Looking for Life With Archie, I ended up picking up this and Archie and Friends.  Actually, I think these two and an Archie and the digests were the only titles available at my Hastings, amongst two stuffed full racks.  I gave up going there for comics because I could never find certain titles, like Jughead #200.  I really dig the new glossy paper.  Colors and lines are brighter.  You can see quite a bit more subtly in the colors, which adds more depth.  In any case, I’m a sucker for Veronica and the issue looked fun as flipped through it.

The premise is Veronica finding Marcy and Dilton working on a time machine, and she wants to go visit the past.  Unfortunately, it takes a while for this story to get going.  Ronnie talks to the reader quite a bit.  (Maybe that’s why I like her.  Betty’s such a snob about breaking the Fourth Wall.)  I wonder if the two opening pages will changed or removed when this story is eventually reprinted. 

Veronica hops back to 1969.  “That’s over 40 years ago,” she comments.  Thanks for making me feel hideously old, babe.  Unsupervised in the past, she discovers and destroys a torrid romance between a young Weatherbee and Grundy.  (Oh, umm spoiler.)  Hopping forward in time, she then disrupts the first date between the future Mr. and Mrs. Andrews.  In the present, Archie disappears from existence.  Marcy has to go back and help Veronica put things right. 

In terms of a mind-bending, thought-provoking time travel adventure, this isn’t exactly Dr. Who.  Or even Back to the Future.  Actually, if the synopsis I just gave was only the first 10 pages of the book instead of virtually the whole book, it would have been better.  Surely, there should have been several pages worth of Veronica squirming and making things worse, before it got put right.  Well, it’s an Archie comic, not Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. 

I wonder if this time travel invention somehow ties into Dilton’s appearances in the Life With Archie?  I wonder if I’ll be able to find the darn magazine on the stands somewhere around here.

I did appreciate that Veronica changed up her hairstyle over the course of the story.  It’s a little thing, but being the trend setting, fashion maven that she is, Veronica should be all about looking good in as many ways as possible.  Likewise, another beautiful centerfold poster.  Always a fav with me.

Overall, as I seem to often say about this title, if you prefer the brunette, get this.  If not, you can probably live without it.