Dear Watchers: an omniversal comic book podcast

Rob: Welcome, um, to Dear Watchers in Omniversal comic book podcast, where we do a deep dive into the multiverse.
Guido: We are traveling with you through the stories and the worlds that make up an omniverse of fictional realities we all love. And your watchers on this journey are me, the brunette, Guido, and me, the blonde run.
Rob: Oh, and look, we've got a redhead who just can't decide between the two of us. He doesn't know which way to go. It's author expert and returning guest, Tim Hanley. Welcome, Tim.
Tim Hanley: Thanks so much for having me. M back, guys.
Guido: Tim, did you realize that the three of us have the right hair color for this episode?
Tim Hanley: But that was a perfect introduction. Well.
Guido: Tim, for our listeners who don't know him because they missed his previous appearances, is an author, historian and comic book expert. Most recently, he wrote Not All Superman Sexism, Toxic Masculinity, and the Complex History of Superheroes, which we got to talk with him, um, in depth about way back in episode 60. Last August, he also wrote the essential history book of Wonder Woman called Wonder Woman Unbound, as well as books on catwoman, Lois Lane, and the subjects of today's episode, Betty and Veronica. And you can also hear Tim join us for our first coverage of the multiverse of DC Comics bombshells back on episode 75 in December 2022. So welcome back, Tim.
Tim Hanley: Thank you. It's great to be here.
Guido: Yeah. This is exciting because you're taking us into a part of the world we don't know very well, so I don't know very well. Rob knows a little better than me, but no one knows as well as you, so that's exciting.
Rob: Well, before we get our malteds gito and begin our trip, what's new in our little section of the multiverse?
Guido: Well, we've still got that Marvel giveaway going on because it is our summer of giveaways. To celebrate our 100 episodes and our two year anniversary, we do have two more bundle giveaways coming at listeners throughout the summer, so just keep listening every week to find out more. We're also getting closer. It is now officially less than three months to New York Comic Con, so if you plan to be there, let us know. We'll be there with lots of stickers with our fancy new T shirts and so much stuff, and we just love the chance to see people in person. So that's exciting.
Rob: We will see you there. And if you are seeing us here on the podcast for the first time or hearing us, then we have three parts of our journey today. Origins of the story. What inspired this other reality? Exploring multiversity. We dive deeper into our alternate universe and pondering possibilities. We examine the impact and what's followed or coming in the future.
Guido: And remember, leave a review wherever you're listening. It helps, uh, us. And you can also post on social media. Thank you.
Rob: And with that, Dear Watchers, welcome to episode 106. And let's check out what's happening in the Omniverse with our travels to today's alternate universe. Today we head to Pop's Chocolate Shop, the nexus of all realities by way of Gotham City, to find out the answer to the question, what if Archie's archie Comics. Betty and veronica met DC comics harley quinn and poison ivy and this Earth.
Guido: Is one in which Gotham City and Riverdale just coexist. And um, we will find out a lot more ah, about this Earth, which seems to only exist in the series we looked at today. But before we get into all of the stories we looked at, tim is going to give us some background on Betty and Veronica.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. So we all know Archie comics. We see them at the grocery store and the checkout line. Um, but Archie Comics wasn't always Archie Comics. It started as MLJ Comics in uh, the early forty s. And they were mainly as superhero, publisher heroes like the Shield and Black Hood. Because after Superman, everyone wanted a superhero. That was a big boom. And then Archie premiered in the uh, very back of Pep Comics number 22 in 1941. Pep was the Shield's main feature and uh, the editor John Goldwater tried to diversify the slate a little bit because you got to fill what were like 70 page anthologies every month. So uh, Archie was a creation of Goldwater and more than Goldwater was, um crap. What's the name? Bob Montana. I was thinking Bob Kane for a second. And that's the other guy. Yeah, Bob Montana, um, grew up in a small town, went to a high school a lot like Riverdale High. Based a lot of the characters on his own experiences there. So Betty, Betty Cooper, the kind hearted blonde girl next door, debuted in this very first Archie story and was immediately infatuated with Archie. Um, he was trying to show off for he was riding the handlebars of a bicycle, walking up on a fence.
Guido: As ah, one dozen.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. Then uh, there were some shenanigans involving a ah, charity festival. Uh, she volunteered Archie to be a tight roper because tightrope walker, because the tightrope walker had to cancel. She'd seen him on the fence. She thought this is going to work great. He fell into the taffy machine. Taffy went everywhere. He and Jen had to rush. It was a whole situation. So really kind of establishing the slapstick components that we all know and love in Archie Comics from the get go. And then having Betty there at the very start. It uh, took I think four or five months later, veronica showed up, um, as this rich heiress, um, from out of town. Very different than Betty, intentionally so. And gave ah, a different flair to the stories. Betty was very much in love with Archie from the get go. She would be part of the adventures but kind of just going along with it. Veronica took him into new, more uncomfortable territories for the young lad. He had to try to impress her, had to try to win her over. And Veronica quickly became the more popular character. Betty really faded into the background through the 40s. Um, she came back a bit in the early 1950s. Betty and Veronica got their own comic book, uh, called Archie's Girls, Betty and Veronica. So you can kind of guess what the focus was there. It was all, um, veronica always won in the 1950s. Whatever was at stake, Veronica got Archie. Betty always lost. She became kind of this uh, perennial sad sack. Um, she frequently complained about being second fiddle and having no shot against Veronica. And so in the 1960s, it slowly begins to change. We'll talk about this a little bit more with Betty, uh, and me, her own solo series. But Betty starts to come to the fore more than she did before. And then we start to see the shift for Veronica from always winning kind of vain and not the kindest character, to shifting full on into villain mode that would continue through the 1970s, uh, and into the 80s. Then we get a relaunch in the late 80s. That kind of shifts focus back to their friendship and kind of gets to the core of who the characters are when they work best together. Like the best betting of Veronica stories all through Archie history are the ones where they're pals and having adventures and not at each other's throats all the time. So that's kind of been the main focus since is their friendship. The Archie relaunch, um, was almost a decade ago now, wasn't it was like 2015, mhm, um, that kind of strayed away from it has since returned. Ah, riverdale is the biggest thing mhm for Archie lately. And uh, the friendship between Betty, Veronica has been central to that show in all of its seasons. So yeah, two iconic characters created um, as if they were meant to be icons like Next Door, Brunette, Rich Girl was a perfect setup. They've remained the same ever since, but with fluctuations over the decades.
