First of all, I must issue a “thank you” to Archie Comics.  I ordered a subscription to the wedding series, but never received the first issue and canceled it.  I was issued a full refund and sent the rest of the series anyway.  That was either very polite or really bad bookkeeping.  I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt.
 
Like it or not, this was probably it for a comic book version of Archie getting married.  Perhaps a new Archie TV show or something might tackle this story in a different way, but this version is the original and canonical.

If I was going to pick out one major flaw of this series, it would be that the proposal, maybe not even including the marriage ceremony itself, should have point of the story.  Archie choosing between Betty and Veronica, and the girls for their part, deciding whether or not to marry him, should have been the heart of the matter.  Anything happening afterward could be left for a sequel, if all.   

Instead, proposal, marriage, and married life were all laid out, just highlighting the events following the decision.  While there were differences between Archie marrying one or the other, the end result was simply ‘happily ever after’ either way.  There was no real consequence to making the choice. 

Archie Comics really can’t let Archie definitely choose between Betty and Veronica, even for an imaginary tale.  Even the two marriage tales had to end up basically equal.  They had already done the cop out thing with Cheryl in the “Love Showdown,” so couldn’t just tease a resolution story again.  But a final choice ruins the Love Triangle, which in turn ruins the much of the premise of the Archie Universe. 

This being the case, why bother doing the story at all, since there’s no chance of any real drama?  Well, it got lots of publicity and greatly increased Archies’ sales.  What do you do for an encore?  Like Daffy Duck blowing himself up in a Vaudeville act, “It’s a great trick, but I can only do it once.”  Here’s hoping the next publicity stunt involves better writing, better artwork, and a better premise. 

That was a cheap shot.  Michael Uslan probably did the best he could with the constraints put on the story.  I think that Jeff Shultz would have been my pick out of the Archie stable to do this job.  He has a way of making the characters look pretty mature to begin with.  Of course, there were probably any number of factors in the choice of artist.  Even for a potentially high volume/big publicity project like this, getting a bigger name artist may not have been doable for Archie Comics.   

Both series started off reasonably well with drama and pacing, but neither paid off.  Instead of increasing drama, it simply lessened.  The pacing became very uneven, leading up the final issue, which featured a bizarre plot revelation on every other page. 

I, and everyone else, am still reeling from the Jughead/Midge pairing.  It just didn’t make any sense, other than shock value.  I could actually see Jug and Veronica together.  They’re so different and often times fighting with each other, it’d be awfully easy to add some sexual tension.  Heck, you could do this regular series (and it has been done). 

The Veronica marriage series had two big problems for me.  One, Archie referring to Betty as being like a “sister.”  I doubt the sheer stupidity of that line needs to be further discussed.  Two, Veronica’s mellow personality was totally out of character in this.  I guess the argument could be made that she’d grown up during college and that was why Archie wanted to marry her.  Perhaps that’d be the only reason why he’d marry her, given that she’s often impossible to live with.  But, it didn’t feel like he married the actual Veronica.  Certainly, marriage to the real Veronica would be funnier and be one of those “consequence” things of making a choice.

The Betty marriage worked a little better.  Veronica was a lot more in character.  Betty still seemed plagued with doubt whether Archie really loved her, or just settled for her.  There was the none too subtle insinuation that Archie was frustrated with Veronica’s ways and felt socially unworthy of her.  Of course, we never really got into Archie’s head during the whole series to know why he made his choices.  It all comes out as sort of lame-sounding reassurances. 

Like I said before, the marriages basically had to be equal, but did events really have to mirror each other?  Having twins.  Archie making elaborate plans for the birth that fail.  Betty and Veronica have hard feelings towards each other and Archie, but quickly getting over it.  And so on.  It was like reading the same story twice with different characters.

The overall story never completed the circle.  The framing pieces didn’t match.  It started with the last day of high school and ended with seemingly just another day there.  Nothing really happened, not even the opening.  The story didn’t seem take the whole premise really seriously.  “That’s right.  It was all just a ‘What If” or an Imaginary Story.  You’re far too fanboyish if you thought otherwise.”  Funny, this was promoted as a big event and certainly at times the story seemed to think it was distilling something timeless.

Like I said at the beginning, this is probably the only Archie wedding story that’ll ever be in the comics.  If Archie Comics does another “event,” it’ll likely be something that tries to be “socially relevant.”  If this ever happens, you’ll know that they’re in a desperate enough situation to even damage the brand just for some momentary reprieve.  However, this final choice/wedding premise is too good to disappear.  If/when the next time Archie is brought into another medium, expect some form of this story to resurface and perhaps done justice.

Thanks for the response, Jug.

Like more-or-less said, I think editorial decisions, particularly that both marriages had to turn out basically equal, likely hobbled the story into mediocrity.  The lack of any really good emotional conflict has been an editorial decision for many years.  (Of course, the kids all being friends, even when in direct conflict with each other, has just about always been part of the basic premise.)

I think the thing that bugged me most about it was the suddenness of Jug/Midge happening. It was like Archie came back and Jug was all "oh BTW I married Midge while you were gone". I mean, WHAT!?! I know if one of MY friends had gotten married without even telling me (what? they had no phones?), I'd be pretty miffed. It was like they just did it for the heck of it.

Thanks Monique, though I probably wouldn't have written about that Jughead/Veronica pairing after last week's news. 

You have a neat blog.  That Jughead/Kevin subtext article was interesting.  I suppose Archie Comics thinks they can tease it without actually going all the way with it.  Well, that strategy worked for all those years of Xena in keeping a certain segment of their audience tuning in.  It's not like Archie hasn't had plenty of practice in not definitively resolving a relationship. 

I would like to change one thing on this review.  I was unfair in regards to Stan Goldberg's artwork.  While I still don't find it that appealing, storytelling is the more important aspect to good comic book art.  Given the amount of story in the series, he was probably the best choice from that aspect.