Looks like it is time to enter the world of Archie. Unfortunately, I can’t say that the series shows a whole lot of promise since it will be heavily romance centered and the setting is high school. What can’t go wrong with this premise? It’s a new take on the classic Archie universe though so hopefully it is able to power through and surprise me in the end. This isn’t even a bad start to the series, I just don’t see it going over well in the end.

Archie broke up with someone over a debacle which is currently the main mystery of the series. Archie tries to convince everyone that he’s over the whole thing, but keeps on proving otherwise. Jughead tricks Archie into performing in front of the whole school which helps Archie start to deal with his new single life. It’s easy to see that most of the series is going to be about the drama between the characters and Archie will keep finding himself in tricky situations. As for how long this premise can go on without getting repetitive…it won’t be very long at all. None of the characters are even all that likable at the moment.

The backup story is a quick one about Jughead. He doesn’t believe in defying authority because he believes that it is ultimately pointless. This changes when his principal is fired and replaced with someone who got rid of the school cafeteria menu and replaced all of the items with green mush. He quickly runs to his friends and demands that a war is started, but they ignore him and hurl the insults right away since he didn’t help them the first time. Will Jughead be able to do anything or is it already too late?

I can’t say that this story has a lot of potential either to be honest. The side characters are actually right for a chance. He wasn’t bothered about anything else before so why would that change as soon as his lunch was taken away. Is lunch really that important? Jughead’s easily still the best character, but I’m afraid that it is not saying a whole lot. I also think that he may have a difficult time holding his own series for even just a few issues. The art was quite bad as well and Archie looked nothing like himself here.

I didn’t expect much else out of a romance drama story though. There’s only so many ways that you can tell this kind of adventure before it starts to plummet down the ranks. I miss the Archie vs Predator series that came out a while ago. That one was certainly new and different even if it was a little too extreme in the end. This Archie comic certainly is not a winner.

Overall 5/10