Rob: Well, I do another thing that I think was influenced them. Um, right. Tim was the Andy Hardy series at the time and you had Judy Garland as the girl next door who never ended up with Andy. And he always was ending up with another girl. So maybe that she was the Betty. Very much of that situation there.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, absolutely. There were a ton of these kind of teen, uh, comedy strips in the early 1940s, even at MLJ before they became Archie comics. Uh, they had a bunch of different characters trying to do the same thing. Archie's just the one that hit largely, uh, because they were able to translate it into a successful radio show throughout the 1940s. So that helped a lot.
Guido: And Betty and Veronica were characters on that, I'm assuming.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, background characters more because the show very quickly became, uh, like a situation comedy centered around the Andrews household. So Mr. And Mrs. Andrews had were second only to Archie in terms of their airtime on the show. Betty and Veronica would show up, and even then, they were very kind of flat, uh, characters, same as always. Betty was in love with Veronica or with Archie. Veronica didn't care about the boy that much.
Guido: Maybe Veronica, too.
Tim Hanley: And, uh, they'd show up, archie would ignore Betty. He'd fall over himself for Veronica. And that was kind of the shtick every every week.
Rob: Well, that's a little.
Guido: I love in your work the way that you're always looking in not all Superman and in Wonder Woman unbound, and in investigating Lois Lane at the way the change in culture is reflected in these characters. And I'm sure that you can really map that onto Betty and Veronica, which I'm excited to do in this episode. But before we get into stories, I wanted to see what your personal background with Betty and Veronica is. Why do you like them or when did you first encounter them, or what's your personal background?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, Archie comics were the first comics I ever got into, like, even before superheroes. Um, my grandmother used to buy me comics at yard sales and stuff, so I still have stacks of old arches. So that was really my entry into comics as a whole. And, uh, I think they're very funny because in getting the old ones, I got a lot of, like, the 1960s Harry Lucy, Super Slapstick, excellent, excellent Archie comics that are, I think, legitimately hilarious. So that was my my entry into it, and I've loved them ever since. I always every year when I go, like, try to take a week off in the summer to go read some books. And if you go to Walmart and you get three arches, they'll give you a deal. It's usually like three for ten for all the listeners out there. And, yeah, dig into the new stories, the old stories, they're just simple and funny, and I really enjoy them. And then as a historian, to look back on them, it's like, oh, this is what these middle aged white creators, teenagers, and especially teenage girls, and to see it through that lens is fascinating. When you can kind of sit back and peel the digests apart a bit. The digest, their stories all glommed together from different eras. So when you can look back and piece it all out and see how the characters evolve, it turns into a very, very interesting story.
Rob: Mhm. It's funny, too, that you said, and I think the very first appearance, there's this tightrope walking. And I believe there was like a trend at the time. This was pretv early radio even. I think there was a trend of tightrope walking as a distraction for people. And that's the big thing about Archie. It always is taking something that happens at the time. I remember I think I discussed on the other episode one I was reading from the it's all about them getting a pet rock. So as a historian, it must be interesting because you are seeing all these trends, popular trends, and then also larger cultural trends and how they evolve over literally 80 years.
Tim Hanley: Absolutely. Like, we're going to talk about a superhero story from the 60s. Uh, archie did superhero stories because superheroes were suddenly popular again and archie wanted to jump back on it. And then after the superhero craze, they got into other TV show spoofs. There's spoofs of the man from uncle, there's spoofs of the monkeys that lead directly to the arches and the whole fictional band and the hit song and all of that. But even beyond pop culture, there's obviously the larger historical things going on. So you get a lot of feminism in the 1970s, but terribly done again, middle aged white men writing these. So every, every feminist, quote unquote story starts with like archie and reggie or mr. Lodge or even pop tape being like, man, this feminism, this is a bunch of garbage. What are these women? And the girls will be like, how dare you speak up against feminism. And then in the end often prove archie and reggie's point by like fighting with each other instead of right the true feminist values they're trying to espouse. But archie tries to be of the time, but is always a little bit behind. So betty and veronica embrace the tenets of feminism by like the early eighty s. And you kind of see sort of the old, the feminist bashing disappears. And then kind of all the rhetoric they talked about, like, girls can do all these things, uh, just exists now. So like say early in the 1970s, anytime the girls would talk about playing sports, it would be like a big joke. And the coach would be like, no way. And they'd end up not playing it because it was going to mess up their hair. But then by like late 70s, early 80s, they just play sports. And um, there's no comment on it. It's just what is so there's this very slow absorption of kind of progress in society that makes its way slowly into archie comics.
Rob: Um, that's amazing. Well, let's get more into the superheroes that you mentioned. And you can hear gito and my backstory on, uh, archie comics actually back on episode 95 with our frequent guest, ethan. So check that out. But for now, let's get our superhero tights on and fly into points of origin and origins of the story.
Guido: My ponytail to make right now on this very show.
Rob: You're going to get the answer to all your questions. Our amazing story begins a few years ago. So this is betty and me, issue number three from archie comics. And that's from August 1966.
Guido: And this is like most comics of its day, not credited, but it's believed. The credits are writer Frank Doyle, artist Dan de Carlo and Inker and possibly letterer Mario Aquaviva. Frank Doyle was the head writer for Archie for over 30 years, writing over 10,000, apparently, Archie stories. And we discussed Dan de Carlo quite a bit on episode 95 when we talked Josie and the Pussycats. He helped develop the look of Archie, co created Sabrina and Josie and the Pussycats. So, Tim, you picked this issue for us. Why?
Tim Hanley: This is a huge turning point for Betty. Uh, Archie had kind of dipped their toes into superheroes at this stage. Uh, there was a feature in Archie where Archie was, um, pure heart. The powerful, uh, Jughead was I forget who Jughead?
Rob: Captain Hero. Captain Hero?
