Archie: The Decision sees our hero attempt to finally choose between Betty and Veronica

Archie. Finally. Decides. At long last, the answer to the question generations of fans have asked will be answered. Who will Archie choose? Betty or Veronica? Archie: The Decision #1 is written by Tom King, drawn by Dan Parent, inked by Bob Smith, colored by Rosario “Tito” Peña and lettered by Jack Morelli.

WARNING: It’s all spoilers from here on out.

Dan Grote: Anna, shall we start by ripping off the Band-Aid? 

Anna Peppard: That depends. Does the Band-Aid have Batman on it? How much hair is attached?

Dan: No, and the normal amount. 

Reader, there is no decision in this comic. Archie does not choose between Betty and Veronica. Our long national nightmare does not end. There is only the boulder and the hill.

This comic is one of Thomas King’s famous psyops. King has once again used his CIA training to tease us into thinking we’re going to get what we think we want. Instead, what we have been given is a standard Archie comic but with more words, a tortured analogy hammered into place with a mallet and a mangled sentence about lightning. 

And it all ends with a panel of Archie literally kicking a can down a road. Because subtext is for cowards.

Anna: If my mood going into this comic was an Archie comic, it would be an eight-pager about how I’m in a bad mood, and there would be a little storm cloud following me around to indicate this as the various members of the Riverdale gang try to get to the bottom of my bad mood, slipping on banana peels and maybe getting possessed by the devil along the way, until, in the final punchline panel, I’m at Pop’s drinking a big pink milkshake with a smile on my face, ’cause it turns out I was just hungry.

Anyway, I have preexisting mixed feelings about both Tom King comics and Archie comics but probably, in general, like Archie comics more. So when this comic was announced, I was irked. My mind immediately went to King giving Archie mommy trauma and revealing suburban Riverdale as a toyetic totem for the toxic cistern of broken promises that is the American dream. Thankfully, this is not that. And while it ain’t quite a pink milkshake, there are some moments of assuaging sweetness — in between baffling burger metaphors and a crack about lightning that made me sit back in my chair and contemplate the tissue tapestry of existence far more seriously than this comic’s final-page Kierkegaard quote ever could. 

Women are meat

Dan: The comic opens with a reprise of the classic Archie dilemma: Betty or Veronica? Archie holds up framed photos of each, the way only someone in a comic would (or a cartoon based on a comic), and weighs their pros and cons. Archie’s bestest pal Jughead, meanwhile, compares Archie’s eternal dithering between the two girls to his indecision between hamburgers and cheeseburgers. 

The choice between Betty and Veronica is comics’ most enduring false binary. How, then, do we compare that to a plain meat patty and one with a flavor enhancer on it? Generally, unless you’re under dietary restrictions or observing certain religious practices, you’re slapping a Kraft single on that thing. Essentially, by making this analogy, you’re not comparing Betty and Veronica. You’re comparing Veronica and Veronica wearing a yellow hat.

Anna: I think it’s very important that we identify the specific terms Jughead uses to make this comparison. “A burger is flawless,” says Jughead. “Juicy, delicious, overflowing, mouth-watering, savory, luscious … the meal between two buns that you order for lunch, then realize is perfect for dinner and then breakfast too.” This ushered in my own very unexpected Decision. Who does a better job of describing eating a lady for lunch: Billie Eilish or Jughead Jones? (I know Jughead’s asexual, don’t worry. And so does this comic. We’re just talking about burgers, and the best way of doing important things like applying ketchup and mustard, a debate which has been known to inspire important questions such as, “Do you do one on each bun or both on one!?”)

I take your point about Veronica vs. Veronica wearing a yellow hat. Or, to once again use the terms the comic does, a burger vs. a burger with cheese. I just can’t get past wondering what cheese represents in this scenario. (Let alone lettuce, tomatoes, pickles and onions.)

Dan: Ah yes, mustard, the second part of this analogy that made me want to launch myself into the sun. Now, I am not saying that no one puts mustard on burgers. You can do that. You’re allowed to. I support your decision. But there are many other condiments I would put on a burger before mustard (or ketchup, really). Barbecue sauce. Mayonnaise. Teriyaki sauce (if I’m using pineapple as a topping — another yellow hat). You know where mustard is a more appropriate yin to ketchup’s yang? If we’re comparing hamburgers and hot dogs. Which, if we’re making the analogy that these two girls are two different commonly beloved meats, would be a FAR BETTER FUCKING ANALOGY, THOMAS.

Sorry. … He just does that to me.

Anna: Hot Dog is the dog, Dan. Who is canonically not a bitch. But did start the zombie apocalypse that one time. 

Dan: Hot Dog did nothing wrong.

Classic Archie

Anna: Speaking of being assuaged, the comic does a lot of heavy lifting trying to make up for the obvious misogyny of its premise with a half-splash of best friends and better rivals Betty and Veronica, out for an arm-in-arm stroll, during which Betty enthusiastically accepts Veronica’s proposal that they “spend the rest of the day together, enjoying each other’s company … free of a certain wishy washy teenage boy.” The word “proposal” is repeated three times. Just in case you didn’t get it the first time. Naturally, however, this detente is short-lived, as the coin clinks past with Hurricane Andrews hot on its heels. Archie’s rabid pursuit of his object knocks the subjects of his Decision upside-down into the air, in a panel showcasing Dan Parent’s talent for classic Archie comics slapstick. 

