It’s been seventy six years since we first caught glimpse of Archie Andrews in his broken down Jalopy with his flaming red hair and freckles. Since then we’ve followed the ‘gang’ through their high school years and watched them deal with everything from shopping for prom to navigating love triangles, dealing with recession, same-sex marriage, and even gun control. This year brought them to our TV screens in the spine tingling new show, Riverdale.
The show is brought to us through the efforts or veteran Archie writers, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and executiver producer, Greg Berlanti. The first episode of Riverdale hit screens last week and we are blown away. The show was pitched as a Twin Peaks meets Gossip Girl, but it so much more than that. In fact it more closely resembles a mix of the two aforementioned shows but also with a dash of 90210, an undertone of Pretty Little Liars and a sprinkling of Vampire Diaries. While admittedly a bizarre mix, murder mystery meets teen show works rather well.
Riverdale present all the classic Archie characters and relationships in one form or another, but with a few interesting twists. The small town which supplies the show’s title, is now a sinister and eerie place with provides the backdrop for our murder mystery. So many scandals and secrets are hinted at within the first episode that it doesn’t take long to convince viewers that no one in this place is what they appear to be.
Apart from the obvious mystery of who caused the dead body of Jason to appear, there are a lot of tiny details that viewers are simply dying to know. At the top of our current list is what exactly did Archie do to piss Jughead off?
Fans of the comic series have been extremely skeptical. Once the stills from the set and promos were released by CW apprehension only increased. The show does bring a lot of our favourite characters to the screen, but they are not what you would expect.
Sassy, sinister Veronica is running away from her fathers incarnation. Bright and bubbly Betty is dealing with mental health issues. The Josie and the Pussycats are an all African American girl band and the combined amount of brooding by Archie and Jughead could seriously give Edward Cullen a run for his money. Miss Grundy is much hotter than we would have ever expected
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The characters do hold on to a few of the physical features of their comic book counterparts. You can’t miss Betty’s iconic blonde ponytails and we have gotten glimpses of variations on Veronica’s iconic white headband.
The show isn’t afraid of crossing boundaries and it is not easy to miss Kevin Keller, the first openly gay character in the Archie universe in the first episode of Riverdale. Whats more we’ve heard promises of Sabrina Spellman making an appearance somewhere toward the end of the first season.
Elsewhere, certain changes to the character’s sexuality are causing a bit of an uproar. In the history of Archie Comics, Jughead has had many admirers pursuing him, but notably showed very little interest in any of them. One notable pursuant of his affections, Ethel Muggs has been cast for Riverdale, although we have yet to see her appear. The almost certain appearance of Ethel and the canonical precedent for Jughead to identify as asexual is not sitting right for many Jughead fans.
The show has only one episode out so far and it has been enough to get audiences hooked!
Check out the trailer below!