Tim Hanley: Yeah. Really creative name there. Betty's super teen. So they're not great.
Guido: Um, Captain Hero.
Tim Hanley: Frank.
Guido: It was a play on the sandwich.
Rob: Yeah, that's true. Oh, yeah, that would you, uh totally.
Guido: I bet it wasn't that.
Tim Hanley: No, I bet it 100% was that.
Rob: I was going to chalk it up to the poor Frank writing 10,000 stories. There's only so much thought that you can give into these.
Tim Hanley: I think Frank Doyle is the most prolific comic book writer of all time. Like that, man.
Guido: No, it sounds like it definitely could.
Tim Hanley: Be so in this era for Betty. Uh, as I said earlier, this is kind of like her sad sack era. She never wins. Veronica always outsmarts her. If she tries to be nice and win Archie that way, it doesn't work. If she tries to be tricky and come with some clever ploy to win Archie, that doesn't work either. It just never, ever turns in her favor. And she's a sad sack to such an extent that there's one issue where she's kind of getting on Archie's nerves trying to get a date to the dance. He tells her to go jump off like a high cliff or something. He's very annoyed with her. Later in the story, some of the other boys have stolen Archie's clothes, kind of hung them up from the rafters. So Betty has climbed up on the balcony to get them down for Archie. Archie sees it, thinks that she's trying to offer self, as he suggested, by jumping off from a considerable height, and immediately asks her to the dance. And Betty's like, oh, so this is how it works. So the the last panel of the comic is Archie and Betty at the dance. And Archie say and Betty saying, if you don't trick me to the boat trip next week, I'm going to shoot myself.
Guido: Oh, my god.
Tim Hanley: This is the kind of desperation we see with poor Betty in this era.
Guido: Well, then it feels go ahead, Tim. Sorry.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. And you can kind of see it in this story, too. She's desperate to save Archie. And in the story itself, no one knows that she does. We have two different stories where she saves Archie and then veronica as well in the second one, and no one knows it's Betty, archie, uh, ends up with Veronica. They end up smooching poor Betty's off to the side. But the shift here that I think is so important for Betty is that the reader knows she did it. This is the first time she's actually done something successfully. It hasn't worked out for her in the story. M. But we, the viewer, know Betty has agency now. She accomplished what she wanted to accomplish. And we're seeing her in literally, but also figuratively, a more heroic light for the first time. So this is kind of a turn for Betty that starts towards, uh, some more growth for the character.
Guido: Yeah, I see what you're saying because yeah, reading it, it's very frustrating. It's that she keeps failing. And what you're saying about this other issue, it actually makes me think, what a missed opportunity. Because in this, Archie falls off a cliff. It feels almost like it could have been a way of reversing or undoing that other story. But it's not. Because everyone thinks that she must have fallen off the cliff too. And that Archie saved her even though she saved, um m uh, by pulling her ponytail and becoming super teen. So how does that happen? Is there ever an explanation for why that happens?
Tim Hanley: No, I don't think there's an explanation for any of the superheroes. They just are. Archie can turn into Pure heart somehow. Jughead turns into Captain Hero. It's a gimmick. So they can tell superhero stories.
Guido: How often do we see super teen?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, um, for about a year or so in Betty and Me. And then every now and then they'll do a team up with all of them. M. Yeah, it was popular for a couple of years. Then, um, their other spoof on The Man from uncle, uh, the man from Riverdale becomes more popular and then Archie stars in that. And then Betty has her own as a girl from Riverdale and Betty Me. And then that kind of takes over for a couple of years as their bigger pop culture spoof.
Rob: M yeah. And as Guito was mentioning a few times, she becomes super teen by pulling her ponytail, which happens accidentally here. It gets tracked in a twig and she becomes super teen. And she looks just like William Kat as real American hero. She's got the red jumpsuit and the white cape. And her powers are also very it's hard to say what her exactly her powers are because she can't fly. Because she actually has jetpack belts that makes her fly. But then in the second story, she's able to transform her whole appearance into a Russian military leader general.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. If you're looking for consistency in canon of any kind, archie comics is not the place to start, much less the superhero stories. They're just whatever is necessary for the story to be funny is what's going to happen.
Guido: Yeah. Because here, too. And I mean, this I had to take as intentionally tongue in cheek, because Archie doesn't recognize Betty when she's wearing the greatest American hero outfit that she's wearing, which is ridiculous, because it's not even like Clark Kent. Like, there is no difference between Betty and super teen other than she's wearing a red outfit.
Tim Hanley: There's no mask, there's no it's just a different outfit. No, but I mean, her hair is not the same. Yeah, I think Joe kid still wears the beanie when he's captain hero.
Rob: And in our first story, we get just this accident that happens. Archie falls off a cliff and and Betty as super teen, saves him. But in our second story, we get actual antagonists, which are communists, geopolitical ones. Um, geopolitical. So they're trying to kidnap Veronica because her father is this rich industrialist. So one of the villains, a yankee capitalist. Yeah, he hits them with some knockout gas and then yeah, as you just said, guido, he says, we get that yankee imperialist lodge to do our bidding once we get his daughter behind the iron curtain.
Guido: Yeah, it's quite a grand motivation. And, uh, it's so huge. The first story is so small and is what I expect of Archie. Like, it's just some ridiculous thing that happens amongst them. And then in this one, as soon as they're talking about getting the yankee imperialist, I'm like, is this the same comic? How did we suddenly become reflective of global affairs at the time?
Tim Hanley: It's really quite an escalation.
Rob: And it's funny too, because, like you were saying, Tim, uh, in that second story, really, it's also all about Veronica because she is the one they're trying to kidnap. So Betty, even though she is the hero, is still kind of off to the side because Veronica is who they're actually trying to get, and Archie is just kind of along for the ride.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, even as a superhero, she's like an incidental character. The villains aren't coming after her. She's just making sure Archie is okay all the time.
Guido: Yeah. And so is that always Betty's motivation in this era? Because I was really struck by the line at the end of the first story where she says, I'd like to spend my life looking after and protecting him. Is that really like, does she really exist for Archie?
