Growing up, Archie Comics were a huge part of my childhood. My elementary school self wanted to grow up and become a teenager quickly so I could be like Archie and his crew at Riverdale High—having fun at school dances, hanging out at the chocolate shop, and driving to the beach. Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, and Veronica Lodge were the iconic fictional love triangle of my elementary school years. The comics were a place for hijinks and good, clean fun.
I’ve grown up since then, and my teenage years were never the sunny days pictured in Riverdale. They were filled with angst, drama, and homework.
And new CW/Netflix show Riverdale certainly brings angst and drama to the idyllic small-town world of Riverdale—and even some crime.
Enshrouded in dark tones and fog from the opening shot, Riverdale has certainly strayed far from its happy-go-lucky predecessors and deep into trope-fueled teen-soap territory. Think less Suite Life on Deck, and more Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill.
Archie (K.J. Apa) is an ab-blasted high school varsity football player who actually just wants to focus on his music. Veronica (Camila Mendes) is a newcomer rich girl with a troubled past, and Betty (Lili Reinhart) is a high-achieving good girl with repressed anxieties.
Like I said—trope-y.
The pilot episode starts off with a shock of criminal mystery, à la Pretty Little Liars: Jason Blossom, twin brother of Riverdale High’s queen bee Cheryl, has drowned in the river, and his body is missing. And from there, things just get juicier: an illicit teacher-student affair, unrequited love, a closeted mega-jock, and mean-girl drama all make for a packed first episode.
Riverdale tackles practically every teen drama cliché in its pilot, but its clichés were done well. As a former Archie Comics fan, I found it was a great follow-up to the cheesy gags from my childhood—once-beloved but shallowly-developed characters had more dimension to them.
Reinhart and Mendes’ performances as Betty and Veronica, respectively, were definitely the highlights of the episode. In an era of fierce Beyoncé feminism and girl independence, the feud over Archie in the comics would have felt tired and outdated in the show.
Right from the get-go, Reinhart and Mendes have fantastic friendship chemistry, and Mendes, in particular, gives much-needed depth to a character typically known for being a petty, shallow, vain rich girl. Their budding friendship, with all its tension, is definitely a shining point to follow this season.
Apa’s performance as the all-American iconic Archie is more broody and less goofy—he’s the typical morally troubled main guy. While Apa’s performance is compelling, the character he plays is extraordinarily average despite being at the centre of much of the drama in Riverdale.
His foil is the more interesting Jughead Jones, no longer a lovable, gluttonous goof but rather Archie’s sardonic, dark-humoured ex-best friend, played by Cole Sprouse. Something during the summer happened to separate Archie and Jughead that has yet to be revealed. Sprouse’s character is the narrator of the show—a lurking outsider who writes about the dark side of small-town life. Sprouse, all grown up since his Disney days, does a good job lurking around, being pretentiously philosophical and angsty.
Overall, Riverdale is definitely not Archie Comics personified—it’s darker, shocking, and, thereby, more compelling for a generation that finds more entertainment in devilishly twisted storylines and sardonic quips than sunny, clean, slapstick storylines.
