powerful loses his powers when he has impure thoughts–so
whenever Archie pops a boner, he’s weak as a kitten. As a comparison, imagine
half the people Superman meets in a given day being made of Kryptonite. Oh, and
also, Betty becomes Superteen when she pulls her magic ponytail. I mean, come
on. Do we need to resort to Ambiguously Gay Duo levels of suggestion in Archie
comics? Should it really be that tough to tell if you’re reading Archie or Cherry?
9) Cheryl Blossom
was popular when Cheryl and her rich twin Jason were re-introduced? The fact
that Cheryl has red hair to complement Betty’s blonde and Veronica’s brunette
does not a good character make. The only reason that Cheryl still exists is to
allow Veronica to be less snotty and bitchy to everyone, which only means that
Cheryl becomes a pale imitation of Veronica, and that Veronica becomes a pale
imitation of herself. The only plus side to this is that Cheryl generally shows
a lot of benday-dot cleavage.
8) Mr. Ramon Rodriguez
importantly the token Chicano in lily-white Riverdale. One might ask why Mr.
Weatherbee needed a Vice Principal after all these years of going it alone, and
the answer is simple: to help manage all the token students that have been
introduced over the years. Archie comics tends to do this: write one story in
which a person (or more often, a family) of color is revealed to have been in
Riverdale all along, living in communal bliss. (This is apparently okay, so
long as there is only one family from each racial group, since there’s
obviously no point in going overboard with the whole thing.) Coach Clayton and
his son Chuck are there for the African-American vibe (and Chuck has a black
girlfriend named Nancy, whose sole purpose seems to be to be his black
girlfriend). Raj Patel is the M. Night Shyamalan clone — an Indian kid with a
videocamera. Kim Wong is the Chinese martial artist, Tomoko Yashida is the
excellent Japanese student (who, we can assume, will at some point shame her
“famiry” and commit seppuku with the fender from Archie’s jalopy).
7) Miss Haggly, et al.
educators. Riverdale High has exactly six employees of any worth whatsoever:
Mr. Weatherbee, Ms. Grundy, Professor Flutesnoot, Coach Kleats, the custodian
Mr. Svensen, and lunchlady Ms. Beazley. The rest of you can clock out and go
home.
6) Bingo Wilkin
no luck with their parents. He’s hapless, but good-natured, and leads a band
made up of his best buddy, who plays the drums, his girlfriend, who mainly
stands there and looks hot. Sound familiar? I’m sorry Bingo, but we already
have an Archie. His name is Archie. You should go now. The authorities will be
visiting you presently to discuss just how you came to be in the possession of
Archie Andrews’ social security number, driver’s license, and storylines.
5) Hermoine Lodge
ready to be pissed off at Archie for whatever reason. His wife, however, seems
to never be around. Maybe she’s pulling a Desperate Housewives on poor old
Hiram, and messing around with their rotund (but oh, so attentive) butler
Smithers. Either that, or “Hermoine” is sort of Mr. Lodge’s beard, and Mr.
Lodge has always really been with his longtime companion, Smithers. Either way,
two things are utterly clear: Hermoine is useless, and Smithers is gettin’
some.
4) Jellybean Jones
Jughead’s younger sister, perhaps meant to usher in a new era of “Young
Archie” stories, instead manages to remind us of Cousin Oliver from The Brady
Bunch. That is to say: a forced cutesy presence that makes us want to gouge out
our eyes with Jughead’s pointy crown.
3) Eye-da
shapely girl with an EYE FOR A HEAD who actually attended Riverdale High back
in the ’50s? Because seriously, pass that around. It’s the only way this chick
is going to make any sense.
2) Artie Andrews
Archie’s paternal grandfather–get this kids!–used to look just like his grandson back in the day. He had a jalopy, and
married a girl that looked just like Betty, and palled around with a guy named
Curly, who was a lot like Jughead. And most recently, the two eras collide when
characters from the present take a stroll down Memory Lane. This is a literal
stroll, mind you. They actually walk down this street called Memory Lane, and
recall themselves in former continuity. I honestly don’t know if that’s awesome
or completely stupid. No, wait, this just in…yep. It’s been confirmed. Stupid.
1)
Glenn
Scarpelli
life–usually, they “Archie-ize” someone such that they’re recognizable, but not
the same person–like introducing a pop-starlet as “Lindsey Lowman” instead of
Lindsay Lohan or a rock star as “Elvis the Pelvis” instead of Elvis Presley. So
it’s natural that they’d wait for a really, really big star to make the direct
translation from the real world of entertainment to the pages of Archie comics.
Yes, that’s right: they were waiting for none other than Glenn Scarpelli. You
know, the Italian kid from the waning days of One Day at a Time. And he was in a couple of episodes of The Love Boat, and he put out an album
that went…well, it went, anyway. Oh, and he was the son of Archie artist Henry
Scarpelli, which doesn’t have a damn thing to do with anything, so shut up.
About The Author
Robert Bricken is one of the original co-founders of the site formerly known as Topless Robot, and its first editor-in-chief, serving from 2008-12. He brought the site to prominence with “nerd news, humor and self-loathing” as its motto, raising it from total internet obscurity to a readership in the millions, with help from his savage “FAQ” movie reviews and Fan Fiction Fridays. Under his tenure Topless Robot was covered by Gawker, Wired, Defamer, New York magazine, ABC News, and others, and his articles have been praised by Roger Ebert, Avengers actor Clark Gregg, comedian and The Daily Show correspondent John Hodgman, the stars of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and Rifftrax, and others. He is currently the managing editor of io9.com. Despite decades as both an amateur and professional nerd, he continues to be completely unprepared for either the zombie apocalypse or the robot uprising.