Tim Hanley: 100%. All she cares about in this era, if you've read more Archie comics over the years, you're kind of used to Betty as the more rounded character she'd become. She becomes a really interesting character. Like, she's a really good mechanic. She usually has all these summer jobs and different things. She and Veronica get up to all kinds of different hygiens and adventures. But in this era yeah, it's mainly try to get a date with Archie, try to take care of Archie, love Archie unreservedly, even though he has little to no interest in her whatsoever.
Rob: Threated suicide, turn into a superhero, whatever it takes. Well, speaking of superheroes, I wonder what if these characters meant some other superheroes? Or should I say supervillains? So let's start exploring. Uh, multiversity.
Guido: I am your guide through these vast new realities.
Tim Hanley: Follow me and ponder, um, the question.
Guido: What if?
Rob: So this week we are asking the question what if Archie comics betty and Veronica met DC comics harley quinn and poison ivy? And this is from Harley and Ivy. Meet Betty and Veronica from DC Comics and Archie Comics issues one to six from December 2017 to May 2018.
Guido: And so these issues are written by Paul Denny, of course, co creator of Harley Quinn, who brought in, apparently, Mark, andraco who was a big DC writer, particularly during the first two decades of the 2000s. They had worked together on the Love is Love LGBTQ comic anthology. And Paul said he wanted to enjoy this book as a fan, so he didn't want to write it, so they developed it together. Mark wrote it. Art is by Laura Braga and Adriana Mello. Laura Braga, a comic book artist still working for DC RT, and Marvel Artist on Bombshells, which we covered together. And Adriana Mello, a comic book artist for both major publishers, especially Star Wars stuff. The colors are by Arif prenupt, Tony, Avignya and Jay Nanjan. Letters are by Darren Bennett. And there are wild cadre of COVID artists on every issue. I mean, you have Jen Bartel, Tula O'Tay, Jenny Frasan, and Adam Hughes variant and just so many others. The COVID artists are very cool on this series. And so before Tim, you give us a summary. I think you can correct me. I think this is the first DC Archie crossover, is that right?
Tim Hanley: I think so, yeah. There was the Marvel one in the 90s with the Punisher.
Guido: Yeah. So Archie meets Punisher had already happened. Archie would go on to meet Predator, would go on to meet all sorts of other people, uh, and especially real world bands in the more modern era.
Rob: Blondie. The b barack Obama.
Guido: And after this, they did Archie meets Batman 66. But I think this was the first DC Archie that I could find. And so, Tim, why don't you give us a little summary of the miniseries? There is a lot going on in it, so we'll dig in once you summarize it.
Tim Hanley: Yes, this is a DC Archie crossover in which Riverdale and Gotham City exist in the same universe, very close to each other. It seems like a car right away. Um, it all kind of starts. Mr. Lodge is throwing a costume party. Betty and Veronica can have decided to dress up as Harlequin and Poison Ivy, but the real Harlequin and Poison Ivy show up, uh, in part because they're trying to avoid a lone shark back in Gotham City, but also because Mr. Lodge is building a development in Sweetwater on land that Poison Ivy is keen to protect. So Zetana and Sabrina's, teenage witch are both at this party. There are some magical shenanigans, and we get a body swap. Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy wake up in Riverdale as Betty and Veronica. Betty and Veronica wake up in Gotham City as Harley and Poison Ivy. So they have to navigate each other's life, uh, the Gotham villain world for Betty and Veronica, high school drama for Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy. Ultimately, it turns out that Mr. Lodge is working with the same lone shark that Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy are having some trouble with on, uh, this new development at Sweetwater. So they all team up to defeat him, uh, save the forest, and get switched back to their own bodies.
Guido: That is an awesome summary because these are dense. Six issues. Surprisingly dense. Rob and I were preparing to read, and I was like, oh, it's an Archie comic. It's going to be a fast read. And then we got to this, and it was like, oh, never mind. Not so fast. Yeah, so thank you for that. Um, gosh, I don't know where to begin. Who wants to start somewhere? Because there's a lot I want to unpack here.
Rob: Well, I'm just curious, Tim, what are your overall thoughts on this comic as an Archie expert?
Tim Hanley: As an Archie expert, it's, uh, kind of indicative of this era of kind of new Archie and the relaunch, um, as the comic starts, betty and Veronica aren't on friendly terms whatsoever, which was kind of the norm for the new Archie stories for several years. Um, there's the Mark Wade book. I think it's 30 issues or so before the girls ever speak a friendly word to each other. Oh, gosh, there's the Adam Hughes miniseries in which the girls are at ODS the entire time. So their friendship is not, uh, a very big deal in these early books. And, uh, you can see that here. And it's over the course of researching Benny Veraca becomes very clear. Uh, Benny Veraca stories are the worst when they're at ODS. They work so much better together as best friends than as rivals.
Guido: Well, and all those examples, including the series, are written by men who I think have an idea of what Betty and Veronica would be like. And that idea is probably a sexist trope of cat fights we'll see after.
Tim Hanley: This, uh, future Betty. Veronica story is written by female authors where they're actually friends and they're so much better. And then even Riverdale as well, which has, like, a ton of female writers and directors. You see, uh, a better take on Betty and Veronica, and you have the actors, too, who very much care about that, because drawings on paper can't say, hey, you're kind of treating me poorly. But the actors can speak up for their characters and make it happen. But at this particular point in Archie's history, uh, things aren't so great for betting Veronica. But then you throw in Harley and Ivey. And you get a whole dense, wacky adventure.
Guido: Yes, you do. I think your summary made me like it more than I did when I read it, because I like the ideas here are really fun. But one thing for me, this might not be a popular opinion, even amongst the two of you, but I struggled. The art is great, but I kept thinking, gosh, if Dan Parent had drawn this book, I think I would have loved it. Like, if it was drawn in the Archie Silver Age style, I think it would have really transformed my sense of it. But because it was drawn in really great art, but like a typical comic book style, which maybe had to do with the fact that they were using the relaunched versions of Archie, like you're saying, it kept taking me out of the absurdity of the plot. And the two didn't feel like they worked in my brain, in my comic book brain. I couldn't reconcile those two things. So that was one wish.
