Sabrina the Teenage Witch #1 (of 5) Review

Story by: Kelly Thompson

Art by: Veronica Fish and Andy Fish

Lettering by: Jack Morelli

Published by: Archie Comics

With the success of the Netflix show, it was no surprise that a new Sabrina the Teenage Witch comic would be on the horizon. What is a little surprising is that this comic is going back to Sabrina’s roots and leaving the uber-horror to its sister title Chilling Adventures. And you ,now what, that’s not a bad thing.

Sabrina has always been an incredibly fun character to read when done right. And boy, does Kelly Thompson capture everything that makes Sabrina fun in this first issue. The issue starts off with Sabrina getting ready for her first day at her new school after, it seems, being transferred there for an unspecified reason (mystery!). The whole scene of her preparing herself, with a touch of magic and some snarky, but somewhat prescient comments from Salem, a warlock imprisoned in the body of a cat for those not in the know. All this is capped off with the re-introduction of her aunts, Hilda and Zelda. The whole scene works as a great introduction to whom Sabrina is - a teenage witch who will use her magic to fix her hair - and who her supporting cast is - personalities and all.

From there, the school scene also properly establishes the rest of the cast capped with the introduction of Harvey (of course) as well as three new characters: a potential love interest, a potential rival, and a new friend.

All of this is played perfectly throughout as Thompson makes sure to not stop for too long on any one character. She makes sure that the reader gets to see who they are through their actions instead of over explaining every character being introduced.

Good scripts are often failed by meager art and that is definitely not the case here. Veronica Fish (with some help from Andy Fish) is fast becoming my favourite Archie artist. After coming off of stints on other Archie titles, I’m glad to see that she got the Sabrina gig after her great turn on the Jughead series from a few years back. Her character designs keep some of the classic stylings (I like that Hilda and Zelda have traces of their original looks) while making them all her own. Her Sabrina design is probably my favourite since the original.

This was a fantastic first issue that did everything right and is highly recommended to anyone who loves comics. This is a must-read.