Someday, someone will do tragedy in mainstream comics better than Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, but if this latest issue of Afterlife with Archie is any indication, it’s not going to be any time soon. This issue–a done-in-one prologue to the series–features the Afterlife version of Josie and the Pussycats. Once again, Aguirre-Sacasa mixes pop culture sensibility, horror…

This issue of Afterlife has a couple surprises. It’s mostly just a really tightly told tale from Aguirre-Sacasa, with some great art from Francavilla, but there’s a strange development at the end. Aguirre-Sacasa isn’t just doing Archie and zombies, he’s doing a horror comic. While zombies are part of it, the human cost is a…

I don’t know how he does it–maybe with some of Afterlife’s built-up good will–but Aguirre-Sacasa manages to do a Shining homage and make it work beautifully. He simultaneously attacks the foundations of the whole Archie brand and then reinforces them. It’s no wonder he’s in charge of the company. The issue starts with Archie recounting…

Aguirre-Sacasa continues the story of the Riverdale survivors in a layered narrative. He uses Betty’s diary as a narrative frame, only she’s recreating her diary from memory, so there are multiple levels of flashback. But he starts near the present action before going back. It’s all over the place in terms of timeline, which is…

It’s not hard to identify Aguirre-Sacasa’s influences for this issue, which tracks the story of Sabrina (the teenage witch) following her brief appearance earlier in the story. The issue is Lovecraftian homage, sort of by way of The Wicker Man, which works out splendidly. In some ways, the issue should be predictable to Lovecraft afficonados,…

Aguirre-Sacasa and Francavilla take their impossible series and finish the first arc and it’s glorious. Aguirre-Sacasa tells it from the butler’s point of view, which gives the issue a very proper, classical adventure narration. He’s journaling. It’s good to have journaling butlers. Some of the issue is spent covering what the supporting cast is doing–how…

Good grief, what a depressing issue. Aguirre-Sacasa definitely knows how to construct an effective story. He even mini-apes the dog issue of Hawkeye, only he does it here to greater success. Archie might be where he can have zombie attacks and make very adult observations about Archie Comics, but it’s also got an air of…

There’s something off about this issue, like Aguirre-Sacasa didn’t have a big event planned for it so he went with three smaller ones. Or two smaller ones, it’s hard to determine whether Archie’s jaunt around apocalyptic Rivertown will be a subplot or the main plot. But the smaller events are a couple regular cast members…

The craziest part of Afterlife with Archie isn’t the idea of “Archie with zombies” but how Aguirre-Sacasa’s writing makes me wonder if I shouldn’t be reading Archie on a regular basis. He does a fantastic job with the characters when they’re dealing with the non-zombie related scenes. Aguirre-Sacasa tells the issue in flashback–with a couple…

Afterlife with Archie is a lot better than it should be, a lot better. Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa sets up the issue beautifully–or maybe he doesn’t. Maybe in Archie comics these days Sabrina the teenage witch is a lot different than I was expecting… and maybe Betty and Veronica do act like mean girls. But even if…