Tim Hanley: The slapstick you should get from the combination of Archie comics and Harley Quinn doesn't really hit in this style. Like Laura Brenga and, uh, Adrian Mello. They're excellent, excellent artists. But it's the kind of expression and physicality you need for this to work, I don't think was there. It's a book that doesn't quite feel like a superhero book and doesn't quite feel like an Archie book. That's true. Where they meld is something different that I don't know that it works entirely. It's fun. There's a ton of great cameos. It's weird and cool.
Rob: Yeah, I got a real cinematic feel to it, even. Just hearing your summary, Tim, it reminded me of classic movies from the 80s especially. I'm thinking something like, ah, who's that girl? Or something that has this kind of frantic, almost screwball comedy elements. And of course, you got the body swapping as well. And then I'm experimenting, seeing each other's lives, and then the wacky villains, because we have a villain that has literally has a peach for a head, but just the frantic quality of it has that, like, what's up, Doc? Who's that girl? Screwball comedy feel where there literally are car chases and stuff like that happening.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, something a little more cartoony might have worked better. Like, ah, an Elsa charrettier, for example.
Rob: Mhm.
Guido: Yeah, that's a great idea.
Tim Hanley: The realism, like yeah, like you said, they're trying to mimic the main Archie series, which had very realistic art. Like, you see Jughead with his weird little hat, not the beanie.
Guido: Yeah. And, um, he had like about torn sleeves, denim jacket. That was the first moment where I realized, oh, this is using the modern versions. I hadn't really realized it other than the torn denim jacket because they're like long noses.
Tim Hanley: They all look like normal people.
Guido: Yeah, but the villains, rob, you mentioned that would fit into like an 80s screwball. Much better. I wanted to ask you tim, what is the deal with Larry? Is he Larry? Larry the lamprey. Lenny, do you have any idea what his deal is? Because I have a question if you.
Tim Hanley: Have I don't have a lot of knowledge on Lenny. I don't know that he exists elsewhere.
Guido: I don't think he does. No, because we looked it up. But here's what I noticed on the COVID of The Betty and Me that you had us read, and the first page, she is fighting a guy that looks to me like Lenny the Lamprey. He's bald and he has vampire teeth. And it's never explained wait, that's not it. That's different. Uh, it's never explained in the Betty and Me issue why she's fighting and this character that has these vampire teeth. And then I saw Lenny the Lamprey, and I was like, oh, my gosh, I think that's the guy from the Betty and Me comic. I don't know if, uh, Laura Braga or Mark Andreco went back and found that reference or if I'm making that up, but I was just curious, like, who's Betty and Me fighting? Does that make any sense to you or no. Is that just generic guy with sharp.
Tim Hanley: Thanks, I think, for that cover from the 60s, it's generic guy with sharp fangs because he doesn't come up at all. But, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if for this story, they saw that cover and we're like, oh, let's kind of make a character in that vein Fleshman I'm creating canon.
Guido: Lenny Lamprey's first appearance is 1966. Believe me, so much more money now.
Rob: There's a little D*** Tracyness about them all because they all have a little idiosyncrasy. But it also then reminds me of stuff like the Tick or Freakazoid, because the one guy can't stop laughing and the other guy literally has a peach for a head, which incites lots of peach related puns and jokes throughout the issue. And then our main villain, Lenny, is very deformed. So, yeah, it's kind of taking all those things of those classic weird looking villains.
Tim Hanley: There's other good 80s hijinks, too. Like, Reggie dresses up as the Joker and gets hit in the head and then thinks he's the Joker for the bulk of the mini. From there on, they're bringing all these fun elements together.
Rob: Yeah, I thought that directly felt so, again, that 80s thing of like, all it takes is one bunk on the head and someone forgets who they are. And we've seen it in a million sitcoms. And I thought it was really clever to have Reggie, our antagonist kind of character, then become, uh, the Joker. And there's some great interactions with Harley Quinn. At one point she shouts pudding, but in fact, it's because there's a giant table full of pudding that she just wants. And there's lots of jokes, especially in that sequence when we get to the prom ball, whatever it is. There's lots of in jokes and references and just chock full both arch pointed out.
Guido: I didn't know the Grundy reference.
Rob: That's the great oh, my gosh, my favorite one, which I did laugh out loud because, yeah, their teacher is Miss Grundy, and here she's Solomina Grundy, and she's talking about herself in the third person, like Solomon Grundy. And that I did laugh out loud at. But, Tim, you probably caught a lot more other little things there that we didn't catch. But what did you think about that kind of in joke, almost meta ness that a lot of this book has?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, I like that part the best. Like, the kind of chaos of seeing all the different characters, kind of who's dressed as who, all the jokes you can make with it. Josie and the Pussycats play at the show, and the real catwoman shows up.
Guido: And I love she said she's seen them 35 times.
Rob: They're her catnip.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. Even, like, the non comic jokes, like, Sabrina comes dressed as Merlin Monroe, so she's in a pink dress and like, a wizard hat, which is mhm just a great little one off gag. It's the kind of stuff you would expect from an Archie story, and maybe the kind of stuff you expect from a Harley Quinn story as well. Mhm. That sequence, I think, works quite nicely.
Guido: That's true. It does combine those two tones where they overlap quite well. I didn't think about that. With Harley's sense of humor, too, and the way that her comics tend to read.
Tim Hanley: Um, also, I would totally read a Zetana and Sabrina team up.
Rob: I know.
Tim Hanley: I was thinking that.
Guido: I was thinking, gosh, that should have been like a whole issue is just the two of them. I would have preferred that over some of the villain stuff in Gotham City.
Rob: And so, of course, another big part of this plot, as you explained, Tim, is this body swapping thing. Uh, element. So I mentioned this on our Josie and the Pussycat story. So my background with Archie is I actually worked for a production company, and we were developing the Archie comics Broadway musical, which never came to fruition. But when we were developing the story, the story that we were coming up with was Betty and Veronica sloppotties with each other. And of course, there's Sabrina. There's some magic, but it's Archie, so you can always have anything that also is magic. Of course. I was so surprised. Oh, my gosh. They're swapping bodies now with poison ivy and harley. What is it about body swapping there? Has this happened before with these characters? Because it just seems like something so inherent. We mentioned 80, so it's also built in there. But what is it about the body swapping?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, anything you could think that might have happened in an Archie comic has happened in an arch. They put out a lot of stories. They will go through every trope humanly possible. But, yes, there have been body swatches swaps before. Betty, uh, veronica have swapped places a bunch, trying, um, to think if there have any been like kind of into other people. I don't know if they've ever switched with the boys.
