I am so happy.... giddy.... actually! It seems that one of my all time favorite comics, when I was a little witch in training.... has been revived as a new horror comic book series! I was a huge Archie fan, and an even bigger Sabrina The Teenage Witch fan!
It's just been announced that the safe little town of Riverdale is getting a ghoulish makeover!
In "Afterlife With Archie," a series debuting today, publisher Archie Comics is launching not just its first horror title, but also its first book carrying a rating for teens and older sold only in comic shops.
The series written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and illustrated by Francesco Francavilla sees Archie, Betty, Jughead, Veronica and others, including (oh yeah!) Sabrina the Teenage Witch, enveloped in a panoply of incantations, elder gods, zombies and the undead.
"It's a hardcore horror book," said Aguirre-Sacasa, a Harvey Award-winning writer who melded his personal interests and horror obsessions into influences for the book. "This is why I was meant to do comics."Those are evidenced in descriptions and images. In one panel, for example, Sabrina the Teenage Witch is clutching the fabled but dreaded "Necronomicon." In another, showing the gang at a party, Archie is dressed as Freddy Krueger from the "Nightmare on Elm Street" films.
Francavilla included his own nods to horror classics, too, like the "'Rocky Horror Picture Show' and 'Nosferatu' posters on Jughead's bedroom wall."
But the book, despite its subject matter, he said, reflects the core characteristics of Archie and the other characters.
For more on this story, click here! And be sure to log on to see the Afterlife With Archie Website!
I know that my first stop today, will be at the local comic book store! Happy Wednesday!