Dan: King’s greatest strength has always been choosing the right artist to drown out his bullshit. Here, he has chosen to work with Parent, the preeminent Archie artist of the past 30 years, the person we think about when we think about Archie in most contexts. And fortunately, Parent has no time for King’s formalist nonsense. There isn’t a single nine-panel grid in this comic (There are two 12-panel pages, but neither of them immediately reminded me that King read Watchmen that one time).

Anna: Parent cannot, however, save any of us from Betty remarking, in response to her fourth-wall breaking recognition of a non-diegetic storm cloud over Veronica’s head, “How much you think really does lightning actually hurt.” My spellcheck has highlighted most of the words in that sentence as grammatical errors. [Editor Matt’s Note: Can confirm] I guess maybe it’s a joke about Betty maybe landing on her head? Maybe? Then Veronica uses the superstrength Jughead often inspires in her to grab Jug’s shirt and hurl him to the ground with a single swing of her powerful arm and I’m back to liking the Parent parts of this comic. 

Dan: As the coin rolls through town, it gathers tons of moss in the form of Riverdale’s many denizens. The gag works at first, as Betty and Veronica get wind of The Great Coin Flip, followed by Reggie and the gang at Pop’s, then Josie and the Pussycats, then some of Riverdale’s adults (including major Pussycats-head Fred Andrews, Archie’s dad). Then it gets to be a bit too much when three people who may be part of the Archie editorial team start pointing out recent creations like the reader should recognize them and be impressed that they’re there. That’s when the plot gets drowned out by the sound of Archie Comics patting itself on the back.

Anna: I don’t want to get too serious in this mostly taking-the-piss review, but there was something a bit something about tossing all the more recent, and noticeably more diverse, denizens of Riverdale into the background of a couple of panels. There is lots of love about the ways Archie has genuinely diversified since its management shakeup around 2010. But it’s also true that most of the books — like this one — star the same old crew, which is mostly fine except for those moments when these comics want you to smile a big smile about tokenistic diversity. 

Anyway, to get back to taking the piss — I’m not even angry about the “that Wilkin boy” joke. I’m just disappointed. I know you can do better, Tom. Or at least, I hope you can. See me after class for some remedial joke training. 

Dan: In the editor’s note, Archie President and Editor-in-Chief Mike Pellerito talks about how this story was born of King, Parent and Pellerito talking at a convention, and you definitely get the feeling like this comic is taking a victory lap, like, “We got the Batman guy, what a way to celebrate 84 years of intellectual property! Let’s f***ing gooooo!” followed by a bunch of violent high-fiving.

But in the end, this comic isn’t breaking any new ground. In fact, it refuses to. This isn’t a work you stand up on a shelf next to Afterlife with Archie or the 2015 Waid/Staples Archie series or the North/Henderson/Charm Jughead series. It’s something I’ll stumble on in a dollar bin five years from now and go, “Oh yeah, I remember that one,” and keep thumbing.

We’ll flip for it

Dan: Here’s a question, not necessarily about the story but about the central trope it employs. People are familiar with flipping a coin to decide something as a concept. In American football, it determines who takes possession at the start of a game. Harvey Dent traditionally uses it in much of his decision making. In Final Fantasy VI, brothers Edgar and Sabin use it to determine which of them will rule the kingdom of Figaro after their parents die.

But have you, Dr. Anna Peppard, noted scholar and nonfictional human being, ever used a coin toss to make a decision about something in your life?

Anna: When I was at an age where coin flips would be funny or relevant, I was probably more likely to flip a pog. (With one of those slammers shaped like a saw blade.)

Dan: Ah, that’s right, pogs. I keep having to be reminded they exist. Here are some Archie ones I found on eBay.

Archie himself calls the coin flip lazy (as does Betty several pages later), which is definitely King hanging a lampshade on it, but I also wonder if he’s not just openly insulting his readers from jump, like “You stupid idiot, you thought you were gonna get something deeper out of this but I’m just gonna spend 30 pages doing goofs.”

Anna: Part of me appreciates this refusal to do depth. I can squint and see King trying for what he thinks is a legitimate tribute to the Archie legacy of goofs. But also, the best Archie comics have long-since become more than that, in some of the stories King cites at the end of the issue as his favorites, like Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Francesco Francavilla’s Afterlife with Archie, and Mark Waid and Fiona Staples’ “New Riverdale” comics. Did I really want King to put his spin on deconstructing the Archie universe? Absolutely not. And yet, even the classic goofy comics King says are faves are much more charming than this. So are most of the regular Archie comics I’ve picked up in the past year. 

Dan: Also, in the age of debit cards, Venmo and E-ZPass, who has change anymore? Like I get that Riverdale is timeless, but also they all have iPhones.

Anna: Archie doing a Decision 2024 livecast on his OnlyFans might have been funnier, but it would have been less fun to draw. 

Dan: There are a lot of feet in this comic. It’s not too large a leap.

Riverdale also-rans

• Fun fact: Dan Parent holds the record for shortest interview with a comics creator I have ever done. This is not a knock on Parent. Some people are just brief.
• I really hoped Sabrina and Salem’s shocked reaction to the coin flip was going to presage a revelation that by making this Faustian bargain, Archie had forever doomed Riverdale (again). But nah.
• Midway through the comic, Reggie has an existential crisis at the Chock’lit Shoppe, realizing that the coin flip underscores his meaninglessness in a comic where, despite all his wealth and how well he fills out a tank top, he doesn’t even rate as a romantic rival. This was the best part of the comic — made better because it’s never resolved.
• By the end of this comic, Jughead has eaten his hat with cheese twice. By the logic of this review, that’s like putting a yellow hat on a hat.

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