Little Archie and his Pals One-Shot

Script: Art Baltazar, Franco

Art: Art Baltazar

Publisher: Archie Comics

I always used to think that the Little Archie stories were sort of dumb, like a Richie Rich ripoff that used another set of characters, but I read them anyway because I was a kid and there wasn’t much else my folks were willing to buy me off a grocery store spinner rack. Then I grew up and discovered animated works that were smarter and more my speed, like Looney Tunes, Animaniacs, and Tiny Toon Adventures.

I mention those cartoons here because the sensibility in this book is very similar to those old-school Warner Brothers cartoons. Start with a cute little critter, add in a beloved hero and some wacky misunderstandings, and hijinks will ensue. And so it is with Sabrina’a adorable kitty, Salem, sleeping in a tree outside Archie’s house. His lovely snooze turns into a terrific sneeze, and mayhem isn’t far behind - in the form of a statically-charged red carbon copycat!

I really adored the deadpan writing style employed by Franco and Baltazar in this book. Possibly the funniest line I’ve read in a comic this week is poor Archie’s reaction to his homework hving been zapped: “Ms. Grundy will find this unacceptable.” Of course, our hapless hero finds himself in detention, suffering the adorably old-fashioned punishment of writing sentences. (Pretty sure Archie Andrews and Bart Simpson are the only kids in America who still have to write sentences as punishment for anything; most kids these days would just do it in Photoshop!)

Art Baltazar’s drawing style is utterly endearing, and made me sad to see that this is just a one-shot. However, it appears that he’ll be back later this year with a Little Sabrina and a Little Josie book as well. I’m particularly happy to see that Sabrina will be back, because Salem was just too ridiculously adorable for words in this story. As someone who is owned by a number of kitties, I particularly enjoyed the panels with the red kitty sleeping on Archie’s head. Many’s the time I have woken up in pretty much the exact same way! 

As this is a one-shot, I can’t say that I hope for more stories like this (even if I do), but I can say that the humor is top-notch (pay special attention to Jughead’s awful puns) and I only have one lingering question - what happened to the blue and yellow kitties that Salem sneezed out?! Inquiring minds want to know...