Everybody knows when you want to make people pay extra attention to a particularly iconic comic book character, you kill them off dramatically—and Life with Archie, the series which deals with the future adult lives of your favorite Riverdale teens, is not messing around with their opportunity to do so. According to new details from Archie Comics, their titular hero will bite the dust while stopping an assassination attempt on an openly gay senator. Wait, this is Archie we’re talking about, right? Dang.
“We wanted to do something that was impactful that would really resonate with the world and bring home just how important Archie is to everyone,” Jon Goldwater, CEO of Archie Comics, said in a statement. “That’s how we came up with the storyline of saving Kevin. He could have saved Betty. He could have saved Veronica. We get that, but metaphorically, by saving Kevin, a new Riverdale is born.”
Kevin Keller, the franchise’s first openly gay character, was introduced in their Veronica title in 2010 and also received his own spin-off. In Life with Archie, he’s a military veteran-turned-senator who lobbies for gun control reform after his husband is shot while trying to stop a robbery in the comic’s 23rd issue. Wait, this is about anti-gay bigotry and gun control? Jesus, Life with Archie. You wanna throw in a protest at an abortion clinic too or something?
But who’s the killer? Goldwater won’t say; you’ll have to pick up issue #36 this week to find out. The Life With Archie series will end with its 37th issue next month, which will pick up a year after Archie’s death as his friends and family try to cope with their loss. And fans of the character’s teenage exploits won’t have to worry: Archie will continue to live on in the comic’s other titles—including the zombie apocalypse spin-off Afterlife With Archie, ironically.
(via Mashable, image via Archie Comics)
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