Guido: That would be fun.
Tim Hanley: But yeah, Betty and Veronica have definitely swapped. They've done it. I think they did it a few times, like intentionally too. Like take advantage of the Archie art quality in which all female characters look the same, just swap the hair and they can repair each other. So I think there's been some yeah.
Rob: So a non magical swap. It's like a wig swap.
Tim Hanley: It's been like a sort of a Prince and the Popper kind of situation.
Rob: Oh yeah, totally. Yeah.
Tim Hanley: Veronica's complaining about being rich, betty's complaining about being poor. They swap for an issue and hijinks ensue. So yeah, a body swap is not out of the norm for Archie, especially with Sabrina in the mix.
Rob: Mhm.
Guido: Well, while we're still thinking about every possibility that happened, here's what I'm wondering. We just covered Harley and Ivy and how Ivy especially has become just a queer icon and their relationship has been rendered explicit and how that's played out. Has there ever been a even homotic subtext about Betty and Veronica? Has that ever played out in anything modern? I would imagine it would be modern because they've been pretty progressive with Kevin Keller. I'd say that was really starting to break a lot of comic book boundaries. I know they have a trans character now. Um, they do all these great one shots where they're like, sometimes horror, sometimes humor. So I'm just curious, have they ever played with that part of their relationship? Have you ever seen anything with that?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, until about 1015 years ago, archie was an extremely conservative publisher. Like the comics code from the 1950s is based on the Archie code. Like their in house code already.
Guido: Right.
Tim Hanley: Their, their entire aim is to be as unobjectionable as possible. So in the vast swath of their history, this has not been a substext whatsoever. There's kind of like joke covers. There's the famous one where um, Betty or no, Veronica and Archie come out of the tunnel of love and Veronica's like smooched up and Archie's like, what's going on? And you see Betty behind them also smooched up, suggesting that and Archie missed it.
Guido: Oh, that's, that's some good, that's some good queer coding there. I like that.
Tim Hanley: But just very subtle joke. M, things like that. Um, the first episode of Riverdale when the girls try out for the cheerleading squad, they have to do a routine and they kiss at the end. And the kiss was in all the ads for the first episode of, uh, Sensationalizing. It, um, it's instantly called out by Cheryl as like dumb queer baiting and doesn't really come into play too much as the show goes on. There are a ton of queer characters on Riverdale, but Betty and Veronica together not so much. Um, I'm not as up on Archie comics as I was when I finished writing the book. So that would have been like, 2019. So I don't know if since they've played with it at all, but generally speaking, uh, they're best friends. There's anything more than that? It's been hinted, uh, at at most occasionally, but not really explored in any meaningful way.
Guido: Yeah.
Rob: I got more of a hinting at through Zetana and Sabrina in this issue, actually, of some kind of attraction between those two characters than I did get through Betty and Veronica there.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, they had chemistry. They were, um yeah.
Guido: And they talk about the magic history. So yeah, I agree. I agree. I think that's true. And it's clear here. I mean, even though Mark and Draco is a queer writer, it's clear here that he's not writing Ivy and Harley together, at least explicitly on the page. They're not together in this. Obviously.
Tim Hanley: I was looking for that as I was reading through, because with the body swap, you're curious, like, how does that carry over? And there's not really anything particularly clear that they are together. No.
Rob: There's a few lines where it's like, oh, this is why I love you, and that kind of thing. But you could definitely read that as being super close friends. Kind of right on the line, uh, for a couple of lines of dialogue.
Tim Hanley: Yeah. I suppose at this point in history, DC was still kind of dancing around.
Guido: It, too, were they not? Yeah, I think it was around this time, actually, that they even had their first kiss following their kiss in Bombshells, which is actually the first place they get to kiss on panel.
Tim Hanley: Bombshells would have predated this, I think.
Guido: Yeah, that one did. But that was multiversal. And I guess this is multiversal, too, because it's never explained why. Uh, what do you both think of that set up for a crossover story? And is that inherent in a lot of the Archie crossovers, where it just is? They don't explain it. They don't send Archie through a portal. They don't do anything. It just is that Gotham City is right there. I don't even know how he ends up meeting the Predator, but does that just happen?
Tim Hanley: Yeah. Um, so, like, the Punisher one, back in the 90s, uh, Punisher was based in New York, and Riverdale just existed in the same universe. There was no one was going from one universe to the other. He was just there. Um I think the predator one was similar, I think. Isn't the Predator story like, they go on an island vacation and there's like a predator in the woods or something. It's just there pretty much any crossover. Archie does it's just for the purposes of this story. This is how it is. Much like the superpowers of the 1960s. It's what it needs to be for this present story. They're not going to spend a lot of time explaining the uh, machinations that got us to this state.
Guido: Yeah.
Rob: My favorite point of the crossover, or one thing I really love maybe it's not my favorite, but I also love the connection between two other characters we haven't mentioned, which is Smithers, the Lodge family, butler and Alfred Louane Butler, who have a great connection because they were Mi five agents together. Intelligence agents. And Smithers calls Alfred on the iconic Batman 66 red phone. And then when we get them driving away, we even get the line, atomic batteries to power. Huebie turbines to speed. Alfie. The great line of dialogue from Batman 66.
Guido: There's another spin off we need.
Rob: Uh huh.
Guido: You be an Alfie.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, that was clever because you read it and you think it's Harley David, and there's, like, a couple of Batman teases Jughead's hat with the points kind of in Shadow looks like Batman. And, uh, Harley and Ivy get freaked out a few times. So you kind of think, is Batman going to come then? No, you can offer it instead, and it's great. So it's just this perfect connection to Smithers. That was really clever and fun.
Guido: Yeah, it was great.
Rob: All right, well, let us, uh, continue our exploration of these characters with our pondering.
