Archie's 80th anniversary: When Betty loved... Reggie?

[alicemacher]

In my opinion, this isn't just one of the best Archie Comics tales from the nineties; it's one of Archie Comics' best stories, period. It shows a degree of character depth and introspection that was rare before the Archie renaissance of the tens.


From "For One Brief Moment," Betty #43 (Nov. 1996). Story by C. J. Henderson (whom I wish had written for Archie Comics more often); art by Doug Crane and Mike Esposito. 4 of 12 pages.


Reggie saves Betty when she's knocked into the path of an oncoming truck. As thanks, she knits him a sweater. This escalates into a series of dates, while Archie and Veronica jealously wonder what's going on with their respective usual fall-back choices. Betty and Reggie themselves don't register what's happening between them, until they independently realize they've just turned down a date with, respectively, Archie and Veronica, in favour of a date with each other.











When I first read this story, I wondered whether Betty and Reggie should've stuck with each other after all, for precisely the reasons their figurative mirror-selves gave. (Since pre-reboot Archie almost never insisted on continuity from story to story, it wouldn't have messed anything up company-wide.) But now I think Henderson made the right call. People, after all, don't fall in love with each other for purely rational reasons, and that's okay. Especially when you find you can still be good friends with your most "rational" option.

What do you think?

Comments

[zachbeacon]

Thanks for posting the issue number. I'd seen bits of this before but didn't know where.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

Ooh, I remember this one!

...what I don't remember is if it was referenced in the Life with Archie universe where Archie chose Veronica, so these two got together.

[janegray]

This is great!

[bradygirl_12]

I've always had a soft spot for Reggie. He's the Eddie Haskell of Riverdale! :)

[tcampbell1000]

I had the pleasure of knowing CJ Henderson toward the end of his life; we were on the same con circuit and I worked with his daughter for over a year on Guilded Age. (Sadly, cancer took him in 2014, at 62.) He was a fun and funny fellow with many writing credits, but since some of my work was teen-comedy-based, our early conversation turned to the Archie stories he'd written.

This one was his favorite.

It's not hard to see why.