Tim Hanley: Possibilities. Will the future you describe be averted? Diverted?
Rob: Diverted togito what are we talking about? For our pondering possibilities?
Guido: We're talking about a book by Tim Hanley.
Rob: Uh oh, my gosh, I'm so surprised. Yes. And that book is Betty and Veronica the Leading Ladies of Riverdale by Tim Hanley, published by Roman and Littlefield in 2020. But why are we talking about it just now? Guido, there's something new. Tell us.
Tim Hanley: Oh, yes. Well, if you cast your mind back to 2020, kind, uh, of a busy year for everyone. A few things fell through the cracks. The betting front came out, then was nicely received. But maybe you missed it because there are other things going on in 2020. Who knows? But it's coming out, uh, again now as an audio book from Last Word Audio. It's coming out July 17. You can preorder it now on Audible itunes, Amazon. And, uh, enjoy the book through your headphones as you relax on the beach this summer or kick back on the deck.
Guido: And that is the day this episode releases. Perfectly timed. It's meant to be. Uh, so tell us, before we get into the book and your expertise on these characters, tell us about the I'm intrigued by the audiobook. Have any of your other books been turned into audiobooks, and how did it come about for this one, and who's reading it?
Tim Hanley: And tell us. Yeah, so my Wonder Woman book and my Catwoman book are both available as audiobooks. Um the Wonder Woman one was done by last word. Audio. And Colby Elliott. Who does this one? Uh, we became, like, Internet friends almost ten years ago now when we did that one. Uh, but my publisher handled all of that. And then with the Betty and Veronica book, through whatever contractual weird things, I kept the audio rights. So I was talking with Colby a while ago, and we were talking about, it'd be good to work together again. I was like, oh, hey, the betting of Veronica book. I have the rights to this. Are you interested in doing it? And, uh, he gave it a read, like the book and was super keen to get it going, so he recorded it for me. Uh, this spring. It's up on the 17th. We kind of wanted out just in time for Comic Con kind of build on that buz. And, yeah, he does a really great job reading it. Um, he sent me the files to check them over and make sure they're okay. And Colby's a pro. I know it's going to be good. So I thought I'll just dip in a little bit, kind of hear a couple bits. I like, see how it is. And I started and I was like, wow, this is really I listen to, like, five chapters in a row. It's not because of the writing, like, the writings good, whatever. The way Colby reads it, it really sucks you in. And it's very engaging and fun. And, uh, I think it's going to be a really good listen for everybody.
Rob: Yeah, the cool thing about the summer, too, is everyone's going on road trips. I know Guido and I listen to a lot of audiobooks and things like that during the summer when you're in the car a lot and doing some day trips everywhere. So it's a perfect time for everyone to dive in back into Riverdale.
Guido: Well, and I love audiobooks, uh, like this, because they're like each chapter is like an episode of a podcast to mhm me. It almost is like your book with its 25 chapters. It's going to be a 25 episode podcast series. And that's really cool. So that's what I'm excited about.
Tim Hanley: Yeah, it's fun. It can break up into nice, manageable chunks. Um, each chapter is kind of its own distinct error, its own unique thing. So you can kind of put it down, pick it up again. I, uh, think it's a really accessible read and listen.
Guido: So rewinding a bit. Why did you decide to write a book on Betty and Veronica?
Tim Hanley: Well, I'd done three books at that point. Uh, wonder Woman, lois Lane and Catwoman. So we kind of get a superhero, a, uh, superhero civilian, and then a supervillain kind of morally ambiguous character. So I kind of hit all the big things for superhero media, and I was trying to decide what to do next, and I had, like, a list of ideas of other heroes, we could do other stuff. And I had Betty, Veronica kind of on the list. And Riverdale was just starting, and I was like, yeah, this is a good time for this because we have 80 years of history. We have this new take on the character. We have the recent Archie renaissance. Um, it just felt like a really good time to look back and see how the characters have grown and evolved over the decades, how they relate to the way they're depicted now. Uh, I've always loved the characters. Getting to spend a year reading Archie comics was dream job for me, basically, because I go back and I read everything I can get my hands on. So it was just like, literally a year straight of me reading comic books, having a great time, remembering a lot of the stories. I'd read them when I was a kid. It's like finding old classics that hit that weird part in the back of your brain that remembers it from when you were six. So, yeah, it was fun, it was timely, and, uh, it was something I'd always wanted to explore in more depth.
Rob: Amazing. And one thing I was thinking, actually reading this Tim, and I was curious what your thoughts were. When I was working for this company and we were developing the musical, what we found very quickly is that it was hard to actually center the musical around the character of Archie because Archie doesn't really have a huge personality. A lot of what makes him a character, actually, is his indecision in many cases. And you get Jughead and Reggie have distinct personalities. Then, of course, Betty and Veronica have big personalities, and we really found ourselves shaping the musical around Betty and Veronica, and even asking the question, well, then what do we do with Archie? So my question really for you is reading all these and focusing on Betty and Veronica, really, should the series not be called Archie, but instead be called Betty and Veronica?
Guido: Archie's gal.
Tim Hanley: Archie Gal. Yeah. Archie is usually the center of the story, but Betty and Veronica are often the catalyst for the story. Whatever Archie does, it is in reaction to something Betty and Veronica have put into motion. Like, Veronica wants to go to a dance and Archie can't afford it. He's double booked them and he has to manage them both together, that kind of thing. So, yeah, like their own book, um, Archie's girls, Betty and Veronica, when they do tell stories without Archie, and they have their own hijinks, they're great. They're great stories because they're such great polar opposite characters that are nonetheless best friends. And it just makes for fun, great storytelling. You can tell a fantastic Betty Veronica story without Archie. I don't think you can tell a fantastic Archie story without Betty Veronica.
Rob: Mhm. Yeah. Interesting. And even in this book, even in the Harley Quinn Poison Ivy book, you get Jughead as this great runner with, of course, eating, which is his thing. And Reggie gets this great thing with becoming the joker and Betty of Veronica, our focus. Archie, really, all of a sudden, when he came back in at the end, I'm like, oh, wait, yeah, there's Archie.
Tim Hanley: Oh, he's a character. Archie is also there. Yeah, I think you can see that too. Like, if you watch Riverdale, they had to put a lot of things on Archie to try to make him an interesting character. Like, he's the musical guy, he's the football guy. It took a while to figure out who he is in and of himself. And in the comics, he can be malleable, he can be like in all these stories, whatever he needs to be for this particular story. But in something that's more, uh, consistent or contained, like a musical or a TV show, he would need a specific characterization. And yeah, I can see how that would be hard to nail down given that he's such a reactionary character to the other bigger, uh, better fleshed out characters around him.
Rob: And I'm curious too. Of course, the characters have grown and evolved over time, and I know they've moved away from this. But is it tricky to have these Archie stories where so much of the fundamental of who the Betty of Veronica characters are, are two women fighting over a man in this era? I know that was another kind of hurdle we had in trying to adapt a story. But how have you seen it evolve in that way? And does that still pose a difficulty in kind of the fundamental aspects, the building blocks of who these characters are?
Tim Hanley: Yeah, the modern stories, when done well, play with it. I think in good ways, like, the friendship comes first. Even if there is a rivalry, light rivalry, at the end of the day, you know, it's not going to tear Betty and Veronica, ah, apart that they both like this boy. So, like a lot of the newer stuff, um, handles it well. Um, like we talked about with kind, uh, of the Archie relaunch did not handle it well at all. Took really four or five years for them to figure it out. Even if you look up back at something like Afterlife with Archie, that was such a hit and such a big change for the publisher. Betty and Veronica are very much background characters at ODS throughout that entire book. But since then, they've kind of figured out that, yes, they need to be friends, put that at the forefront, and then kind of go from there. So whatever other story you tell, keep that as the kind of guiding light of the story. And that was a big shift for the characters in the late 80s. They canceled Archie's girls, Betty and Veronica and relaunched. It just as Betty and Veronica And the book was, uh, very intentionally shifted away from that whole Archie's girls mentality. So they'd fight over Archie. There would be the usual issues, but every story ended with Betty and Veronica on good terms. There was, I think, one story early on, um, Betty and Veronica were wearing the same dress to the dance. And it was going to be a big fight 20 years ago. It would have been an absolute brawl. It would have been a mess. And when the dance comes around, they're each wearing different dresses. And the end of the story is basically explaining, our friendship is worth more than a dress. I'm not going to do it. And this is like, I don't know, 91, 92. But then it's been followed by Love Showdown. The Cheryl Blossom comes in. Archie finally decides it's a whole big thing. In like, 1993 was their big event book. So again, the rivalry comes back. So it was a back and forth. But Betty Veronica comics, the ones with Betty Veronica on the title, I think have really embraced this friendship. But looking back at the old stuff, it's like, yeah, I got nieces now. Um, one's five years old. She can read a bit now. I'm like, do I want her to read kind of these old stories? And even like, what would she think of these old stories? Because she's grown up in a world where the idea that our girl can't do anything she wants is entirely foreign to her. We read these stories together of like, famous women who have done great things and that they have to overcome obstacles. It's like, what's going on? She does not understand it at all. And so to expose her to this world where there's just two gals fighting over a guy, um, I mean, I have a lovely book. I can give her to contextualize it exactly.
Guido: She can listen to it while she's developing her vocabulary.
Tim Hanley: But yeah, some of that older stuff does make you cringe a bit when you read it.
Guido: Yeah. I'm curious. As we wrap up, I have a final question for you. What is something you want to see from Betty and Veronica that we've never seen before? Whether it be a story or maybe a medium or a creator or what's, something that you wish for the future of these two characters.
Tim Hanley: I'd like to see something like long form with Betty and Veronica. We always get, like, a lot of miniseries, like smaller stories. I'd like to see kind of like a four years of high school thing, but from Betty of Veronica's perspective, kind of navigating it all that's written by someone who's modern and not some old white guy they brought in from a superhero publisher. Like someone who understands the characters, who's modern and can really present a new take on the character that actually has some legs, that explores them in depth in a way I don't think we've really seen before. I think they deserve that kind of long form storytelling that, um, we kind of see with an Archie focus elsewhere now with the Archie relaunch and stuff. But I think Betty Veronica could really excel in that kind of format and present a really compelling story that I think, uh, a lot. Of teens, but then a lot of other folks would find really interesting and, uh, identifiable and enjoyable.
Guido: Yeah, I think that sounds like something, uh, especially I teach in a girl school, so that's something I would love to read and would appreciate if it was able to capture that voice and that experience and be written from a really authentic perspective. And there's a few writers out there. I can imagine doing some of that work in the superhero realm. I'm sure there's non superhero people who'd be amazing, but I could imagine like, Kelly Thompson or Leah Williams doing that really well. Or from non superhero books. I mean, Alice Osman, they would be extraordinary. The creator of Heart Stopper, I think they could do something really cool with characters like this. So I've got my fingers crossed that we get that ongoing. You want from the right team. So that is a wrap. And Tim, could you, uh, tell listeners how they can find the audiobook and how they can download it, listen to.
Tim Hanley: It, support it, all that the audiobook is available for? Well, this is going out day up, so it's available for order now on Amazon, on itunes, and on Audible. Just search Betty and Veronica. It should be one of the first few things that come up. Not a lot other of folks have written Betty books and they don't do audiobooks to comics. M, uh, if you want more information, you can go to my website tHanley WordPress.com. And I'm chatting it voted a bit. I'm still clinging onto Twitter as it wanes in its final days, uh, at Tim Hanley One. Great.
Guido: And that's how people can stay up to date with other things you're working on for now.
Tim Hanley: Excellent. Twitter dies and we end up somewhere else. Exactly.
Guido: All right, well, that is a wrap. Dear Watchers, thank you for listening. I have been your brunette Guido.
Rob: I have been your blonde Rob. The reading list is in the show notes and you can follow us on the dying, uh, platforms and, uh, alive Platforms and Emerging platforms at Dear Watchers.
Guido: And, uh, leave a review, please, wherever you listen and leave a review for Tim's books after you read them and after you listen to them. We'll be back soon for another trip through the multiverse.
Rob: And in the meantime, in the words of Awatu, keep pondering the.